CARNIVAL OF LIGHT RAVE POSTER--THE BEATLES

I love those rare opportunities when I can showcase something that I’ve never seen nor knew existed—and this poster is exactly that.

If you take the time to click on the art and can decipher it, you’ll see it’s a poster for the Million Volt Light and Sound Rave, an electronic music and light festival held at the Chalk Farm Roundhouse in London, on January 28, 1967.

Sometimes referred to as the Carnival of Light Rave, the event featured live performances by the Soft Machine, Tonics (?), The New Vaudeville Band, and most importantly, the only playback ever of the legendary “Carnival of Light,” a fourteen minute sound collage by The Beatles, created especially for the event during the sessions for “Penny Lane” (and advertised on the poster as “Music Composed For The Occasion by Paul McCartney.”)

The genesis of the track came in December 1966 from designer David Vaughan, who had recently painted a psychedelic design on a piano owned by Paul McCartney. About the same time as he delivered the piano to McCartney's Cavendish Avenue address, he asked if McCartney would contribute a musical piece for the upcoming event. To Vaughan’s surprise McCartney agreed, and drafted all of the Beatles to participate.

"Carnival of Light" was only played once, at the Million Volt Light and Sound Rave, and has never been released nor bootlegged. Beatles expert Mark Lewisohn, one of the few who have ever heard the track, says the song included "distorted, hypnotic drum and organ sounds, a distorted lead guitar, the sound of a church organ, various effects (water gargling was one) and, perhaps most intimidating of all, John Lennon and McCartney screaming dementedly and bawling aloud random phrases like 'Are you alright?' and 'Barcelona!”

In 1996 McCartney tried to release the track on the compilation album The Beatles Anthology 2, but George Harrison voted to reject it, because according to McCartney "he didn't like avant garde music.”

While I knew there had been a handbill for this event, this poster wasn’t something I knew existed (I've since discovered the existence of only one other copy, illustrated in the UK Poster book "High Art.") It’s a great psychedelic image, and very desirable, as pretty much any British 60’s psychedelic concert poster is extremely rare. But it’s the Beatles connection that makes this a true killer collectible. Available on the Recordmecca website.

(Electric Poets, who also played the Rave, were a short-lived band featuring Soft Machine's Daevid Allen and Robert Wyatt with Gilli Smith; Allen and Smith went on to found the progressive rock band Gong.)

The Virtual Museum: Dylan's First Concert

Friday, April 12, 1963 was a very important date for the then 22 year old Bob Dylan. For on that night, Dylan played New York’s Town Hall—his first-ever concert as a headliner. Prior to that night, Dylan had only headlined in small clubs and at the 200 seat Carnegie Recital Hall, where he drew fewer than 70 people. Though he’d occasionally played a few songs on larger stages as part of multi-artist bills, this was the first ever proper Bob Dylan concert (with many thousands to follow !) A crowd of 900 attended the Town Hall show, which took place six weeks prior to the release of Dylan's 2nd album, "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan." Columbia Records recorded the show for a proposed but never released live album; however various tracks have surfaced over the years on compilations and promo cd’s. Above is the handbill (identical to the poster) and a signed program for the show, which we recently sold. The program features the first appearance of Dylan's poem, "My Life In A Stolen Moment," reprinted many times in future years. We know of only a few other copies of this extremely rare program. On our website, Recordmecca, we are currently offering a Dylan signed program from his famous Halloween, 1964 concert at New York’s Philharmonic Hall (released as part of Dylan’s “Bootleg Series.”)