Move over, Ms L!

Hi all, wondering why you are looking at this jumbled up page? This is due to the fact that Facebook didn't like our url since it starts with wog, so we have been forced to move the blog. This was some time ago, and we have placed a script which would automatically send you to our new location. Obviously, this hasn't worked for all of you, since we have just finished moderating some of your comments which appeared on this site recently, and not on our new (and improved!) site. So what we're saying is head on over to our new site, and update your bookmarks!

Saturday 22 November 2008

All You Need Is Love - Acetate



Interesting item out on ebay at the moment:

Beatles All You Need is Love original Acetate

Beatles All You Need is Love AcetateThe Beatles A single-sided acetate All You Need is Love, Emidisc white label inscribed in black ball point pen THE BEATLS 45 MD and the length of the recording 6.39. This is the only known acetate of the full-length recording of this famous 1967 Beatles single, which originally ran for 6 minutes 39 seconds (in comparison with the 3 minutes 40 seconds of the release version). This predominantly instrumental take was recorded on the 14 June 1967 at Olympic Studios in Barnes. It features John Lennon on Harpsichord, Paul McCartney on double bass, Ringo Starr on drums and George Harrison on rudimentary violin. John Lennon adds occasional vocals 'all you need is love' as a guide to where the chorus of the song will be. The end of the song becomes a freeform/chaotic structure reminiscent of other 1967 work – in- progress songs such as Only a Northern Song andYou Know My Name (Look Up The Number), with little of the melodic commerciality of the finished record. This acetate documented the state of the recording at the end of the 14th June session, before vocals and more conventional backing were added at their next session on 19th June. All You Need Is Love was subsequently used as Britain's contribution to the first worldwide TV broadcast Our World, on 25th June, 1967.
Link

Wednesday 19 November 2008

The Fireman: Electric Arguments


Electric Arguments

Paul McCartney & Youth continue their collaborations as the duo "The Fireman" with their most commercial product yet. You may listen to the whole album over at NPR.
Track listing : Electric Arguments

1. Nothing To Much Just Out Of Sight
2. Two Magpies
3. Sing The Changes
4. Travelling Light
5. Highway
6. Light From Your Light House
7. Sun Is Shining
8. Dance' Til We're High
9. Life Long Passion
10. Is This Love ?
11. Lovers In A Dream
12. Universal Here ,Everlasting Now
13 .Don't Stop Running

Produced By Paul McCartney & Youth
All Tracks written By Paul McCartney
Release Date 24 /11 /2008

On Amazon (UK): A limited edition vinyl album, which also includes a copy of the CD for convenience sake.
Here's the Amazon (US) link.

As ever when there's a new Paul McCartney album out, there are collectible promotional items out. There's not likely to be any commercial single release, but at least two radio promo singles are out. Here's "Sing The Changes":

Here's a promo copy of the album and two promo singles:

I'm sure you know where to look!

Official Fireman site

Sunday 16 November 2008

Carnival of Light


For Beatles fans across the world it has gained near mythical status. The 14-minute improvised track called 'Carnival of Light' was recorded in 1967 and played just once in public. It was never released because three of the Fab Four thought it too adventurous.

The track, a jumble of shrieks and psychedelic effects, is said to be as far from the melodic ballads that made Sir Paul McCartney famous as it is possible to imagine. But now McCartney has said that the public will have the chance to judge for themselves.

'It does exist,' McCartney says on a BBC Radio 4 arts programme to be broadcast this week. Talking to John Wilson, the presenter of Front Row, the former Beatle confirms that he still has a master tape of the work and says he suspects that 'the time has come for it to get its moment'.

'I like it because it's the Beatles free, going off piste,' he adds.

In the 40 years since 'Carnival of Light' was recorded by McCartney, Ringo Starr, George Harrison and John Lennon in the Abbey Road studios in London, its collection of disparate rhythms has become a kind of holy grail for Beatles obsessives. The track was put together on 5 January 1967, in between working on the vocals for the song 'Penny Lane'.

