BEATLEMANIACS NEVER DIE

It’s the First Annual Beatles’ Convention, Magical Mystery Tour, and I’m standing in the lobby of the Bradford Hotel, Boston. For the last hour I’ve been watching five teenage girls in black tee-shirts (“Bring Back the Beatles,” “The Beatles Forever”) collecting signatures for a petition to keep John Lennon in the United States. In the center of the room, gaggles of lean boys wearing row on row of Beatles’ buttons flash rare albums at each other and reach out to fondle LPs missing from their collections. A blind woman wearing a long, dayglo green dress with sparkling rhinestones spelling out “JOHN GEORGE PAUL RINGO” is jauntily whisked through the lobby on the arms of a friend. No one notices.

Inside the hotel’s cavernous ballroom this Saturday afternoon, 20 metal folding tables have been filled with Beatles’ records and memorabilia. A thousand Beatle devotees, most of them under 20, crush through each other or peer between bodies to get a better view of the merchandise. Money changes hands quickly and cheerfully.

Among the items: Bubble gum cards with the Beatles ($1); the Polish poster for A Hard Day’s Night ($3.50); tie tacks with individual Beatles’ faces ($2); tie clasps shaped like a guitar with Beatle faces where the hole should be ($1.50); 1964 Beatles concert book, black with purple border and casual photos of all four Beatles inside ($20); foreign and domestic magazines with stories on the Beatles (80 cents to $20, including the 1964 TV Guide at $3), and more.

At one table the former president of the Beatles’ New, York fan club is selling promo photos, once free, for $2 to $4. She is only parting with her dupes, she says, as she keeps her eyes on the frenzy of hands flipping through her collection. “I’ll clear, let me see, $200 when it’s over. Pretty good, since they didn’t cost me anything, right?” She smiles and winks.

At another table, men and women are anxiously sifting through stacks of bootleg Beatles records at $4 each. At yet another table, I pick up a copy of the mimeographed Beatles’ fanzine Strawberry Fields Forever, and brush up on my Liverpudlian slang. I also find that a letter writer, for reasons known only to himself, is looking for “a list of George Harrison’s childhood diseases.” Off in the corners of the auditorium, small groups of people pull out singles carrying cases, bubble gum cards, press clippings, and start making individual trades.

Later in this weekend, there will be nine straight hours of Beatle films and promo clips (including Magical Mystery Tour, of which three prints, worth $50,000 each, exist), there will be a march on the State House to keep John Lennon in America, and there will be much admiring of each others’ buttons. But right now, Joe Pope, 26-year-old organizer of the convention and publish er of Strawberry Fields Forever, is calling the room to order for an auction of rare Beatles’ memorabilia. Among the items:

A lunch pail (without thermos) with the Beatles in bas relief and color, is gobbled up by a New York publicist for $25. “I’ll use it as a pocket book,” she explains. “It’ll be just GREAT at cocktail parties!”

A pair of Beatles sneakers (size 7 1/2, women’s, the only sneakers at the convention) go for $25. This Is Where It All Started, a Metro LP of Tony Sheridan and the Beatles, is worth $20. A mobile display unit for record stores brings in $12.50.

There were movies, music, speeches and gossip. But mostly there was sales.

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“And now,” says Joe, “what you’ve all been waiting for, and what most of you have never seen. You’ve heard about it. It’s called ‘The Butcher.’ It’s the original cover of Yesterday and Today. Only 100,000 were printed. Most were destroyed by Capitol. It was considered in bad taste. Some are under the new cover of the LP. But this copy is not steamed off, it’s the original.”

Gasps go up from the crowd.

“We have a minimum of $200 on this item,” Joe says, “and . .. here it is!”

He holds up a jacket with the four Beatles, grinning from ear to ear, dressed in white smocks and fondling decapitated dolls and sides of blood-red beef.

“You’ll notice,” Joes says pointing to the cover, “that there is no record with this. We collectors take out the record because it leaves a circle mark on the cover. The cover is the important thing. Now do I have a bid?”

The room grows silent, then one lone hand is raised. It belongs to an acned adolescent boy. He gets “The Butcher” and the room erupts in applause. End of auction.

The seller of that last item is Wayne Rogers, jocular president of a bootleg company called Rock and Roll University. He looks dejected as he tells me, “I didn’t want to sell ‘The Butcher.’ My wife made me. I wanted to trade it for an Atco promo record, Ain’t She Sweet. There was one guy here who had it, but he didn’t want to get rid of it. I make money from the bootlegs and the tapes. That’s what my company does. Right now I’m collecting tapes from Dylan’s tour. I trade to get them. But I also have a private collection and that ‘Butcher’ was in perfect condition. I hung it on my wall.”

David Peel, sometime street singer and friends with John Lennon, shows me a demo tape of something called “Marijuana,” which he then proceeds to sing. “Marijuana, marijuana, marijuana,” he yells. “We want marijuana, BRING BACK THE BEATLES.” I tell him the song seems very appropriate.

The room is cleared and cleaned. Before long, it’s filled up again, this time to hear Murray the K, once known as the 5 th Beatle.

“I’m going to give you the bad news first. The Beatles will never, repeat, never, get together again.”

A groan, coupled with boos, goes up from the crowd. Murray, stuffed in khaki slacks and white cowboy shirt, waits for the noise to die down.

“Now that you have the bad news, let me fill you in on all the gossip. The biggest shocker I can lay on you is that Ringo and Maureen are going to be divorced.”

Murmers from the crowd.

“George made sure, while Ringo was away, that Maureen wasn’t lonely.”

More murmurs.

“And, John is seeing Yoko Ono.”

Boos.

“You know, I’d like to see a picture of Yoko Ono with a couple of lines that said, Rasputin in drag. All you Yoko Ono fans, well, all I can say to you is, Up Yours!”

Wild cheers.

“I’d just like to say one thing, there has never been nor will there ever be anything to rival the Beatles.”

Tumultuous applause.