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It’s Here. Record Store Day 2013
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Tag Archives: Beatles Related
Beatles Collecting – The Nice Things People Do
Sometimes you don’t go looking for Beatle records. Sometimes, Beatle records come looking for you. That was my experience about three weeks ago when an old friend asked me if I was still interested in collecting the Beatles because she had a couple of records and would I like them?
Well, yes of course I would! Always open to donations. She dropped them in a couple of days later, and you’d have to say it’s a mixed bag of goodies….
The first one wasn’t even the Beatles. It was Wings. Well, not even Wings really, just an obscure band called P.K. and the Sound Explosion doing covers of Wings:
I think there are only two saving graces about this one. One is the daggy cover design featuring a (poorly) stylised version of the official Wings logo of the time. This is what the real thing looks like: 
The other saving grace is that this copy is still sealed in protective plastic and is in mint condition. This is a US copy that came out on the Pickwick Records budget label back in 1977. It is so bad, it’s good! (P.K. and his group have also done a Disco Christmas LP, the Beach Boys Songbook, a Paul Williams Songbook, and the Bee Gees Songbook).
Next came three of the real thing, some it has to be said in better shape than others. For instance this very well-used example of the Australian-only cover of Beatles For Sale:
You’d have to say this is a copy that has had a good life. I’m not sure about you, but it has so much patina of age that I’m tempted to keep it just because it looks so pre-loved and lived-in. There was one other intriguing thing. When I took out the vinyl it’s the mono pressing, but not the Australian version. Here’s what I got:
This is what it should look like:
Clearly the original Aussie pressing has been played to death and someone, over the course of the long history of this particular copy of the album, has sought out another to replace it – that being the UK mono we see above….
There was another Australia-only cover in the four records my friend donated. It’s the 1972 release The Essential Beatles on the Apple label. This is a “best of” compilation and as its catalogue number suggests (TVSS 8), it was associated with a TV advertising campaign by EMI in Australia:
This copy of The Essential Beatles has a well-used cover but the vinyl inside is actually in pretty good shape.
Finally a double LP of the soundtrack to the documentary movie Imagine John Lennon:
This is a gatefold album of twenty-one Beatles and Lennon songs. It is in what I would describe as good (G) to very good (VG) condition. The Internet Movie Database says of the film: This “biography” evolves around the nearly 240 hours of film and videotape fortuitously taken by Lennon of his life. The archive footage is transformed into a fascinating life story of one of the most complex and fascinating men of the modern music era….Includes some very personal and insightful footage, never before made available to the public.
The gatefold has some nice photos:
This is the Australian pressing, on the black and silver Parlophone label:
So, some varied, interesting and unusual donations from a friend. Sometimes you don’t have to go looking too far. Beatle records just come to you.
Record Store Day 2013
A late addition to Record Store Day for 2013 will be a Ringo Starr Singles Box, three 45″ singles accurately reproduced in their original picture sleeves in an Apple Records lift-top box. It will come with a Record Store Day spindle adapter.
The singles will be Photograph b/w Down And Out; It Don’t Come Easy b/w Early 1970 and (It’s All Down to) Goodnight Vienna b/w Oo-Wee. There will be just 5000 copies released.
The 3×7″ lift-top lid box sounds very similar to the Beatles singles box from Black Friday 2011 (an alternate Record Store Day limited edition release).
Also this year on Record Store Day Paul McCartney will release a Maybe I’m Amazed 12-inch single with mono and stereo versions of the song in varying durations. This is a pre-cursor to the next instalment in his McCartney Archives release series which will be Wings Over America, due later in the year (probably June by all accounts) featuring a multi-disc CD/DVD box set, “deluxe” and “standard” edition CD’s, plus vinyl.
This live version of Maybe I’m Amazed was originally serviced as a radio-only promotional 12-inch vinyl single back in 1976, also to herald the release of Wings Over America.
Is Your Beatles Collection Insured?