Once released it should offer proof that the Fab Four, and McCartney in particular, were much more avant-garde in their tastes than many gave them credit for. According to the few who heard the track on the one occasion the recording was played publicly, at a London music festival in 1967, it features the sound of gargled water and strangled shouts from Lennon which vie with church organs and distorted guitar.

'We were set up in the studio and would just go in every day and record,' McCartney tells Wilson. 'I said to the guys, this is a bit indulgent but would you mind giving me 10 minutes? I've been asked to do this thing. All I want you to do is just wander round all of the stuff and bang it, shout, play it. It doesn't need to make any sense. Hit a drum, wander to the piano, hit a few notes ... and then we put a bit of echo on it. It's very free.'

McCartney had been commissioned to create a piece for an electronic music festival at the Roundhouse Theatre in north London by his friend Barry Miles. The event, the Million Volt Light and Sound Rave, was organised by International Times, an underground newspaper. Many in the audience had no idea they were listening to a new Beatles track. Other performers included Delia Derbyshire whose work at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop included jointly creating the theme for Doctor Who.

McCartney, who this month releases his third experimental album of new work under the alias the Fireman, regards 'Carnival of Light' as evidence of how musically adventurous he has always been. For the three other Beatles the track was just an oddity. George Harrison dismissed it as too weird. But McCartney is hopeful it can now be released with the agreement of the group's estate.

'It will help reaffirm McCartney's claim to have been the most musically adventurous of all the Beatles,' said Wilson this weekend. 'He told me he would love to release the track. All he needs now is the blessing of Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono and George Harrison's widow Olivia.'

The piece was inspired, McCartney says, by the works of composers John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen. In his book Complete Beatles Recording Sessions, author Mark Lewisohn - who was played the track in 1987 - describes 'distorted, hypnotic drum and organ sounds, a distorted lead guitar, the sound of a church organ, various effects (water gargling was one) and, perhaps most intimidating of all, Lennon and McCartney screaming and bawling random phrases including "Are you all right?" and '"Barcelona!".'

Beatles fans came close to hearing 'Carnival Of Light' in 1996 when it was considered for inclusion in the exhaustive Anthology compilation. 'We were listening to everything we'd every recorded,' McCartney says. 'I said it would be great to put this on because it would show we were working with really avant-garde stuff ... But it was vetoed. The guys didn't like the idea, like "this is rubbish".'

McCartney revealed that George Harrison disparaged sonic experimentation as 'avant-garde a clue'.

Sir George Martin, the Beatles producer who oversaw the track, has described it as 'one of those weird things'. 'It was a kind of uncomposed, free-for-all melange of sound that went on. It was not considered worthy of issuing as a normal piece of Beatles music at the time and was put away.'

Friday 14 November 2008

Brian's schedules

Some documents that previously belonged to former Beatles' drummer Pete Best have appeared at the upcoming Bonham's auction in London. These are prelimenary booking schedules, presumably from Brian Epstein's office as information for "the boys".
Some dates previously unmentioned by Miles and Lewisohn appear before the June 6th famous "first recording session" at EMI. Not surprisingly, the 3d and 4th of June are spent rehearsing for the imminent recording session - at The Beatles' "home away from home", the Cavern Club.
The whole of the 5th is set aside for the journey to London. A day is also set aside for the journey home, on the 7th.

The booking schedules poignantly end with dates which Pete Best was going to miss. He was fired by Brian earlier in the day and didn't show up for the Riverpark Ballroom gig in Chester on the 16th of August. Filling in for Pete on that date and the next was Johnny "Hutch" Hutchinson, drummer with The Big Three. Ringo made his debut as the new drummer on the 18th at Hulme Hall.
Brian's booking schedule shows that The Beatles were going to play together with Clinton Ford at the Cavern Club on Sunday the 2nd of September, whereas Miles has them sharing the bill with Kingsize Taylor & The Dominoes and The Zenith Six Jazz Band.

Lot description:
Lot No: 532
The Beatles
Beatles concert material,
1962,
comprising: a list of Principal Engagements - August/September, together with the original envelope addressed to Pete Best and postmarked 16 AUG 1962*, together with two carbon-copies of a list of bookings for July-August, one sheet annotated by Pete, and a handbill for Joe Brown/The Beatles at the Tower Ballroom, New Brighton, 27th July.
Estimate: £750 - £1000

*Note: The 16th of August 1962 was the day Brian summoned Pete to his office and fired him.

