1977 televised tribute to the Beatles.

August 5, 2011 9:26 PM

In 1977, Rolling Stone magazine turned 10 years old. To celebrate, they put together a TV special, which included "A Day in the Decade" -- a star-studded, 15-minutes-long tribute to the Beatles.

Ted Neeley (of Jesus Christ Superstar fame) hosts this ill-conceived party, which includes hokey choreography, embarrassing costumes, and ham-handed political messages.

posted by chowflap (68 comments total)

"Every time a new technology takes over, a chunk of film history gets left behind."
.
..
...
"found by me on an unlabled Beta tape at a flea market."
posted by stbalbach at 9:46 PM on August 5, 2011

Still classier than Across the Universe.
posted by item at 9:47 PM on August 5, 2011 [3 favorites]

Good lord amighty this is horrific. I bailed at "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds. Couldn't make it through any more. What on god's green earth were they thinking?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 10:03 PM on August 5, 2011

So was the cocaine stronger back then, or did people just do more of it?
posted by item at 10:08 PM on August 5, 2011 [4 favorites]

If you feel like bailing, do yourself a favor and skip to 10:45. It's not that it gets good, but...well...just go to 10:45 and see.
posted by darksasami at 10:27 PM on August 5, 2011 [3 favorites]

So was the cocaine stronger back then, or did people just do more of it?

It was purer ... at least that's what I heard many years later in 1979 after a good friend had melted down in addiction and killed himself. Fuck that drug and what it did to the future way back when!
posted by philip-random at 10:30 PM on August 5, 2011 [1 favorite]

What on god's green earth were they thinking?

"Let's beat Robert Stigwood to the punch?"
posted by mintcake! at 10:40 PM on August 5, 2011

Can someone alive and conscious at the time confirm something for me?

OK so nowadays, everything that happens happens today (as it were)
7 year olds love The Beatles, the old stuff, new stuff and everything in between.
As do 17 year olds, 27 years olds, and so on.

Reading a Rolling Stone piece from around 76 about the Wings Over America* tour paints a markedly different picture. A picture of Wings playing to huge crowds comprised considerably of young teens that knew Wings first and The Beatles barely if at all. They were actually puzzled when Wings would play a classic Beatles song.

Now I know our world now is much much different and everyone has access to most of recorded history at will. But the impression that I got was that there was a period of time int eh 70s when maybe The Beatles were passe or at least not thought of often? Its intriguing to me because I find that hard to imagine.

Please advise.

* fuck I love that record
posted by Senor Cardgage at 10:50 PM on August 5, 2011

There's nothing wrong with Wings Over America. In fact it is a potent reminder that Venus And Mars is a far better record than people think. "Letting Go," for pete's sake. So good.

(I think Back To The Egg is the true lost gem of the Wings catalog, but I don't get a lot of love on that one either.)
posted by mintcake! at 11:03 PM on August 5, 2011 [2 favorites]

Wow I had to bail on that almost immediately. That arrangement of Day in the Life, it was just....so disturbing and really, really terrible.

It's too bad, because I was enjoying the story unfolding in the video. I'd be interested in learning about the rest of that guy's day. That pole he slid down when he woke up, it seemed kind of splintery. So was he a fireman, or a lighthouse keeper? Guess I'll never know. I can't go back to that place.
posted by jamjames at 11:07 PM on August 5, 2011

Did I give the impression that there was anything wrong with it?
posted by Senor Cardgage at 11:08 PM on August 5, 2011

A picture of Wings playing to huge crowds comprised considerably of young teens that knew Wings first and The Beatles barely if at all. They were actually puzzled when Wings would play a classic Beatles song.

The young teens part is fairly accurate. Wings were one of the HUGE bands of the day in my high school. But we kids all knew full well who the Beatles were. I would've been finishing Grade 11 when Wings Over America hit Seattle. Everyone was going because PAUL McCARTNEY WAS A BEATLE!!!!!!!!!

