Английская Википедия:Apple scruffs
Шаблон:Short description Шаблон:For Шаблон:Use dmy dates Шаблон:Use British English The Apple scruffs were a group of devoted Beatles fans who congregated outside the Apple Corps building and at the gates of Abbey Road Studios in London during the late 1960s, in the hope of seeing or interacting with one of the band members.Шаблон:SfnШаблон:Sfn According to Apple press officer Derek Taylor, when The Sunday Times wrote a feature article on the company in the late 1960s, their map included a location for the scruffs, on the steps of the offices at 3 Savile Row.Шаблон:Sfn
The scruffs carried membership cards and sought to protect the Beatles from the frenzied fan worship of Beatlemania. They built a rapport with the band members and became associated with the Beatles' history in the years before and shortly after their break-up in 1970. Harrison's song "Apple Scruffs", from his 1970 triple album All Things Must Pass, is a tribute to the Apple scruffs.Шаблон:Sfn
Membership
The Apple scruffs had a membership hierarchy, which helped ensure that newcomers refrained from screaming at the sight of one of the Beatles,Шаблон:Sfn and printed membership cards.Шаблон:Sfn Almost all of the scruffs were young women.Шаблон:Sfn Apple Corps press officer Derek Taylor recalled that unlike the groupies that bands such as the Beatles and the Byrds attracted in the United States, the scruffs' motives were innocent, as they sought merely to be supportive of their heroes.Шаблон:Sfn According to American journalist Al Aronowitz, who documented the scruffs' all-night vigils during the 1970 recording sessions for All Things Must Pass, George Harrison's first post-Beatles solo album:Шаблон:Sfn "In the morning they'd go off to their jobs and in the evening they'd be back outside the studio door again. Their grapevine was infallible."Шаблон:Sfn
Beatles biographer Bill Harry lists the members as Margo Stevens, Gill Pritchard, Nancy Allen, Carol Bedford and Wendy Sutcliffe, and other girls known as Sue-John, Chris, Di, Kath, Virginia, Dani and Lucy.Шаблон:Sfn In addition, there was Tommy and Jimmy,Шаблон:Sfn two gay boys from New York.Шаблон:Sfn Sue-John was so named because of her passion for John Lennon; Lucy, an Italian, was fixated on Harrison; Bedford's favourite was George Harrison.Шаблон:Sfn By 1969, when the Beatles were recording their Abbey Road album, tourists would also wait outside Abbey Road Studios (then named EMI Studios) with the scruffs.Шаблон:Sfn
Stevens, the scruffs' leader,[1] was a babysitter and originally brought her charge with her.Шаблон:Sfn While still a scruff, Stevens started work as a caterer at Apple Corps; she later became a promotions officer for the company.Шаблон:Sfn Pritchard, a 17-year-old hairdresser in March 1969, left Birmingham for London midway through serving a customer after hearing radio reports about McCartney's upcoming wedding to Linda Eastman. Pritchard went on to work at Abbey Road Studios for many years.Шаблон:Sfn The scruffs made Taylor an honorary Apple scruff in 1969 and issued him with a membership card.Шаблон:Sfn
Operation
Interaction with the Beatles
Шаблон:Quote box In a 1996 article on the Apple scruffs for Mojo magazine, Cliff Jones wrote that their presence at Apple and outside recording studios such as Abbey Road and the Beatles' homes ensured them a role as insiders and witnesses to the band's history. In this way, he continued, the scruffs "transcended" fandom and became part of "the Beatles' legend" themselves.Шаблон:Sfn Harrison told Disc and Music Echo in April 1969 that "their part in the play is equally as important as ours."Шаблон:Sfn Taylor was intrigued by the scruffs' ability to discover which studio the Beatles were working in on any given day, and at how the scruffs were often more informed about the band's activities than the Apple staff were. In this regard, he said they were like "Sherlock Scruffs".[1]Шаблон:Refn
According to Taylor, the Beatles were fascinated by the scruffs because of their innocence. He said that Lennon was "sometimes difficult"; McCartney was always polite but struggled with their treatment of Linda; Harrison overcame his shyness and aversion to fan worship, and "grew very fond" of the scruffs; and Ringo Starr "was Ringo and always had time for a joke or a quip".Шаблон:SfnШаблон:Refn
Through their proximity to their heroes, the scruffs came to see how normal the band members were.Шаблон:Sfn Pritchard recalled that, in contrast to the other Beatles, particularly Lennon, McCartney sought their approval, as if to say: "I'm the nice one, like me, like me!" Sutcliffe said that while most of the scruffs liked McCartney for his "cute" image, this changed over time, and they "saw through Paul" just as they did Lennon's intimidating, caustic exterior.Шаблон:Sfn Harrison showed an interest in some of the scruffs, asking after their families and, in author Alan Clayson's description, sharing exchanges that recalled "the spirit of the Cavern".Шаблон:Sfn Due to its location at Cavendish Avenue in St John's Wood, close to Abbey Road Studios, the McCartney home was another popular location for the scruffs.Шаблон:Sfn He trusted some of the girls enough to let them walk his dog Martha.Шаблон:Sfn