Link to Bonham's Auction

McCartney's hair


Bonham's is currently planning another of their Pop & Rock memorabilia auctions, this one's to be held on the 25th of November in Knightsbridge, London - and if you're after a lock of young Paul McCartney's undyed hair, now is your chance!
This lock of hair was won by the vendor's mother, who was a 12-year-old schoolgirl from Annandale at the time. The competition was organised by Sydney's 'TV Week' magazine. An article in the issue included in the lot gives the background to the competition, in which readers were asked to '...give the best and most original 25-word reason for possessing it (the hair).' The winning entry stated that she '...would like to win a lock of Paul McCartney's hair to prove to my father that the Beatles really do have their hair cut.' The article continues: 'She is now the only teenager in Australia with a lock of hair cut from Paul McCartney's mop-top during his fantastic stay in Australia...Catherine will keep her souvenir by securing it in a blue bow.'

According to 'The Beatles: A Diary' by Barry Miles (Omnibus Press, London 1998), John, Paul and Ringo had their hair cut on 17th June 1964, prior to them playing the final two of six sets (over three nights) at the Festival Hall, Melbourne. It is possible that 'TV Week' acquired the lock of hair on this occasion.


Other interesting items at the auction are a pair of Ringo's skiing gloves, lots of John&Yoko photographs taken by Luiz Garrido from March to June 1969 (sold with copyrights and most of them previously unpublished), a number of early concert posters, hand bills, tickets and autographed photos.

The auction also includes a number of items from the late Spike (from The Goons) Milligan's collection. He was a friend of The Beatles, so some of his lots are also Beatles-related. The auction is called: Entertainment Memorabilia including "The Private World of Spike Milligan"

Link to auction

Thursday 13 November 2008

German Let It Be VHS


Beatles Let It Be - German video cassette
While looking through the excellent Beatles Collecting forum, I came across a rare picture of the German 1992 release of Let It Be on VHS. As we know, the German version is the one that presents the picture in the least cropped manner. We also know that the UK company, "VCI", announced plans to issue the movie for the first time in England. They claimed to have a version that was remastered in 1992 and that they would release it in 1997. Could the German VHS on Warner Home Video be from that 1992 restoration?

McCartney buries Eleanor Rigby claim


LONDON (AFP) — Paul McCartney on Wednesday shot down suggestions that his Beatles song "Eleanor Rigby" was inspired by a hospital scullery maid after a woman claimed the star had sent her a pay slip signed with that name.

"Eleanor Rigby is a totally fictious character that I made up," McCartney said in a statement released to AFP by his publicists.

"If someone wants to spend money buying a document to prove a fictitious character exists, that's fine with me," he said, referring to a forthcoming auction of the document.

His spokeswoman added they had not been able to establish whether McCartney sent the pay slip to Annie Mawson, who is auctioning it off to raise up to 500,000 pounds for a music therapy centre.

The pay slip dates from 1911 and originally came from City Hospital in Liverpool, McCartney's home city.

Mawson, chief executive of the Sunbeams Music Trust charity, said the ex- Beatles' office sent her the document after she wrote to him asking for a donation to help children with special needs.

Explaining how she received the document in 1990, Mawson said: "One day in the post came a brown envelope with a Paul McCartney world tour stamp, nine months after I had written the letter.

"I opened it and inside was this beautiful, ancient document. It was spine-shivering really, partly because he responded in such a personal way."

"Eleanor Rigby" -- McCartney's song about a lonely woman who "died in the church and was buried along with her name/Nobody came" -- appeared on the 1966 Beatles album "Revolver" and was the B-side to the single "Yellow Submarine".

McCartney has previously said the name Eleanor was inspired by actress Eleanor Bron, who starred in the Beatles film "Help!" in 1965 and that Rigby came from the name of a wine merchant.

In the 1980s, a grave was discovered at Saint Peter's Church in Woolton, Liverpool, where McCartney and bandmate John Lennon used to sunbathe as teenagers, bearing the name Eleanor Rigby.