I was way more worried about catching Yes again.
posted by philip-random at 11:09 PM on August 5, 2011 [1 favorite]

Heck, did I come off like I thought that? Sorry. That'll be my usual defensive posture while discussing Wings...
posted by mintcake! at 11:25 PM on August 5, 2011

I love Wings. We are therefore...brothers.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 11:29 PM on August 5, 2011

Nobody sings like Linda.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 11:30 PM on August 5, 2011 [4 favorites]

I know people give Linda shit but think about it this way:
Youve been to the very tippy top of the mountain.
You are on the top of the world and your catalogue is unimpeachable.
You can literally do whatever the fuck you please.
The love of your life wants to be in your band.
I'd do it. You'd do it. We'd all do it.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 11:33 PM on August 5, 2011 [2 favorites]

I've never been a huge Wings fan, exactly, but I certainly didn't hate them. One of the things that always impressed me the most was how post-Beatles Paul moved into the kind of songwriting he did: it was utterly distinct from his Beatles-era writing, whereas it seemed as if Lennon was just, you know, continuing in the same vein, largely.

And that's not to indicate in any way that Lennon's post-Beatle output didn't contain plenty of great stuff. But somehow Paul seemed to seek out a genuinely new mode of expression for himself, and that is something rather unique and admirable, I think.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 11:35 PM on August 5, 2011 [1 favorite]

If I don't have some sort of acid nightmare vision of the "Polythene Pam" portion of this video when I go to sleep in a bit I'll pay everyone in this thread $5. My brain is all spider webs and '70s moustaches right now.
posted by mintcake! at 11:44 PM on August 5, 2011

Having watched this video now let me say this: if you grew up in the wake of The Apple and Rocky Horror and irony and whatnot, this is god damn AWESOME.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 11:59 PM on August 5, 2011

Y'all crazy. This is awesome. (Cast of characters anywhere? Who was that singing Helter Skelter?)
posted by Gator at 12:05 AM on August 6, 2011

The love of your life wants to be in your band.
I'd do it. You'd do it. We'd all do it.

For better or worse, I think that also pretty much sums up what John did with Yoko.

I know that when I say this,
I may be stepping on pins and needles;
But I don't like all these people
slagging her for breaking up the Beatles.
(Don't blame it on Yokey)
if I was John and you were Yoko,
I would gladly give up musical genius,
just to have you as my very own, personal Venus.

posted by Davenhill at 12:09 AM on August 6, 2011 [2 favorites]

>The love of your life wants to be in your band.
>I'd do it. You'd do it. We'd all do it.

For better or worse, I think that also pretty much sums up what John did with Yoko.

And George with Krishna.
posted by Sys Rq at 12:25 AM on August 6, 2011 [3 favorites]

But the impression that I got was that there was a period of time int eh 70s when maybe The Beatles were passe or at least not thought of often? Its intriguing to me because I find that hard to imagine.

During the 70s and the 80s, there was definitely much more of a bias against older music than there seems to be today. If you were young and didn't have a lot of money, you pretty much listened to what was on the radio, or maybe had a modest record collection. It might have been different in the bigger cities, but out where I lived, you either had Top 40, country, Mexican folk, or oldies, where "oldies" was Frank Sinatra and Glenn Miller. There just wasn't a venue for music from the 50s and 60s in a lot of markets, though they would occasionally throw something in on the Top 40 stations.

I'm not old enough to remember when the Beatles were around, but I was a little kid when Wings was popular, and remember being surprised to find out that Paul McCartney was one of the Beatles. I don't think I really knew much about the individual Beatles until John Lennon was killed, at which point (of course) they were thrust back into the spotlight.

That said, the Beatles were still revered. It's just that the record industry hadn't yet given up on finding the "next" Beatles, and there just wasn't much money to be made selling Beatles records (most record stores were pretty small, so only carried the latest stuff). I think The Knack was the last band that finally killed that idea dead.
posted by robla at 12:49 AM on August 6, 2011 [1 favorite]

The love of your life wants to be in your band. I'd do it. You'd do it. We'd all do it.

I think that also pretty much sums up what John did with Yoko.

And George with Krishna.

And Ringo with... um... Joe Walsh?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 12:58 AM on August 6, 2011

My mother tuned in to LA's KRLA when I was a kid in the 70's. Their motto at the time was "from Elvis to Elton".
posted by brujita at 1:24 AM on August 6, 2011

And Ringo with... um... Joe Walsh?

Barbara Bach, though that didn't turn out terribly well.
posted by Kinbote at 1:28 AM on August 6, 2011

Their motto at the time was "from Elvis to Elton".

