Strange Fruit – The Beatles’ Apple Records

Posted on March 29, 2014 by beatlesblogger

A recent trip to Canberra, Australia’s capital city, afforded a visit to the second-hand store Flip Side Exchange which specialises in CD’s, vinyl and DVDs.

Found this great DVD there:

It is a 2012 documentary on the Beatles’ record, film, publishing and electronics company Apple. Reviewer Carlos Gonzales wrote at the time of release: “….other than their music, the Beatles tried to do something good for their fellow man, in this case struggling musicians that needed a break, a chance. It was then that they created Apple Records, and the wonderful Strange Fruit -The Beatles’ Apple Records provides us with an honest view and great, historic information about the history of the label and its artists.

The film is quite long (162 minutes), and it is loaded with history and music…..Strange Fruit -The Beatles’ Apple Records [tells] how the label began working on projects, beginning with the production of the film “The Magical Mystery Tour.” They then signed singer-writer Jackie Lomax, Mary Hopkin, The Iveys, James Taylor and others. They also made the Beatles White album. By 1969, the Beatles — pushed by John Lennon — hired Allen Klein, who promised them that he would clean up their finances. That year they signed Billy Preston, The Iveys became Badfinger, and the Beatles began disintegrating as a group. From then on, the filmmakers examine year by year everything that happened to the label, ending in May 6, 1975, when Apple announced that it would cease operations. Along the way, we learn about other groups that were signed by Apple….for example, Ravi Shankar, Yoko Ono, John Tavener, Modern Jazz Quartet, and Brute Force. Of course, we hear some of their music along the way.

The movie has interviews with some of the players, such a Jackie Lomax (who said that Apple Records was ‘utopia’), Ron Griffiths (from the Iveys), Joey Molland (Badfinger), and others. There are also interviews with historians, like Stefan Granados, Chris Ingham, Mark Paytrees, and more. In the end, we are told that Apple was a “curious disappointment in the history of rock music. A revolutionary label that never reached its potential.” And the big lesson, perhaps, is that “artists can not take care of other artists.” You will be the judge. Strange Fruit — The Beatles’ Apple Records is a great document of our times. With no apparent help from or sanctioned by the Beatles, the documentary tells the history of this controversial — for lack of a better word — music label.”

It’s a must for all collectors of the Apple Records releases.

For a sneak preview:

Dylan 30th Anniversary Concert Re-Issue

Posted on March 22, 2014 by beatlesblogger

For those George Harrison completists among us comes a CD re-issue of the1992 concert held to mark the 30th anniversary of Bob Dylan’s recording career. This 2CD Deluxe Edition, with remastered audio, adds two previously unreleased recordings from the concert’s sound check to the original release. Our copy just arrived in the post:

George Harrison (then making his first US concert appearance in 18 years) is introduced on Track 7 of Disc 2 singing “Absolutely Sweet Marie”. As well we get him playing guitar and backing vocals on two other tracks. Sadly we don’t get “If Not For You”, though it was performed during the concert.

The 30th Anniversary Concert Celebration is also now out on DVD and Blu-ray for the very first time. See WogBlog’s post for all the details on those releases.

The back of the CD booklet has a tribute to all the musicians who have since passed:

The original 1992 CD cover looked like this, with a photo of George pretty much front and centre:

A Hard Day’s Night Re-Issue Coming Soon

Posted on March 20, 2014 by beatlesblogger

http://www.criterion.com/films/28547-a-hard-day-s-night

Criterion Films have announced a new re-issue of the Beatles A Hard Day’s Night film. It will have a new cover:

And will come in two versions – a DVD only, and a “dual-format” 3 disc box set edition which combines DVD and BluRay versions. What you’ll get is:

A new 4K digital film restoration, approved by director Richard Lester, with two audio options—a monaural soundtrack and a new 5.1 surround soundtrack made by Apple Records (which Giles Martin worked on) — presented in uncompressed monaural DTS-HD Master Audio on the Blu-ray (dual-format only)
Audio commentary featuring various members of the film’s cast and crew (dual-format only)
In Their Own Voices, a new piece combining interviews with the Beatles from 1964 with behind-the-scenes footage and photos
You Can’t Do That: The Making of “A Hard Day’s Night,” a 1994 documentary program by producer Walter Shenson
Things They Said Today, a 2002 documentary about the film featuring Lester, music producer George Martin, writer Alun Owen, cinematographer Gilbert Taylor, and others (dual-format only)
New piece about Lester’s early work, featuring a new audio interview with the director (dual-format only)
The Running Jumping and Standing Still Film (1959), Lester’s Oscar-nominated short featuring Peter Sellers and Spike Milligan (dual-format only)
Anatomy of a Style, a new piece on Lester’s approach to editing (dual-format only)
New interview with Mark Lewisohn, author of Tune In: The Beatles: All These Years—Volume One (dual-format only)
Deleted scene (dual-format only)
Trailers
PLUS: An essay by critic Howard Hampton
The film will be in a 1:75:1 aspect ratio, which is how it was originally shown in movie theatres in 1964
The re-issue is due for release on June 24

Yoko Ono and the World of Dance Music Remixes

Posted on March 15, 2014 by beatlesblogger

When we posted about the forthcoming re-issues of Yoko Ono’s Apple Records back catalogue we were contacted by the people at Mind Train/Twisted Records asking if we were aware of Yoko Ono’s other considerable success over many years in the world of dance music and remixes.

