Harry And His Box Set (V1, 2, 7, 10, 12, 15, 14 update.)

[kontroller]

Disc 11 track 38 ("Intro") - 0.55 to 1.00 - an early glimpse of You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)...?

[fabwill]

Did your school friends like The Beatles too? It seems odd that no-one ever would have mentioned it to you.

If you weren't told by someone, it would be tricky to know they were on. Flicking through an issue of Radio Times, I have to look really hard to find the listing, even when I know it's supposed to be there. It's literally three lines. I would guess that very few if any people heard ALL the radio programmes The Beatles were on because it would have required scanning each RT very carefully in advance. I mean, you wouldn't know they were going to appear on, say, Side By Side in advance. You'd really need to be looking for any Beatles mention of any kind. But with PGTB I guess if you heard it once then you would probably remember most of the time to tune in again.

I wonder if lots of younger people really did study the RT and/or daily newspapers (pretty much every home would have had one at the time) - there was so little on for them that it would have been worth investing a small amount of time. And once you'd heard one PGTB, then given what your shows tell us about how dull other radio acts were, you'd definitely seek out next week's show. I'm confident my Dad could still tell you what time of week Dan Dare was broadcast in the 50s.

The very fact they did so many shows (and other bands did not) suggests the BBC thought an awful lot of people were listening in. I get that once broadcast, the shows were largely forgotten (not least because the band were scaling ever higher heights) but I struggle to believe they went unheard.

But this is all supposition on my part. Do we know anything about what kind of audience ratings were claimed for the Beatles BBC shows?

[masterjedi]

How have I not seen this thread until yesterday? LR, this looks fantastic. Does it completely replace the previous BBC set?

[eclipsed1]

How have I not seen this thread until yesterday? LR, this looks fantastic. Does it completely replace the previous BBC set?

It does, with plenty of upgraded material!

[JoeWadley]

How have I not seen this thread until yesterday? LR, this looks fantastic. Does it completely replace the previous BBC set?

This is everything, most of it fresh transfers from tape sources. Not just a few upgrades here and there, a complete overhaul.

[Lord Reith]

How have I not seen this thread until yesterday?

You weren't paying attention!

[Lord Reith]

I wonder if lots of younger people really did study the RT and/or daily newspapers (pretty much every home would have had one at the time) - there was so little on for them that it would have been worth investing a small amount of time. And once you'd heard one PGTB, then given what your shows tell us about how dull other radio acts were, you'd definitely seek out next week's show. I'm confident my Dad could still tell you what time of week Dan Dare was broadcast in the 50s.

The very fact they did so many shows (and other bands did not) suggests the BBC thought an awful lot of people were listening in. I get that once broadcast, the shows were largely forgotten (not least because the band were scaling ever higher heights) but I struggle to believe they went unheard.

But this is all supposition on my part. Do we know anything about what kind of audience ratings were claimed for the Beatles BBC shows?

I can only go by my own experience as a young person. The most frustrating thing about the "old days" if you want to call them that was the lack of easily accessible information and there being no way to remind yourself of anything further than 24 hours into the future. When I knew about something in advance, I would go to lengths like sticking a note on my bedroom door a few days beforehand so I would see it every morning... but then your mum would clean up and take it down. I always seemed to miss the first few episodes of ANY series I badly wanted to hear/see. And then I would always miss a random episode at some point after that. And there was no going back and getting what you missed, unless someone else happened to tape it, and then it was a huge hassle trying to make a copy. So it didn't matter if I knew stuff was going to be on, because at least 50% of the time I would still miss it anyway. Short of carving it on your forehead, there was no way to make sure you'd remember.

The way these broadcasts were so utterly and completely wiped from the collective memories of everybody afterwards though reminds me of the mentality back then. Repeats were met with a groan and everybody expected a constant diet of new material. So it was a case of out with the old, in with the new. Yeah, we heard that radio series with The Beatles but that was a year ago and we're thinking about their new movie now. Even in the 1980s when i tentatively started collecting movies and tv shows on vhs, it was considered very weird and eccentric by most people. They thought it was a waste of time and money. But more than that they just couldn't understand the thinking behind it. Why would you want to watch them again? You've already seen them.

At school you'd talk about stuff on tv and "hey you've got to watch this show" or whatever but at that age you're more interested in talking about girls and stuff so I suppose I can understand how some fans didn't even know the shows were on. I guess they weren't seen as anything special, it was just how it was and you'd expect your favourite band to play live on the radio every now and then so why bother even talking about it.

The listening figures for the early Here We Go's were like 2 million I think. But those weekday shows had only started on New Year's Day 1962, and probably took a while to catch on. Prior to that there was sweet FA for teens during the week excepot a record show called "Teenagers Turn" where a different deejay each day played the kinds of records teenagers parents would have liked (typical BBC ). So by the time PGTB came along, I guess most teens had begun to realise there was stuff on for them at 5pm on weekdays and the first PGTB had an audience of 4 million ISTR. Eric Clapton says that when he was at school, word about that show spread quickly and so I would imagine that by the end the figures would have been substantially higher. Saturday Club got like 10 or 15 million listeners but I don't think PGTB had that kind of audience.

[steepien]

How have I not seen this thread until yesterday?

I missed it too, for me it was because it doesn't have one of Lord Reith's signature ALL CAPS TITLES

[Lord Reith]

How have I not seen this thread until yesterday?

I missed it too, for me it was because it doesn't have one of Lord Reith's signature ALL CAPS TITLES

THIS IS TRUE!

[JoeWadley]

How have I not seen this thread until yesterday?

I missed it too, for me it was because it doesn't have one of Lord Reith's signature ALL CAPS TITLES

Well, it was a stealth release. This thread started as a different BBC release, and then we started to get Volume 1, Volume 2.... and we had to ask. Is this a new BBC set? The thread title changed a couple of times. It was all quite mysterious and exciting.