No love for the father of them all, of course. Elmore.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 1:54 AM on August 6, 2011 [2 favorites]

Interesting that this medley, like the only-somewhat-less-tacky Cirque Du Soliel thing pulls almost everything from Sgt. Pepper's, White Album and Abby Road. If you grew up hearing 70s-90s rock radio, that's pretty much the catalog segment that was put into rotation as well.

The #1 record seems to have rectified the history a bit, showing they weren't just a rock band, but a rock 'n' roll band too. The Rock Band game ( in part because sought to dramatize the storyline of their career, or at least the storyline of their haircuts) is more evenly distributed as well.
posted by bendybendy at 3:54 AM on August 6, 2011

Looks like they spent a lot of money on that shit too!
posted by punkfloyd at 5:49 AM on August 6, 2011

Those strawberry costumes at the 3:45 mark are incredible (and super creepy!)
posted by Ike_Arumba at 6:17 AM on August 6, 2011

This is full of all kinds of really strange awesome. The use of the cast of JCS as the main singers is totally a jumping off point of greatness. The unison background dancing during Magical Mystery Tour is great because it's filmed long-form (no quick cuts) and it's totally foreshadowing Michael Jackson videos. The blatant 1970s arrangements are a great "modern" take on music which was at about a decade old when this was filmed. And the Nixon / Carter bit... Wow. So much hard work obviously went into this, with so many people involved... Truly a project of passion and they intended it for greatness on some level. And I support that intent. Fuck the haters.

As far as the soundtrack for Love goes, you're entirely wrong about what it pulls from. Those song titles are for the overarching theme of each segment, but the entire album is one giant mash-up, with background music and vocals and everything being mixed and mashed from all eras of the Beatles catalog. It's a fascinating look at the music that the Beatles did, and will make you look at the old tracks in a new way. I suggest getting the 5.1 surround version so you can hear all the tracks nicely isolated for maximum auditory digestion.

As far as attitudes toward the Beatles goes, they've undergone quite a renaissance and redemption over the past 20 years or so. They were kind of respected but a bit ignored or even put down during the 1970s when I was a kid, and in the 1980s nobody wanted to look backwards at music anyway. It was when ABC aired The Beatles Anthology (which sadly is impossible to find -- only the Apple Corps version can be easily purchased) that the resurgence of Beatles and the building of their mythos into the demi-god status it enjoys today began... and that was in the early 1990s.

Anyway, this video is amazing, and I never heard of this before. Thanks so much for posting.
posted by hippybear at 6:23 AM on August 6, 2011 [3 favorites]

The difference b/w Yoko and Linda, is that Yoko pulled John into some serious musical exprimentaiton, because she was part of a crowd that valued it (see LaMonte Yonge), while Linda was a dillentate. (see her photography career)
posted by PinkMoose at 6:29 AM on August 6, 2011

It's shit like this that turned me, and a generation of kids, into punk rockers. I was sick of that pablum for stoned out hippies, and wanted to smash them all to bits. Somewhere I have an old NME magazine I bought in 1977, the centerfold was always the US and UK charts. In the US, the BeeGees and Abba were the top hits. In the UK, it was The Sex Pistols' "God Save the Queen."
posted by charlie don't surf at 6:29 AM on August 6, 2011 [4 favorites]

Barbara Bach, though that didn't turn out terribly well.

No it did not.
posted by jeffen at 6:39 AM on August 6, 2011

I've seen Ted Neeley dressed in a sparkly tux singing "Magical Mystery Tour". What is there left to live for? Goodbye.
posted by MikeMc at 6:49 AM on August 6, 2011

If you grew up in the seventies watching TV variety shows, that video doesn't seem all that wild. It was an interesting decade.
posted by octothorpe at 7:13 AM on August 6, 2011

I bailed at "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.

