THE BEATLES
The story of the fan club flexi discs the band made and posted every Christmas – poems, pantos, Tiny Tim and all.
HAT OPENING SCENE FROM THE BEATLES FAN CLUB Christmas record for 1967 spoofs the reverence the BBC demanded from anyone hoping to broadcast on its hallowed airwaves in the days of its hegemony. Of course, when they recorded the sketch The Beatles hardly needed permission to pass anywhere. Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and All You Need Is Love had confirmed their position in the vanguard of popular culture. Yet in November 1967 they were making fun of a time, only a few years before, when pop music was viewed as merely a scruffy subset of show business. Back then, The Beatles had worked very hard to gain entry to the establishment. By 1967, they were subverting it. The cheeky larking about on the seven fan club records they made between 1963 and 1969 is as engaging now as it was then, but the recordings also serve as reminders of how things stood at the end of each full year of The Beatles’ recording career. In 1963 and 1964, there are send-ups and much giggling among themselves, but the
group is still tethered to the solid ground of show biz. By 1968’s offering it is clear The Beatles have rocketed out of that orbit forever. Each disc is an unintentional annual state of the union report on the group: compare the level of co-operation involved in the production of the 1967 disc to the splintered and uneven contributions stitched together in 1969. Today’s instantaneous and direct access to the personal lives of pop stars through social media could never have been imagined by music fans in the 1960s, when an important relationship between The Beatles and their fans was nurtured mainly through the mail. Upon payment of the annual subscription, members of The Official Beatles Fan Club became “Beatle People” and each Christmas from 1963 to 1969, members living in the UK were treated to the free gift of a flexi disc containing a seasonal message of thanks. Thirty thousand were distributed in 1963. By 1965, the number of fan club members receiving a record had increased to 70,000. The flexi discs were ultra-thin and bendy, less expensive to manufacture and cheaper to send in the post, but they could never match the sound quality of a standard vinyl record. It was recommended to avoid a flexi slipping to place it on top of a 7-inch single and weigh it down with a coin on the label. This was not hi-fi. The man behind the Christmas flexi giveaways was Tony Barrow, head of public relations at NEMS – the company run by Brian Epstein. For the 1963 and 1964 messages, his scripts were toyed with by the group rather as a cat teases a mouse. Before the recording of the second disc, a newsletter printed in an edition of monthly fan magazine The Beatles Book promised the special gift for club members in 1964 would be “something everybody will like. But we’re not saying a word!” The next issue revealed “the big secret is out!” It was another Christmas record. After that, fans expected the annual messages to continue and, no matter what, a new one did drop through letter boxes every Christmas from 1963 to 1969. At the end of 1970 – the year the group ceased recording together – a vinyl LP for fans, called From Then To You, included all the material on the flexis. Given a simpler title – The Beatles Christmas Album – and with a different cover, it was also distributed to members of the US Fan Club. Recently remastered at Abbey Road for a limited edition 7 x 7-inch vinyl box set, the Christmas Records have never sounded as good as they do now. Coin balancing no longer required. during this hectic year, John declares “the biggest thrill” to be the bill-topping live TV performance on Sunday Night At The London Palladium on October 13. With an audience of 15 million viewers, this appearance was regarded as a significant marker for an act hoping to rise through the ranks of British show business. John also highlights their subsequent invitation to play for the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret at the Royal Variety Performance – a regal seal of approval for their charm offensive. Paul takes an opportunity to try to halt the bombardment by Jelly Babies. “We’ve been inundated,” George had revealed on TV in August. “They tend to throw them when we’re on stage. I got one in my eye which wasn’t very nice.” “We’ve gone right off Jelly Babies,” Paul advised fans. “But we still like Peppermint Creams, Chocolate Drops and Dolly Mixtures!” He also decides that the group most enjoyed “going into the recording studio to make new records.” Next, Ringo sings a swinging version of Good King Wenceslas before George thanks Bettina Rose and Anne Collingham, who were described on the disc’s sleeve as Joint National Secretaries of the fan club. In fact, Tony Barrow had invented the name Anne Collingham to represent several workers in the London office, who would masquerade as the fictional character in photographs. After recording this fan club message, even more “gear things” happened by Christmas. Their jewellery-rattling appearance at the Royal Variety Performance was a triumph, With The Beatles replaced
their novelty hit Football Crazy. Auld Lang Syne is performed in the croaky vocal style of Barry McGuire on his recent US Number 1 Eve Of Destruction, with some references to its apocalyptic words. When Paul asks, “What are we gonna do that’s out of copyright?”, John replies, “How about We’ll Gather Lilacs In An Old Brown Shoe?” Did that joke inspire the title of a 1969 Beatles B-side? With a note of relief, the fan club newsletter in the December 1966 issue of the Beatles Monthly Book reported: “It’s quite possible that for the past couple of months you have felt that the Beatles had ceased to exist. the Beatles are back in existence.”
more deploying his best Scottish accent to wish “all the best from me to you” over an organ accompaniment of Auld Lang Syne and the sound of a chilly winter wind whistling over the glens.