The grave was first mentioned in a book about The Beatles and the Liverpool scene written by former Liverpool band promoter Sam Leach, "Follow The Merseybeat Road" in 1982. Sam wrote to me and told me that he had sent the manuscript to Paul McCartney prior to publication. He got a note back from the then manager of Paul, Steve Shrimpton saying:
"It's a thumbs up from us, but Paul can't quite agree with the Eleanor Rigby piece. We trust the book is selling well."

Wednesday 12 November 2008

Ringo's first cymbal for sale

It's Ringo Starrtime with guitar hero Ringo and the Hurricanes

I was browsing through the live auctioneers website, doing an article on the new Eleanor Rigby item (follow this link for that) when I chanced upon a special item with an interesting story. Now just how did Ringo Starr's first cymbal from his time with the Eddie Clayton Skiffle group find it's way to a junk shop in Connecticut?
Here's what the auction site said:
Lot #250 from The Fame Bureau: Ringos Starr's first cymbal - A 14" Krut Special (made in England), that has "Richard Starkey 1958" engraved on the back.
The cymbal was purchased from a junk/ old furniture shop in Connecticut owned by a man whose father was a drummer back in the 40's & 50's, who has since past on, and used to live in England back then occasionally and would visit his mother who lived there.
He got this old cymbal at a music store, used it and then kept in an old smelly trunk with some sticks and drumheads. Krut cymbals were manufactured in the '50's by Premier Drum company, and were a cheap line of cymbals that they pushed. The word "Krut" was a marketing ploy by Premier that is "Turk" spelled backwards, to make the drummer believe it might be somehow be related to the Turkish "Zildjian" cymbals. Unfortunately the marketing plan probably backfired, & "Krut" sounded more like "Krud", a more accurate description of the sound of the cymbals.
Ringo's first cymbal, according to the Beatles Anthology, was an old junker that his step father had given him for Christmas sometime between 1956 & 1958.
This kit consisted of an old bass drum, snare drum, cymbal, and a few other odds & ends. Supposedly in 1958, Ringo (then Richard) borrowed 46 pounds from his Grandfather and bought his 1st legit drum kit, an Ajax with single headed toms at Frank Hussey's music store.
Ringo said his first drums were junk that he could play with anything that was available (including firewood).
This certainly fits the criteria of this cymbal, obviously before the Beatles time (where he later played Premier & Ludwig drums, and Zildjian cymbals. In 1958, Ringo (then Richard) was only 18 years old and just starting to gig with the Eddie Clayton skiffle band and play some odd gigs around town, where drummers would often sometimes share kits with the other bands playing.
According to the Beatles anthology, Richard (not owning a car yet) would travel to gigs on a bus with nothing more than a snare, hihat, and top cymbal. He may have just engraved his name on the back to help identify his stuff, (which makes perfect sense, as he was an apprentice engineer at H. Hunt & Son - two of his fellow band mates were a joiner & a lathe operator there).
If you refer to the "Drum Book" on page 31, Geoff Nichols mentions that Ringo used to play Ajax & Krut cymbals with Rory Storm.
Now, you decide if this is a tall tale or if it could be true.
Link to auction

Tuesday 11 November 2008

Let It Be from BBC

Click for bigger
There's a new DVD transfer of the Let It Be movie "going the rounds" in collectors' circles. It's sourced from a video cassette taped from the last screening of the film on BBC in the UK (BBC2 Saturday 8th May 1982, 3:10-4:27pm), and the tape has not been viewed since it was recorded. Here's a comparison of various versions:

Sourced from the official laser disc (USA)

Sourced from an official VHS (Germany)

Sourced from the BBC 1982 screening

Composite:The bigger picture is the german version, blue frame=laser disc, green frame = BBC.

So far, it looks like the german version is the winner, it keeps the colours and is in the correct 16mm aspect ratio. Too bad it has those german subtitles. The laser disc is from the cinema print, which was blown up to 35 mm (it was filmed with 16 mm movie cameras), resulting in a cropped picture. The BBC version is not bad, it looks good on a big widescreen TV because it has a bigger picture size: 931 x 570 pixels as opposed to the other two, 640 x 480 and 618 x 480, respectively. It's a bit more subdued in the colour department, but looks quite lifelike. The thing with how much of the image we're supposed to see is that we would have to second-guess what director Michael Lindsay-Hogg envisioned for the film.
Visit the excellent Beatles Movies site for more info on The Beatles' movies.