And missed the strawberry people?
posted by the noob at 7:14 AM on August 6, 2011

Nixon singing I'm a Loser is just awesome.
posted by octothorpe at 7:18 AM on August 6, 2011

Oh the dance in Long Long Long,

But yes, 70s TV was all about this. Polythene Pam is trying to do a Tommy Gypsy Queen thing.
posted by the noob at 7:19 AM on August 6, 2011

It really bugs me what the media did to Nixon after the impeachment. Turning him into a clown effectively whitewashed prior administrations which were every bit as treacherous. I could get behind this video until that schtick.
posted by jwhite1979 at 7:46 AM on August 6, 2011

Thanks, I had never seen this. I was a kid in the seventies, but this quite nicely sums up the Road-of-Excess approach that I recall from the days when variety shows ruled TV. No Palace of Wisdom in sight here, though.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 7:47 AM on August 6, 2011

So we're celebrating old anniversaries now?
posted by Fizz at 7:49 AM on August 6, 2011

I was 19 in 1979 and I totally didn't see the beatles "ignored" or not respected in the 70s. Maybe that was just my 70s, but what I remember was LOTS of attention from Rolling Stone (really the only way to read/hear about pop music or even pop culture), constant reunion rumors, John Lennon showing up on talk shows a lot in the early part of the decade, pretty popular re-releases and repackagings (Live at the Star Club, Hollywood Bowl, the red and blue greatest hits LPs), Klaatu (supposedly beatles in disguise), The Knack (supposedly beatles knockoffs), &tc.

The veneration really started after Lennon's killing, but I wouldn't say that they were less respected or less overtly influential prior to that, except among the punk/New Wave crowd, which in a way existed as the anti-beatles anyway.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 7:51 AM on August 6, 2011

It really bugs me what the media did to Nixon after the impeachment.

Does it make you feel any better knowing that he was the 2nd or 3rd most liberal president of the last 50 years? I'm going to guess not.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 7:53 AM on August 6, 2011

It's a nice tribute to The Beatles. Warts and all.
posted by rmmcclay at 8:12 AM on August 6, 2011

And the Nixon / Carter bit.

That was Kissinger, not Carter.
posted by benito.strauss at 8:12 AM on August 6, 2011

Carter was singing Mother Nature's Son.
posted by octothorpe at 8:14 AM on August 6, 2011 [1 favorite]

Oops! I, too, couldn't watch the whole thing. My bad.
posted by benito.strauss at 8:19 AM on August 6, 2011

This, in a strange way, makes me feel just like I did listening to the popular alternative songs of my youth that were played during the Saturday Morning Flashback to 1991 today on WXRT. Everything just seems so damn sincere compared to what I know follows it.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 8:29 AM on August 6, 2011

Whenever the chorus of "Band on the Run" comes into my head, it automatically gets mashed up with Ricky Martin's "Bailamos."

Band on the run
Let the rhythm take you over
Bailamos

It's like a spontaneous melodic haiku. I should start whispering it in people's ears on the subway.
posted by Beardman at 8:32 AM on August 6, 2011 [4 favorites]

If you were young and didn't have a lot of money, you pretty much listened to what was on the radio, or maybe had a modest record collection.

Something overlooked in these days of Youtube, Grooveshark, etc. - back in the day if you didn't own the record (or know somebody who owned the record), you couldn't hear the song. Years would pass between the opportunities to hear even something as essential to he canon as Chuck Berry or Buddy Holly. I remember driving over two hours with friends on a pilgrimage to a jukebox that had John Lee Hooker and Sonny Terry records in it - music we had read about but never had a chance to listen to.
posted by squalor at 8:35 AM on August 6, 2011 [9 favorites]

They were kind of respected but a bit ignored or even put down during the 1970s when I was a kid, and in the 1980s nobody wanted to look backwards at music anyway.

I don't know. In my memory, the 1980s looked backwards at a lot of stuff, particularly the 1950s and 1960s, even while it was creating its own sound. The 1980s didn't have the technology to definitively embalm past decades the way we do now, but I can remember any number of nostalgia trips. Matthew Broderick shook his butt to the Beatles cover of "Twist and Shout" in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off." "Got My Mind Set on You" was the last hit by any Beatle to go to #1, and it was followed by the two Traveling Wilburys albums, which were nothing if not exercises in nostalgia. U2's Rattle and Humincluded a (forgettable, in my opinion) cover of "Helter Skelter" in which Bono pretentiously intones that "Charles Manson stole this song from the Beatles and we're stealing it back." Marshall Crenshaw's first album was a retro nod to the Beatles covering the Everly Brothers. One of the first videos on MTV was Nick Lowe's "Cruel to Be Kind," which was a new wave homage to doo-wop and Merseybeat both. Elvis Costello started out snarling at the 1960s and by the end of the decade his twee "Veronica" was a loving wet kiss to 60s pop psychedelia -- co-written with Paul McCartney -- and it was his biggest-charting hit in the States. Even Prince went for the Sgt. Pepper's sound on parts of Around the World in a Day. So did Tom Petty and the Haerbreakers on "Don't Come Around Here No More." All of this stuff may not have been looking backwards, but if it wasn't, I'm not sure what else it was doing.
posted by blucevalo at 9:25 AM on August 6, 2011 [1 favorite]