No, we said – tell us more.

And so Rob at Twisted kindly sent through a signed (yes, autographed by Yoko herself), 2-disc promo set which gathers together a selection of the very best of her output in this genre from the last 10 years or so:

Under the monicker ONO she has had huge successes with DJ remixes of her work on the Billboard Club charts. Last year ONO had not one, but two consecutive Number 1 hits – making her one of the most successful dance artists of 2013 and prompting articles like this one in Time magazine.

Her product is prepared and released by the Yoko-associated Mind Train Records and the iconic New York-based house music label Twisted Records. For more on Twisted see their Facebook page.

Yoko Ono’s Imaginepeace site also has some info on these releases.

Gotta say, I quite like these. They’re creative, mesmerising, and make you want to move. It just goes to show that in the world of collecting Beatle and Beatle-related music there is always something new to learn….

(for larger versions click on the images above)

Beatles ’64 – A Hard Day’s Night in America

Posted on March 8, 2014 by beatlesblogger

We were recently able to do a big Beatles crate dig while visiting the city of Newcastle in New South Wales, Australia. It yielded a few treasures.

Ah, Newcastle. A former steel city now more focussed on tourism, education, health services and coal exports, it must also be second-hand central when it comes to the large number of shops it has selling vintage books, records and CDs. We got around to some (but not all) the outlets due to time constraints. But those we did get to were worth it.

Found this great book in a second-hand bookshop called Indigo Books on Hunter Street:With this year being the 50th anniversary of the Beatles invasion of the USA, who could resist a book with the title Beatles ’64 – A Hard Day’s Night in America….

Yes, it has a small rip in the dust jacket, but this book is a fantastic memento and really worth having.

First released in 1989 to mark the 25th anniversary, Beatles ’64 has extensive text by journalist A.J.S. Rayl. But perhaps its most striking feature is one hundred and fifty (then) never-before-seen photographs of the band taken by freelance photographer Curt Gunther who accompanied them on that first historic US tour:

Gunther’s photographic career spanned over four decades. He met the Beatles in 1964 and a friendship was formed. Asked to pay his own way on the tour he offset his expenses with winnings from nightly poker sessions with the band! Find out more about Curt Gunther here, and see more of his Beatle images.

As the Amazon Books review says of his work: “….[as you flip through the book] every so often a picture jumps out by capturing the essence of both the premiere British pop invaders and the tenor of the time.” Here are couple of those images from Beatles ’64 – A Hard Day’s Night in America:

I liked this one of their guitars backstage:

And this one of Paul driving (and smoking) in the US:

Finally – the look on the face of the young lady who pulled up alongside the Beatles in their limo says it all:

It’s a book really worth having in the collection – especially in this the 50th anniversary year. Here’s an interesting review which also contains a couple more of the Curt Gunther images.

We’ll definitely be heading back to Newcastle again soon as there is certainly more Beatles treasure to discover there. In coming posts we’ll feature a couple of other nice things we found.

Yoko Ono Albums To Be Reissued

Posted on March 1, 2014 by beatlesblogger

Flipping through a recent copy of Mojo magazine we noticed this small article:

Being interested in anything Beatles and Apple Records related we decided to do a bit more research.

Yoko Ono’s Plastic Ono Band site has this small promo tile (complete with a grapefruit) – but no links when you click on it:

Same for her Imagine Peace site. Again, there’s the same promo tile on the page but no other information or links, although there is a tiny bit more info as the tile at least lists two record company names:

Chimera Music is Ono’s (and son Sean Lennon’s) record label. A search revealed no further information on their site though. Not sure what Secretly Canadian has to do with the releases (it’s an American independent record label based in Bloomington, Indiana) because there’s no reference to Yoko Ono or Plastic Ono Band on their site either….

Of course these titles have been released previously. The details of that 1997 reissue project are in this MTV article:

“….beginning on May 20th, the label (Rykodisc) will present 11 different Yoko Ono and Plastic Ono Band albums, all of which are being remixed and remastered as needed by Ono herself…..The first wave of releases will be unleashed on May 20 with the four titles, Unfinished Music #1: Two Virgins, an album or tape manipulation and random noises reportedly made the night before Ono and John Lennon made love for the first time; its sequel, Unfinished Music #2: Life With the Lions, which deals with Ono’s subsequent miscarriage and also contains a “song” called “Radio Play,” 12 minutes of random radio dial-turning; the collaborative The Wedding Album, whose second song is a 22 minute drone consisting of the couple calling each other’s name and, finally, the first Plastic Ono Band album, Yoko Ono with the Plastic Ono Band.

