Originally posted by Steve Hoffman: "I remember watching The Beatles cartoon show at my friends house on Saturday mornings (his parents had a Zenith color TV). " Does anyone have a clue if these are available in any form? my brother was telling me about them, he said they were a lot of fun!
Apple now has control over the cartoon series. And we all know how wonderful they are in giving the fans what they want.
If you want to know more about them get the book Beatletoons by Mitch Axelrod... it's a very informative and interesting read. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...f=sr_1_1/104-5851269-0052743?v=glance&s=books
Somebody wrote an entire book about those bad cartoons? Wow. When the Beatles saw them for the first time, any idea of writing some special songs evaporated. Heh.
Sponsored by A.C. Gilbert of American Flyer trains and Erector sets - I'd like to see shows with the commercials still in them. I'd betcha that someone at Termite Terrace/Toon Zone could point you guys wanting these toons...
Mitch has many original 16MM prints of the cartoons that were used for TV broadcast. He is auctioning them on EBay now. Here is the URL: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3535398077&category=432
I remember these and I remember that they were indeed horrible. I wathced them thought, I don't know why. I read somewhere that these cartoons were the reason that the Beatles did not want to use their own voices on Yellow Submarine, because they thought the film would be like these cartoons! Did they pre-date the Monkees? I can't remember. Were they ever shown in the UK? Did they use the "mono" mixes??? I seem to recall they only used the early songs.
MTV got rerun rights to the Beatle cartoons at one point (late 80s?) I taped a whole bunch of 'em, commercials and all. I've seen bootleg sets, both VHS and DVD. I'm sure they were never officially released on video, at least not in the US.
MTV was showing the Beatles cartoons quite often between 1986 & '87. In 1991 Apple bought the rights to the entire series and in typical fashion, locked them up in their vaults (thanks Neil A.) Mitch Axelrod the author of The Beatles cartoon book had an amazing 1 hour show he did at Beatlefest a few years ago. He showed some rare footage of the day The Beatles came down to the studio to watch the first in the series of cartoons. George appeared real unhappy about something in this (silent) footage, but calmed down after John spoke to him. After the cartoons were shown, Ringo apparently said to the producers "well I see you've made me out to be the dumb one here." Axelrod gave a great overview of the series and speculated that Apple may release these in the near future. To this day there have been no offical home video releses of any of the cartoons, just bootleg dubs from MTV broadcasts. Finally I believe all of the music used in the series were the mono mixes.
I remember watching those on Saturday mornings. Even then I thought they were dumb, but how could I not watch? I'm not surprised if The BEatles wanted nothing to do with them. Ringo only said "Duhu! Yeah..." Kitchy. THe intro was And Your Bird Can Sing (complete with car tyre screetching noises). What was the music at the end? Or was that the End music? or both?
In the first season, "A Hard Day's Night" was the intro music. For some reason, MTV didn't run the intro for those episodes (unless I'm remembering wrong, there was a stereotypical Chinese caricature in this intro). The "And Your Bird Can Sing" intro came during the second season. The outro music was the same generic instrumental music bed that closed each of the individual cartoons, not a Beatles recording. And the mixes were indeed the mono versions, but usually horribly edited.
At one point about a month ago they were available on VCD with no commercials in one of the Beatle newsgroups.
For more info from the author here's a link to the Guest Author: Mitch Axlerod section of the Abbeyrd board. http://www.xsorbit4.com/users2/abbeyrd/index.cgi?board=mitchaxelrod To answer some questions: Yes they did predate the Monkees. Acccording to the book the first episode's airdate was Sept 25, 1965. They consisted of two separate cartoons. Show 1 was A Hard Day's Night and I Want To Hold Your Hand. The first show's rating was a 52 share. The last one was shown on ABC on April 20, 1969 but by then they were just repeating episodes. The last season with new Toons was 1967 and one of the last was Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields Forever. One reason they didn't look that great was that King Features at one point was using three different studios in three different countries (England, Australia, & Canada) to produce them. And finally, No they were not Allowed to be shown in England, according to the book. That decision was made by Brian Epstien himself.
Good for Brian! I think George of the Jungle came on next. Much better show! Or was it Johnny Quest?...
Eh, I love 'em! They're laughable, poorly animated, the voices are completely off base (even though many of the voices, including John and George, were done by one of the true cartoon voice masters, Paul Frees), and they're frankly pretty condescending to the Beatles, but they were probably the first place I ever became aware of the Fabs. For that, they still hold a fond place in my memory. Look, even Apple still uses those character designs all the time. I'm personally sorry that they're probably locked away for good now. And remember, many of these same producers and animators were later responsible for Yellow Submarine as well.
I picked up these cartoons the other day and I think they are pretty cool even if they are a bit well... stupid. Let's face it, it's The Beatles in a cartoon that features singalongs and not much of a plot. For what it is, it's ok in short doses. Yellow Submarine had to get a start somewhere.
I'm w/ ya Rich! As someone who was just old enough to love the Beatles and the perfect age for cartoons when the Beatle 'toons came out, I loved 'em. I think some are forgetting how rare & precious music-related TV was at that time. It's not like today where you have 24hr. music video channels. It by no means replaces the LPs, the movies, and the videos they shot, but for a young guy w/ a BAD Beatles jones at that time, they were a God send.
I watched them on my friend's parents Zenith color TV every Saturday morning. Watched a bit of "Milton The Monster" as well. I was Beatles' STARVED back then. I would have watched the show regardless of how good it was. I do remember the second season got better, the drawings more lifelike...
You're of a much better memory than I Steve. What I recall was that the segments dedicated to the songs became more imaginative & representative of the material, more psychedelic I suppose. Perhaps there was some inputs from the Fabs or younger animators came on board who could relate more to the Beatles and their art. One of the great non-music moments for me of the video "Anthology" was George H. describing the Fabs visit to Elvis in LA saying they fell out of the limo laughing, "Just like in a Beatles cartoon!". It stirs up such a mental image for me anyway.
Milton The Monster? Oh man Steve, geez I haven't thought of that show since The Beatles were still together! Yeah watching color TV at friends or relatives homes in the 60's usually carried compromises with them. That's for shure.
This series was how I first got into music when it aired in syndication in the mid-late 70s. I used to tape songs by putting my GE tape recorder next to the speaker of my dad's Philco color TV. Regards,