Monday 10 November 2008

David Fishof Ringo Sale


David Fishof, who started the "All Starr Band" series of concerts have disassociated himself from Ringo, and is selling off a lot of personal items from his relationship with Ringo. Of interest are lots of signed items, including concert posters.
After more than 15 years of working with Ringo Starr and producing 8 of his All-Starr tours, David Fishof accrued a more than interesting library of audio and video material. In the spirit of this auction, Fishof agreed to open his vault and share many of these treasures with Ringo's vast and loyal fans and collectors.
Some of the stuff on sale is very reasonably priced.
Backstage Auctions

Friday 7 November 2008

Macca gets award


Paul McCartney got an award again last night. It was a "special" award created by the organizers of the MTV European Music Awards, because the event was held in McCartney's native Liverpool this year. The "Ultimate Legend Award" was presented by U2's Bono, who gave the Beatle a rather long drawn out introduction - almost nausiatingly flattering Paul. It reminded us of the far better introduction Ellen DeGeneres gave Paul at the 2006 Grammies: "The next performer needs no introduction!" Then Paul simply entered the stage.
That was the time when McCartney lost the "Album of the year" Grammy for which his "Chaos & Creation in the Backyard" was nominated, to U2's "How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb".
So perhaps Bono was just making up for that.
Yesterday, Paul knew there was no way his "thank you" speech was going to be able to surpass Bono's big build-up, so he simply high-fived audience members he was passing, and then went on to thank Liverpool, his parents Jim and Mary, his brother Mike (who was also there), George, Ringo and John, Britain - and the americans for voting for Obama. The ex-Beatle didn't perform at the event.

Bono and Macca first met up at "Live Aid" in 1985


The two also opened the "Live 8" event together in 2005

Thursday 6 November 2008

Apple Boutique

Pair of Long Haired Londoners in a Psychedelic Corner of the Beatles' Apple BoutiqueNow here's funny picture I found while browsing the Allposters online store: This photo is entitled "Pair of Long Haired Londoners in a Psychedelic Corner of the Beatles' Apple Boutique".

Wednesday 5 November 2008

Allposter prints

Paul McCartney

Paul McCartney in Concert, 1989 - Photo

11.2 inches x 14 inches

George Harrison


George Harrison, Royal Albert Hall 1992 - Photo

8 inches x 10 inches

Rock Star John Lennon and His Second Wife Yoko Ono
John Lennon and Yoko Ono - Premium Photographic Print
David Mcgough

24 inches x 18 inches

Pop Music Group the Beatles in Concert Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, George Harrison, John Lennon


The Beatles in Concert - Premium Photographic Print

Morse, Ralph

40 inches x 30 inches

Click image to buy from Allposters.com

Auction results from Cameo


The Kansas City film that I discussed in an earlier posting went for £4,100 when it went under the hammer at the sale in Reading, England. The buyer was The Beatles' own company, Apple Corps. We're hoping this means Apple has plans for the film... extra footage on the Blu-Ray Anthology series, perhaps?
At the same auction, a worn 1963 first issue of the stereo album "Please Please Me", black & gold labels with 5 tracks credited to Dick James in an E.J Day sleeve fetched £2,000.

Monday 3 November 2008

Plastic Ono Supergroup

The Plastic Ono Supergroup

"Peace for Christmas" concert in aid of UNICEF - December 15th, 1969 at the Lyceum ballroom, London.

