Roll Up For The Mystery Tour!
1962 - 1966

If you are a new fan, you are undoubtedly confused over where to start this journey into the world of Beatlemania. Start with Anthology? Videos? Books? As your tour guide, I recommend you "Get Back" to the beginning where it all began and experience the trip as it was meant to be - with a little help from your friends.

You may also skip ahead to 1966 - 1970.

To get the full impact of the Beatles, you need to put yourself back in time to 1963, a time when music was very un-fab. Begin your tour by listening to a few songs of this time:

• Go Away Little Girl (Steve Lawrence)
• Blue Velvet (Bobby Vinton)
• Dominique (Singing Nun!)

Lame indeed! Of course, some of the music was not bad. The Beach Boys and Jan and Dean were there, as was Leslie (It's My Party) Gore. But you cannot underestimate the impact of hearing your car radio blasting The Beatles for the first time after listening to years of sap. (Sort of like hearing "Free as a Bird" in 1996 juxtaposed next to Whitney Houstin, only better.)

Also, you must have a President that you actually like assasinated. Since it will be difficult in 1996 for that to happen, perhaps imagine if the internet died or was no longer free. People were that sad.

Now, turn off the color on your TV and make everything around you black and white. You are now living at home with absolutely no options for happiness, your sister has braces and your dad has a crewcut and horned rimmed glasses. Just for fun, let's make him smoke at dinnertime and let's put mom into a plaid dress and apron.

Depressed yet? Then you are ready! Go out and buy the following:

• The Complete Beatle Chronicle, Lewisohn. Considered by most to be the definative guide to Beatle history and recording sessions.

• Please Please Me album. The first official Beatle album. ("Meet The Beatles", which is no longer available, was the first Capitol Record release and was actually an edit of The Beatles' second album, "With The Beatles".)

• Past Masters, Volume 1 album. Includes singles not available on the actual released albums. The Beatles did not think it was fair to include singles on the albums since their fans already had bought the singles.

• Live At The BBC album. Listen to some of the early tracks like "I Got A Woman" or "Soldier of Love" to get a good feel for what this band could do "live" and imagine if you can hearing this new music in the sweaty Cavern Club.

• Anthology 1: The outtakes of this era show the roots of the band and their hits and misses along the way. Try to listen to these tracks in the proper sequence - this means exercising tremendous self control to only play the tracks that appy to this era with the objective of gaining more insight to the original releases.

Now that you have all the goods, read the book through the release of the "Please Please Me" album and listen to the music they created in 13 hours. (Notice the squeek in Ringo's bass drum pedal!) Study up on the BBC tracks to hear the early influences, from Chuck Berry to Buddy Holly. Take a listen to the early demos from Anthology 1 and the Decca audition tapes to get an appreciation of where the Beatles started from and how quickly they improved. Now, listen to "I Want To Hold Your Hand" off "Past Masters". Play it in your car so loud that your parents (or your kids) yell at you to "turn that noise down"! You are officially entering Pepperland.

"Shut up while he's talking", says John

Begin this month with the following goods:

• With The Beatles album. Their second album. Note the large amount of "cover" songs on this album. Though emerging as strong songwriters, they still didn't have enough quality originals to fill out an album. The "covers" are holdovers from their live act, including "Money", "Please Mr. Postman", and "Roll Over Beethovan". Compare these versions with their BBC "live" versions.

• The Beatles: Their First U.S. Visit videotape. Official Apple release. This is a great tape that gives you a real version of "A Hard Days Night". It even has a great train sequence, as well as concert footage. This tape gives you a great feel for what early Beatlemania was like.

• A Hard Days Night album and videotape. This is where the images of who The Beatles are was born. You might also want to pick up the optional "Making of A Hard Days Night" video at this point.

Always begin with Lewisohn's book. Start with "Anthology 1" and listen to disc 2, which has the famous live performance in England (where John told the royalty to "rattle their jewelry") and then to their first Ed Sullivan performance. The Ed Sullivan show was the first exposure to The Beatles for most Americans. Paul warbles "All My Lovin'" as the opening song, and parents everywhere declared The Beatles as long-haired hoodlums just making noise.

