The Old Timers' Bootleg-Shopping-Recollections Thread

[walrus gumboot]

Now I really am an old timer...and my bootleg collecting goes way back to 1970 when I was working in Leeds UK. During my lunch hour I used to browse the Record Shops and at the Virgin shop, as someone said all bean bags and cans... I found Kum Back !
I had no idea what it was and hadn't heard of bootlegs.
In the days when Albums were £3 this one was £5.
Couldn't wait to get home and play it.

In reasonably quick succession and from a record stall in the Merrion Centre underground market I got Spicy Beatles Songs,Shea! Live ( actually the Hollywood Bowl ) and then I discovered Tape Trading via an advert in the Melody Maker...I only recall one name from back then, Chris who lived in Doncaster.

Great days and wonderful memories.

[C90]

I became aware of bootlegs when I went to my first record fair in 1985 but didn't get into collecting Beatles boots until around 1990. I went for tapes only as they were £3 each and vinyl boots had prices of £10/£15/£20 so I could get more for my money, although most of them were probably taped from vinyl.

Maybe I should dig out some of the tapes and scan the covers if anyone's interested in what some of them looked like.

Ha, yes, I remember dealers selling trays of home-made cassettes at record fairs - much better value than the actual bootleg LPs especially if you were unsure of the content (I remember how disappointed I was when I paid £12 for the 'Twenty Years Ago' LP only to find how misleading and wrong the track descriptions were) Hence my user name here!
Of course lots of tapes were live concerts which had never been bootlegged on vinyl, but there were plenty which were clearly derived from LPs. It was a good little money spinner for a dealer to run off a few tapes from his bootleg stocks, easy and cheap to do. I'm impressed that you found your tapes were filled with bonus stuff. I never did. And whoever bothered to double up the Ultra Rare Trax CDs onto one cassette was very generous!
Those crummy B/W tape inserts even had a charm, sometimes with typewritten or Letraset wording. Completely worthless now, IMHO, although now cassettes are hip again you do see some people offering those bootleg ones on eBay.
Yes please, Mr Crisis, I'd be interested in seeing scans of any you kept.

[harrythebannister]

The first bootleg I bought was back in 1982 when I was 17 from a guy who ran a second hand record shop in Plymouth called Vinyl Dave. He literally produced it from under the counter. It was “Rough Notes” which was pretty average and contained at least one out fake, which was one channel of “Every Little Thing” (I think) with a badly out of tune guitar played periodically over it.....naaf to say the least.

[Lord Reith]

The first bootleg I bought was back in 1982 when I was 17 from a guy who ran a second hand record shop in Plymouth called Vinyl Dave. He literally produced it from under the counter. It was “Rough Notes” which was pretty average and contained at least one out fake, which was one channel of “Every Little Thing” (I think) with a badly out of tune guitar played periodically over it.....naaf to say the least.

That lp also contained three pristine BBC rarities! To this day that lp is still the best source for those tracks.

I agree there was some questionable material on it though. What the hell was "I Need You" supposed to be. It sounded nothing like John. I did like "I Want You" but I don't think that was The Beatles either.

Aside from the three BBC cuts, my favourite tracks on that lp were Band On The Run and 1985. I think I actually bought that album in 1985!

[harrythebannister]

Thanks for that info. I didn’t know that about the Beeb tracks. I still have this LP but it’s stored away at the moment. I seem to remember Hand On The Buns aswell

[simond9X]

I think my first bootlegs were from Shude Hill Market in Manchester around 1971, probably 'Pinky' by Pink Floyd and a Grateful Dead album. They were sold quite openly back then around Manchester - a magazine shop called Paper Chase (I don't think it was anything to do with the current chain of shops), Piccadilly Records up by the station, and especially Black Sedan Records on Oxford Road, which seemed to have more bootlegs than official albums. I bought a lot there including Yellow Matter Custard, my first exposure to the BBC material. I too remember the first tiny Virgin record shop on Oxford Street in London, with the bean bags and headphones around the walls..... no pressure to buy, just hang out there. Even when Branson opened his larger store near Marble Arch, there were still bootlegs openly on sale in the racks. I can still recall the buzz of seeing a new title. Without an internet, we relied on newspaper and magazine articles to find out what was around. I recall going to the office of the International Times (IT) to pick up a boot I'd ordered from them.

