Ariadne In Stitches

On February 6th, 1968, Ringo stepped into the spotlight without his bandmates by making a solo appearance on British TV. Along with Spike Milligan and Peter Brough, he was one of Cilla Black's special guests on her new TV variety series, Cilla, which aired live on BBC1.

Unfortunately, no film or videotape copy seems to exist of the broadcast, but a home-taped audio recording has survived. Ringo appeared in three segments:

- Helping Cilla read viewer mail

- Acting as a ventriloquist, with Cilla as his dummy, and singing "Nellie Dean"

- Duetting and dancing with Cilla on the oldie "Do You Like Me?"

The Beatles Were Born

Napoleon, 1973

A bizarre early Beatleg, one of the first in a deluxe cover. Half is a mangled version of the Hollywood Bowl concert (with "Twist And Shout" repeated). Half is outtakes from Captain Beefheart, Buffalo Springfield, and The Who, with no Beatle content whatsoever. The label mentions Tony Sheridan for no apparent reason.

Side 1:

- Boys

- A Hard Day's Night

- Long Tall Sally

- Twist And Shout

- You Can't Do That

- All My Loving

- Twist And Shout

Side 2:

- Diddy Wah Diddy

- Moonchild

- Bluebird

- Frying Pan

- A Quick One While He's Away

Rappin' With Rosko

Another request, and another Montreal Bed-In telephone interview. This time, John and Yoko (and Timothy Leary) spoke with New York disc jockey Bill Mercer, better known to listeners of WNEW-FM as "Rosko".

The interview was taped on the night of May 30th, 1969, one day before "Give Peace A Chance" was recorded.

Rappin' with Rosko

Yellow Matter Custard

TMOQ, 1971

One of the most famous early Beatlegs, Yellow Matter Custard contained 14 numbers from the summer 1963 BBC Radio series Pop Go The Beatles. Only "Slow Down" had been released by The Beatles, making this LP that much more intriguing, despite the mediocre sound quality.

Side 1:

- I Got A Woman

- Glad All Over

- I Just Don't Understand

- Slow Down

- Don't Ever Change

- A Shot Of Rhythm And Blues

- Sure To Fall (In Love With You)

Side 2:

- Nothin' Shakin' (But The Leaves On The Trees)

- Lonesome Tears In My Eyes

- So How Come (No One Loves Me)

- I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Cry (Over You)

- Crying, Waiting, Hoping

- To Know Her Is To Love Her

- The Honeymoon Song

Hidey Hodey, Everybodey!

The Beatles' only visit to New Zealand took place in late June, 1964, towards the end of their Australasian tour. After performing in Wellington, they flew to Auckland for concerts on the 24th and 25th at the Town Hall.

Following a press conference at Auckland's Royal International Hotel on the 25th, Sydney DJ Bob Rogers chatted with Paul, John, and Ringo. The next day, he recorded a long and often hilarious conversation with all four Beatles in their suite at the New City Hotel in Dunedin.

Edited versions of both interviews appeared on the 1981 LP The Beatles Talk Downunder, but longer tapes were bootlegged on the LP Fuck! in 1988. Here are composite recordings using both sources:

Auckland

Dunedin

The Live Beatles Nippon Budokan Hall Tokio

Bulldog, 1987

A pedestrian reissue of the common June 30, 1966 Budokan performance. What made this unique is that (for a time) it was able to be sold legally due to the copyright protection for concert recordings expiring in certain countries (thus the "It was more than 20 years ago" slogan on the cover).

Side 1:

- Rock And Roll Music

- She's A Woman

- If I Needed Someone

- Day Tripper

- Baby's In Black

- I Feel Fine

Side 2:

- Yesterday

- I Wanna Be Your Man

- Nowhere Man

- Paperback Writer

- I'm Down

The Cute One

Paul was the last Beatle to be interviewed by Brian Matthew for BBC Radio's Pop Profile. Their conversation was taped May 2nd, 1966 and distributed on disc by the BBC Overseas Transcription Service. Here is the complete programme as included on the disc:

Paul - Pop Profile

Top Of The Pops

Highway High Fi, 1974

A TMOQ hodge-podge, with (in reverse order) half of the Hollywood Bowl concert, some common BBC cuts, the Smothers Brothers performances, and two non-Beatle cuts.