Summer in Australia is great. It’s warm, holiday time, Christmas (yes, its hot here while it’s cold in most other places celebrating Christmas around the world).
It’s also a bad time of year – we get frequent floods, bushfires and cyclones (the Southern Hemisphere equivalent of hurricanes).
This year has been particularly bad for flooding rains, and that got me thinking about the value of my Beatles collection, and how I’d feel if my house got flooded. What could I do to protect it? I guess I also had in mind those confronting images which went around the world after the “super storm” – Hurricane Sandy – hit the east coast of the USA last year…What if your precious collection was inside this place?:
The photo above was taken at Fairfield Beach, on Long Island Sound in the US in the wake of Sandy. And there were people there who did indeed have their record collections affected:
This poor lady, Carla Strobel (at left above), is attempting to dry out her record collection which was damaged by Hurricane Sandy in Fairfield, Connecticut on November 11, 2012. (Photos: Brian A. Pounds). It’s even worse if you own a record label with masses of stock in a warehouse that gets trashed by a hurricane. Check out these poor folk at Norton Records in New York who also suffered massively at the hands of Sandy.
Truly soul-destroying. Of course it could be something a lot more simple and plainly domestic that gets you. This poor guy just had a water heater burst upstairs. Over a period of just forty-five minutes several hundred gallons poured on the floor and eventually made its way to his record collection down in the basement:
Or this poor record store flooded by a blocked drain that wasn’t even on their property. It slowly seeped into storage area though…
All this leads me to an email I received from an organisation called Home Insurance. They wrote an article for Beatlesblogger which I reproduce here as it may just have some information for you about whether or not you should insure your collection against loss or damage:
Insurance Considerations for Beatles Collectors
When you’re collecting memorabilia from a band whose influence still makes a limited edition Bazooka Bubble Gum Wax Box go for more than $4,000 on eBay (despite being broken up now for five times longer than they ever existed in the first place) – you’re bound to rack up a sizeable bill. If any of your prized Beatles possessions are ever stolen or damaged in a fire, how will you recover all of the big investments you made in your collection?
A limited edition Beatles Bazooka gum color cards Box.
Even if you’ve already purchased a smart homeowners insurance policy, chances are your Beatles collection won’t be fully covered. Consider the fact that most standard policies include a limit of only $200 for high-value items. That’s nothing when you’re talking about collectibles from the Fab Four.
Do you own a blue Aladdin 1965 Lunchbox? You could be sitting on almost $700, depending on its condition. A cork stopper branded by Paul McCartney is worth more than $500. Even if you’ve just held on to a pair of original Beatles concert tickets from 1964, you’re likely already way over your insurance policy’s coverage limit. So how can you affordable and adequately protect these items?
One option for serious Beatles collectors is to purchase additional coverage on their homeowners insurance policies by scheduling an endorsement. An endorsement is a quick and convenient way to increase coverage limits for valuable collections under an existing policy. It’s important to have your collection appraised by an expert in order to make sure you’ve insured it to its full value.
Another option is to invest in a personal articles floater from a provider that specializes in insuring collections like yours. This option is more expensive than scheduling an endorsement and may increase your premiums anywhere from 1-20% (depending on the value of your personal collection), but it also comes with peace of mind that your claim will be handled by someone with expertise in collectables.
Whether you’re just starting out or if you’re the proud owner of The White Album no. 0000005 – the first LP given to anyone outside of the band and last valued at $31,000 – it’s important to take steps to protect your Beatles collection. Contact an expert or licensed insurance agent as soon as possible if you’re not 100% sure you’ll be able to get help recovering your investment if something ever happens to your prized possessions.
(This article was contributed by Kelly McMurtrie, a writer for HomeInsurance.com. Kelly has been writing content for HomeInsurance.com and other major brands since 2011 after graduating from the University of South Carolina with a B.A. in Media Arts).
For one other sad collection damage story click here. I also came across some info from the University of Iowa on how to professionally salvage records, CD’s and DVD’s affected by flooding.
