MissHimMissHimMissHim...

Label: DarthDisc, DD016-23

Volume One: The Start of the Rumor

Disc One
1. Introduction
2. from WABC-AM, NYC: Roby Yonge's Last Night -- October 21, 1969
3-7. material from WKNR, Detroit, with Russ Gibb, October, 1969 including:
Interview with Derek Taylor
Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono
The Beatle Plot - Part 1: Clues
The Beatle Plot - Part 2: Voiceprint Analysis
The Beatle Plot - Part 3: Derek Taylor Tries Again
8. Footnote: CFNY rebroadcast of The Beatles Plot, from WKNR, with David Marston and John Small.

Disc Two
1. from WNEW-FM, NYC: News Close-Up, with Christopher Glenn, November 1969
2. from WPLJ-FM, NYC: Introduction to the mid-1970's rebroadcast of its Paul is Dead special.
3. WPLJ-FM's analysis of the clues, from 1969
4. WPLJ-FM takes another look at the clues, from the mid-1970's.

Volume Two: The Rumor Examined

Record One:
Side One . .
1-7. From WMCA-AM, NYC, late October or early November, 1969: Alex Bennett special, (Part 1): (Derek Taylor - Neil Aspinall - Trash - Fans outside Apple - Thomas Nutter, tailor - Iain Macmillan, photographer - Leslie Cavendish)

Record Two:
Side One . .
1-3. From WMCA-AM, NYC, late October or early November, 1969: Alex Bennett special, (Part 2): (Ringo Starr - From the BBC: Chris Drake interviews Paul and Linda McCartney on October 24, broadcast October 27, 1969 - Paul Krassner)

4-9. News clips (4. from the BBC: Paul and Linda in Scotland - 5. from ABC TV: October 22, 1969 - 6. from ABC TV: October 23, 1969 - 7. from ABC TV: October 24, 1969 - 8. from NBC TV: October 24, 1969 - 9. WABC-AM Radio: includes an interview with Richard DiLello, October, 1969)

10-20. RKO syndicated TV special: "Paul McCartney: The Complete Story, Told For the First and Last Time," a mock trial with F. Lee Bailey and the following "witnesses": (10. Russ Gibbs, DJ, WKNR-FM, Detroit - 11. F. Lee Bailey introduces the program - 12. Russ Gibbs discusses clues - 13. Doc Segal, a recording engineer - 14. Fred LaBour, student record reviewer - 15. Paul Cannon, program director, WKNR-FM, Detroit - 16. Stell, a former Apple secretary - 17. Peter Asher, Apple record producer (etc.) - 18. Sal Ianucci, President, Capitol Records - 19. Allen Klein - 20. F. Lee Bailey's conclusion)

21. A word from John Lennon, from Emperor Rosko Midday Spin, Feb. 15, 1970.

Volume Three: Ends and Odds

Disc Five
1-9. Paul Is Dead special from WKBW-AM, Buffalo, NY

Disc Six
1-3. The Mike Douglas show, late October or early November, 1969
Christopher Glenn
Mike McGear
Mike Douglas's closing comments
4. Clue Number 1, from the National Lampoon's Radio Dinner (Banana/Blue Thumb BTS-38, 1972)
5. Terry Knight - Saint Paul (Capitol 2056, 1969)
6. Werbley Finster - So Long Paul (RCA 74-0290, 1969)
7. Mystery Tour - Ballad of Paul (MGM 10097, 1969)
8. Mystery Tour - Ballad of Paul (Following the Bouncing Ball)
9. Billy Shears and the Pallbearers - Brother Paul (Silver Fox 121, 1969)
10. Clue Number 2, from the National Lampoon's Radio Dinner
11. Give Ireland Back to the Irish, from the National Lampoon's Radio Dinner
12-13. Lou Yeager radio special, source unidentified (1970s)

Volume Four: Perpetual Post-Mortem

Disc Seven
1-11. Radio special by Dave Fox, based on Joel Glazier's 1978 article for Strawberry Fields Forever
12. excerpt from The Long and Winding Road radio documentary, with a Derek Taylor quote.
13. excerpt from The Beatles Story, BBC, 1972, with comments from George Martin and John Lennon

Disc Eight
1. Chris Farley and Paul McCartney, Saturday Night Live (rehearsal), February, 1993
2-13. The Beatle Years, Westwood One: from show 93-46 (week of November 8, 1993) and 93-47 (week of November 15, 1993).
14. Interview with R. Gary Patterson, author of The Walrus Is Paul, from The Beatle Years, using segments from shows 96-43 (week of October 21, 1996) and 00-44 (week of October 28, 2000)
15. Paul McCartney on "Glass Onion," 1984, from The Beatle Years show 00-44
16. Chris Farley and Paul McCartney, Saturday Night Live, February 13, 1993


Liner Notes
The "Paul Is Dead!" mania of October and November 1969 is a decidedly peripheral area of Beatles collecting, and far be it from me to suggest that it is anything more than a footnote in Beatles history -- no matter how many books have been written about it. But what an interesting and peculiar footnote it was. For those of us who were still digesting the newly released Abbey Road, in that autumn of 1969, it didn't matter whether we actually believed that Paul McCartney had been killed in a car crash in 1966, and replaced by a look-alike, one William Campbell: there was simply no way not to get caught up in the business of finding and discussing the clues and symbolism said to be embedded in the group's recent work. The story took on a life of its own, as conspiracy theories tend to do.

And then, just about as suddenly as it started, the story vanished, only to be taken up again years -- even decades -- later by writers and collectors who had made the business of clue-finding into a specialty, documented in a handful of books and parodied by McCartney himself on his 1993 album, Paul Is Live.

On MissHimMissHimMissHim... we have assembled some vintage material that show this madness as it unfolded, as well as some explanatory material from 1970's rebroadcasts of the original shows -- and even new looks at the material from the 1990's.

It's all quite a circus. One DJ, manifestly unfamiliar with Shakespeare's King Lear, hysterically proclaims that someone can be heard saying "services for Billy" at the end of "I Am the Walrus." Another thinks that "Your Mother Should Know," played backwards, sounds like "Bach funeral music" for organ. (And which of Bach's non-existent funeral works would that be, exactly?) A third misidentifies the author of "The Passover Plot," which he also clearly hasn't read. But most stunning of all is how little everyone seems to know about the Beatles and their music. One DJ with a short memory tells us (in 1969!) that Sgt. Pepper was released after Epstein's death. A Capitol Records executive refers to "the Abbey album," and Allen Klein claims Abbey Road is not a real Beatles album at all!

But don't get me started. It's all here for you to parse on your own -- eight CDs worth, including, just about every clue unearthed at the time, backwards and forwards.

So there you have it -- !yojnE

- Neo