So nice to hear John in the late 60s being complimentary about the Beatles... unlike the next few years.
It is indeed possible that the show was sent to Australia by the BBC, but I would expect some of the older Aussie Beatle fans here would remember it screening. The Abc music shows of the time (maybe GTK or the earlier ones), sometimes played isolated clips from things. It may have been edited off a full version over here and then remained archived in the ABC vaults as only a single song clip and the original complete show may not have survived. However why only edit off Octopus's Garden and not also others? Certainly some posters have mentioned Abc Australia music shows (Hitscene?) that have many many episodes still in the vaults that have never been aired during Rage's Retro Month years. Fascinating find nonetheless. I would love to know the answers.
I have some more information regarding the Saturday Night Live show, contemporary with the original screening, but it is going to take a little time to decipher so bear with me. It is looking less likely that the programme was repeated on 10 October as previously believed although more may turn up regarding this. It seems that although some items were on videotape the programme itself was broadcast essentially live (which makes repeats and overseas sales maybe a little less likely). A range of film sources were used and I think a least some part (dancers?) were live in the studio (perhaps a bit like Pan's People on Top Of The Pops). I will see what I can ascertain from the information and post later - probably tonight in reality! One other item. The Rage film segment of Octopus's Garden (which may or may not have originated from the Saturday Night Line-Up) seems to have originated from the 1942 colour film Reap The Wild Wind - a much better quality clip than in the Rage compilation can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0Mr4VbnW08. It appears that given the commercial clearances required for use of this film sequence it is less likely to have been used in the Saturday Night Live broadcast. It is also not clear at this point if the bikini girl swimming in the Octopus's Garden clip is from the same film - it does not seem to be sequenced as it would in the original film anyway.
Would you please get the name of the original program right!! - it was called "Late Night Line Up" and was not and never was called "Saturday Night Live".. it wasn't even aired on a Saturday night! You are just confusing anyone who hasn't read this thread from page 1. Good find with "Reap The Wild Wind" BTW.
Sorry. Not sure where I picked that up from but I have just carried on using it! Will stop doing it immediately! I was convinced That I must have picked the name up from a previous poster but no it looks like I just completely fabricated it. Needless to say I have been referring to Late Night Line Up all along. Apologies for the confusion caused. Will try harder in future!
OK. I'm going to do this in stages as it may be quite lengthy. LATE NIGHT LINE-UP Friday, 19th September 1969: 10.55pm This is effectively the running order of the programme: (The visuals will be dealt with later and are somewhat speculative.) 1. Come Together (3:55) There would have been a caption during this item stating LINE_UP PRESENTS and the LP sleeve shown in some format It would then appear that there would be a live studio "TURNTABLE LINK" (this is presumably the spinning record described by those who remember the broadcast) 2. Maxwell's Silver Hammer (3.25) (TURNTABLE LINK) 3. Here Comes The Sun (3:04) (TURNTABLE LINK) 4. Because (2:41) (TURNTABLE LINK) 5. Octopus's Garden (2:46) (TURNTABLE LINK) 6. Sun King (2:26) (TURNTABLE LINK) 7. Mean Mr Mustard (1:08) Polythene Pan (1:17) (TURNTABLE LINK) 8. Something (2:59) (TURNTABLE LINK) 9. You Never Give Me Your Money (3:45) (TURNTABLE LINK) 10. Golden Slumbers (3:00) 10a. Golden Slumber (reprise) (0:45) LP cover back 11. The End (0:22) - Her Majesty deleted? This is our starting point. Now we need to investigate what may have been shown. Various hints will follow shortly but next will follow some contemporary press release info.