I’d be interested in your thoughts and comments on this one. Have you insured your collection? Or (like me) do you take the risk and hope for the best? Can an insurance payout bring back a lifetime of collecting anyway? So many items would be so difficult to find and replace. And how do you put an accurate value on a big collection?
John Lennon’s Rolls Royce – Part Two
I’ve had an update on the latest whereabouts of John Lennon’s Rolls Royce from one the men who helped restore it, and on the portable Sony TV which used to be installed in the rear passenger area of the car. That television was possibly the one also featured on the front cover of the Sgt Pepper LP, although there is a bit of mystery surrounding that little Sony.
Jim Walters works at Bristol Motors in Victoria, British Columbia in Canada and they have been the custodians of John Lennon’s famous Rolls Royce since 1993.
The car is actually owned the Royal British Columbia Museum, which for a long time has been looking for a replacement portable Sony TV to install into the space where the original used to be – one just like a Sony model TV9-306 UB – the one on the “Sgt Pepper” cover.
Well, Jim writes:
“I just thought I’d update the search for a Sony TV 9-306 UB. I finally found one on eBay in the UK last year and now have it here on display in my shop (Bristol Motors). The Royal BC Museum’s curators have not yet decided whether they will put it in the car as it is not the actual TV that was in it, although it is the identical model. Also John Lennon’s Phantom V 5VD73 is on display in the Pointe-a-Calliere Museum in Montreal, Canada until April 2014. They have an exhibit called “The Beatles in Montreal” in which the car is prominently displayed.”
Thanks so much Jim for the update – and anyone living in or travelling to Montreal in the next year should drop in to see “The Beatles in Montreal” exhibition. You can find more details on that here. The exhibition opens on March 29 and runs for a year.
With 2014 being the 50th anniversary of the Beatles first world tour there are a number of museums, including here in Sydney and in Melbourne Australia, planning exhibitions of their city’s brush with Beatlemania….
Beatles with Records – Part Eighteen
Our friend Lammert Mulder, who has contributed in the past to solving some other Beatles with Records mysteries, has come up with a wide range of new photos and information. First up is a photograph of George Harrison at home with three records. I can only identify two – the first (on his knees) is The Fabulous Miracles: 
(This the same Miracles LP we saw in a photo of John Lennon in the Beatles with Records Part 17). George also has what looks like a copy of the 1963 pressing of Little Richard Sings Gospel (it is lying beside him on the bed):
If anyone can identify the third LP that he is holding, let us know.
In the Beatles with Records Part 15 we showed this photo of George from 1964, loading singles into the then very groovy in-dash record player in his E-Type Jaguar:
Here’s another shot from a different angle – and we can now identify the 45 as “Can’t You Tell by the Look in His Eyes” by the Reflections:
(click on images to see larger versions)
This is the portable player – a Philips Automignon AG2101D 45 In-Car Record Player:
Paul had one fitted to his Aston Martin, and John had one in his psychedelic Rolls Royce too (thanks to Piers Hemmingsen at Capitol 6000 for this info).
Yet another shot of George – this time with Ben E. King’s 1962 release Don’t Play That Song:
This LP also shows up in a pile of records that John and Paul have in this photo (from the Beatles with Records Part 1). You can see it just under the copy of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan that Paul is holding:
Yet another photo of the lads (below) leaving the USA after their first tour. They purchased a lot of records for their personal collections on that trip – and we’ve seen some of these in previous posts. This is a new one of Paul holding up a copy of Martha and the Vandellas 1963 Heatwave LP:
(click on images to see larger versions)
Any ideas about this photo of Ringo below? It’s been suggested that this is the rear cover of the LP Mary Wells Live on Stage:
And this additional photo of Ringo at the Beatles Green Street flat in 1963 confirms that the record he has underneath The Shirelles (see BWR Part 2 and BWR Part Three) is in fact The Marvelettes – Live on Stage (1963):
This next one is a photograph of John’s record players at his Kenwood home – and lined up on the shelf you can clearly see a 1966 copy of Buffalo Springfield’s first self-titled album Buffalo Springfield:
Plus a copy of Electronic Music which we also saw in the Beatles with Records Part Nine:
And I reckon you can also see a copy of Sgt Pepper peeking through behind the experimental Electronic Music (click on the photo to enlarge it). It’s odd though because you can see the Shirley Temple doll with the “Welcome the Rolling Stones” sweater, and also what looks like the Mae West cut-out, but they are on the wrong side or reversed to what is the published and very famous original…. Anyone got any thoughts? And can anyone else identify any other titles on the shelf?
