The Rutles

Six years before This Is Spinal Tap, Monty Python’s Eric Idle and Neil Innes of the Bonzo Dog Band stuck it to the Beatles. What started out as a fictional band for a mockumentary became a short-lived phenomenon known by fans as the Prefab Four. They toured, recorded and even landed a couple of UK hits. This collection boasts 20 songs that helped make the 1978 comedy All You Need Is Cash a cult film. Like Spinal Tap, each of the Rutles played their own instruments and sang. But members Ron Nasty, Barry Wom, Stig O'Hara and Dirk McQuickly were not only influential to other rock mockumentaries, as evidenced by 1990s Rutles Highway Revisited (A Tribute to the Rutles) comprising artists such as Galaxie 500, Shonen Knife, Daniel Johnston and others. The opening “Goose-Step Mama” perfectly parodies the early incarnation of the Beatles when they mixed Merseybeat with skiffle folk, while “Blue Suede Schubert” rips on the pre-moptop Teddy Boy era when back-beat was added to rockabilly. “Piggy In the Middle” nails “I Am the Walrus,” replete with warbly Mellotron.