Incidents
In November 1968, Lennon and Yoko Ono released their avant-garde album Two Virgins on Apple Records with a cover showing the couple naked. It was distributed by Track in the UK and Tetragrammaton in the US since EMI refused to issue the record with the intended cover. Apple hired several of the scruffs to package the album in the controversial sleeves. According to Apple employee Jack Oliver, they worked "in the basement of the old Apple shop".Шаблон:Sfn
McCartney took to calling the scruffs "the Eyes and Ears of the World" since they were always aware of the Beatles' movements.Шаблон:Sfn The Abbey Road song "She Came In Through the Bathroom Window" refers to the day when some fans climbed into McCartney's house through an upstairs bathroom window and raided his wardrobe for a pair of trousers, which they took turns wearing. They also stole a framed photograph, among many other items, but later returned it at McCartney's request.Шаблон:Sfn The episode marked a rare example of an Apple scruff acting disloyally towards the Beatles.[1]Шаблон:Refn
Throughout 1969, they also witnessed scenes of friction that reflected the divisions within the band. In one incident during the sessions for Abbey Road, McCartney stormed out of the studio building in tears; when he failed to attend the following day's session, an irate Lennon went to McCartney's house and climbed over the high wall after McCartney refused to respond to his banging on the gate. The pair then had a heated argument in which Lennon berated McCartney for ignoring how Harrison and Starr had driven in from outside London especially for the recording session.Шаблон:Sfn
Due to Stevens' employment at Apple, some of the more trusted scruffs were invited to the company's 1969 Christmas party. They danced with Beatles aide Mal Evans and socialised with Harrison and Starr.Шаблон:Sfn
The Apple scruffs were a regular presence outside the London studios where Harrison recorded All Things Must Pass in 1970.Шаблон:Sfn According to Bedford's published account, he went home with her one night and confided that his marriage to Pattie Boyd was in trouble.Шаблон:Sfn On another occasion, he invited the scruffs into Abbey Road to hear his newly recorded tribute song "Apple Scruffs".Шаблон:Sfn Pritchard recalled that it was at 6 am, after the sort of particularly cold night that used to make them "curse the Beatles sometimes under our breath"; Stevens, Bedford, Lucy and a girl named Cathy were the others present when Evans delivered the invitation. She said that after hearing the track, "We all just looked at each other, it was unbelievable. We were so moved we went home in a daze ..."Шаблон:Sfn
Some of the scruffs described American producer Phil Spector as a favourite, saying that he understood why they waited on the steps at Apple and even joined them there for breakfast one morning.Шаблон:Sfn They also recalled an incident during a session at Abbey Road when Harrison appeared cradling an overwrought Spector and helped him into a waiting car. When the scruffs asked if Spector was okay, Harrison described him as "[a] great producer and a really beautiful person but very self-destructive". After the release of All Things Must Pass in November 1970, according to Pritchard, Spector wrote a letter to the scruffs, c/o "The Steps" at 3 Savile Row, and he continued to send them cards.Шаблон:Sfn
The scruffs assembled at Apple on 12 March 1971,Шаблон:Sfn the day that the High Court of Justice ruled in McCartney's favour to dissolve the Beatles as a legal partnership.Шаблон:Sfn Pritchard recalled that Lennon's white Rolls-Royce arrived and he, Harrison and Starr tumbled out laughing uncontrollably, with "tears streaming down their faces". She and the other scruffs "wondered what they were on".Шаблон:Sfn According to another account, which Beatles historian Keith Badman attributes to the Apple scruffs, the three former bandmates first drove to McCartney's house, where Lennon climbed the wall and threw two bricks through the windows.Шаблон:SfnШаблон:Refn
Magazine
At the start of 1970, shortly before the Beatles' break-up, the scruffs started their own magazine, The Apple Scruffs Monthly Book.Шаблон:Sfn Lennon enjoyed reading it; when each issue became available, he would be heard laughing uproariously in his office at the comments about him and Ono. Taylor said the magazine was "hilarious" though also "quite cruel at times", and reflective of how the scruffs often had a better perspective on life at Apple than those on the inside, "because they weren't caught up in the details."Шаблон:Sfn
