The PBS station I worked at aired this in 1985 I think, perhaps a repeat showing. It was heavily promoted and we received special artwork, etc. for advertising. We'd just converted to stereo broadcasting, but the tape machines were of course mono. I checked the recording that had been made from the stereo satellite feed, and it was only one channel, so much of the music was wrong (no vocals, etc.). I pointed it out to programming and played a sample but they didn't see what was wrong. They had someone record the re-feed, exactly the same way, and of course it was still wrong. I told them they couldn't air it that way, and I ultimately had to get the head of production to come in and say "he's right, we can't broadcast it that way". Programming was pissed and we had to get a special re-feed from PBS and somebody finally patched in a mixer to get a mono mix for the quad machine. I was tasked with recording the same stereo satellite feed on my then brand new VHS Hi-Fi machine to prove what I had been telling them all along. I still have that recording.
I bought the DVD set for five dollars at a Five Below years ago. Glad I never had the scratch to buy the boots.
The set I bought was beautiful, you can see the one corner fold on the book. Funny thing is there was a piano in the house and this looks to be unused. Big sheet music books like that usually have lines running through the binding where a particular song is. Did you use yours to play an instrument?
My son is a musician, and a very talented one. He's more into Jazz but him having it makes much more sense than me having it on a bookshelf never to pick it up again. Blackbird was one of his acoustic guitar staples when he was younger. I wish he picked up his acoustic more often.
Not the same. Back when I was first Fabsing, I had Volume 1 of COMPLEAT (which was chronological) and ended up with volume 2 from this series (which is alphabetical). A few key and lyric inaccuracies in these, one of which I've always theorized is responsible for a gaffed lyric in a famous cover (Fiona Apple's "Across the Universe.") The initial COMPLEAT books are killer, though.
I had borrowed the German VHS version of The Compleat Beatles a couple times from the local library when I was a kid. Recorded it to another VHS one time... and I still have that copy tape! I watched it a lot over those many years but... always felt something was odd. I realized the German dub version has some clumsy translation at certain times. Partly some misinformation involved, I believe. There's the section where George Martin talks about 'Strawberry Fields Forever' and how they created the master take/mix. In the original he (obviously) said that John liked the brass/busy drums version but also he liked the earlier take and asked if there's a way to couple both takes together. However in the dubbed version it's wrongly translated as 'John also liked the old songs the band did'. Also a bit later, however, a live version of 'Boys' came up in place of 'Mr Kite', probably to cover up that statement. Quite odd. There's even a scene where George Martin continues to talk and no German voice-over is appearing, instead the orchestra 'freak out' from 'A Day In The Life' comes up until you can't hear him talk anymore. Like, they gave up on him. lol Oh, and Bruce Johnston's comment about Sgt. Pepper was translated totally weird. Ending up as "We (The Beach Boys) celebrated ourselves that we got so many hits. Afterwards we played Sgt. Pepper again." or something. The German version has its errors but still it's great to have. Would love to watch the original version sometime.
Before the original edition was published, its compilers were already admitting that these may not be perfect. In the Billboard article I mentioned above, there was also this: “Trust and Okun have been working on this book since 1978. It took so long to assemble all the material, they say, and also to prepare the sheet music. Okun says he had to go to the original recordings, because existing arrangements were almost invariably wrong. ‘When I went to the commercially available arrangements, I was shocked,’ says Okun. 'The bass lines were invariably wrong and the words were wrong.’ Okun says the reason for this is that when the Beatles first released their songs, Charles Hanson (sic), who then owned the music, wanted to get the sheet music on the market as soon as possible, and he would give his arrangers sometimes as little as one day to transcribe an LPs worth of music.” Mistakes were inevitable, but they were not corrected. As each new Beatles LP came out, the new hastily prepared music was added, and a new folio printed, without ever going back and redoing the earlier songs, says Okun. When corrections were later made, the arrangers did not go back to the tapes, he adds.” This image illustrates that Hansen used the American Beatles albums.