I can't recall which my first Beatles boot was - possibly YMC above. But other early ones were the 65 Shea stadium show, a 66 Budokan show and Hahst Az Son with the Get back sessions.

[fabwill]

My bootleg buying came in 3 phases
1 - record fairs in London from mid 90s onwards - usually 2nd hand CDs
2 - 2 trips to New York in the late 90s. I spent a fortune in shops in Greenwich Village, including $200 on Get Back Journals 2
3 - Vigotone, Strawberry and Midnight Beat CDs from an online dealer. The Hollywood Bowl box was a real highlight - the packaging was so much better than the eventual legit CD. I bought all 3 Mythology boxes and they each came with old pre-decimal pennies in.

I also bought the old Great Dane BBC box from ebay. I know it's been long since superseded, but I'll never sell.

[MarkRJones1970]

Part 1: I just couldn't afford to buy real bootleg records back in 1983. They cost anything between ten and fifteen pounds and there was no way I could afford that so I made do with tapes that the vendors would record of each illicit album. A C60 tape would cost £2.50 and a C90 £3.50. I had a paper round at the time and earned £3.50 a week. I was 12/13 years old.

The first bootleg tape I bought was called 'Strawberry Fields Forever' released by NEMS from a record fair in College Street, Northampton. It caught my eye because, as I scanned the track listing, I saw that it contained some titles I'd never heard of before – 'A Perfect Rendition', 'The Bus', 'Barber of Seville' and 'Peace of Mind'. What on earth were these? I asked the seller if I could have a quick listen to the tape before I parted with my cash. My jaw dropped when I heard the first track – I was hearing an acetate version of one of my favourite songs which was also the title of the bootleg. I was so excited when I realised it was the complete version of the first half of the released song, albeit sourced from a scratchy acetate. It's a well-known fact that 'Strawberry Fields Forever' is made up of two separate recordings using two completely different arrangements. With the magic of studio trickery they were joined together by George Martin to make the finished track. It also came in a red tape box which I thought was fitting as Strawberries are red!




Over time I got more and more tapes. My cousin would buy some too on occasion and I would copy them from him. I then started to type up inlays for them using my Dad's typwriter he kept in the cellar of our house as the ones I bought just had track listings written by hand by the vendor, and they weren't the neatest.




Over time I threw most of them away as I got upgrades on CD. Looking back I should have kept them.

Having had my appetite whetted for the illicit fair that some bootlegs offered I was desperate to hear these hitherto unheard recordings that were being played at the Abbey Road Show I saw advertised in The Beatles Monthly. I thought that being able to would be an unreachable dream. We were so very lucky that the day we were in London for a fiamily day out tickets for the event hadn't sold out. After standing in a queue outside Abbey Road studios Dad managed to get three tickets for me, him and and my cousin Hayden while Mum and my sisters, who weren't the slightest bit interested in sitting in a darkened studio for two hours, went to London Zoo to occupy themselves. While in Abbey Road I was in heaven, I was occupying space that the members of The Beatles had occupied and, for the first time ever, I knew that for the fact. Upon arrival back home I immediately typed out a report on the day's events, which had proved to be one of the most amazing days of my life so far. I reproduce my recollections exactly as I wrote them back in 1983:



“OUR VISIT TO THE ABBEY ROAD SIGHT AND SOUND EXHIBITION.

