Longest Cocktail Party: An Insider's Diary Of The Beatles, Their Million-Dollar 'Apple' Empire And Its Wild Rise And Fall [Paperback]

"The Longest Cocktail Party" reads like a diary, filled with short illustrative stories, and one can't help smile at the well-meaning if naive ideas that seemed to fill the very air. For those who missed those heady days (or forgot them altogether) the idealism, earnestness & naivete are all a bit touching. DiLello keeps the tone light and nonjudgmental, and the anecdotes are never less than entertaining. It's all here: the failed Apple boutique, the lovable charlatan Magic Alex forever refining his imminent technological marvels, the endless parade of squatters, hopefuls & pie-eyed pilgrims hoping for a glimpse, never mind an audience with the Royals.

Our author used his vague contacts & native American hipsterism to impress himself as essential to the Beatle's Press Officer, Mr Derek Taylor. Our opportunistic narrator installs himself at Apple as "House Hippie," eventually parlaying the position to a brief role as Director of Public Relations. One disappointment is that, given his first and last obligation to Press Officer Taylor, firsthand anecdotes directly relating to the Fabs are a bit thin. Given the circus described it's not hard to see why the Beatles themselves were a rare sight in the Apple offices; the few times they do appear it is usually with chaotic if not downright unpleasant results. No matter, though-- the daily life at Apple was a riot in it's own right of visiting Hells Angels, merry buffets, and even the appearance of writer Ken Kesey who had been signed to a spoken word contract. Still, at the heart of the firm there was Apple Records to be managed, and DiLello does an admirable job detailing the daily operation of the label; signing & promotional shenanigans for White Trash (later rechristened Badfinger), provincial singer Mary Hopkin, the Modern Jazz Quartet, even, and a very young James Taylor. Naturally none of these acts even approached profitable, and Apple's operations naturally focused on the promotion, management, and whims of the four main breadwinners. DeLillo relates a not atypical request from John & Yoko to locate and post some hundreds of acorns in clear mylar boxes to world leaders as a peace offering, and much of Apple (and the latter part of the book) detail the new couple's combination of conceptual art and press management. From John & Yoko's marriage fiasco, their various Bed-Ins and work for peace, the suddenly unmanageable and venomous press, it's all there from an insider's perspective. Inevitably the book closes with details of the extended legal wrangling that brought Apple Corps, Ltd and the attendant cocktail party to a final close. Completists and purists will be happy to find reprints of the legal transcripts that served as Apple's epitaph and the Beatles death knell.

This reviewer's honest impression is that the book was written in 1972 as a quick attempt to cash in on the author's proximity to a rare and unique period in time and place, but this alone is not enough to withhold recommendation. For the Beatle fan it is an essential read, a must-have, and even for the casual observer it is a fascinating tale of money, hubris, and the usual good and bad intentions found where humans tread. That four well-meaning lads with more money than God and a gaggle of hangers-on struggled to make their own sense of a time never seen before or repeated exactly again, a time no one has even yet adequately explained, well, at the very least it makes for good history. Besides its wealth of ripping good yarns and Beatle-stories found nowhere else "The Last Cocktail Party" may find value to future readers as an anecdotal primary history on the birth and consequences of what came to be called Super Stardom.

The book's stream-of-consciousness style is occasionally irritating, and this is certainly not a book with great literary pretensions, nor does it offer any real insight into the lives of the Beatles themselves. However, it's a fast, enjoyable read, and very evocative of the drug-tinged, hippie whirlwind that the author experienced. I doubt casual fans would find it particularly enlightening, but as a highly personal account of the Apple fiasco, it's absorbing and frequently humorous.

What this is, is a taste of what it was like to be in the midst of the heady days of the Beatles' Apple Corps. We get to meet, hear and see an ever-changing cast of strange characters, bits of juicy gossip, weird goings-on and the like.

DiLello makes no effort to be comprehensive, detailed or offer any scholarly insights. That's not what this book is about, nor for. It's a recollection of his time in what happened to be the pop music hotspot of the 60s, and nothing more. For that, he's done a terrific job of re-creating the times, and this is a book that might not open any new areas of scholarship, but is really about as much fun reading as you can find.