The next set of four releases (June 10) contains what many considered to be the first post-punk record (ironic, since it pre-dated punk), the noisy, experimental Fly, credited to Yoko Ono and the Plastic Ono Band. Also released on that day are two other Plastic Ono Band Yoko titles, Approximately Infinite Universe and Feeling the Space. Also included will be Ono’s cathartic, personal album, Season of Glass. July 1st will bring the last set of three releases,It’s Alright (I See Rainbows), Star Peace and A Story, a previously unreleased album that was included in the box set. Ono is currently searching for some appropriate bonus tracks for the releases…”

Rykodisc were also involved with this 1992 6-CD set, Onobox:Yoko Ono herself writes about the contents of this box set extensively here. Onobox is a kind of a “best of” compilation, with tracks from across her own (and John Lennon’s) output from 1968 to 1985.

It’ll be interesting to see what the 2014 project brings….

Hear the Beatles Tell All – British Charly Records Re-Issue

Posted on February 27, 2014 by beatlesblogger

With the Beatles 50th anniversary of the arrival in the US now well under way, it was intriguing to come across a re-issued example of one of the earliest efforts to cash in on that US success.

Hear the Beatles Tell All was an interview disc which consisted of two lengthy conversations between the Beatles and Los Angeles radio disc jockeys. On Side One Dave Hull interviews John Lennon, while Side Two was titled “Jim Steck interviews John, Paul, George, Ringo”. No Beatles music was included on this interview album, rather a quite odd but jazzy percussion backing edited and scored by Lou Adler, and played by then top LA session drummer named Hal Blaine.

Originally released in September, 1964 on the Vee-Jay Records label, what we have here is a 1981 re-issue by the British record label Charly Records:

Charly Records have faithfully reproduced the cover. If you have the original Vee-Jay release the label will look like this:

But if it is a fake, you might have this:

Apple Introduces a Beatles Channel App on Apple TV

Posted on February 11, 2014 by beatlesblogger

Many of the the Mac watch sites are reporting that Apple has launched a new channel dedicated to the Beatles:

Linked in with the commemorations on the weekend for the 50th anniversary of the band’s debut on American TV screens, if you have an Apple TV device you can watch the first Ed Sullivan Show performances of “All My Loving,” “‘Til There Was You,” “She Loves You,” “I Saw Her Standing There” and “I Want to Hold Your Hand” on the big screen. The complete performance clocks in at just over 14 minutes. The Ed Sullivan recordings will be available for a limited time, according to the information on the channel.

There are also links to The Beatles U.S. Albums, available for purchase from the iTunes Store (of course!).

The Beatles and Calderstone Productions Limited

Posted on February 9, 2014 by beatlesblogger

We’ve been intrigued to read in the small print on the back of each of the most recent Beatle CD and vinyl releases a reference to a company called Calderstone Productions Limited. It has not been on releases prior to Universal Music taking over EMI, and so we began to wonder about what it is – and started doing some snooping.

You can see a reference to Calderstone on the Beatles’ On Air – Live at the BBC Volume 2, and also on the re-issued version of Live at the BBC:

At first it looked like it might be a company set up just to deal with the copyright and publishing issues around all the BBC recordings used on those discs, but now Calderstone Productions has also appeared in the small print on the bottom of the CD box set The Beatles U.S. Albums released last month:

(Click on the images above to see larger versions)

Going back further, a bit more snooping shows there’s also reference to Calderstone on iTunes for the digital download of Let It Be… Naked. The iTunes site says:

Would this make Let It Be…Naked the first official Beatles release since Universal got hold of EMI? Calderstone Productions is registered in the UK and was previously known as Beatles Holdco Limited. This was changed to Calderstone on 29 November, 2012.

Calderstone’s Company Secretary is registered as a Mrs Abolanle Abioye (age 53 and also Secretary to Universal Music Publishing), and the Directors are listed as Mr Adam Barker (45 years old and a company director on at least fifteen other companies), and Mr David Sharpe (a 46 year-old Irishman, also listed as a director of at least another 15 companies, also mostly music-related).

The registered address for the company is 364-366 Kensington High Street, London W14 8NS, which not surprisingly is the same address as Universal Music UK. Google maps shows that their front door looks like this:

Calderstone lists a share capital of just £1 English pound – although this site says the company has a combined assets value of £7,954,000.

Interestingly there are strong Liverpool links to the name Calderstone. There’s a park there called Calderstones Park. And Calderstones School is located opposite the park on Harthill Road in the Liverpool suburb of Allerton. The school was founded in 1921 as Quarry Bank High School, whose most famous student was one John Lennon….

Coincidence?

Beatles Blog

Adventures in collecting Beatles music

Tag Archives: Beatles

Strange Fruit – The Beatles’ Apple Records

A Hard Day’s Night Re-Issue Coming Soon

Beatles ’64 – A Hard Day’s Night in America

Yoko Ono Albums To Be Reissued

Hear the Beatles Tell All – British Charly Records Re-Issue

Apple Introduces a Beatles Channel App on Apple TV

The Beatles and Calderstone Productions Limited

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