LATE NIGHT LINE-UP: Press preview from Daily Mirror (Friday 19 September 1969) "The Rowan and Beatles Pop-In" by Clifford Davis Rowan Ayres, editor of "Line Up" gets a big pop scoop tonight (BBC 2. 10.55) - the first presentation of the new Beatles LP "Abbey Road". The title come from the studios in North West London where EMI which has the world's top group under contract records the Beatles' hits. Tonight will be the first time the tracks have been heard. "The Beatles approached us," the BBC says. "It seems they often watch the programme and they like the way pop music has been covered visually." Devices Ayres plans to use about a dozen tracks and to illustrate the music with caption, film sequences and electronic devices. Many top pop people - performers, recording executives and experts - will be watching with tremendous interest. And so I imagine will ATV. For although ATV - through its new shareholding in Northern Songs - has management control over the Beatles music, they are not in a position, even if they wanted to, to stop the Beatles giving their LP to the BBC. EMI must feel strange about things too. They have a stake in Thames Television, another ITV company. But the Beatles still have the last word about which network presents their discs first. And they have chosen the BBC. Tonight's presentation will be TV history. Nothing like it has been attempted before, and it may set a pattern for future programmes. Odd therefore that they did not save it if it was previewed as being "TV history"!
REBUILDING ABBEY ROAD LATE-NIGHT LINE-UP: Part 1: Photo sources documented for use in programme: NASA: 6 stills (Moon and Earth) APPLE: 2 stills (?) The 6 NASA photos were used during the 4. Because segment and apparently carried no fee. It does appear that NASA imagery (at least where no people are identifiable) tend to be copyright free. The front and back of the album are documented as being shown at the start and end segments of the programme and could account for the 2 Apple stills but I feel that as they broadcast the album being played in the studio they probably had access to the actual LP sleeve also. So we have two Apple photos unaccounted for at this stage.
LATE NIGHT LINE-UP PEOPLE 1: Michael Fentiman (co-producer of the Abbey Road special) Obituary (from the Guardian) Michael James Fentiman, television producer and writer, born 27 September 1938; died 22 February 2017 The innovative spirit of BBC2’s Late Night Line-Up owed much to the creative skills of one of its senior producers, Mike Fentiman, who has died aged 78. His enthusiasm and wide range of interests fired up a whole generation of programme makers to create lively and often surprising television. He championed the new, pioneered the radical and irritated the BBC establishment. The initial idea of Late Night Line-Up – broadcast every night from 1964 until 1972 – was to look at the evening’s output of the BBC’s two channels with informed and appropriate guests, and I was one of its four long-term presenters. People such as Ken Loach and Tony Garnett would discuss Cathy Come Home, while Clive James and Jonathan Miller appeared regularly as critics. Before long these nightly chats were flanked by different forms and subjects. An avalanche of new music found its way into the programmes: the Who, the Kinks, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix. Soon there was poetry, book and film reviews, and comedy. Michael Palin and Terry Jones honed their new style of humour, Ivor Cutler his surrealist monologues. Line-Up was to spawn significant offspring – Colour Me Pop, The Old Grey Whistle Test, Film Night – and Mike was the energising spirit behind much of this enterprise. All his creative life he pushed at the boundaries of what the corporation would tolerate. And sometimes beyond. Mike always enjoyed an adventure. In 1967 Line-Up had picked up rumours that radical thinkers and writers were on the move in Czechoslovakia. Under the pretext of reporting on that year’s Prague television festival, Mike and I went out to snatch undercover interviews with, among others, the playwright Václav Havel and the film director Miloš Forman; they spoke of the rising tide of discontent and resistance to communist rule. The following year, the Prague Spring led to occupation by Soviet-controlled forces. It took till 1989 for communist government to collapse in the Velvet Revolution, and for Havel to become president. Born in East Ham, east London, Mike was the son of James, an engineer, and his wife, Dorothy (nee Morris). He was educated at a number of primary schools, the only pupil in his year to pass the 11-plus. He attended East Ham grammar school for boys and Leicester University, graduating in 1960 with a degree in English literature. After a brief stint as a teacher he took up a traineeship as a studio manager in the overseas service of the BBC. By 