When I ducked into a random newsagent shop recently in Surry Hills (in Sydney), I picked up the special Newsweek commemorative edition devoted to fifty years of the Beatles.

I also picked up a copy of this CD:

It was in a small pile of discs I saw in a corner on the floor. The pile was a selection of those free CDs which come attached to the front of some magazines. These discs had obviously become separated from a variety of publications over the last couple of months. The newsagent had held onto them and was now offering them for sale individually at $1.00 each. I don’t think they are supposed to do this – offer the CDs for separate sale….

Anyway, what I found in there was well worth the dollar asking price – it was “Sounds of the Star Club”, the free CD that came on the cover of this Uncut Magazine in March 2012:

The CD is actually a very good 16-track collection of the original versions of some of the songs the Beatles covered in the band’s very early years.

It’s not a bad little CD to have in the collection because it references some of the key musical influences to impact on the Beatles, songs they loved enough to put into their repetoire for live shows, or to record on early albums. This includes original tracks by the likes of Chuck Berry (“Roll Over Beethoven”); Carl Perkins (“Lend Me Your Comb” and “Everybody’s Trying to be My Baby”); Fats Waller (“Your Feet’s Too Big”); Little Richard (“Kansas City/Hey Hey Hey”); Peggy Lee (“Till There Was You”); Gene Vincent (“Be-Bop-A-Lula”); Ray Charles (“Hallelujah I Love Her So”) and Elvis Presley (“I’m Gonna Sit Right Down and Cry Over You”):

(click to see a larger image)