Tag Archives: Paul McCartney

Twin Freaks – Variations and Limited Releases

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“Those of you who were there for the European Tour will have heard our DJ, Freelance Hellraiser, cooking up some mixes before we came on and people have been enquiring about these mixes ever since. Well the good news is he’s put together an album called ‘Twin Freaks’ using fragments from my original multi-tracks which we hope will rock your little cotton socks!”
Paul McCartney.

That’s how Paul McCartney introduced listeners to his 2005 project, “Twin Freaks”:

The front and rear covers (above) of “Twin Freaks”. The cover image is a painting actually called “Twin Freaks” which is featured on page 69 of Paul’s book of his artworks entitled “Paintings“.

Back in June, 2005 one of the increasingly frequent experimental releases by Paul McCartney, using a nom de plume like his Fireman records, came out. It was a 2 LP, vinyl-only release of twelve remixed McCartney tracks by British DJ and producer Freelance Hellraiser (a.k.a. Roy Kerr).

The Wikipedia entry for the disc sums it up pretty well saying McCartney and Kerr “….created the double vinyl album as a continuation of Kerr’s collaboration with McCartney from a 2004 tour. Kerr had previously released the mash-up album “A Stroke of Genius” in 2002. The format of the mashup is that of an extreme remix in which two disparate musical and recording experiences are combined in a manner that goes beyond remix to literally merge or mashup the two songs so that they emerge as something unique or hybridized. The technique sometimes obscures the original source material or so seamlessly blends the divergent elements that disentangling the grafted parts becomes nearly impossible.

Kerr performed a half-hour set prior to McCartney’s 2004 gigs in which the DJ remixed various McCartney solo tracks into some unusual and often unrecognizable forms. “Twin Freaks” was the outgrowth of these manipulations.

All the McCartney tracks are revised and reinvented in the process. Who is responsible for what aspects of the works or their reinvention is unclear.

The album was produced as a double vinyl release and as a digital download. The cover and interior artwork, which feature paintings by Paul, are similar in tone and style to artist Willem de Kooning.  McCartney knew the late artist, with whom he shared a similar painting style.” (ex Wikipedia)

The LP (on Parlophone Records) comes in a nice thick cardboard gate-fold cover. The images above are from inside the gate-fold and show more McCartney-painted faces and a track-listing (with writer’s credits) for each record. The labels on each of  the LPs are custom-designed with one side having the track-listing for both sides, and the other a painted face:

If you want to hear the type of thing DJ Roy Kerr does with the McCartney tunes here’s a YouTube example of “Maybe I’m Amazed”:

The album spawned two – and possibly three (see below) – 12-inch vinyl singles. The first was a promo-only release of the song “Really Love You”. It was limited to 500 copies worldwide and came out in a clear plastic sleeve that was heavily screen-printed on both sides (the printing is different on each side), with the repeated words “Twin Freaks”:

The “Really Love You” 12-inch promo came out on MPL/Graze Records and carried the catalogue number GRAZE 010. It has just the one song on Side A:

The other side was entirely blank – no grooves, just smooth vinyl – but it had a simple label:

“Really Love You” also had a commercial as a 12-inch single. This came out teamed with another song from the Twin Freaks album – a new McCartney song called “Lalula”. It carried the catalogue number GRAZE 012 and came in a clear plastic sleeve, screen-printed on just one side:

“Really Love You” and “Lalula”, like the promo single, was a one-sided 12-inch single – but this time the “B” side carried what was described as an acid-etched image of the “Twin Freaks” faces painting. It was apparently limited to 2500 copies. It’s quite difficult to capture in a photograph but I’ve had a go below:

Side A carried this label:

I think there was a third, very limited 12-inch vinyl single released from “Twin Freaks”. It was the song “What’s That You’re Doing”, a song co-written by McCartney and Stevie Wonder. I remember at the time seeing a few copies of this for sale on Ebay, but they were expensive and always quickly snapped up. I think it carried the catalogue number GRAZE 011. These have disappeared from trace now and must be real collectors items. If you have any more information on this 12-inch vinyl single please let me know using the comments box below, or email me at beatlesblogger@gmail.com

Did the “Twin Freaks” LP ever come out on CD?  You see them occasionally on Ebay, but I don’t think this one was ever officially released by McCartney. Please let me know if this is wrong.

Below is the full 2005 Press Release for “Twin Freaks”:

TWIN FREAKS SET TO RELEASE SELF-TITLED DEBUT ALBUM
TWIN FREAKS OUT 13TH JUNE, 2005

The TWIN FREAKS eponymous debut album is released through Parlophone Records on the 13th of June. TWIN FREAKS is a collection of some of Paul McCartney’s best-loved classics alongside some hidden gems from music’s most envied back catalogue.