1965 he had joined Late Night Line-Up, and was to stay at the BBC until ill-health forced his retirement in the 1990s. Mike’s passion for public service broadcasting was ideological. He believed every opinion deserved to be heard, every outlook given access. He took the risk of transmitting a film made by American Vietnam draft dodgers that was banned in the US. His film Rocking the Botha gave apartheid protesters their voice. In 1984, his Taking Liberties film reported the miners’ strike from their point of view. His efforts brought frequent conflicts with the higher echelons of the BBC. The move towards access television went back to an incident in 1972 when the Line-Up presenter Tony Bilbow visited the Guinness factory to record workers’ views of television. He was met with hostility: “You types will just take what we say and cut out what you don’t like,” they told him. Bilbow guaranteed there and then this would not be so. Mike grabbed the idea and the opportunity. He and Line-Up editor Rowan Ayers persuaded the BBC to approve the idea of “community programming” – an editorial attitude that, as he put it, “did not derive from the assumptions of the university educated elite who are commonly believed to dominate television production.” In 1961 Mike married Dorothy Filby and they had three children, Jonathan, Kate and Daniel. They divorced in 1988, and in 1989 he married Patrice Abrams. They had two daughters, Jessica and Eleanor, and divorced in 2013. He is survived by his children and nine grandchildren.
LATE NIGHT LINE-UP PEOPLE 2: Rowan Ayers (co-producer of the Abbey Road special) Obituary (from the Guardian) Rowan Ayers, television producer and journalist, born June 16 1922; died January 5 2008 Rowan Ayers, the creator of BBC2's innovative Late Night Line-Up programme - and one of the first producers to open up the airwaves to public participation in the 1960s - has died in Queensland, Australia, at the age of 85. What he did behind the scenes had an enormous effect on British television. Everything about him personally - his demeanour, attitudes, beliefs and charm - was inseparable from Ayers, the television executive. The modus operandi he brought to meetings, his uncontrived manner and unpredictable plans for programming, rarely failed to set alarm bells ringing on the sixth floor of Television Centre, west London. But any concern was always tempered by an admiration for his innovative ideas and his daring leaps into the unknown. Supported by such luminaries as Huw Wheldon and David Attenborough, he was able to fight off other departments' opposition to Late Night Line-Up's groundbreaking policy of reviewing not only the BBC's output but also that of ITV. In those days it was anathema to the BBC hierarchy to even acknowledge the existence of ITV on screen. Although Late Night Line-Up's remit was to review all the communicating arts - theatre, television, music, films and books - it was always the TV reviews that caused ructions. But Ayers' great advantage was live television and the inability of any outside force to wield the editing scissors before transmission. Born in Essex, Ayers attended Dulwich college, south London, where he showed great promise at the classics and ancient history. At the outbreak of the second world war, he joined the Royal Navy, turning his back on plans to continue his studies at Cambridge University. He was a midshipman on the battleship HMS Duke of York when it ferried Churchill to America for a secret meeting with Roosevelt after Pearl Harbor, and served throughout the battle of the Atlantic. Demobbed with the rank of lieutenant at the end of the war, he worked for a short time as assistant editor of the Boy's Own Paper before becoming a freelance copywriter. Over the next three years he had 50 short stories published in magazines and two radio plays produced by the BBC. He became TV editor of Radio Times in 1955, and, in 1961, moved to BBC-TV as assistant head of presentation. Here, he revealed the first indications of his long-term interest in access television, producing Points of View. With the imminent arrival of BBC2 in 1964, Ayers planned a 10-minute programme, Line-Up, to start each evening as a trailer for that night's programmes. It soon transferred to the end of the evening, changing its title to Late Night Line-Up - and its operation from trailing to reviewing. The advantage of being the last programme of the night meant that it could run as long as the content merited. In the hands of a group of largely unknown young presenters recruited by Ayers - Denis Tuohy, Joan Bakewell, Michael Dean, Tony Bilbow and Philip Jenkinson - the programme went from strength to strength. Vaclav Havel, Woody Allen, Albert Speer, Duke Ellington, Jacob Bronowski, Gore Vidal and Karlheinz Stockhausen are just some of the names in the visitors' book at this time. The programme also