The Rutles were a rock band that performed visual and aural pastiches and parodies of the Beatles. This originally fictional band, created by Eric Idle and Neil Innes for a sketch in Idle’s mid-1970s BBC television comedy series Rutland Weekend Television, later toured and recorded, releasing two albums that included two UK chart hits. The band toured again from 2002 until Innes’ death in 2019.
The Rutles were foreshadowed in episode 3 of Eric Idle’s 1975 BBC television series Rutland Weekend Television later became the song “Good Times Roll” (included on the Rutles’ first, self-titled album in 1978). The Rutles themselves first appeared in a sketch later in 1975, which presented a mock mini-documentary about the fictional 1960s band. The sketch featured Neil Innes (formerly of the Bonzo Dog Band and a frequent Monty Python collaborator) fronting the band, singing “I Must Be in Love”, a pastiche of Lennon and McCartney’s 1964 style.
Encouraged by the positive public reaction to the sketch, Idle wrote the mockumentary television film All You Need is Cash (1978, aka The Rutles). Idle co-directed the film with Gary Weis; it featured 20 Beatles’ music pastiches written by Innes, which he performed with three musicians as the Rutles. A soundtrack album in 1978 was followed in 1996 by Archaeology, which spoofed the then-recent Beatles Anthology series. A second film, The Rutles 2: Can’t Buy Me Lunch (modelled on the 2000 TV special The Beatles Revolution) was made in 2002 and released in the US on DVD in 2003.
Written by Idle and Innes, All You Need Is Cash documents the rise and fall of the Rutles, paralleling much of the history of the Beatles. The project was given extra recognition through Harrison’s support; as well as providing ideas, he supplied Idle and Innes with a copy of the Beatles’ long-planned documentary, The Long and Winding Road. Idle drew inspiration from this 1976 version of the documentary, as compiled byNeil Aspinall, and was granted permission to use some of the archival footage to tell the Rutles’ story.
Innes wrote, composed, and produced the music. He relied on his memory of Beatles music, and not careful later analysis, to create sound-alike songs. Innes assembled a band (himself, John Halsey, Ollie Halsall, Andy Brown, and Ricky Fataar) and the group played in a London pub to gel. During Rutles performances and studio recordings, Innes took lead on the songs that resembled Lennon’s; Halsall sang on most McCartney-esque tunes; Fataar sang the Harrison songs; and Halsey sang a Ringo Starr-type song. Idle mimed to Halsall’s singing and Brown’s bass playing in the completed film. Halsall appeared in the film as “Leppo”, the fifth Rutle who in the earliest years “mainly stood at the back”. Brown did not appear in the film.
