Following the Beatles' 1965 U.S. Tour, Capitol Records began prepping a documentary album to compete with the multitude of substandard Beatles interview albums that were being issued by fly by night companies trying to cash in on the Beatlemania craze. It seemed any journalist with a tape recorder that could gain entry to a Beatles press conference was hawking their "exclusive interview" tapes as "tour souvenir" record albums to fans. The best known of these journalists was probably Ed Rudy, the self-proclaimed "Fifth Beatle," who released a series of Beatles Q&A records during their heyday.
Capitol's "Beatle Tour" follows roughly the same format as Ed Rudy's infamous "News Documentary" releases, but instead of the interviewer providing awkward voice-over commentary inbetween random interview clips, "Beatle Tour" is a series of actual interviews. In both cases the interviewers get self-consciously chummy with each band member. One cringe-inducing moment on "Beatle Tour" has "Jerry" (the interviewer) showing pictures of his wife and kids to Ringo Starr. In another segment Jerry chats with Paul and Ringo about his pet poodle. But for all of its shortcomings it does have something the knock-offs don't -- actual Beatles music in the form of super-short snippets that act as buffers between subjects. The production values are miles ahead of anything Ed Rudy ever dreamed of releasing, the questions are surprisingly probing, and the answers from each Beatle are interesting. Based on the narration, these interviews were recorded throughout their U.S. Tour in August 1965. It's not clear if this project ever moved off the back burner at Capitol. It never saw an official release.
Beatle Tour:
http://sharebee.com/e7db602dNot familiar with the unintentionally hilarious Ed Rudy albums? They must be heard to be believed. Grab two of them here:
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