produced a number of spin-off series. Film Night with Bilbow developed into Film 72 with Barry Norman (and is currently running as Film 2008 with Jonathan Ross), and Colour Me Pop and Disc 2 led on to The Old Grey Whistle Test. When Late Night Line-Up finished in 1973, after 3,000 editions, Ayers was appointed to run the BBC community programmes unit, from where he conducted his purest experiment with access television, setting up Open Door, a programme that gave a voice to a large number of disparate groups - and significantly, gave them editorial control. The success of Open Door led to him being invited to speak in Australia on the future of access television, and by the end of 1974 he had emigrated and was lecturing at Macquarie University, Sydney. This was followed by a three-year contract as executive producer with Kerry Packer's Channel 9, where among other things he supervised the station's 1976 Olympic games coverage and a six-part documentary on Africa. In 1997, he retired to Noosa, on Queensland's sunshine coast, where time spent sailing his yacht alternated with directing plays for the local theatre. Married four times, he is survived by his son, Kevin Ayers, a founding member of the 1960s psychedelic band, Soft Machine.
REBUILDING ABBEY ROAD LATE-NIGHT LINE-UP: Part 2: Film sources documented as used in programme: A: "Because" footage speculation: "Moon Walk" (38ft 16mm) approx 1 minute - Pathe Film Library Whilst it is not possible to state what footage this is the only moon walk possible is Apollo 11 with Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin from July 1969. Other landings would have been after the broadcast of the Abbey Road Special. Pathe still licence footage and the most obvious candidate is a segment of the astronauts on the moon in front of the Lunar Module. The wonderful historic footage was at that time some of the most historically important and ground-breaking imagery captured (the ghostly shimmering nature of the film only adds to its impact). A six and a half minute compilation of footage from the first moon landing is available from British Pathe: Pictures of the moon landings. Blurred images inside lunar module 'Eagle' of Neil Armstrong adjusting camera and equipment etc. Various shots of the surface of the moon. MS Neil Armstrong climbing down ladder onto surface of moon and describing what it is like. MS Armstrong and Edwin (Buzz) Aldrin walking across moon, various shots of moon's surface. MS astronauts walking along surface. MS Aldrin and Armstrong planting the Stars and Stripes flag of the United States of America in the surface and standing by it. MS of the men standing and jumping on the moon, and speaking into microphones about what they are seeing and experiencing. Link to potential footage: Man On The Moon The obvious candidate for this footage would be Because as we know that NASA photos were used as part of this segment. As the broadcast version of this song was 2:41 and only a minute of moon walk footage was use the programme makers must have incorporate other footage even if the 6 photographic images from NASA were given full screen treatment. "Universe" (75ft 16mm) approx 2 minutes - National Film Board of Canada Universe is an interesting 28 minute film mixing film and animation which takes the viewer on a voyage through space: "A triumph of film art, creating on the screen a vast, awe-inspiring picture of the universe as it would appear to a voyager through space, this film was among the sources used by Stanley Kubrick in his 2001: A Space Odyssey. Realistic animation takes you into far regions of space, beyond the reach of the strongest telescope, past Moon, Sun, and Milky Way into galaxies yet unfathomed." Link to potential footage: Universe Early segments of this film featuring the moon would dovetail well with the moon landing footage to provide an interesting video accompaniment to the Because section of the Abbey Road special with the NASA images that are documented to have been used.
A couple of years ago on another forum-I suggested a possible DVD 5.1 of Abbey Road using reverse sync footage from Get Back sessions (at least whatever exists on film), George's Something video and finding Ringo's footage from that special. Also CGI on John's One to One performance of Come Together (like they did to the Beatles on the Rock Band promo), perhaps some of the cool non-CGI animation from Rock Band, and even the technology recently shown of animating old photos (from Super bowl commercial). I had never heard of this special from the thread though I do have Lewisohn's Chronicles. While it might sound a little hokey...I think adding new visuals to old music is fine if you stick to the theme (unlike the What is Life contest video winner-showing a girl dancing). Sounds like they tried to do just that in an era where there was not a lot of footage to go by.
