Archaeology (The Rutles, 1996)

Bear in mind that whatever the Beatles did, so did the Rutles. It only seemed fair that if the surviving Beatles were reuniting for the Anthology series, the "surviving" Rutles should do the same. While the Anthologies introduced a heart-stopping two new tracks, plus a heap of unreleased songs and alternative versions of released ones, the Rutles' Archaeology is largely new music, but repackaged to seem archival. At long last one can hear the Rutle rendition of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" and "Back in the USSR". Being the Rutles, however, they weren't content to do straight up parodies, so on most tracks the listener will pick up obvious or subtle references to four or five different Beatles songs, many of which aren't usually though of as going together. Is that "Flying" that's being referenced at the end of "We've Arrived! (And to Prove it We're Here)"?

Briefly, Archaeology is basically the second Rutles album, and in reality (not the fictional Rutles story, but the real band fronted by Neil "Ron Nasty" Innes) most of the material here was recorded in the 1990's and is neither from the 1960's or the 1978 sessions that led to the first album. A handful of tracks really are outtakes from 1978, and "We've Arrived" even includes a false start that's very much in the spirit of the Anthologies. There are no "alternate" versions of previously released Rutles material. That being said, the material presented is very good, and in many ways surpasses the first album, with highlights like "Shangri-La" and "Joe Public". While the first album largely focused on the "early" Rutles, this one seems much more centered on their "later" period, hence more homages to Beatles material from 1966 to 1970 than, say 1962 to 1965. As with the Beatles, the Rutles really are down a member, as "hidden" Rutle Ollie Halsall (who played on the songs and doesn't appear in the movie or photos) had died in 1992. (Meanwhile, Eric Idle, who did not play on the songs but appears in the movie and photos, is, of course, alive and well, but only three band members appear on the photos included in the CD packaging).

For what it's worth, a second Rutles movie came out around the time of this CD (Can't Buy Me Lunch), but it is pretty useless, with anything funny having already been done by the first movie. Stick with Neil Innes and the music!

I was happily surprised to find the Rutles took on the Beatles mashup/remix album Love and came up with Lunch, which is freely available via YouTube (originally via the Rutles' Lunch website). Also through that channel is some rehearsal tapes from 1978 which have been slyly repackaged as the "This is the Savage Young Rutles". A few of those songs that didn't make it on to their first album make their appearance on Archaeology.

Here's Lunch, for the curious. It's not anywhere near the level of Love in the deftness of the mashup, but it's still downright clever.