Stumbled across a nice old copy of Sgt Pepper, and a copy of With the Beatles yesterday at a garage sale. They are both Australian pressings. The Sgt Pepper is mono on nice heavy vinyl in the gatefold cover, with the cut-out insert, and it’s on the black and yellow Parlophone label:

That, according to Jaesen Jones’ fantastic reference book “An Overview of Australian Beatles Records“, would make this pressing from around 1969. The weird thing though is the inner bag. It’s one I’ve certainly never seen before and I wonder if it’s an official variation on the original, or just a random bag that a previous owner has adopted for the purpose. It looks like this:

It looks aged and very much like it comes from the same vintage as the LP. The colours are very similar to the famous “psychedelic” original inner sleeve too. As you can see they are shades of pink, red and white – but in regimented stripes. Does anyone know anything about this one? Ever seen it included in a Sgt Pepper before?  This is what the usual bag looks like:

At the same garage sale I also got a really nice copy of With the Beatles – with an original Australia-only cover:

These are difficult to find in reasonable condition as they suffered ring-wear badly. With an orange Parlophone label this means this particular copy comes from around 1969:

It would have been amongst the first to use the orange Parlophone label, but amongst the last of the Beatles LPs to have the old-fashioned flipback cover construction:

And it would have been the last to have a black and white “STEREO” sticker on the top left-hand side as these were phased out in 1969:

So, two nice additions to the collection. If anyone can help with information on the unusual Sgt Pepper inner sleeve above let us know by posting a comment below or you can email me.