REBUILDING ABBEY ROAD LATE-NIGHT LINE-UP: "Something" footage speculation: It is documented that Something featured a "girl dancing" (probably in the studio) to the music and some slides superimposed or mixed with this footage. Elsewhere there is documented mention of 26 "gooey slides". This would seem to point to a Pan's People type visual accompaniment to the song with perhaps a psychedelic light-show style overlay. The dancer is identified as Jane London. She has proved quite illusive, however a good friend of mine has unearthed an article from The Daily Mirror newspaper from Wednesday 30 July 1969 (perfect date-matching) which reports on the dancing progress of one Julie London. With the headline "Jane Graduates To Show Business" the short report states: "It's obvious from Jane London's sunny smile that she is happy in her work. And she has a lot of work to be happy in - dancing, modelling, commercials and films. Jane, 23, used to be a teacher, instructing little girls in the intricacies of dance and drama at a college in Kensington. Then she decided to try practicing what she preached. She must have been paying attention to herself in class because after just 18 months in the new world of show business she is doing very nicely, thank you. And as her admirers point out, she is a most attractive subject to study." The article features a large photograph of a blonde-haired girl who could almost be the mystery mini-skirted model on the rear sleeve of the Abbey Road album. Again there is no confirmation that this dancer is the actual Jane London from the programme but all evidence does point to it being a distinct possibility. This segment of the programme is probably going to be one of the few that cannot be recovered in any form as it was essentially played live into the broadcast. Other footage may exist in film libraries and could be synched to the music tracks to produce an approximation of the programme as broadcast.
OK we have had a go at Something and Because tonight. There is more to come and research is continuing. There is some leads on Octopus's Garden which are very interesting but perhaps indicate that the Australian Rage footage does not originate from the Late Night Line-Up show.
Late Nite Line Up did go out live, so maybe there isn't an official recording of it - though someone earlier in the thread suggests it was repeated on the Sunday after the original showing. Am I right in remembering that the Sunday night programme was a sort of compilation of the previous week's programmes? Either way, some sort of recording must've been made if it was repeated. But as I missed the Friday night broadcast due to a local power cut, I think I would've remembered if there'd been a second chance to see it.
From the information I have at present the repeat looks less likely to have occured. This perhaps makes the recording of the episode less like to have occured or have been retained. Will tryto ascertain if there is any more information regarding this. It seems unlikely that if a repeat of a Beatles related programme was possible the BBC would have passed on the option. Perhaps it was contractual that there was only one screening and therefore no recording was made.