Proceed to "With The Beatles", then watch the "U.S. Visit" video. Begin to grow your hair longer now and get your friends together to form a "beat group" and try to play the first chord of "A Hard Days Night". You may now listen and watch "A Hard Days Night". Make sure you turn down all the lights when you watch the movie. If you can, invite a dozen 12 - 14 year old girls over to scream throughout the entire movie. Have them paint a banner that says "I LOVE PAUL" and wave it whenever Paul sings. Fantastic!

Some have wondered whether this portrait of "loveable moptops" (as John would later sarcastically label this era) is true or fabricated. But watch how the true personalities come through even though they are following a script: Paul is the amiable Beatle, eager to smile and please, John is the witty and sarcastic one, George is aloof and perhaps less at ease as a Beatle, and Ringo is loveable. Time has told us that these traits are true, or at least true enough! So look at this film as a semi-cinema verite documentary.

The music from the film is exceptionally strong and still holds up today. Try to put the music back into the context of early '60s rock and roll, when sappy produced pop songs played side by side with The Beatles. Can you even imagine a band today responsible for songs as strong as "I Should Have Known Better", "If I Fell", "And I Love Her", "Can't Buy Me Love", and "You Can't Do That" - and put them all on one album?

Listen to the Anthology version of "Can't Buy Me Love", which is take 2, to hear how different and unpolished the "early" version of the song is. This makes the final version, take 4, all the more amazing when you realize that the entire 4 takes took less than an hour! Yes - from working version to the final release that you know by heart in less than one hour!

Recording "Can't Buy Me Love" at Pathe Marconi in Paris

Their next album, "Beatles For Sale", is considered by some to be their weakest album. Recorded in the thick of Beatlemania and touring, they were stretched pretty thin. One of Paul's "new" songs was "I'll Follow The Sun", a song he wrote years ago when he was a mere 16 years old. Paul himself said this song was not recorded earlier because they felt it wasn't good enough. A bootleg version of this song is circulating from the Cavern Club era, only with a rockabilly feel that makes the early version quite different from the lovely mid-tempo ballad that was released.

They followed up with "HELP!" and another movie ("this one was in a-color", John would remark). Folk and protest music was strong at this point. You can hear the difference in their music as they switch to acoustic guitars and Lennon stretches with more introspective lyrics. Originally titled "Eight Arms To Hold You", the movie was once going to use "Eight Days A Week" as the title song. Only after Paul and John got into a little competition to see who could write the new title song did John pull off "Help!", reading the lyrics he scrawled on a matchbook cover. John was later very vocal about what the song actually meant - it was him crying out for help, this being what he called his "Fat Elvis" period.

Don't forget to listen to the singles off the "Past Masters" disc, as well as the outtakes from Anthology 1, and always read the book before listening to the music!

This months supplies:

• Beatles For Sale album. Not a great one by Beatle standards, but any album with "Eight Days A Week" on it can't be that bad. Add "Leave My Kitten Alone" from Anthology 1 and have a listen to the outtake from "Mr. Moonlight". Compare the released versions with the Anthology outtakes to appreciate the creativity in the studio, and read along in the book to put all the takes (most recorded one after another) back in context. Even with a "weak" album The Beatle magic still shines through.

• HELP! album and videotape. Their second movie and another great soundtrack album. On the original album, side one was the movie songs and side two were songs that didn't make it. Considering that side two has such gems as "I've Just Seen A Face" and "It's Only Love" (a song John hated but most fans love), you can see why this album was such a big hit. The title song, "Help!", was originally much slower. John was convinced to speed it up to make it more commercial.

