Backbeat Songs From The Original Motion Picture - The Backbeat Band (1994)

Ideated from: a week of stuff that doesn’t seem to exist on streaming services

Backbeat was a film dramatizing the early years of the Hamburg-based Beatles which included the short and mercurial life of original Beatle Stu Sutcliffe. I have not seen the film. I don’t really plan to.

The early days of the band were speed-fueled bar rock, covering early rock n roll and R&B and ripping the shit out of it raucously and joyously. You get a feel for the real Beatles’ versions of these songs on the Past Masters collection, although by the time the band recorded these some of the original rawness was probably lost.

The band assembled to recreate this early beatles sound was a literal supergroup of 90s alt rock types. Dave Grohl (who at the time was in a band called Nirvana, named after the t-shirt brand the kids wear I think), REM’s Mike Mills, Thurston Moore from Sonic Youth, and Don Fleming from Gumball provided the muscular music, with Greg Dulli of Afghan Whigs doing John’s vocal parts, and Soul Asylum’s Dave Pirner doing Paul’s.

This is a condensed, concentrated half hour of pure throwback bliss.

Tracks I Liked

Money (that’s what I want) - Many versions of this very early Motown tune over the years, but the Beatles is a standout and so is this recreation of it

Bad Boy - Larry Williams’ kind-of-novelty tune reimagined as a straight banger

Rock & Roll Music - you could reasonably argue that Chuck Berry only had one song early on that he just kept playing but this one is as good as any of them.