TWIN FREAKS features the studio wizardry of DJ and producer The Freelance Hellraiser, best known for his unforgettable mash-up the 2002 bootleg ‘A Stroke Of Genius’. Hellraiser has since become one of the most sought after remixers and last year he came to the attention of music legend Paul McCartney.

In the summer of 2004 The Freelance Hellraiser joined Paul McCartney’s 13 date European stadium tour, opening each show with a twenty-five minute set of remixed McCartney tunes, which culminated in the famous headline performance at Glastonbury. At the time The Freelance Hellraiser said, “There is such an amazing album to be made of some of Paul’s unknown tracks from the late Seventies and early Eighties. He was doing some utterly cool stuff then that the young audience would lap up now”.

Causing quite a stir on the underground club scene throughout the UK TWIN FREAKS has already received airplay on Radio One’s prestigious show The Blue Room as well as support from Zane Low, Annie Mac, Huw Stephens and XFM. The album is packed with dance-floor epics that span Paul McCartney’s illustrious career.  From his solo debut album McCartney (“Maybe I’m Amazed”) through to 2003’s Driving Rain (“Rinse The Raindrops”) and including electro-pop rediscovered classics such as “Temporary Secretary” from 1980’s Coming Up album. TWIN FREAKS is an alternative take on the greatest back catalogue in music.

TWIN FREAKS will be released as a double vinyl
(Catalogue Number: 3113001)

12-inch single Press release:

TWIN FREAKS NEW SINGLE ‘REALLY LOVE YOU’ RELEASED ON GRAZE – 6TH JUNE

6th of June sees the release of the debut single ‘Really Love You’ from TWIN FREAKS on the new underground label Graze Records.

‘Really Love You’, a twelve inch only release, is the debut from TWIN FREAKS, featuring the studio wizardry of London based DJ and Producer The Freelance Hellraiser AKA Roy Kerr. Best known for his unforgettable mash-up the 2002 bootleg ‘A Stroke Of Genius’. Hellraiser has since become one of the country’s most sought after remixers and last year caught the eye of music legend Paul McCartney.

In the summer of 2004 Hellraiser toured Europe with Paul McCartney, opening each show with a twenty-five minute set of remixed McCartney tunes, which culminated in the famous headline performance at Glastonbury.

‘Really Love You’ is a remix of the original track taken from Paul McCartney’s 1997 hit album Flaming Pie. TWIN FREAKS are set to take this McCartney classic to a new audience in clubs across the country this summer.

TWIN FREAKS are in the process of putting the finishing touches to their first full album to be released later in the year. ‘Really Love You’ and ‘Lallula’ are just a taste of what’s to come.

Release date:  June 6, 2005     Label:  MPL/Graze GRAZE012 (12″)

John Lennon’s Rolls Royce

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I use this great photo of the Beatles standing in front of an impressive all-white Phantom V Rolls Royce in my blog banner from time to time:

This 1969 photo reminded me of a similar car that John Lennon took ownership of in 1965 – and had substantially and dramatically re-painted:

Or if you prefer it in colour for the full effect:

Lennon’s psychedelic Roller wound up in 1993 as a display item at the Royal British Columbia Museum in, of all places, the city of Victoria, British Columbia in Canada. How did it get to be in Canada? You can read the full story here. It is still owned the Royal British Columbia Museum, but is now on display at the motor shop which takes care of it’s maintenance and servicing.

How do I know this? Well, when I posted on Paul McCartney and the portable Sony TV set which can be seen on the front cover of the famous “Sgt Pepper” album, it prompted some comments including one from the very knowledgeable   WogBlog, who said that the TV was actually owned by John Lennon. WogBlog’s post then got a comment from Jim Walters, who is a volunteer at the museum in Victoria, saying that he looks after maintenance on the Rolls. He says the restoration work is all done at Bristol Motors in British Columbia which now credits itself as “the home of John Lennon’s Rolls“.

Anyway, the volunteers are looking for a replacement portable Sony TV. The original from the Rolls had gone missing (you can see it in the black and white YouTube clip above) – and it indeed looks just like a Sony TV9-306UB – the one on the “Sgt Pepper” cover:

Jim Walters is determined to find a replacement TV. He also posted on a Sony collectors page called Sony Insider saying of the little portable TV:

Paul McCartney bought two while they were on tour in Japan. One was used on the cover and I think the other was for John Lennon. I look after John Lennon’s yellow Rolls-Royce Phantom V for the owner, the Royal British Columbia Museum in Victoria, BC, Canada. This same model was installed in the rear seat console when JP Fallon Coachworks painted the car yellow and had artist Steve Weaver do the Romany style scrolls and flowers in 1967. The TV went missing from his car over 25 years ago. I am trying to find the same model of TV so I can donate it to the museum to fill the big hole in the console where it used to be. If you can think of anyone who may be able to help please forward this message to them.

