Almost exactly 30 years ago, on March 22, 1978, long before TiVo — heck, even predating the VCR — i held my cassette recorder up to the single speaker on my television set to capture in perpetuity (at least aurally) the Rutles mockumentary All You Need Is Cash. For a teenage fan of both the Beatles and Monty Python/Saturday Night Live such as myself, this was some sort of convergence of the gods, who until then had never put aside their petty differences to create a paradise on Earth.
The fact that there were numerous Beatles connections between the Rutles and their object of parody was soon made evident — George Harrison makes a wry cameo in the film; former Fabs publicist Derek Taylor worked the soundtrack album. Most important is that Python cohort Neil Innes, who portrayed the John Lennonesque Ron Nasty and wrote all the splendid spoofs of every style in Beatledom, was a key member of the Bonzo Dog (Doo Dah) Band. Not only did this 1960s Dada-jazz-rock-psych-pop combo appear in the Beatles' weirdie Magical Mystery Tour film, Paul McCartney, calling himself Apollo C. Vermouth, produced the Bonzos' "I'm the Urban Spaceman," an Innes composition.
Suffice to say that Innes' skills at Beatle mimickry both in song and in voice showed up long before he was pressed into service as the chief Rutle. On the final Bonzo Dog Band LP, 1972's Let's Make Up and Be Friendly, the song "Fresh Wound" shows his gift for parroting the Lennon style before going slightly overlong. "Give Booze a Chance," another Lennon-referencing Bonzos track, was in this instance written and sung by the group's other main creative force, the appropriately perpetually soused Vivian Stanshall, and is found in this BBC Radio session take.
A post-Bonzos Innes collaborated with a post-Python Eric Idle on the BBC Television series Rutland Weekend Television, where the Rutles proper made their debut in a sketch that was also shown on a Saturday Night Live episode, shaking their mocktops to an early version of "I Must Be in Love." (Interestingly, Innes also performs "Cheese and Onions" on SNL a year before All You Need Is Cash's creation.) An abbreviated version of the Rutles' "Good Times Roll," then named "The Children of Rock and Roll," also has its origin in an RWT sketch.
This past couple of weeks, the Rutles have been going meta, with Beatles tribute band the Fab Four portraying Nasty, Dirk, Stig and Barry in an official 30th anniversary celebration in Los Angeles and New York. But the concept of Rutlemania-mania predates this dubious milestone. In 1990, Shimmy-Disc issued a tribute album titled Rutles Highway Revisited, and, currently plying their trade in Austin, Texas, is Ouch! — yes, a Rutles tribute band. Below find some Rutles-related curiosities and rarities, and be thankful you don't have to hold up your cassette player to this computer in order to possess them for posterity.
Bonzo Dog Band: Fresh Wound (MP3)
Bonzo Dog Band: Give Booze a Chance [BBC session] (MP3)
The Rutles: I Must Be in Love [Rutland Weekend Television version] (MP3)
Ron Lennon: The Children of Rock and Roll [Rutland Weekend Television version] (MP3)
The Pussywillows: Hold My Hand (MP3)
Neil Aspinall is dead! does this mean there's one less FAKE PAUL ?!
http://digilander.libero.it/p_truth/
Posted by: sid bators | March 25, 2008 at 01:57 PM
So happy to hear you did this TV taping thing too! I wish I still had some of those cassettes I made - to this day, I can't hear "Go Ask Alice" without remembering the place I dropped the recorder when my dad startled me by coming in the room.
Posted by: elizabeth | March 25, 2008 at 02:17 PM
The only successful Beatles spoof, IMHO. The "Homer's Barbershop Quartet" episode of THE SIMPSONS and Utopia's DEFACE THE MUSIC don't compare.
"Cheese and Onions" HAS appeared on Beatles' bootlegs, some Fab Four fans mistaking it for an actual Lennon composition...
Posted by: Andrew | March 25, 2008 at 06:13 PM
As an additional trivia point, Neil also recorded his own version of "Shangri-la" on his solo album Taking Off (1977), before rerecording it for The Rutles Archaeology.
Video evidence here:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=IkN0dbm5z8k
Posted by: John dEFROG | March 26, 2008 at 07:03 AM
My favorite Rutles story is about how Neil Innes vetted the Rutles songs through either George or John. After playing each track, Innes was advised on whether or not he had to make changes because "Our lawyers will sue on that one"
Posted by: Dh | March 26, 2008 at 09:03 AM
Attention RUTLEMANIACS!!
VH1 Classic will be airing both "All You Need Is Cash" and the sequel "Can't Buy Me Lunch". Despite unnecessary editing and those STUPID POP-UP ADs, these "mockumentarys" are a rare treat, especially the first one. Besides George Harrison, look for appearances by Mick Jagger, Ron Wood, Michael Palin, Dan Ackroyd, John Belushi and Gilda Radner.
Now if VH1 Classic would dredge up another cult masterpeice from that era..."Mr. Mike's MONDO VIDEO", I would be a happy man indeed.
Goo Goo Ga Joob, you Groovy Freaks!
Posted by: Rory Murray | March 26, 2008 at 05:28 PM
Gaylord, thanks for posting this! Just last week I was on a youtube bender, and started watching all the Rutles videos.
I remember watching and loving "all you need is cash" on TV in western NY as a Beatles-obsessed 8th grader. My similarly obsessed friend had caught it on a toronto station the night before, and freaked out -- Sacreligious! Somehow, out in the hinterlands in that ancient era, I had read about the flick in advance, and was able to explain that it was a parody. Lucky for him it ran the next night on NBC and we watched it together. Then my bro got the soundtrack LP and I played it to death.
Posted by: Brian C. | March 26, 2008 at 09:28 PM
Thanks for the mention!!
Ronn
OUCH! A Tribute to The Rutles
Posted by: Ronn | April 02, 2008 at 09:38 PM
Great article! I was a television/radio recorder, too! I still have my cassette recording of All You Need is Cash and hours of Dr. Demento shows circa 1976-1979. Nerd. And I still have all the vinyl. A few weeks ago I finally made my dream mix, The Rutles vs. The Beatles, comparing and contrasting these two great bands. I can't stop listeing to it!
Posted by: John Hubbard | April 08, 2008 at 11:33 PM