Beatles, The - Anthology 1 & 2

Beatles, The - Anthology 1 & 2
Originally uploaded by omuniuum

Volume 1 covers July 1940 to March 1963. In addition to the interviews with the Beatles, we hear from schoolmate (and future band assistant) Neil Aspinall, producer George Martin, and manager Brian Epstein (in Sixties clips). We learn about the various Beatle parents and childhood memories. The guys cover the early impact of rock on them and other musical influences and trace how they got to know each other and join the same group. We hear parts of their first recording (“That’ll Be the Day”/“In Spite of All the Danger”) and other very preliminary performances. We learn about early Beatles Stuart Sutcliffe and Pete Best, the origins of the band’s name, early management and gigs, experiences in Hamburg, their return to Liverpool and rising popularity, their failed audition for Decca Records and successful test for EMI, Brian Epstein’s arrival as manager, Ringo’s recruitment into the group and Best’s departure, their first sessions with George Martin, the release of their first single (“Love Me Do”), the band’s insistence that they play their own material and the recording of “Please Please Me”, and that single’s success.

Because it concentrates on their pre-Fab years, “Volume 1” doesn’t include a lot of performance material from the Beatles. We get a Nineties solo rendition of “Twenty Flight Rock” from Paul as well as a complete band versions of “Some Other Guy” from the Cavern, a lip-synch take on “Love Me Do” from TV, and a live TV clip of “Please Please Me”. (Much more music appears in the Anthology, of course, but I’ll only list bits in which we see the Beatles perform, whether in concert or on TV.)

Volume 2 goes from March 1963 to February 1964. It includes remarks from the Beatles, Aspinall, Martin, and press officer Derek Taylor. Volume 2 starts with burgeoning Beatlemania, early UK tours, recording the Please Please Me album, playing with Roy Orbison and other tour memories plus the acquisition of road manager Mal Evans, pressures to produce new material, creating “She Loves You”, leaving Liverpool for London, Sunday Night at the London Palladium performance, dealing with fame, Royal Variety Show performance, creation of With the Beatles and its cover, and finally breaking into America.

For full performances, we find more than a handful of bits. We get a live montage of “Twist and Shout” synched with the studio recording, “She Loves You” in concern, a “This Boy” lip-synched with some montage elements, “I Saw Her Standing There” and “Long Tall Sally” live on Swedish TV, “From Me to You”, “Til There Was You” and “Twist and Shout” live from the Royal Variety Show, “Please Mr. Postman” lip-synched on TV (nearly complete), “Roll Over Beethoven” live on TV (nearly complete with narration over the end), and a TV lip-synch performance of “I Want to Hold Your Hand”. We also get partial snippets of a lip-synched “From Me to You” lip-synch, both the Stones’ and the Beatles’ “I Wanna Be Your Man”; the former’s truly live, while the latter’s a lip-synched TV rendition. The episode tosses in some audio outtakes from the recording studio plus a clip from the band’s skits on the Morecambe and Wise TV show.