[Dixielandjazz] LONDON (July 13) - All you need is luck.

[TCASHWIGG at aol.com]

Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time?   If I had been on 
tour in Australia and stopped off to vist with Mate Ross Anderson, I could have 
beent he lucky guy to find this suitcase.   Would have financed the entire tour 
too, and for the first time in history I would have been happy to give the 
money back for all the gigs on the tour, :))

Now what I want to know is how Ross let this one slip by, so close yet so far 
away.

I just love old suitcases, well looking into them anyway.  I found one years 
ago and opened it and learned Victoria's Secret, :))

Cheers,

Tom Wiggins
Musical content:  "We're in the Money Now"

Battered Suitcase Yields Possible Beatles Trove
Australia Flea Market Find May Contain Late Beatles Roadie's Lost Archive

A vacationer who purchased a suitcase at an Australian flea market found a 
trove of Beatles memorabilia inside, including photos, concert programs and 
unreleased recordings, The Times newspaper reported Tuesday.

While the materials have yet to be authenticated, some experts believe the 
collection is the lost "Mal Evans archive," originally belonging to the Beatles' 
roadie and sound recordist.

Evans was killed by police in Los Angeles in 1976 after he had brandished a 
fake gun. The contents of the suitcase were lost during the police 
investigation, The Times said.

Fraser Claughton, 41, from Tinkerton, England, found the suitcase in a small 
town outside of Melbourne, The Times said. Realizing the suitcase was not 
empty, he bought it for about $36.

"It's like finding the end of the rainbow in Australia," The Times quoted 
Claughton as saying. "I spotted one tatty old suitcase, which frankly I wouldn't 
have given house room, but when I picked it up there was something in it."

The 4 1/2 hour reel-to-reel tape recording includes John Lennon and Paul 
McCartney experimenting with alternative versions of some previously unrecorded 
tracks. The collection also includes previously unknown versions of new 
recordings of "We Can Work It Out" and "Cry Baby Cry."

The tapes, labeled "Abbey Road... not for release," will be evaluated by the 
Beatles' record label, Apple, and examined by experts to determine their 
origin and authenticity.

"With the exception of (two tracks) it sounds very exciting indeed," 
memorabilia consultant and Beatles specialist Peter Doggett told The Times.


A spokeswoman for Christie's said while the auction house has had no contact 
with the collection as of yet, there is "Beatles memorabilia in every pop 
memorabilia sale - it's very popular."

In 1998, a notebook compiled by Evans, containing draft lyrics for "Hey Jude" 
and "Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," sold for $185,000 at a 
London auction.

A year earlier, McCartney obtained an injunction to prevent Evans' widow from 
selling a scrap of paper with the original lyrics to "With a Little Help From 
My Friends."