John Lennon said of this show "I thought it was fantastic, I was really into it. We were doing the show & George (Harrison), Delaney & Bonnie, Billy Preston, all that crowd turned up. They'd just come back from Sweden. George had been playing invisible man in Delaney & Bonnie's band, which Eric Clapton had been doing, to get the pressure off being famous Eric & famous George. They became the guitarists in this. They all turned up. It was again like the concert in Toronto. I said 'Will you come on?' They said 'Well, what are you going to play?' I said 'Listen, we're going to probably do a blues...or "Cold Turkey", which is three chords'. Eric knew that. & "Don't Worry Kyoko" which was Yoko's, which has three chords & a riff. I said 'Once we get on Yoko's riff, just keep hitting it'. It was a fantastic show, it was fantastic....very heavy! A lot of the audience walked out, but the ones that stayed, they were in a trance. They just all came to the front because it was of the first real heavy rock shows...it's only to be expected that some people were disappointed in that we only did two long numbers, but we play 1984 music! I don't know what they want. I'm trying to get it across that the Plastic Ono Band plays the unexpected"

The full line-up for the Plastic Ono Supergroup was:
John Lennon - vocals & guitar
George Harrison, Eric Clapton, Delaney Bramlett - guitars
Klaus Voorman - bass
Jim Gordon, Keith Moon & Alan White - drums
Billy Preston - organ *
Bonnie Bramlett & 'Friends' ** - percussion & brass

* Sadly, Billy's organ was buried in the original recording, and Nicky Hopkins' overdubbed an electric piano in 1971 in New York when the songs from the concert were released on the "Some Time in New York City" album bonus LP.

**'Friends' included: Bobby Keys - saxophone; Jim Price - trumpet; with Bobby Whitlock & Carl Radle), also assisting was 'Legs' Larry Smith (from the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band) & Dino Danelli (the drummer from The Young Rascals)

A Beatle on Blu-Ray


Paul McCartney will be the first Beatle to take the plunge into the new market of High Definition TV, when the film from his 2005 US Tour, "The Space Within US" will be released on the new Blu-Ray disc format on the 18th of November.
Directed by Mark Haefeli, the film's centerpiece is the concert at Anaheim, California - when McCartney communicated with two astronauts on board the International Space Station through a live feed up to space. McCartney played "English Tea" for the men. Other songs heard in this film: "Magical Mystery Tour," "Flaming Pie," "Let Me Roll It," "Drive My Car," "Till There Was You," "I'll Get You," "Eleanor Rigby," "Maybe I'm Amazed," "Got to Get You Into My Life," "Fine Line," "I Will," "I'll Follow The Sun," "Good Day Sunshine," "For No One," "Fixing A Hole," "Penny Lane," "Too Many People," "She Came in Through The Bathroom Window," "I Got A Feeling," "Follow Me," "Jenny Wren," "Helter Skelter," "Yesterday," "Get Back," and "Please Please Me".
The film has been out on DVD since 2006 and a shortened version was an A&E Special, but this is your first chance to see it with this clarity.

Saturday 1 November 2008

Top 20 unreleased Beatles


1. Live at the Cavern, mid-1962: Auctioned to Paul McCartney on August 29,1985, this tape contains 18 songs, mostly covers, including a few of which no Beatles version circulates. Those covers, and the versions on which they were modeled, are: "Hey! Baby" (Bruce Channel), "If You Gotta Make a Fool of Somebody" (James Ray), "Sharing You" (Bobby Vee), and "What's Your Name" (possibly Don & Juan's doo-wop hit of the same title). As McCartney owns it and nothing was used on Anthology 1, however, we can probably assume the sound quality's not too good.

2. "Sheila," October 26, 1962, BBC: Occasionally at their BBC sessions, the Beatles taped numbers that weren't used in the actual broadcast. This cover of Tommy Roe's chart-topping Buddy Holly soundalike "Sheila" is one of them, and though a poor-fidelity live version that the group taped a couple of months later in Hamburg was issued as part of the Star-Club tapes, this would presumably be both better sounding and a better performance. It's likely, however, that the tape was erased or has vanished forever.

3. "Three Cool Cats," January 16, 1963, BBC: Another instance of a Beatles song taped at a BBC session, but not broadcast. There is a version of "Three Cool Cats" from their January 1, 1962 Decca audition that's easily available. But it's a shame this BBC version doesn't survive, as presumably it would be a considerably improved rendition, the group having improved so much in general in the ensuing year.