I don't know. In my memory, the 1980s looked backwards at a lot of stuff, particularly the 1950s and 1960s, even while it was creating its own sound.

Indeed. You couldn't go five minutes without being assaulted with that godawful boogie-woogie piano shit.

No thanks, eighties. No thanks.
posted by Sys Rq at 9:47 AM on August 6, 2011

I don't remember any time in my life when the Beatles weren't revered as a hugely influential band. As a boy in the 70s, I distinctly remember people proving how "serious" they were about music by criticizing others for not being familiar with the Beatles, their music, and their place in history. I guess there must have been somebody saying they didn't like the Beatles, but all I can remember is the response: it was not acceptable not to like the Beatles. Not liking the Beatles only proved that you didn't understand the roots of the music you did like.

Looking back now, knowing a little more about the Beatles and their influences, I think we gave the Beatles too much credit. It was almost like we thought they had invented Rock and Roll.
posted by Max Udargo at 9:50 AM on August 6, 2011

Also - another delicious 70's Beatles influenced oddity:
All This and World War Two.
posted by squalor at 9:59 AM on August 6, 2011

Metafilter: an ill-conceived party, which includes hokey choreography, embarrassing costumes, and ham-handed political messages.
posted by joe lisboa at 10:19 AM on August 6, 2011

Still classier than Across the Universe.

I almost lost a friend over Across The Universe. He loved it and hated I'm Not There. In fact, I think I did lose him there.

I don't know. In my memory, the 1980s looked backwards at a lot of stuff, particularly the 1950s and 1960s,

In my universe, the Beatles were never less regarded than during the 80s (the early part particularly). I'd simply heard way too much of them, particularly in the wake of John Lennon's murder. It was too much living in the past. In fact, at the radio station I contributed to, we had a unwritten rule. Actually, it was scrawled on the chalkboard. Sometimes it would get erased, but it would always reappear:

NO BEATLES EXCEPT OLD BROWN SHOE

Things started changing a bit by about 1986, mainly with the angrier, weirder stuff from the White Album, Yer Blues in particular. Which was a full-on John Lennon onslaught, of course. Paul McCartney was about as irrelevant as an artist could be in the 80s. That decade required edge.
posted by philip-random at 10:24 AM on August 6, 2011

Why Old Brown Shoe?
posted by Beardman at 2:29 PM on August 6, 2011 [1 favorite]

This is quite a find. I actually wish this included commercials so that I could have an even more enhanced flashback. Miller time anyone?

I can definitely see how this could be offensive to modern sensibilities. The mimey "theatrical jazz" acting going on is pretty obnoxious and over the top, but I think that was the whole schtick with JCS. "Hey we're doing something NEW and EXPRESSIVE!" Or something.

I shouldn't talk though, at that time the only thing I knew about JCS was that kids, including myself, were running around playgrounds singing: "JESUS christ SUPER star WHO in the WORLD/HELL do you THINK you are!"

BAD 70's kids!

(Oh, that song with the spider web with the Black Diva singing was pretty fucking Punk Rock!)
posted by snsranch at 6:58 PM on August 6, 2011

Very Star Wars Christmas. A must see for all the wrong reasons.

Regarding Back to the Egg, I bought that when I was 10. Loved the sleeve for some reason, was fascinated that all the songs were written by Paul except apparently one, and loved Arrow Through Me. I can't say I remember anything else about the album though.
posted by juiceCake at 10:04 PM on August 6, 2011

I can't say I remember anything else about the album though.

Rockestra
posted by mintcake! at 5:20 AM on August 7, 2011

So, where's the rest of it? Not that I actually need to, uh, see that again.