Side 1:

- People Say

- I'm Walking

- Hey Jude

- Revolution

- Long Tall Sally

Side 2:

- A Hard Day's Night

- Things We Said Today

- Shout!

- Twist And Shout

- You Can't Do That

- All My Loving

- She Loves You

- Things We Said Today

- Roll Over Beethoven

Howard's Beginning

By request, here are two telephone interviews with John Lennon from his 1969 Montreal Bed-in. Village Voice journalist Howard Smith had covered Yoko Ono's happenings in New York, but this was the first of many times he spoke with her husband.

Their initial interview, conducted May 29th, was lengthy and revealing. After it was aired on WABC radio, it prompted this follow-up discussion, recorded the next day.

Meet The Beeb!

Beeb Transcription, 1988

Sort of a companion to the Beatles At The Beeb LP series (though not from Yellow Dog), this LP was the first to include a number of The Beatles' early BBC Radio performances. The one curiosity was "Abilene" (mistakenly called "My Evelyne" and attibuted to The Beatles), a number by Tony Rivers and the Castaways from Pop Go The Beatles, which still hasn't appeared on CD from a tape source.

Side 1:

- Dream Baby

- Memphis, Tennessee

- Please Mr. Postman

- Ask Me Why

- Besame Mucho

- A Picture Of You

- Some Other Guy

- Keep Your Hands Off My Baby

- Beautiful Dreamer

- From Me To You

Side 2:

- I Saw Her Standing There

- Misery

- Too Much Monkey Business

- I'm Talking About You

- Please Please Me

- The Hippy Hippy Shake

- I Saw Her Standing There

- A Shot Of Rhythm And Blues

- There's A Place

- "Pop Chat"

- Abilene

Pleasure To Be Here

Although they passed on "Love Me Do", "Please Please Me", "From Me To You", and "She Loves You", USA's Capitol Records didn't skimp when it came to promoting The Beatles once they did concede to issue "I Want To Hold Your Hand" and Meet The Beatles.

As part of their media blitz, a Capitol rep traveled to London and interviewed the group at EMI Studios in the first week of 1964. The recording was pressed on a 7" disc distributed to American disc jockeys, with "I Want To Hold Your Hand" following the chat, and "This Boy" and "It Won't Be Long" (both from the LP) on the B-side.

The interview was "open-ended", which means only The Beatles' answers are heard, allowing any DJ to read the questions from the script provided on the sleeve. This way, local stations could claim "exclusive" interviews with their on-air talent, or even better, claim that The Beatles had dropped by their very own station!

The Beatles Open-End Interview

The promotion was successful enough for Capitol to repeat in April upon the release of The Beatles' Second Album. The second "open-end" interview was a different edit of the same January recording, with a bit of overlap in content, and was followed by "Roll Over Beethoven". Side B contained "Please Mr. Postman" and "Thank You Girl".

The Beatles' Second Open-End Interview

Classified Document

Instant Analysis, 1987

Actually Starlight Records using old CBM/Instant Analysis labels. No new Beatle tracks here, but plenty of solo material that was rare at the time (available on cassette only).

Side 1:

- Long Tall Sally

- For No One

- Peggy Sue

- I'm Gonna Love You Too

- Lady Madonna

- Who Can See It

- I'll Follow The Sun

- A Day In The Life

Side 2:

- Borrowed Time

- Woman

- I Don't Wanna Face It

- Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)

- Honey Pie

- Junior's Farm

- One Hand Clapping

Bruce Morrow Never Knows

Since their first visit to New York in February 1964, WABC disc jockey "Cousin" Bruce Morrow had been interviewing The Beatles. By 1966, the novelty of American radio had worn off for the Fabs, and they refused to play along with Cousin Brucie's schtick. This was made clear as Bruce attempted to interview them live on the air following a press conference on August 22nd:

WABC interview

Tokyo-Sixty Six

CBM, 1973

The precursor to the famed Five Nights In A Judo Arena. Pressed from the same tape of the June 30, 1966 Budokan concert, but the later LP had a deluxe full color cover and sold far better.