On July 26th 1983, Mum, Dad, Leanne, Nicola, Hayden and I went to London for the day and Dad, Hayden and I decided to try and get tickets for the exhibition in the Abbey Road recording studios. So, at 2 o'clock we managed (by pushing in the line) to get 3 tickets for the 7:30 performance.
7:30 arrived and we arrived at the legendary studios in Abbey Road. Our bags were searched for tape recorders (they didn't want any bootlegs) and we entered studio number 2. Hayden and I bought 3 “Beatle Now” mags and sat down. A man gave a speech and the lights went down.
The video started with some early history of the studios. It showed the very first piece of music being recorded there which was “Pomp and Circumstance”. We were then shown a 1961 piece of film of Helen Shapiro recording a song. Then we saw The Beatles. Norman Smith was interviewed for the video, which was shown in pieces throughout it.


Here's some of the features of this superb video; We were given some studio outtakes of Beatles songs to listen to, for instance, we heard The Beatles playing “I Saw Her Standing There”, they were half way through the tune when Paul said “Too fast, It's too fast”. They sang it again, stopped near the beginning and then sang the released version. We heard brilliant Beatles renditions of “How Do You Do It” and “Leave My Kitten Alone”. These were ACE! We also heard a 1963 version of “One After 909”. Which was better than the “Let It Be” version. We saw The Beatles singing “Ticket to Ride” with John and Paul seated in armchairs, George seated on the floor and Ringo standing up. During the song John misses out a “Yeah” and puts it in about 4 seconds later. We also saw the “Paperback Writer” and “Rain” videos. We see John drinking some wine, he sees he's being filmed, puts down the glass and picks up a cup of tea and gives us a grin. We heard “She's a Woman” as it sounded in the first couple of takes. Also “Help!” without the vocals. We heard 2 versions of “Strawberry fields forever”, a slow version with soft “ahhhhhs” added, and the second half of the released version played at its recorded speed which is much faster than the released one.
We heard an early version of “Hey Jude” which was slower and it had piano pieces in and out of the “Na na na” bit.

We saw the rare version of the video of “Hello Goodbye” which had John doing some very funny dancing. Also, the rare videos of “S.F.F.”, “Penny Lane” and “Day in the Life”. We heard “Lady Madonna” being sung with laughter, shouting and talking in it. Also, we listened to the first version of “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” with just an accustic accumpiant.It finished with a goodbye message from Ringo then a picture of John came on and we heard “No 9 Dream”.
“This is Ringo here, the other 3 have said everything except thank you and goodbye”.

Written by Mark Jones.

I took some photos of the street sign, Hayden and I outside the studio and crossing the crossing (my Dad took the last 2), the Ludwig drum kit, the studio itself and some instruments.”







That last part of our trip to London had really been amazing. I couldn't believe that I had touched the keys of a harmonium that John Lennon's fingers had actually played while recording the song 'We Can Work It Out' and had been in the very room all of my favourite Beatles' songs had been recorded in. It had still only been less than three years since John had been murdered. I, along with many people in the studio that day, fought hard to stop ourselves from crying while the video played out to the end accompanied by John's solo song 'No.9 Dream' from 1973.

Four days later and back at home Dad wrote a poem about my Beatles obsession and mentioned our trip to Abbey Road:

“Mark, he is my only lad,
Hasn't got good taste like his Dad.
Likes The Beatles, not the Stones,
With taste like that shouldn't call himself Jones.

He's got their records and their tapes,
If a Beatle was sick he'd send them grapes.
Last 'Beatles Monthly' he was shown,
Then dragged me off to Abbey Road.

Talked me round by being shifty,
Made me fork out £13.50.
For him and Hayden and also me,
To get in studios, what a fee!

Every day while sitting peaceful,
Out of the window comes sound of Beatle.
'She's a Woman' and 'Hard Day's Night',
'Yesterday, 'The Inner Light'.

If you sing and you're word out,
Out of the window he will shout!
“Get it right, or don't sing at all!”
He really drives you up the wall!

Goes up Weston, heavy laden,
Gone to see his cousin Hayden.
Shouts at Paul “Wotcha Haystack!”
Gets a belt across the back.