I saw this when I was in 9th grade. I had just started getting into rock and reading Rolling Stone, and when I saw this (I think the whole thing was about an hour long at least) I remember thinking, Jesus, what the hell is happening? Most fans of rock music and RS magazine had about the same reaction to it as everyone here. It was just so strange and awful. People were bewildered by it at the time too.

It turned out that the magazine had very little to do with how this show turned out, and they even apologized for it a few weeks later.

Crazy times!
posted by freakazoid at 7:40 AM on August 7, 2011 [1 favorite]

freakazoid's remembers it much as I do. It was as if Rolling Stone, still the coolest magazine going, had lost big at poker and part of the deal was the other guy got to use their name for a while. The Beatles probably lost in that game too which is further evidenced by the likes of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (the movie) which came out a year later.

Anyway, as charlie don't surf points out, it all had to happen. The hippie dreams of peace and revolution had to melt down into an ugly syrup of Hollywood-variety-show-over-production and cocaine residue, or else punk rock would never have had reason to happen.
posted by philip-random at 9:55 AM on August 7, 2011 [2 favorites]

Yeah, once the "counter-culture" started to become the "mainstream-ish" culture, something else had to come along to replace it. I'm not sure if that kept happening after the late 70's with punk and new wave, but I basically got too old to care. If anyone wants to fill me in, feel free.
posted by freakazoid at 11:08 AM on August 7, 2011 [1 favorite]

The big difference between punk and the hippie dream (other than the obvious fashion + music likes) was that punk was never about changing anything, per say. It was not a revolution. The culture was not going to get turned on its head, the President wasn't going to have long hair and wear a tie-dye shirt.

Punk was about resistance. It was about hanging on to one's values and sanity in the face of seemingly overwhelming greed and insanity ... By Any Means Necessary. In fact, I remember a button from those days, probably an anarchist thing. It simply said, "BE STRONG. RESIST."
posted by philip-random at 11:26 AM on August 7, 2011

once the "counter-culture" started to become the "mainstream-ish" culture

Well, except this never happened.

The trappings of the counter-culture were assimilated. The clothing and the colors and other aspects of the aesthetic which that particular tribe had created to establish identity was co-opted into the larger culture. But the actual belief system and goals of the counter-culture... the idea that love and sharing and freedom could replace the status quo and that people should learn to expand their minds not their pocketbooks and all that other stuff... that was never mainstreamed.

That's the way the establishment works to neuter the things it fears. It finds the traits which denote membership in the troublesome group and makes those things mainstream, thus diluting the ability of that group to discern those who are truly in it for the ideology from those who are in it as a statement of being fashionable and current. Once that is achieved, the movement has lost its power of identity, which is the primary way it had for achieving any sort of coherence within the greater culture to begin with.

Seeds were planted... Sesame Street and other such programming was largely created by the counter-culture and managed to exert its influence on an entire generation. But those seeds require fertile soil to grow and blossom, and the establishment does everything it can to salt the earth of young minds against counter-cultural ideology. There will always be a few who grab onto the belief system and allow it to flourish in their minds and lives and who will seek to pass along the path of peace and love to those others. But the mainstream will always seek to squash that kind of belief system in favor of capitalist social darwinism, because it is through the striving for the unobtainable and the creation of a sense of malcontent and the hope that it can be alleviated through participation in the dominant culture and purchasing the right products that the establishment maintains its existence.

Punk wasn't a new movement outside the counter-culture of the 60s. It was a continuation of it -- specifically the idea that you don't have to be commercial or skilled to make a statement, and that your statement should spring from the moment and be heart-felt and those qualities will attract an audience. As long as that energy remains alive, no matter how it manifests, there will be hope. Even in modern culture, the blogosphere / internet started out with a large amount of this philosophy. Sadly, it has now also become co-opted into the greater marketing machine and so has lost its teeth and importance. I look forward to seeing what comes next.
posted by hippybear at 11:31 AM on August 7, 2011 [2 favorites]

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (the movie) and this TV tribute to the Beatles are both prime examples of 1970s cheese that once inspired me to create a "truckloads of cocaine" scale (as in "How many truckloads of cocaine were necessary to make this sound like a good idea?") for rating 1970s cultural product.
posted by jonp72 at 6:43 PM on August 7, 2011

Barbara Bach, though that didn't turn out terribly well

Aren't they still married?
posted by kirkaracha at 6:36 PM on August 8, 2011