On Nov. 22 PBS aired a fascinating special about John Lennon in New York City, titled LENNONYC. Check it out below.

Steve Marinucci’s interesting review of the film is here and Shelley Germeaux’s is here.

There is also a series of podcasts with individual interviews from those that appeared on the show. More info on that is here.

Also, I understand a DVD will be released on December 7th or a special PBS issued DVD is in stock now (just click the DVD link above the video window)!

Watch the full episode. See more American Masters.

Beatles music can be a great gift idea. Click on the links below to read about or purchase these related releases from Amazon:

1) Power To The People: The Hits – featuring the big hits all remastered in 2010

2) Gimme Some Truth – a 4-CD ultimate compilation of John Lennon’s best tracks, all remastered in 2010.

…and here’s more Amazon links for your favorite Beatles-related music: The Beatles, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr.
Visit www.thebeatlesrarity.com for a new Beatles rarity each week, plus lots more!

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Welcome to yet another installment in the Beatles Rarity Of The Week series.

When The Beatles Anthology 1 CD set was released in November 1995, I was truly in awe over it. While I had heard some of the recordings on my own unofficial releases, there were many that were new to me. And in most cases, the quality of the recordings I already had in my possession were significantly upgraded.

One fascinating example of a historically significant set of songs is explained in the set’s accompanying booklet. In the spring or summer of 1958, The Quarry Men (John, Paul, George, John Lowe & Colin Hanton) heard about a guy named Percy Phillips. Percy owned a disc cutting machine, and for a small fee could make them a 78rpm vinyl 10-inch record with one track on each side. So, of course, John’s band had to make the trek across town with their instruments and make their first record. The A-side was idol Buddy Holly’s That’ll Be The Day and the B-side was an original song written mostly by Paul, but had a guitar solo by George that earned him a composition credit too. It was called In Spite Of All The Danger. Both of these songs have lead vocals by John Lennon and both are on The Beatles Anthology 1 CD set.

However there are two more pieces to the story that were not included in the CD booklet:

1) Since there was only one copy of the disc made, it was passed around amongst the band and ended up being saved in John Lowe’s private collection, and in July 1981 he made an attempt to auction it off. Paul McCartney had him served with an injunction until he could make an offer on it himself, and ended up purchasing from Lowe what was really already partially his, for a generous price. Afterwards, Paul made copies so that the original would not be degraded any further from playing.

2) While recording In Spite Of All The Danger, Percy Phillips was signaling frantically for them to wrap it up because they were running out of time on the disc (at 3 and half minutes!). Similarly, when the track was prepared for the Anthology disc, a repeated verse and chorus (around 45 seconds) were edited out of the recording. What you are hearing here is actually a forgery, created from the Anthology 1 account by inserting a second copy of the included verse and chorus that was repeated into the appropriate section that had been removed by EMI. Note that the repeated verse begins with the line I’ll look after you like I’ve never done before.

It’s actually a pretty charming recording with Paul harmonizing and John missing his vocal entrance cues in spots. At George’s guitar solo, an unidentified Quarry Man shouts out “honky tonk!”. Paul claims to have been inspired by Elvis’s Trying To Get To You when he wrote it. And now for your listening pleasure, you have a BROW-version, restoring the song to it’s original length.

Quarry Men photo at The Casbah Club (Liverpool) opening, August 1959

Want to make a suggestion for a future Beatles Rarity of the Week? Then let me hear from you. Read about more Beatles rarities and suggest one for me to post. You can begin by searching for different versions of specific tracks right here.
Visit www.thebeatlesrarity.com for a new Beatles rarity each week, plus lots more!

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It’s that time of the week again. Happy Friday.

This week’s BROW is not a very good quality recording. In fact, it’s not even complete. The playing is not very good on it either. So what gives it the worthiness to be this week’s BROW? Well, it’s a piece of history, that’s why.

Last week’s BROW went back very early to a Beatles recording from the BBC made even before The Beatles met producer George Martin. This week goes back even earlier, when the name of the band was The Quarry Men.

When this recording was made on July 6, 1957, John Lennon was 16 years old and Paul McCartney was not yet in his band. In fact John and Paul were only to meet later that same day since Paul happened to be in the audience at The Woolton Garden Fete where this song fragment was taped.

The song The Quarry Men are playing was a British number 1 at the time called “Puttin’ On The Style” by skiffle artist Lonnie Donnegan (1931-2002). John Lennon is singing (his vocals are unmistakable) and playing guitar with Pete Shotten (washboard), Eric Griffiths (guitar), Len Garry (bass), Rodney Davis (banjo) and Colin Hanton (drums).

I believe this is the earliest known recording by what was to become The Beatles. Isn’t it great that someone happened to have a tape recorder going?

The Quarry Men

Want to make a suggestion for a future Beatles Rarity of the Week? Then let me hear from you. Read about more Beatles rarities and suggest one for me to post. You can begin by searching for different versions of specific tracks right here.
Visit www.thebeatlesrarity.com for a new Beatles rarity each week, plus lots more!

Related posts:

1. Beatles Rarity Of The Week – In Spite Of All The Danger (original length) Welcome to yet another installment in the Beatles Rarity Of...
2. Beatles Rarity Of The Week – Catswalk (1962 Cavern Club rehearsal) Welcome to this week’s BROW, which turns out to not...