ORIGINAL AUDITION TAPE, CIRCA 1962

COMMENTS

A collection of previously available BBC radio cuts, taken from various sources and arranged in order to distribute a record with only officially unreleased tracks, that has nothing to do with the Decca tracks. This is what Wizardo told us regarding this misleading title: "Most Beatle collectors back in the early seventies had heard about the mythical Decca Audition Tape. I think Hunter Davies was the first to talk about its existence in his Beatles biography. Up until it was finally offered for sale at the Capitol Records swap meet, ten years later, it was considered the holy grail for Beatle collectors. As a result, everybody was looking for it and there were always a million false trails with no pay off. I had been promised a copy of the tape from a collector in Houston. I was foolish to believe him but told J it looked like a sure thing. The tape of course never arrived, but J had printed one of those damn order forms listing 'The Beatles Decca Audition' as being available for sale. When I told him it wasn't happening, he had Mad Jack copy Yellow Matter Custard [NOTE - also tracks from some other records] and draw up a cover saying 'Decca Audition Tape'. No point in letting a little lie get in the way of selling records, he figured. I was furious and insisted that Mad Jack was to have nothing to do with making records, only insert artwork. I waited a couple of weeks, then convinced J we no longer needed Jack or his wife working for us. We fired both of them and never regretted it. Once a bootleg got out of the barn there was no point in trying to close the doors. I refused to provide my customers with the record, but they would insist on ordering it anyhow. I've no idea how many times those stampers got pressed on, but it was always embarrassing to me. The record never should have been made in the first place.". Nevertheless, this is not an unpleasant compilation for the time, even though quality of some songs is quite poor.