Side 1:

- Rock And Roll Music

- She's A Woman

- If I Needed Someone

- Day Tripper

- Baby's In Black

- I Feel Fine

Side 2:

- Yesterday

- I Wanna Be Your Man

- Nowhere Man

- Paperback Writer

- I'm Down

Starrdust Memories

By request, here are Ringo's two final recorded interviews as a Beatle, promoting his Sentimental Journey album in March 1970.

First is an open-end discussion of the new LP, as aired on Radio Luxembourg (broadcast date unknown).

On March 31st, Ringo appeared live on BBC 2's Open House, chatting with host Pete Murray and introducing a number of record requests, including a Beatles oldie. One day later, Ringo would participate in Phil Spector's overdub session for Let It Be - the final recording date in the Beatles era.

Words Of Love

Wizardo, 1975

Not studio outtakes, as the insert claims, but BBC Radio recordings copied from earlier Beatlegs and sorted chronologically.

Side 1:

- Love Me Do

- Please Please Me

- From Me To You

- I Saw Her Standing There

- Misery

- Do You Want To Know A Secret

- There's A Place

- Anna (Go To Him)

- Chains

- Boys

Side 2:

- She Loves You

- Till There Was You

- Roll Over Beethoven

- You Really Got A Hold On Me

- Devil In Her Heart

- Money (That's What I Want)

- Long Tall Sally

- Honey Don't

- Kansas City/Hey Hey Hey Hey!

- Words Of Love

These Youngsters From Liverpool

February 9th, 1964 was perhaps the most important day in The Beatles' career. But apart from their triumphant performance on The Ed Sullivan Show, how else did they spend the day?

After an afternoon dress rehearsal (including three songs taped for later broadcast), they unwound in their suite at the Plaza Hotel. Or tried to unwind, as disc jockey Murray the "K" Kaufman was in their faces relaying events to the metropolitan New York area via WINS-AM:

Wacker the "K"

On the way into CBS Studio 50 for the pivotal live broadcast, they were stopped by a CBS News reporter for a few words:

White Christmas

After the show, Washington DC disc jockey Carroll James lurked backstage and briefly interviewed Dizzy Gillespie and George for WWDC-AM before CBS security put the kibosh on things:

Good ol' Dizzy!

The post-show celebrating continued late into the night at the Peppermint Lounge, where Murray and Ringo danced to the house band, as the Maysles brothers' camera captured the action. At 4 A.M., the camera was rolling as Paul and Murray said goodnight in front of the Plaza:

By gum, Murray!

Sam Houston Colosseum

Beat Records, 1987

A clear vinyl LP of the August 19th, 1965 evening show in Houston. Common material at the time.

Side 1:

- Twist And Shout

- She's A Woman

- I Feel Fine

- Dizzy Miss Lizzy

- Ticket To Ride

- Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby

Side 2:

- Can't Buy Me Love

- Baby's In Black

- I Wanna Be Your Man

- A Hard Day's Night

- Help!

- I'm Down

The Nose

As we've seen, Brian Matthew interviewed George and John in November 1965 for BBC Radio's Pop Profile. Six months later, he sat down with the other half of the group, beginning with Ringo on May 2nd, 1966.

This is the original, complete and unedited Overseas Transcription Disc recording of the interview:

Ringo - Pop Profile

Sweden 1963

CBM, 1973

The first complete (but middling quality) issue of the great Stockholm radio performance from October 1963. Impressed bootleg collector John Lennon upon initial hearing. Side 2 is useless filler from Washington DC and From Us To You.