This kind of fits with what I wrote about the TV on the cover of “Sgt Pepper”, that it was actually owned by Paul. It kind of makes sense because John’s TV of course would have been installed in the Rolls Royce at the time of the photo shoot. The article I was quoting from the Japan Times in my post said that the Okazaki City Mindscape Museum would be displaying the actual receipt for the purchase of the TV in an exhibition called “Swingin’ London” from January 2011. So, I decided to look and see if the Okazaki City Mindscape Museum in fact has that “Swingin’ London” exhibit on at the moment. And it does!

My Japanese is non-existent so I put some text from the site into Google Translate and it came back with:

“Famous Beatles record jacket ・ (・ サージェント・ペパーズ・ロンリー・ハーツ Club Band) that was captured on television unravel the mystery of the “bill signed by Paul McCartney (invoice).”

So I reckon we are still working out the mystery of the who owned the TV set. Seems it might have been Paul McCartney after all……

FAB: An Intimate Life of Paul McCartney – Reviewed

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This is the US cover of the hardback edition of “FAB: An Intimate Life of Paul McCartney” by well-known biographer Howard Sounes.

I posted previously on this book when I got a copy of the Australian edition in softback. If you click on the link you can see it was published with a very different cover to the rather subdued and conservative North American edition.

It has really taken me some time to actually read the book and write this appraisal.

What happened was I’d published that earlier post and then Da Capo Press, the US publishers of the book, saw the post and wrote offering me a review copy of the US release. It took a while to get here via snail mail and then, at 634 pages, it took me a while to read it from cover-to-cover.

I found it a pretty good read actually. Sounes writes in an engaging style and the book had just enough new details to keep me coming back. All-in-all it really was a great summer holiday read (its still summer here in Australia!). The book is not sensationalist – it pretty much sticks to the facts and tells it like it is – and that is refreshing.

One thing does stand out though – like many books on the Beatles it’s still written from an outsiders perspective. No matter how many interviews you do with some of the main players in and around McCartney’s life (and Sounes did many – he says he interviewed over 220 people for the book), he didn’t interview McCartney himself and so you still get this feeling of an outsider looking in.

Having said that, “FAB: An Intimate Life of Paul McCartney” is very revealing of the man himself, showing us aspects of the Paul personality we’ve perhaps thought were there but were never really sure. What we tend to see is the facade Paul wants us to see: “Macca”, the thumbs-up, positive, likable guy. This book goes deeper and reveals his his perfectionism; the fact that he he doesn’t suffer fools lightly; that for a wealthy man he was often quite frugal (for example paying Wings band members a very basic wage); that he wants above all to be remembered for having made a mark and leaving some sort of legacy; that family is very, very important; and that his mother (and her early death) has played a central role in his life, in his creative work, and in his relationships.

Sounes’s book is also good because it brings the reader right up to the present day. Its not just about the pre-Beatles and Beatles glory days. It includes a lot of detail about the Wings years, and about Paul’s solo career right up to 2009’s “Good Evening New York City“. In fact a good half of the book deals with the post-Beatles life of Paul.

It also gives a hint of what it must be like to live, practically for your whole life,  as one of the most famous and wealthy people in the world. Paul is a man who is used to getting his way and getting what he wants. Its not a life to be envied really. Everyone around you agrees with you because you are Paul McCartney. They suck up to you, they pay their respects. It must be incredibly difficult to keep a handle on what is real.

The gratifying thing about this book is that it’s not sensationalist. To be sure there’s plenty of opportunity to do that – particularly in that period of his later life (post Linda McCartney) when McCartney made some really bad relationship choices – but Sounes wisely sticks to the facts.

The book also has some great photographs. Who better to step us through the contents using some of those than the author Howard Sounes himself:

“The Beatles” – An Interesting Book

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Another Beatles book has recently come into the collection. Again, it’s from a discount book store that is just near where I work. They specialise in selling remaindered stock at greatly reduced prices and I’ve picked up some interesting titles from there over the years. This one is simply called “The Beatles“:

There’s a great photo of the band on the front cover – it’s highly colourised but quite striking in its effect. The title words “The Beatles” are printed in silver and so don’t show up too well in this scanned image. Interestingly, nowhere on the front or rear covers, or even the spine, is there mention of the author. You have to go to the publishers details page inside where in the fine print it says “Written by Mike Evans”. I’m not sure why Mike doesn’t get a mention anywhere on the outside of the book. A quick Google search reveals Evans is actually quite prolific having written or edited, amongst many other titles, “The Beatles: Paperback Writer: 40 Years of Classic Writing“, “The Art of British Rock: 50 Years of Rock Posters, Flyers and Handbills“,  and “The Beatles: On Camera, Off Guard 1963 – 1969“, so the guy has form.