REBUILDING ABBEY ROAD LATE-NIGHT LINE-UP: Part 3: Film sources documented as used in programme: B: "Octopus's Garden" footage speculation: Two film sources are documented for the Octopus's Garden segment of the programme but no actual footage title or description is given: 1. 150ft 16mm footage from Filmfinders Ltd (part of Octopus's Garden and You Never Give Me you Money) 2. 131ft 16mm footage from Henry Howard, Mitchell Monkhouse Associates (Octopus's Garden) With no actual footage title noted we are left with two suppliers and the length of film used. The first footage equates to approximately 4min 10 secs but is shared between two tracks from the album and the second footage is around 3min 35secs (these are rough approximations but give an idea of what footage was used. The Octopus's Garden clip is around 2min 45secs so if the utilisation details are correct it may mean that parts of either section of footage may also have been elsewhere. Next the two suppliers: Filmfinders Ltd The collection of Filmfinders is now controlled by Moving Image Communications and is reported to consist of film from 1900 to about 1934 (feature, interest, documentary material covering most aspects of silent cinema and introduction of sound). Video: 180 hours. Now 75% of the library is on either 1-inch or Betacam, with VHS viewing cassettes. Video components: VHS Video, Beta/Beta-SP, 1-inch Video. Film: 200 hours. The film holdings include material on early transport (railroad, stage coaches), 1920s and 1930s novelty acts, vintage car comedy compilations and house-produced compilations on various subjects e.g. cliff hangers, custard pie battles and syncopated black and white cartoons (150 hours). 10% colour film, 90% black and white film. Feature films, other material. Film components: 16mm. No catalogue seems to be available as the collection appears too diverse to classify. Requirements are given on application from the supplier. At first this does not appear particularly useful but when looked at in connection with the second supplier there are some clues. Henry Howard, Mitchell Monkhouse Associates Malcolm Mitchell was a guitarist, bandleader, composer and vocalist: born London 9 November 1926; died Bognor Regis, Sussex 9 March 1998. Mitchell had his own television series on BBC and Southern television and wrote the music for Bob Monkhouse's Golden Silents television series. He eventually formed a group, Mitchell Monkhouse Associates (MMA), for the production of music and jingles, with Monkhouse and Henry Howard. MMA was a pioneer in the prestige business conference field, and as the publicity firm HP:ICM designed the massive figures for the Millennium Dome. Bob Monkhouse (1 June 1928 – 29 December 2003) was a comedy writer, comedian and actor and was also well known on television as a presenter and game show host. An expert on the history of silent cinema and a film collector, Monkhouse presented Mad Movies in 1966. He wrote, produced, financed and syndicated the show worldwide. The show featured clips from comic silent films, many from his own private collection, some of which he had helped to recover and restore. Henry Howard was born on June 2, 1927. He is a producer and actor, known for Mad Movies (1965), The Patti Page Show (1956) and Perry Como's Kraft Music Hall (1948). Mad Movies: During 1965 and 1966 Bob presented a programme called Mad Movies. It featured clips of silent movies of Buster Keaton, Charles Chaplin, etc. Octopus's Garden clip Speculation: So, we can probably assume that as both of these suppliers specialised in silent and early cinema productions that the Octopus's Garden footage was of this type. I have not been able, at present, to ascertain any details of the Mad Movies compilation clips which may suggest a fit with the song but since a lot of vintage footage featured dramatic usage of vehicles and special effects I can imagine that there would have been some water based footage that could have been utilised. Perhaps there are people out there who may have knowledge of the kind of material that could have been sourced from these suppliers at that point in time. This documented source material from the Abbey Road Late Night Line-Up programme does seem to rule out the Diver/Octopus/Bikini Girl footage that turned up on the Rage Beatles special. This was from a later period colour film from the 1940s which was still being screened on TV at the time Abbey Road was released. As Reap The Wild Wind is not documented as a piece of film footage used in the special it would seem to preclude this Rage footage as being part of the programme. It seems less likely therefore that TV archives in Australia are going to uncover the Late Night Line-Up programme. I realise that this is not what we all wanted to hear but it is looking less likely that the programme is going to be rediscovered after all this time if indeed it was ever recorded on film or tape in the first place. It may well have been broadcast live and if no repeat was scheduled there would have been little point in preserving it. I know that sounds short-sighted now but without a potential domestic TV repeat or sales reason, keeping this on expensive videotape or tele-recorded film would have been a luxury that would have not been considered viable. Sorry. However, although there were legal issues with the Bob Monkhouse film archive and some of his massive film collection was taken from him prior to his death, there is still the possibility that the original silent footage used for the Octopus's Garden segment still exists somewhere. What was included however is still open for debate. What we need is a detailed list and description of the compilation of film used in Mad Movies and that was held in 1969 by Filmfinders Ltd. Anybody?! I would suggest that as the time someone making the decision about what footage was to be used in LNLU would have been looking through a list of potential footage to licence and for Octopus's Garden would have been looking for keywords - octopus, undersea, diver, diving, coral reef etc. - for a fit. More to follow, but perhaps someone out there can run with some of the speculation and perhaps have access to some details that may help with.