Side 1:

- I Saw Her Standing There

- From Me To You

- Money (That's What I Want)

- Roll Over Beethoven

- You Really Got A Hold On Me

- She Loves You

- Twist And Shout

Side 2:

- Till There Was You

- I Want To Hold Your Hand

- Roll Over Beethoven

- All My Loving

- I Wanna Be Your Man

- From Us To You

I Think Of Wink

After touring the UK, France, and US in a four-month period, followed by two months spent filming A Hard Day's Night, The Beatles took the month of May 1964 off. Paul and Ringo headed for the Virgin Islands with their girlfriends Jane Asher and Maureen Cox.

John and his wife Cynthia accompanied George and Pattie to Hawaii, en route to Tahiti. As they departed Honolulu Airport on May 5th, George expressed his displeasure at the intrusions of the American press during their brief stay:

Honolulu Airport

Three weeks of sun, surf, and sand in Tahiti seemed to lift his spirits. When he and John connected through Los Angeles on the way back home May 25th, they were in a silly mood as they recorded greetings for radio station KFWB-AM and their DJs Joe Yocum and Wink Martindale. John recognized Wink's name from his hit single "Deck Of Cards", which he parodied as "Deck Of Dubs":

KFWBeatles

This brief recording was pressed onto a souvenir single sold at a Los Angeles-area music store in June, with "You Can't Do That" on the B-side.

Live At Abbey Road Studios

no label, 1984

A Tobe Milo-associated release, containing an audience recording of the soundtrack to the 1983 multimedia presentation The Beatles at

Abbey Road. This was the first Beatleg appearance of many alternate studio takes.

Side 1:

- Love Me Do

- How Do You Do It

- I Saw Her Standing There

- Twist And Shout

Side 2:

- One After 909

- Don't Bother Me

- A Hard Day's Night

- Leave My Kitten Alone

- I'm A Loser

- She's A Woman

- Ticket To Ride

- Help!

Side 3:

- Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)

- I'm Looking Through You

- Paperback Writer

- Rain

- Penny Lane

- Strawberry Fields Forever

Side 4:

- A Day In The Life

- Hello Goodbye

- Lady Madonna

- Hey Jude

- While My Guitar Gently Weeps

- Because

- #9 Dream

Zappled Right Between The Eyes

By request, here is a recording of John and Yoko promoting their new Zapple LP, Unfinished Music No. 2: Life With The Lions. On or about May 8th, 1969, they spoke with BBC Radio's Pete Drummond, most likely from their office at Apple HQ in London. This may have been the only time "No Bed For Beatle John" was aired on BBC Radio!

Life With The Lennons

Sessions

Parlophone/EMI, 1985

Not an EMI release, of course, but copied from a tape of a cancelled EMI release, by the Yellow Dog folks. An exciting Beatleg at the time, but nearly all of these same mixes (unfortunately - the editing is atrocious) ended up on the Anthology CDs.

Side 1:

- Come And Get It

- Leave My Kitten Alone

- Not Guilty

- I'm Looking Through You

- What's The New Mary Jane

Side 2:

- How Do You Do It

- Besame Mucho

- One After 909

- If You've Got Trouble

- That Means A Lot

- While My Guitar Gently Weeps

- Mailman Bring Me No More Blues

- Christmas Time Is Here Again

Dance, Tony, Dance!

With George in the USA, Ringo moving into a new home, and John by Yoko's side in hospital, it fell to Paul McCartney to promote The Beatles (aka the "White Album") on Radio Luxembourg.

To this end, DJ Tony Macarthur recorded a track-by-track examination of the double album at Paul's London home on November 20th, 1968. Except that Paul only felt comfortable talking about his own compositions, although he does touch on "Happiness Is A Warm Gun" and a few other songs.

Here is a composite, mostly from a so-so off-air recording (it aired November 21st) but with a couple of excerpts from a very good quality source tape spliced in. Who out there has the complete upgrade?