Both John and George were obviously fans of Save as Milk (1967) by Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band. How can we tell? They both had the free bumper sticker that came with the album displayed in their houses. In fact, John had two stickers in his home:
George at Kinfauns (above), John at Weybridge. The original release of Safe As Milk came with a free sticker, as pictured (thanks to Michael Stanowski).
Meanwhile, back in the studio in the studio with B.B.King’s Live at the Regal (1965) on the electric piano:
Love Me Do, P.S. I Love You and Copyright Law
Will you be buying any of the “new” Beatles CDs which are taking advantage of “Love Me Do” and “P.S. I Love You” being out of copyright? Both songs are now fair game in Europe for any compact disc compiler out there to use when putting together a Beatle early days disc, and a number of small labels are taking advantage.
[European copyright laws grant ownership of a recorded track for fifty years – and “Love Me Do” has just gone past that. There are moves to extend the period to 70 years, but this is not expected to happen until at least November this year. In the US the period of copyright is 95 years.]
So, there are a number of Beatles recordings due for release shortly. Wogblog has already mentioned this one:
The Beatles Archive I Saw Her Standing There will come out on February 25. And there are more on the way. Rolling Stone is reporting that a company called Digital Remasterings will be including “Love Me Do” on a compilation of early Beatles recordings, and that the French classical reissue label Pristine Classical has also released the song as a remastered single. This was apparently done in protest against the trouble the planned 70 year copyright extension will cause it when reissuing old symphonic recordings. However, I’ve scoured their website and cannot find any reference to the Beatles at all…..
And here’s another CD I found on Amazon yesterday – The Beatles – The Early Years. It’s also listed as having a February release:
These albums are pretty much entirely made up of songs recorded by the band before they signed to Parlophone Records. They are all previously released material which can now legally be supplemented by two official songs.
So, here’s a quick straw poll. Let us know what you think:
Greta’s Beatle Records
OK. We take a little bit of a sidetrack here. To a website I stumbled across by accident last week. As you do.
It’s still very much about “…adventures in collecting Beatles music…” though.
It’s a site called Greta’s Records, and it’s a fascinating concept realised by an American woman named Allison Anders. As she explains on her site: “Just before Christmas, I treated myself to a new and special experience — I bid in a live celebrity auction. Julien’s Auctions in Beverly Hills, Ca. presented a 2 day live auction of the remaining estate of classic film actress Greta Garbo”.
And there was a mass of possessions on offer in the auction. (Click here to see the full Garbo collection catalogue).
Allison continues: “The question one needs to ask when you bid in an auction like this — what do I truly WANT, just something which belonged to her? Everyone would love a dress she wore — but what would I really DO with it?…..Then I saw it. WOW — Greta Garbo had records! Of course! Why wouldn’t she? Everyone had vinyl records, stacks of them in the 50s, 60s onward. What would possibly be in Greta Garbo’s private record collection? All of it was thrilling and surprising. There were several lots of records up for auction — including one of classical records and opera, one of spoken word, one of jazz, then one of international records, and one of rock and pop records…..[and] I was the winning bidder on the rock/pop records! 50 of them!” (Click here to see the catalogue page featuring Lot 420 – the popular records).
The first Beatles LP of Greta Garbo that she explores is Introducing the Beatles.
