What happened to the Podcast?
In which we explain the missing podcast episodes, but still produce a new one.
As some folks have already mentioned to me, you may have noticed that various episodes from Seasons 1 through 3 of the original Before They Were Beatles podcast have been disappearing from your feeds.
This is due to a change in ownership of the hosting platform. When we started the Before They Were Beatles podcast it was hosted on the Anchor.fm platform, and they were OK with the episodes having embedded music clips as long as they are short (i.e below 30 seconds in length) under the principle of Fair Use.
Anchor.fm was then purchased by Spotify, and over the last few months they have started a purge of podcasts that contain music. Originally they just pulled down episodes that they felt had unlicensed music without warning - and we were hit with a few episodes disappearing. Now they at least send a warning note outlining episodes they are looking at removing.
In light of this we preemptively pulled the targeted episodes to stop them being permanently deleted.
I do have the original files for all the deleted episodes as well as the ones I pulled. We are now working through those episodes removing the music and doing any edits necessary to make sure that the narrative still makes sense. That will take some time.
In the meantime please continue to listen to and enjoy The Forgotten Beatles series, which seems to be unaffected.
Thanks for your understanding.
Alan
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The Savage Young Beatles
THE SAVAGE YOUNG BEATLES will be making a return appearance at the excellent Abbey Road On The River festival.
This year’s festival will be held in Jeffersonville Indiana at the end of this month, from May 22 to 26.
If you haven’t been to an AROTR event I highly recommend it.
Unfortunately, I won’t be able to join the festivities this year due to some long-standing travel plans around an upcoming book launch.
You can find out more at the festival’s website
And here’s a taster of The Savage Young Beatles on stage at a previous AROTR
And it looks like the boys will also be making a return visit to The Woodlands in Widnes on 24th August.
Podcast Updates
The latest Forgotten Beatles episode is now live and can be found on your favorite podcast platform, or directly right HERE.
This month the spotlight falls on trumpet player David Mason, drummer Tommy Moore, and bass player Chas Newby.
Beatles Books From My Shelves
“Beatles vs Stones” by John McMiilian
I’ve always thought that the “Beatles vs Stones” argument was a pointless discussion. Sure you may have a preference for one group’s music over the other (No prizes for guessing where my preference lies), but the two aren’t mutually exclusive. Then at a business event a few weeks ago I heard two people having this exact discussion.
I pulled this off the shelf hoping it might provide some insights into why this is something that is still discussed. Unfortunately it didn’t really. It’s more of a joint biography of both groups careers during the sixties that while it often quotes the bands themselves as saying they had nothing but friendship and mutual respect for each other it repeatedly goes back to its central thesis in trying to prove a non-existent rivalry between them. Basing the thesis on media reporting, fan magazines, and marketing ploys designed to sell records while ignoring , or dismissing, evidence from primary sources just irritated me.
And as biographies go it didn’t add anything really new that I didn’t know before - other than the fact that the Stones’ first published review was written by a young student called Brian May who turned out to be pretty handy with a guitar himself.
The Beatles in Comics
Condorito #13
Zig-Zag Empressa - Chile
1964
Cover art by “Pepo”
This is a fun, bright and energetic cover. As far as I can tell with my rusty Spanish and from the few pages that I have seen, the story here concerns the lead character from the Condorito comics (38 issues published between 1955 and 1972) and his friends deciding to become the Chilean version of The Beatles. To achieve this they purchase a set of wigs from a women’s hairdresser - but then get confused with a bunch of thieves that have a similar mop-top hairstyle.
Rock out to our BTWB Playlists
If you would like to listen to full versions of the songs mentioned in either the main Before They Were Beatles podcast, or the new Forgotten Beatles series you can now find them on my new YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/@AlanPorterWriter
Or you can check out the Before They Were Beatles playlist on Spotify at
What Else Is Alan Working On?
For more information on what else I have going on with writing, podcasting, and general slice-of-life stuff, check out my regular FREE weekly CAN’T SEE THE FOREST newsletter -
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See you next time.
Alan J. Porter
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