Paul and Tony do it in the road

Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

Thames, 1986

Notable at the time for the title track, the "Oh! Darling" vocal tape, and an 8 minute version of "Dig It". The rest is filler repeated from File Under: Beatles and elsewhere; also a bit skimpy on the total running time.

Side 1:

- Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da/Christmas Time Is Here Again

- Cannonball/Not Fade Away/Hey Little Girl/Bo Diddley

- Oh! Darling

- Dig It

Side 2:

- We Can Work It Out

- Let It Be

- Christmas Time Is Here Again

Mersey Sound Meets Puget Sound

Seattle, Washington was the third city on the summer 1964 North American Beatles tour.

When they landed at Seattle-Tacoma airport on August 21st, local TV news was there to film a few words from Paul. So was Larry Kane, who chatted with Ringo as he deplaned.

Kane also spoke with press officer Derek Taylor and interviewed fans hanging around outside the Edgewater Inn, where the group stayed and fished out the window of their suite overlooking Elliott Bay in Puget Sound.

Prior to their show that night at Seattle Coliseum, The Beatles met the media for a typical press conference, livened only by John's reluctant reading of his poem "Good Dog Nigel".

Snaps 'N' Trax

Geritol Records, 1982

A listenable compilation, half Beatles-era and half solo-era. Everything is copied from other boots, but the side 2 material is fairly obscure.

Side 1:

- I Got A Woman

- Honey Don't

- Act Naturally

- It's All Too Much

- Yer Blues

- Hound Dog

Side 2:

- Too Many Cooks

- I Love My Suit

- My Carnival

- The Pirate Song

- Say Darling

- Soundstage Of Mind

- Twenty Flight Rock

Psychedelic Freakouts

On January 18th, 1967, a few weeks into the Sgt. Pepper sessions, Freddie Prinze - er, I'm sorry, Paul McCartney sat down for a filmed interview to discuss the burgeoning psychedelic scene for the benefit of Granada TV's viewers. Excerpts of the interview were used in the Scene Special documentary "It's So Far Out, It's Straight Down", aired March 7th.

Another snippet appeared in a 1971 Guinness Book TV special, The Record Makers, and more recently further extracts were issued on a DVD. I've stitched all the available bits together into a recording lasting 6:41:

Far Out

Kum Back

no label, 1970

A knock-off of the earliest Beatleg, with a couple of mono tracks ("One After 909" and "Dig It") inserted into the stereo lineup.

Side 1:

- Get Back

- The Walk

- Let It Be

- One After 909

- Teddy Boy

- Two Of Us

Side 2:

- Don't Let Me Down

- I've Got A Feeling

- The Long And Winding Road

- Dig It

- For You Blue

- Dig A Pony

- Get Back

Hernia and Odeon, take 2

In listening to the fabulous new Unsurpassed Broadcasts set, I realized it contains a slightly longer version of the Dibbs Mather Doncaster interview, with a few more lines of John's "The Neville Club" reading. So, in the interest of completeness, here it is:

Dateline London

Come Back Johnny!

Melvin, 1979

Another of Melvin's entertaining Beatlegs, albeit not as eclectic as usual. Most of the LP consists of the One-To-One concert (a mix of audience and broadcast tapes), with a healthy dose of Lennon media appearances sprinkled throughout.

Side 1:

- Comment to a Bleary-eyed Bob Dylan

- Power To The People

- New York City

- It's So Hard

- Woman Is The Nigger Of The World

- Listen to This Radio Spot

- Well Well Well

- Instant Karma!

- Goodnight Vienna radio spot

Side 2:

- Monday Night Football

- Mother

- Come Together

- Cold Turkey

- Hound Dog

- Well (Baby Please Don't Go)/Rock Island Line/Maybe Baby/Peggy Sue

- Johnny B. Goode

- Imagine

Hernia and Odeon

On December 10th, 1963, The Beatles' Autumn Tour stopped by Doncaster for a pair of shows. Backstage at the Gaumont, they were visited by Australian broadcaster Dibbs Mather, who interviewed them for Dateline London, a BBC Overseas Transcription show.