As well as some detail about the release and it’s songs, Allison has researched Introducing the Beatles fairly thoroughly – even down to notes and links on this the most counterfeited of all popular LPs. She also includes a backgrounder on the Vee Jay label, the most successful black-owned record label before Motown. And there’s even a video on how to tell whether your copy of this record is legitimate or a phoney (….turns out Greta Garbo’s is a phoney):
Well, there’ll be more Beatle records coming up on Allison’s great blog. There are at lease two others (Sgt Pepper and Magical Mystery Tour which we can see in the photos) and I’m sure she will be worth reading when she gets to these.
For anyone with a collector’s heart this is a fascinating journey and a document of a famous person’s taste in popular music.
Beatles With Records – Part Sixteen
We’ve had some great feedback from the Beatles With Records – Part Fifteen.
Firstly, David wrote to correctly identify the record that you can see Paul holding in these two photographs below when the band arrived back in the UK in 1964, fresh from their first US tour. It’s the Okeh record Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um: The Best of Major Lance:
Thanks David!
We’re still looking for someone to identify the record that Ringo has under his arm in the top photo. It’s a lot more generic because it seems to be some sort of “Best Of” LP. You can only just see part of the title (on its side) – the numbers “1963”, followed by what looks like a track listing in the style of juke box listings:
Meanwhile, the photo of Klaus Voormann signing a Revolver CD in Part Fifteen reminded French Beatles collector Claude Defer of a photograph that he has of Klaus signing his very own Revolver LP (a German issue):
You now have a real collectors item there Claude!
Collector Andrey sent in a Beatle-related image. It is of John Lennon’s estranged father Alfred Lennon who tried to cash in on his son’s fame by releasing a record of his own in 1965 called “That’s My Life (My Love and My Home)”:
You can hear some of “That’s My Life (My Love and My Home)” here:
And read an interesting article by the man who penned the words to the song here.
Andrey also sent in this advertising photograph of Paul McCartney holding a CD copy of his ninth solo album Off the Ground, released in 1993:
The same image was used as the cover of a highly collectable extended 2CD version of Off the Ground called Off the Ground – The Complete Works:
The photo was again used (with a different background Photoshopped in) to promote the first round of re-mastered and re-released McCartney back-catalogue back in 1993, called “The Paul McCartney Collection” series:
Don’t forget you can submit photos or further information that you have by posting a comment below or you can email me here.
And you can view the other parts in “The Beatles with Records” series here:
Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 , 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 17.
Linda McCartney Remembered – Well Sort Of
Back on 16 January WogBlog posted about a mysterious new animation which had appeared overnight on YouTube on a newly-created Linda McCartney channel. He was tipped off to it by a Tweet from Paul McCartney:
The video cartoon has Paul singing a new arrangement the song “Heart of The Country” from the Ram album. So….what was this? A belated effort to promote the Ram remaster? Or the start of something new? Perhaps another of McCartney’s forrays into animation? Then a week later the same video appeared, this time with a voice-over by Elvis Costello:
Turns out it’s an advertisement for Linda McCartney Foods. The theme of the campaign is #Love Linda, and it’s the first time in 15 years that the vegetarian brand has done television advertising. The thirty second ad shows the McCartney family in animated form and is produced by Passion Pictures, whose other work includes projects for the Beatles and the Gorillaz. It went to air for the first time on 28 January as part of a campaign to launch a new range of chilled meat free foods.
Then I get home yesterday and find an email from a PR company letting me know about “…..a new 30 minute film called Love Linda in which members of the McCartney family speak about Linda McCartney, her influence on them and how they are continuing her legacy. It also includes commentary from people who knew Linda including Elvis Costello and Chrissie Hynde. The film is a very personal look at how Linda touched the lives of people she knew, interspersed with beautiful photography of her and the McCartney family.” Here’s the three-and-a-half minute trailer:
And here is the full thirty minutes.
All this kind of reminds me of Paul and Advertising and The Beatles and Advertising.
Beatles Blog 