Several scruffs disliked McCartney's wife Linda, partly out of loyalty towards his former fiancée, Jane Asher. The final issue of Apple Scruffs Monthly depicted Linda as a big-breasted dominatrix who bullied her husband.Шаблон:Sfn
Image
Шаблон:Quote box McCartney's wedding was the subject of heavy press coverage,Шаблон:Sfn which showed the Apple scruffs and other fans in mourning at losing the last romantically available Beatle.Шаблон:Sfn Margo Stevens recalled reporters pushing her towards the newspaper and TV cameras, and goading her to add to the spectacle by weeping harder; episodes such as this taught the scruffs to distrust the press, she said, since they "didn't understand us and made everyone look like idiots".Шаблон:Sfn She included Aronowitz's 1970 piece for the New York Post as an example of misrepresentation in the press.Шаблон:Sfn Among his comments in the article, Aronowitz wrote: "Sometimes George would record from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. and there they would be, waiting through the night, beggars for a sign of recognition on his way in or out."Шаблон:Sfn Wendy Sutcliffe, who first came to London to look for the Beatles in 1967, recalled that this issue was what especially impressed them about Harrison's tribute song: "[he] understood how we felt and ... knew we weren't just sad, stupid girlies."Шаблон:SfnШаблон:Refn
The scruffs converged on the Apple Corps building on 10 April 1970 following McCartney's announcement that the band had broken up.Шаблон:Sfn Asked by a reporter whether anyone could ever replace the Beatles, Carol Bedford said that no one could, and that the scruffs had grown up and developed in tandem with the Beatles' developments. A CBS News report predicted that the gathering at 3 Savile Row was "only the beginning", since, "The event is so momentous that historians may one day view it as a landmark in the decline of the British Empire."Шаблон:Sfn
Chris O'Dell, an Apple employee and the inspiration for Harrison's song "Miss O'Dell",Шаблон:Sfn described the Apple scruffs as "the most loyal and loving of all the fans". She said that they conferred "the fairy dust of fame" on those they recognised as part of the Beatles' wider circle.Шаблон:Sfn Bobby Whitlock, one of the backing musicians on All Things Must Pass, wrote of the Apple scruffs: "All they really wanted was to touch us or just have an autograph. Mostly it was just to see us and give us a flower ... They were all very sweet and cute."Шаблон:Sfn
Disbandment
The scruffs began drifting apart as they grew older and also because several objected to McCartney's actions in dissolving the Beatles as a legal partnership.Шаблон:Sfn When Harrison attended the opening of the refurbished Apple Studio at 3 Savile Row, in October 1971, the NME reported that the scruffs were "still around in force".[2]
In Alan Clayson's view, the Apple scruffs' vigils ended through the individuals' personal maturation along with "the realisation that the Beatles as a 1960s myth would long outlive the mere mortals that constituted its dramatis personae".Шаблон:Sfn According to Bill Harry, the scruffs disbanded in December 1973, when Apple vacated its offices at Savile Row.Шаблон:Sfn
The scruffs were drawn together again in the wake of Lennon's murder in New York City on 8 December 1980.Шаблон:Sfn As part of an international day of mourning on Sunday, 14 December, crowds gathered outside Abbey Road Studios, where Pritchard still worked.Шаблон:Sfn She recalled that, following a silent vigil, the studio engineers played Lennon's "Imagine" at full volume. She added that for the former Apple scruffs, it was especially tragic to learn that the murder had been committed by a "crazed fan".Шаблон:Sfn
Bedford wrote a memoir titled Waiting for the Beatles: An Apple Scruff's Story,Шаблон:Sfn published by Blandford Press in 1984.Шаблон:Sfn She promoted it with an interview on the London radio station LBC in April that year.Шаблон:Sfn In his 2013 novel She's Leaving Home, author William Shaw cast the Apple scruffs as characters involved in a murder investigation.[1] In a 2014 article he wrote for Rolling Stone about this and subsequent fan phenomenons, Shaw states:
There are Beliebers, One Directioners, Miley Cyrus's Smilers and Beyoncé's Beyhive. There have been Blockheads and Duranies. But there will never, ever be any group of fans as legendary and as sweetly original as the Beatles' most devoted admirers, the Apple Scruffs. Because not only did the Apple Scruffs follow the most celebrated and innovative musical foursome that pop music has produced, they helped keep the band sane.[1]
Notes
References
Sources Шаблон:Refbegin
- Шаблон:Cite book
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Шаблон:Apple Corps Шаблон:The Beatles