This is one of the longer and more in-depth 1963 Beatle interviews, as well as one of the most entertaining, largely thanks to John, who reads his newly-minted poem "The Neville Club" but is reticent to answer many questions.

Dateline London

Spare Parts

Bird Brain Records, 1987

An aptly-named concoction, full of unrelated tracks from other bootlegs. Bird Brain was better known as Starlight Records.

Side 1:

- That's All Right Mama

- I Saw Her Standing There

- Lonesome Tears In My Eyes

- Do You Want To Know A Secret

- And I Love Her

- Honey Don't

- Dizzy Miss Lizzy

- Ticket To Ride

Side 2:

- I'm Looking Through You

- I Am The Walrus

- Act Naturally

- Birthday

- Dig It

- Her Majesty

A Delaide Drummer

The Beatles spent the first week of their June 1964 Australasian tour a man short. Jimmy Nicol filled in admirably on drums while Ringo recuperated from inflamed tonsils back in London.

By the 13th, he was declared fit enough to travel and, accompanied by Brian Epstein, made the arse-numbing journey from London to Adelaide, via San Francisco and Honolulu. He chatted with an ITV reporter before setting off.

Other than a brief stopover in Los Angeles by John and George the previous month, this was the first Beatle visit to US soil since their history-changing February tour. Naturally, the San Francisco press descended upon Ringo, although this reporter seemed to bear a grudge for having to cover the event.

Meanwhile back in Adelaide that day, John, Paul and George killed time waiting for their bandmate by bantering with Bob Rogers and, uh... looking at kangaroo pelts.

Return To Abbey Road

no label, 1986

A nice Abbey Road-themed compilation, pairing the No. 3 Abbey Road NW8 tape with various "Get Back" session rehearsals.

Side 1:

- Something

- Maxwell's Silver Hammer

- Oh! Darling

- Octopus's Garden

Side 2:

- Because

- You Never Give Me Your Money

- Sun King

- Mean Mr. Mustard

- Polythene Pam

- She Came In Through The Bathroom Window

- Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight

- Her Majesty

The Witty Beatle

Here is the second in the series of Beatle Pop Profiles done by Brian Matthew for BBC Radio. The Beatle under scrutiny this time is John, in a conversation recorded November 30th, 1965. Again, this is the complete uncut program from Transcription Disc.

John - Pop Profile

Pittsburgh, PA

On September 14th, 1964, The Beatles flew to Pittsburgh for a concert at the Civic Arena, where fans had been lining up since the previous evening. When they arrived at the airport, a few mischievous kids lobbed tomatoes in their direction, but the performance went off without a hitch.

Here's a lengthy (and low-fi) recording of the pre-show press conference as aired on radio station KQV-AM.

Cinelogue III: A Hard Day's Night

Instant Analysis, 1974

Pretty straightforward - a copy of the complete soundtrack to the first Beatles movie, A Hard Day's Night, obviously taped off a TV speaker during a broadcast of the film. In the days before home video, this was a fun way to revisit the dialogue and musical score.

Side 1:

- A Hard Day's Night

- I Should Have Known Better

- I Wanna Be Your Man

- Don't Bother Me

Side 2:

- All My Loving

- If I Fell

- Can't Buy Me Love

Side 3:

- And I Love Her

- I'm Happy Just To Dance With You

Side 4:

- Can't Buy Me Love

- Tell Me Why

- If I Fell

- I Should Have Known Better

- She Loves You

- A Hard Day's Night

Ringalong Singalong

Each of the Beatles gave individual interviews to promote Abbey Road in the autumn of 1969. John's turn came in September when he spoke with Tony Macarthur of Radio Luxembourg. In addition to commenting on each track on the LP, John discussed his recent performance at the Toronto Rock And Roll Revival concert, the Moog synthesizer, and other current topics. The interview was aired September 27th.