HELP! You can see the strain of Beatlemania in the movie, for the most part uninspired and flat. But just as you wonder whether the Beatle sheen has worn off, they sing and you regain all confidence in them. The music, as always, is great. Pay special attention to "Yesterday", a song often criticized as overplayed and sappy. Imagine hearing it for the first time at a time when a string quartet was absolutely avandt garde!

If you have it, now is a good time to listen to the "Hollywood Bowl" concert, which was released on vinyl (not CD) in the '70s. The Beatles sound great live, and you can almost imagine yourself in the middle of all of those screaming girls. Search around your favorite local record store for the bootleg Hollywood Bowl CD, which typically contains both the '64 and '65 concerts. You should now be feeling slightly overwhelmed and wondering what the Fab Four could do next to top this success.

You are now in the mid-sixties. Begin this month by burning an American flag in your front yard and chanting "Hell No, We Won't Go!" in your car on your way to work. Now that you are in the spirit, pick up these supplies:

• Rubber Soul album. Considering that this album was quickly recorded to satisfy Capitol Records executives who wanted yet another new album, it is one of their best and very listenable 30 years later. It is hard to believe that the recording didn't start until October 12, 1966 and the album had to be in stores by early December for the holiday season!

  Songs were recorded in this order: "Run For Your Life" and "Norwegian Wood" outtake (10/12), "Drive My Car" (10/13), "Day Tripper" single (10/16), "If I Needed Someone" (10/16, 10/18), "In My Life" (10/18), "We Can Work It Out" single (10/20), "Norwegian Wood" (10/21), "I'm Looking Through You" outtake (10/24), "Michelle" (11/3), "What Goes On" (11/4), "12 Bar Original" outtake (11/4), "I'm Looking Through You" (11/6), "The Word" (11/10), "You Won't See Me" and "Girl" (11/11). "Wait" was from the "Help!' sessions and added to Rubber Soul when they needed one more song to finish the album.

• Revolver album. Some fans like this one even better than Sgt. Pepper. Now that touring is over, you can hear the music take on greater depths on this album. From the bright horns of Paul's "Got To Get You Into My Life" to the strange drone of "Tomorrow Never Knows", this is one classic Beatle album. No more straight pop. This one was, and still is, unique and original.

• Past Masters, Volume 2 album. More singles left off the albums.

• Anthology 2 album. Incredible outtakes from this era (and into Sgt. Pepper/Magical Mystery Tour). When the touring stops, the studio outtakes get even more interesting. Compare "Got To Get You Into My Life" outtake with the final version and you will see that they never ceased to experiment.

Optional: If you ever wanted to begin a life of drug abuse, now is a good time to begin dropping acid and smoking pot. You might want to read the "Tibetan Book Of The Dead" to better understand the lyrics to "Tomorrow Never Knows." Also, if you actively participate in the rec.music.beatles newsgroup (and if you don't, check it out), this is a good time to post the age-old question of who wrote the music to "In My Life"? Lennon or McCartney? (Paul claims he did but Lennon fans claim this can't be true. Go figure.)

With Beatlemania in full swing, the boys are beginning to feel the strain of touring. Can it go on forever? Will they ever falter? This is the end of their live concerts, and if you heard any of the concert bootlegs from this era or seen any of the live shows, you know why. They could barely hear each other because there were no "monitors" on the stage like today that would let them hear what each other was playing. Not only that, but The Beatles' music was expanding and couldn't be reproduced on stage. In their last tour they did no songs from their new album, "Revolver". It just couldn't be done.

With death threats from right-wingers who just couldn't accept that the Beatles were bigger than Jesus to having the entire population of the Philipines wanting to kill you because you snubbed their leader by not making a personal visit, The Beatles knew it was time to end the live show.

Special Project

Want to feel like The Beatles did back then? Then during a big meeting at work when you are suppose to be making the final presentation to your largest client, tell them that your company is "bigger than Jesus". When your boss gives you that "I'm going to kill you" look, defend yourself by saying "Christianity will go, but our company will stay." Later, hold a press conference and claim you were misquoted.

Moptops no more?

End of Part One

Continue to Part 2