The use of silent film footage from the early days of cinema to illustrate non-performance music tracks became standard practice on Old Grey Whistle Test and other off-shoots of Late Night Line Up in the pre-video age. There may be some acknowledgement in the credits from these later shows that might point to the origin of the clips used in the Abbey Road programme. The journalist Richard Williams was involved very early on in these shows. If he could be contacted, via social media, he might provide some useful information. Bob Harris is easily reachable but he was involved much later.
An interesting fact that seems to have emerged from the timings of the tracks included in the programme as documented to have been shown is that in addition to I Want You (She's So Heavy), Oh Darling and She Came In Through The Bathroom Window it would appear that The End was also not included. BBC documentation seems to confuse The End and Her Majesty (perhaps because the latter is uncredited on the sleeve, and they definitely had access to the cover as both front and rear are indicated as being shown on screen). The slot credited to The End (Her Majesty) is only 22 seconds so it would appear to be the latter that was played. On the plus side, although not credited at all in the BBC documentation, the time slot for Golden Slumbers would suggest that Carry That Weight was included also.
@dormouse... I find everything what you're saying to be fascinating and enjoy even reading about the 'speculative' stuff. I do appreciate the research you have been doing and who knows, even if the programme is long-gone (sadly, almost a certainty) it might aid someone somewhere to unearth something concrete, by jogging a distant memory. It was a pleasant surprise to see this thread become suddenly so active, after I was thinking that almost everything had already been said. I know some have access to old newspaper scans via their local libraries - someone mentioned that to me a few years ago now (I can't remember what that was regarding although it wouldn't be relevant to this anyway.) BUT I do wonder if there is any way to access scans of old Radio Times? There are people who collect copies of them and so they come up for sale in the usual places online. Now, that would be interesting just to see the entry for this tv show! Also, I wonder if they did a feature on it - like they did whenever a new series was due to start, or one was about to return? Looking on this searchable site, at the dates given for broadcast, there is no mention of the show - just the listing for the name of the 'parent' series : BBC Genome But I didn't really expect there to be. Any avenue is worth exploring though...
No, not even nearly true. Where does this stuff come from? The Beatles did have the first 4 Philips audio cassette recorders in Britain, in October 1964. Not video.
Thanks for the post - much appreciated. There is more to come but it does sometimes take time to search around for leads regarding the various pieces of footage that may have been (and in some cases were) used. Keep dropping in. I have been talking to a friend who may well have access to the TV Times for that date. He did provide a copy of the Daily Mirror page which had the short article that I quoted in a previous post. I feel sure that he would have mentioned a Radio Times article if one had been written at the time of the show but I will ask anyway. I suspect that it just gave a brief listing and that is why he came up with the newspaper item instead. It is surprising how little this programme seems to have left in its wake. I would have thought that it would have had a much higher profile given that it previewed a good proportion of what would be the final recorded Beatles album. I guess the fact that the Beatles were only peripherally involved lowered the reporting somewhat. It is however an interesting footnote and one that deserves some investigation. Thanks again for the comments.
I thought they were the first four people in Britain to own homes. Wasn't Britain a very uncivilized place, with people still living in caves and trees, until the Beatles created modern forms of habitation?
I'm not sure when the first domestic video recorder appeared in the UK. For a long time it was reported that the Steptoe and Son writers, Galton and Simpson, recorded some previously believed lost episodes of the classic sitcom and therefore they have survived. However it appears that this is not actually the case. A short feature on the British Comedy Classics website states: "There is a story has it that the episodes were recorded off-air by Galton and Simpson themselves. However it isn’t quite true. These episodes still exist because copies were made from the master tapes for writers Galton and Simpson by an engineer at the BBC using a Shibaden SV-700 half-inch reel-to-reel b/w video recorder—a forerunner of the video cassette recorder." Whether they did in fact have such a machine to play them on is not detailed, but I am assuming that at this point these recorders were not in the public domain generally in the UK.