Apple issued a restraining order against MGM/UA in October 1982 to keep The Compleat Beatles video off the market. A week later the two organizations worked things out with a royalties agreement. By November, Delilah Publications and MGM/UA were ready to sell the tapes, disks, and books and to promote the hell out of them. Delilah partnered with Special Features/Syndication Sales Corporation to launch a Beatles crossword puzzle contest that was syndicated in US and UK newspapers. I haven't seen the UK edition but here is the US version in several large images. I don’t think I ever found a list of winners. <> <> Here it is in 3 large images.
Do they use the same notations on the individual songs as the initial set. Actually putting them in alphabetical order makes more sense, as you're probably only looking for one song at a time.
Some notes about The Compleat Beatles on television and in theaters... January 4, 1984 - Variety: Universal Pay Television has acquired pay-tv rights to the homevid offering “The Compleat Beatles” and has licensed the two-hour music-docu to Home Box Office’s Cinemax service and SelecTV, and continues to negotiate with other pay services. Delilah Films produced the program, basing it on the Delilah book of the same name. It’s an unusual acquisition for U Pay TV, since the made-for-home-vid program was released in the videocassette format by MGM/UA Home Video. But its one of a number of Universal-distribbed pay-tv exposures in the homevid market, a U Pay TV spokesman said. February 14, 1984 - The Hollywood Reporter: The most interesting opening was TeleCulture’s “The Compleat Beatles,” which has been available from MGM/UA Home Video for over a year. With enthusiastic reviews accompanying its theatrical opening at the Festival and the general hubbub surrounding the group’s 20th anniversary in America, the picture did quite well - $13,896 for three days. February 25, 1984 - Screen International: Box office take to date for The Compleat Beatles at the Festival Theater in New York City (546 seats) was $30,757 [$87,647 today]. April 1, 1984 - The Film Journal (Buying & Booking Guide):
I bought the VHS version in the 80s, I think, and I transferred it to DVD about 20 or so years ago. I still watch it now and then.
Hey, Jimmi - I overlooked this post during the threads merge. You said “my band”—was this with The Laughing Dogs? Is there anything else about this you can share?
It was when I was the lead guitarist with Eddy Dixon's band. The folks making the film didn't wanna pay (or couldn't afford) sync rights for the original versions so they paid us to record 4 songs: 1. Raunchy 2. Rock Island Line 3. Be Bopa Lula 4. Twenty Flight Rock. We gave them all 4 but they didn't include our recording of Rock Island Line. I believe they did use Lonnie's original for that one. I forgot all about the project until a friend of mine invited me over to see a new video release about The Beatles. I had no idea that "The Complete Beatles" was the film that they'd used our recordings for. Half way through Twenty Flight Rock I recognized Eddy's voice singing the lead. Same on Be Bopa Lula. Then I heard myself playing the lead on Raunchy. That was cool!
Not to go completely off topic, but you were in the Laughing Dogs? I saw you in Boston and had your LP. Cool.
Yep. Probably saw us at The Rat in Boston. We played there a bunch of times with other CBGB bands. Also with Orchestra Luna and The Cars.
Yeah, the missing A Day In The Life part has always bothered me. I first saw the film on rented VHS not long after release and it had the ADITL part (after the 'two songs from John' narration). When it was shown on TV a few months later (and I taped it on VCR) that bit was now missing. And I now have a rip of the laserdisc version (which looks better than my old tape) and it's bizarrely missing from that too. I thought at the time of the TV broadcast that it was possibly deleted because of George Martin's comment about 'an orgasm of sound'. But that seems too tame for censoring. And it doesn't explain why the rip of the laserdisc (assuming it's authentic) would have it removed. Great film though, I watched it a few nights ago for the first time in ages. I did notice how poor the quality was in places compared to what's available now, and also wondering why the original interviews looked so bad. And using the American sleeve for Revolver is just wrong.