4. "Hold Me Tight," studio outtake, February 11, 1963: It's known the Beatles attempted an early version of "Hold Me Tight," later redone for With the Beatles, at their Please Please Me sessions. It's likely the tapes (along with about half the session tapes for Please Please Me) no longer exist, but stranger things have miraculously turned up.

5. "Do You Want to Know a Secret," demo tape, early 1963: Billy J. Kramer remembers hearing a demo tape of this song before he covered it for his debut single on March 21, 1963. As he revealed in the liner notes to the CD The Best of Billy J. Kramer & the Dakotas: The Definitive Collection, "I had this tape given to me, and it was John Lennon singing it with an acoustic guitar. On the tape he said, 'I'm sorry for the sound quality, but it's the quietest room I could find in the whole building.' Then he flushed the toilet."

6. "Three Cool Cats," July 2, 1963, BBC: Yet another version of this Coasters cover, taped at a BBC session in July 1963, but—like the one they taped for the BBC in January—not broadcast.

7. "World Without Love," demo tape, circa early 1964: Peter Asher of Peter & Gordon has said he has a tape of Paul McCartney's demo of "World Without Love" without the bridge, before it was covered by Peter & Gordon for a #1 hit.

8. Beatles-Carl Perkins session, June 1, 1964: The late rockabilly great Carl Perkins claimed on several occasions that he and the Beatles recorded in the studio together on June 1, 1964. The songs they did varied according to the account, but they might have included "Blue Suede Shoes," "Honey Don't," "Everybody's Trying to Be My Baby," "Your True Love," "Sawdust Dance Floor," and others. No tape has surfaced, however, and it seems possible that if such a session took place, it might not have even been taped. For while Perkins remembered staying in the studio until almost three in the morning, no Beatles recording session officially ran past midnight until October 13, 1965.

9. "You're My World," studio outtake, June 3, 1964: A strange song for the group to be covering, "You're My World" was not a Beatles original, but a song that had just gotten to #1 in the UK for Cilla Black. As it turns out, however, it's reported that the version lasts just 33 seconds.

10. "It's For You," demo, mid-1964: Cilla Black has remembered getting a demo of this Lennon-McCartney song that she covered on a 1964 single (and of which the Beatles never released their own version), featuring just Paul and guitar.

11. "No Reply," demo, mid-1964: Before the Beatles recorded this for Beatles for Sale, there had been thoughts of "giving" it away to another Brian Epstein-managed act, Tommy Quickly, though Quickly never did release his own version. Colin Manley, who played guitar on Tommy Quickly's unreleased cover of "No Reply," told Kristofer Engelhardt in Beatles Undercover that "I don't think the Anthology 1 version is the demo we heard; it's too complete. I wish it would have been the one we heard. I'd back my life that the demo we used had no middle eight; it didn't have any clue as to the rhythm we should use. It contained the sound of a toilet flushing at the end which we thought was hilarious because it was typical of John's humor. I think we were told it was recorded in a hotel room. We immediately noticed when the Beatles put it on their album Beatles for Sale that it had a middle eight."

12. "In My Life," private tape, 1965: In his 1980 Playboy interview with David Sheff, John Lennon said he probably had an original (presumably home) tape of "In My Life." John's memory wasn't always faultless, but in the same answer, he also remembered having tapes of "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "We Can Work It Out," both of which did turn up. Like "Strawberry Fields Forever," "In My Life" is known to have mutated considerably in the course of its composition—in an early draft, it referred to numerous Liverpool landmarks by name—which could make pre-studio tapes of the song fascinating.

13. "What Goes On," private tape, late 1965: In the April 1966 issue of The Beatles Monthly Book, Neil Aspinall reported that "when Paul wanted to show Ringo how 'What Goes On' sounded he made up a multi-track tape. Onto this went Paul singing, Paul playing lead guitar, Paul playing bass and Paul playing drums. Then Ringo listened to the finished tape and added his own ideas before the recording session."

14. "Love You To," take 1 (studio outtake), April 11, 1966: The most intriguing of the Revolver outtakes known to have been taped is an acoustic version of George Harrison's "Love You To" with Paul McCartney on backing vocals that must have been considerably different in this early form than the Indian-flavored final album track.

