Tag Archives: Asian Beatles

Some Unusual Asian Beatle Items – Part Five

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Well, it seems that all good things (eventually) come to those who wait.

You know what it’s like in this Beatle collecting business. You have titles and versions on your list you’re on the lookout for and they just never seem to appear during any of your travels, or in searches online….

That’s what happened here. Way back in 2010 we had a holiday in Vietnam and found a few interesting Beatle items along the way. Amongst them, in a Hanoi CD store, was a series called The Beatles Double Golden Collection. This is a series where two, separate Beatle albums have been issued in one double CD box, each with an outer cardboard slipcase. You can read more about what these look like here.

The sets on display in the store were Magical Mystery Tour/Yellow Submarine; Please Please Me/Sgt. Pepper; Revolver/WIth The Beatles; Help!/Rubber Soul; Abbey Road/Let It Be; and Hard Day’s Night/Beatles For Sale. I know, odd pairings.

These all seem to have been pressed around 2009, the same time as the then-new Beatles Remastered CD reissues because each disc in these sets also had mini-documentaries included.

One album from the canon has been obvoius by its absence. Missing from the shelves in Hanoi was the legendary The Beatles (or The White Album). It just wasn’t in the store when we were there. So, every now and then since 2010 we’d have a quiet look at eBay to see if anything like The Beatles Double Golden Collection popped up in searches. It never has….

Until last week.

After nine long years this has finally been added to the collection:

That’s the front cover of the outer cardboard slipcase. It’s not an exact match (it doesn’t say Beatles Double Golden Collection, for example), but this is clearly from the same company that produced the other CDs as just about every other detail is identical. Here’s the rear of the slipcase: Inside is a larger than usual plastic CD jewel case. Not sure why, but it is bigger:This jewel case holds two discs, one each side of one of those flip-over trays:And inside is a booklet that contains no real text (except for photo location details), just lots of images of The Beatles, most but not all of them time relevant to the the recording dates of the The White Album! The rear cover of the booklet is from the Let It Be sessions:So, not sure what the moral of this story is. Patience pays off? Finally, after nearly a decade, the basic set of Beatle albums in this sereis is complete. Also, after a lot of research on these, we’re pretty sure they are not official.

As usual click on the images if you’d like to see larger versions.

See also: Some Unusual Asian Beatle Items – Part One; Some Unusual Asian Beatle Items – Part Two; Some Unusual Asian Beatle Items – Part Three; and Some Unusual Asian Beatles Items – Part Four.

Some Unusual Asian Beatles Items – Part Four

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This is the fourth and final part in a series of posts titled “Some Unusual Asian Beatles Items”.  These posts have all been based around a recent holiday visit to Vietnam, and some CDs and a DVD box set (The Beatles Anthology) I picked up in a shop in Hanoi. (Click here to read Part One, Part Two and Part Three)

The last CD I’m describing comes in a cardboard package that is meant to resemble a small hardback book, complete with coloured, “sown” binding:

The packaging is designed to look like a small book

It is called “The Beatles – 1956 – 1970”. Parts of the cover are printed in a shiny, metallic silver print making it difficult to read from certain angles:

The CD front cover - lots of Chines and a little bit of English

There are three compact discs inside, and they sit flush with the page surface of the thick cardboard pages. They’re held in place by a small circle of cardboard that fits the centre hole of the CD. You can’t quite see it in the picture below, but the CD is printed to look like a vinyl record with tracks and a label in the centre. Kind of cute.

One of the "pages" showing the how the CDs are secured

As I said, there are three CD’s inside across which is a sprawling sample of The Beatles output – with songs from their earliest official album (“Please Please Me”) through to the final, “Let It Be”. However, they are not in chronological order as such. Disc One for example starts with “Love Me Do” and finishes with “The Long and Winding Road”.

"The Beatles 1956-1970" CD Cover - Rear

I’m not sure why the CD has been given the title “1956 – 1970” because there is nothing pre-1962 here. Notice the final song on CD 3 – “All My Loveing”. Spelling mistakes like this are often dead giveaways that what your’e looking at is an unofficial, illegal release.

Disc Two has “Komm, Gib Mir Deine Hand” and “Sie Liebt Dich”, as well as some interesting B-sides like “The Inner Light”, “Rain” and “You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)”. “Across the Universe” is the “wildlife” version as it has the bird sound effects start.

There is an odd-looking booklet inside which, for some entirely unknown reason, has a picture of an Alfa Romeo sports car on the front….inside are the titles of each song and lyrics.

Now that is just plain weird.....

So, where does this come from and is it kosher? A close up of the rear cover “small print” shows an official-looking barcode, Chinese writing, the words “24 Bit – 100hz”, “Fashion.D.Z.” and “Sony”:

Rear cover close-up

The really small writing says: “This compilation P&C 2007 Earth’s Earth Sound and of the owner of the recorded work reserved. Unauthorized copying, hiring, renting, public performance and vroadcasting (sic) of the recording is prohibited”.

This whole series of posts (Part One, Part Two and Part Three) on potentially fake CDs and DVDs is based on the principle that I don’t collect Beatles bootlegs, and I don’t support or promote piracy in the music business. All my collection to date has been made up of legitimate, officially released discs – that’s all my CDs, LPs, 45rpm singles, books, DVDs, magazines and other printed items. In publishing this series I’m not advocating or promoting these sorts of discs. I am still genuinely confused about a couple of these releases. Any additional information or views on these releases are welcome. Feel free to email me at: beatlesblogger@gmail.com, or comment using the “Leave a Reply” hotlink below.