Soon he'll go to School for Boys,
There he won't make so much noise.
Perhaps by then when on those headphones,
He'll start to like those genius STONES!

Composed by R.V. Jones 30.7.83”

After that I thirsted after more bootlegs. I'd now got another job at at the Co-Op supermarket and was earning a whopping £10 a week. Some trips to the record fair, which was only on once a month, resulted in me coming away empty handed which always left me disappointed. I'd have to wait at least another 4 weeks before I had another chance. I did manage to find a real copy of that 1st tape so I grabbed that as it was so important to me and it was nice to own a proper copy of it:





Then I'd pick up more bootlegs, usually blindly, and by studying the track lisitings. I made a few duff purchases but, in the main I was lucky. I had heard there'd been a bootleg released containing recordings of the Beatles in 1960! That was so exciting to me but when I got to the fair he'd sold his only copy so I had to ask him to try and find me another copy as I was desperate to own it. Lukcily he did and let me know:



Despite the genreal consensus about these recordings it remains one of the favourite bootlegs and I listened to it loads. I can even whistle along AND include all the bum notes in my whistling!

My collection grew and grew:







to be continued as the Sky man is about to arrive to fix our dodgy Wifi connection that keeps dropping...

[MarkRJones1970]

Part 2: The Sky man has been so hopefully my internet won't keep dropping now!

Then, of course, we got the Ultra Rare Trax series. I managed to get the 1st 2 CD volumes at a record fair but when a mate of mine got the follow ups, 3&4 and 5&6, the seller only had 1 copy of each, the ones he'd just bought, so I had to order them. These were a revelation. Someone had got into the vaults! Those secret, impenetrable vaults at Abbey Road! New stuff we'd never heard in master tape quality were on these 4 records, tracks we'd never dared dream we'd get to hear. I'm sure these were the releases that George Harrison blamed on Mark Lewishon, but we all know it was DJ Roger Scott who made the copies while he was researching the Abbey Road show video. What a HERO!:







I was always a bit pissed off that these amazing volumes didn't come on CD like the 1st 2. The CD series that followed, also called 3,4,5,6 etc was nowhere as good as these 4 records and was mainly full (if 30 minutes per CD could be called 'full') of stuff that had appeared elsewhere.

While at my 1st Liverpool Beatles convention in 1989 at the Adelphi in Liverpool I spied a new series, the 'Unsurpassed Masters' volumes. I duly grabbed 1 of each volume that had, so far, been released. Luckily my copies were the correct versions that had both sides of the stereo included instead of the 1st batch that only had 1! These discs contained material that had been on Ultra Rare Trax but was surrounded by more outtakes and goofs. Plus, they were all on CD! Unfortunately for me Vol 4 had a great big dirty gouge on the playing surface, just where the most interesting track was (the early mix of Everybody's Got Something to Hide... with the extra guitar bars. It jumped just after that section) so I had to find and buy another copy of it later on. There was no way I could take it back to where I bought it and get a swap!



I would trawl each record fair looking for further volumes and I usually bought anything Beatles that had the Yellow Dog label attached to it.

The came along the beautiful Great Dane BBC boxset. I only ever saw one copy available and snapped it up. Glad I did as I never saw another:





A few years later, in 1994, I spotted these boxsets by Yellow Dog, The Ultimate Collection 1-3 series at the record fair. I'd learned by now that if I didn't buy something there and then chances are I'd never see them again so I toddled off to the cash point from the record fair and, more or less, emptied my bank account and bought all 3: These contained yet more studio outtakes, some of which hadn't been available anywhere else before. Another plus was that these boxes contained booklets outlining what was on the discs. This was a 1st for Yellow Dog as their previous CDs just contained track listings and sweet fanny adams else:









After getting these I barely touched my Unsurpassed Masters CDs. A few discs were picked up after this, we had a bit of a dry period. The odd disc contained something new and exciting but there was a lot of 'upgrades' and CDs containing a couple of new bits surrounded by rehashes. Some were good, some not so. The better ones were 'The Lost Pepperland Reel' because we could now hear the full 8 min + version of Gerorge's' 'It's All Too Much' and 'Turn Me On Dead Man' which had yet more outtakes we'd never heard before including an early version of 'What You're Doing' that was new to disc and a whole set of 'That Means A Lot' run throughs, some of which had been on 'Arrive Without Aging' but there they were were horribly tinny and warbly. These were perfect quality. There was also a lot of new Get Back era material, so I bought the Rockin' Movie Stars series:



At a fair in in 1999 I spotted 3 brand new boxes, the Mythology set. Again, I knew that if I didn't buy them there and then I would probably never see them again. These were great looking and 2 of the 3 boxes contained a coin from the 60s in them.(I should hunt down a 1967 penny for the box that doesn't have one!) A gimmick but a neat one:









Getting them home though I soon realised the content left a little bit to be desired. They weren't great, there was a lot of poor quality spoken word stuff. Still, I didn't realy regret buying them but, as I barely touched them, they are all still in mint condition.

Since then I don't think I've actually bought a brand new bootleg CD. Releases containing new material dried up and what did come out was either 'remastered' or slightly better sounding verisons of stuff I already had that could be downloaded off the internet. Then of course we all got to hear the long version of 'Revolution 1' on a boot called 'Take Your Knickers Off', which was absolutlely amazing.

I did, for a while burn my downloaded bootlegs to CD but soon gave up as, a few months later, a new, upgraded version of the same material would usually surface on the internet. Now, I don't bother with the burning to CD. I stick it on my iPod and listen to new stuff via that.

For a while I had a hand in making some bootleg CD & DVD covers of my own for releases put together by a fellow called Hobnail (I am the 'Jones' of 'Hobs, Apes & Jones', the made up label we put them out under). I even ended up having some of the covers I'd made feature in the 901 pdfs that reviewed the latest bootleg releases, a mag I bought a couple of issues back in the late 80s. I loved doing these and the fact I had some of my covers sitting on Beatles fans shelves all over the world was payment enough for the time I put into making them:





But then came along the HMC series of DVDs containing piles of video footage we'd never had access to before. I downloaded the 1st few volumes I wanted as I had no idea whatsoever about where to buy them. For a while I saw that physical copies were available to buy on eBay so I managed to get myself 4 originals but, when they arrived, was dismayed to see they didn't come in proper boxes. The discs themselves were inside the booklets. In some ways I prefer the copies I downloaded and made myself as I put them in solid DVD cases. I did get the same thrill though when they arrived in the post, as I had when I'd found something exciting to buy at those record fairs back in the 80s and 90s. The last time I looked on ebay they were nowhere to be seen. Either they've all sold out or Ebay cracked down on the people selling them.



But now, even those appear to have dried up. Now I have to rely on the Beatles themselves with their expanded deluxe boxsets for my new Beatles fix. Of course I bought the Pepper, White Album and Abbey Road boxes in order to hear more new studio outtakes from the best band there's ever been in the world. The band that have been the soundtrack to my life since I was 10 years old!

There will never be a time, until I'm dead that is , that I won't enjoy hearing the Beatles in the studio, at work, chatting, joking, running through songs etc.

But still, I do wonder. What will be the next surprise recording that surfaces by the Beatles? Things are slow at the moment but I'm sure they'll be something exciting and new to hear. Eventually.....

Oh and as a footnote to all this, all my bootlegs aren't shown. Despite not burning physical discs anymore I still have loads sitting on my shelf (that's straining under the weight) and a big pile a vinyl boots too. Here's what the CD section currently looks like:


Here's me at the start of this story (12 June 1983 to be exact)


And me now:

[Lord Reith]

Wow, terrific post Mark. Great photos!

And I see that your Great Dane set also came with a dog.