15. Paul McCartney home tapes, circa 1966: In the biography Many Years from Now, Paul remembered using a studio in Montagu Square in London to "demo things. I'd just written 'Eleanor Rigby' and so I went down there in the basement on my days off on my own. Just took a guitar down and used it as a demo studio." A very brief snippet of Paul on acoustic guitar singing "Eleanor Rigby" has shown up that might be from this period, but no other such tapes have circulated.

16. "Carnival of Light," studio outtake, January 5, 1967: One of the most legendary never-heard Beatles "songs," "Carnival of Light" was actually an experimental sound collage, lasting almost 14 minutes, made for (and played at) a countercultural media event of the same name at the Roundhouse Theatre in London on January 28 and February 4 in 1967. There's an entire 12-page chapter on the recording in Ian Peel's book The Unknown Paul McCartney: McCartney and the Avant-Garde, for further details. Since it was compared by McCartney biographer Barry Miles to the Mother of Invention's searingly jarring, side-long 1966 Freak Out! avant-garde cut "The Return of the Monster Magnet" in Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now, however, it can be assumed that it's neither too tuneful nor too characteristic of the Beatles, even in their psychedelic period.

17. "Good Night," mid-1968: Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick's memoir, Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles (co-written with Howard Massey), mentions that John made a demo of "Good Night" for Ringo that was played back a couple of times in the studio. "It's a shame that this particular tape has been lost to the world, and that nobody will ever hear the gorgeous way John sang his tender little song," wrote Emerick. "In comparison, I really don't think Ringo did the song justice."

18. "Helter Skelter, take 3 (studio outtake), July 18, 1968: Perhaps the Holy Grail of unheard Beatles outtakes is this legendary 27-minute version of "Helter Skelter," at a session also producing ten- and twelve-minute versions. In The Beatles Recording Sessions, Mark Lewisohn noted that "each take developed into a tight and concisely played jam with long instrumental passages." The four-and-a-half-minute edit of take 2 on Anthology 3 lowered expectations, however, as even this truncated version both veered on tedium and was far inferior to the final arrangement, with its dragging tempo and rote blues-rock guitar licks. Explaining why a longer version was not chosen for the Anthology CD compilations in a 1995 Dutch interview (as seen in the bonus disc of the bootlegged director's cut of the Anthology documentary), George Martin was blunt: "I think it gets boring." His elaboration perhaps gave away more than he would have liked about the core philosophy behind the Anthology collections: "In making these records, my consideration has been to put in works that are interesting to the majority of people. Not to Beatle fanatics. And I have to look at the public as a broad, interesting thing. And I don't want to put anything that people are going to say"—here he yawned for emphasis—"'I wonder when this is gonna finish.' And that's what that would do. Now, there are the hardcore Beatle fanatics who would love to have this. But they already have it on bootleg." Most Beatles fanatics love George Martin for what he did with the group, but most could have told him that he was wrong—we don't have it on bootleg, as none of the long versions have ever made it onto that format. (In fact, the over-halved edit of take 2 on Anthology 3 is the only version of "Helter Skelter" from this session to have made it into circulation.)

19. "Etcetera," studio outtake, August 20, 1968: The second most sought-after outtake from The White Album is Paul McCartney's "Etcetera," recorded as a one-take demo by the composer. Recalled by EMI technical engineer Alan Brown as a beautiful ballad, the tape's apparently no longer in EMI's vaults. That could be because Paul, contrary to Brown's estimation, didn't rate the song highly when he spoke about it in Barry Miles's McCartney biography Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now, where he remembered it has having been written with a Marianne Faithfull cover in mind.

20. "The Long and Winding Road," studio outtake, circa late 1968: It's also known that Paul, playing piano, did a demo of "The Long and Winding Road" at some time during the White Album sessions, in advance of it being rehearsed and recorded at the Get Back/Let It Be sessions in January 1969.

Honorable mention: George quits the band, January 10, 1969: The tape was rolling at the precise moment when George Harrison quit the Beatles (for just a few days, as it turned out) during the Get Back/Let It Be sessions—but the discussion/reaction immediately following that moment is missing from the circulating unreleased tapes.