“The Beatles” is chronological in nature and, over 21 chpaters and 224 pages  traces the evolution of the band from the early years through to the final chapter called “The Beatles’ Legacy” which brings the story up to 2009 and the release of the newly remastered CD sets – so I’d say it came out in late 2009, although again the book itself does not have a publication date on it. Strange.

In a lot of ways its a pretty standard Beatles book – but a nicely produced one – one that has at least been done with some care. Its a hardback with lots and lots of photographs (some of them unusual and interesting), and quite detailed text covering each important Beatle release, from “Please Please Me” (1963) through to “Let It Be” (1970). Mike Evans deals with the tours as well – including the troubled 1966 tour to Japan and Philippines where the Beatles were lucky to escape with their lives. In this news photo in the book they, along with manager Brian Epstein, look pretty happy to be back in London in one piece, their smiles belying the danger they faced after a perceived offense to the President of the Philippines and his wife:

As well as terrific photos there are lots of other worthwhile visual additions scattered throughout, like colour reproductions of Beatles memorabilia like movie posters, concert tickets, Beatles stamps, and this US concert poster from August, 1966 for the concert at Candlestick Park, San Francisco:

The photos inside are often unusual, like this one of Paul in the studio in January, 1968 with Cilla Black, taking her through the song he’d written for her called “Step Inside Love“. It became the theme for Black’s successful TV show of the same name:

Author Mike Evans deals with both the up-side of the Beatles’ success, and the down-side, including the ill-fated Beatles foray into selling fashion. Described by Evans as “..the biggest disaster for Apple….The idea was to sell trendy items; Paul McCartney described it as “a beautiful place where beautiful people can buy beautiful things.” In reality, though, it was a clothes store, and became known as the “Apple Boutique”. By the middle of 1968, the shop had made a loss of nearly US$500,000/£250,000, a fortune in those days and on July 30 it closed.” In this photo crowds gather outside to grab a bargain and to witness the Apple Boutique’s last day of business:

“The Beatles” is published in Australia by Hinkler Books.

Label Variations – Part Five “Band on the Run”

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I have to thank the very wonderful Chained and Perfumed blogsite for this one. Every now and then this site features photos of interesting record labels from their own collection. One recent post highlights a whole raft of great images – different versions of “Band on the Run” (on vinyl) from around the world.

Chained and Perfumed got these from Ebay from a seller who has on offer a large number of versions of Paul McCartney’s classic album, itself recently re-issued on vinyl.

Like Chained and Perfumed we like seeing different global variations – so here are few from the Ebay collection, followed by a couple from my own collection. First off a couple of different Korean pressings:

Then Greece and Italy:

And France (on nice yellow vinyl):

India and Sweden both used the traditional Apple:

While for some strange reason New Zealand used the same Apple colour as those used on George Harrison’s “All Things Must Pass” original vinyl:

The Japanese pressings used the original custom labels. Here are two versions, one with the Apple logo, the other with the Capital and MPL logos:

And now for Argentina and Mexico:

Here’s an interesting version on Odeon Records in Germany:

There are a couple of Russian versions on Ebay. Firstly one on Santa Records and then the more common Melodiya:

Next come a couple of UK versions. The first is a pretty standard issue, but without the Apple logo appearing:

The next is a special limited edition of the disc from 1997, released to celebrate the EMI Records Centenary – 100 Years of recording:

Here are some labels that are from my own collection which are not represented  above which you might also find interesting if you are into this sort of thing. First is a Canadian pressing – which I think is actually exactly the same as the US:

We had a strange example from New Zealand above. The re-issue of “Band on the Run” in that country came out on Parlophone Records:

Of course there is always the standard, original UK pressing with the Apple logo:

In Australia the original release also looked very much like the UK:

The re-issues in Australia though came out on the Capital label. Here are two variations, one on purple Capital the other on blue Capital:

Finally, in 1999 for the 25th anniversary of the release of “Band on the Run” there came a two-disc, limited edition, remastered version. This is the UK pressing of disc 1:

And here’s the second disc, which contained previously unreleased material featuring alternate versions and special interviews on the making of “Band on the Run”:

If you’d like to see some more Beatles and Beatles related record label variations you can go to:

Label Variations – Part One “Sgt Pepper”

Label Variations – Part Two “Let It Be”

Label Variations – Part Three – McCartney’s “Choba B CCCP”

Label Variations – Part Four  “Shaved Fish”

“All Things Must Pass” – Variations and Collectors Items

and

The Beatles “Love” collectable variations

The Next McCartney Releases

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Wogblog is one Beatles blogsite you can trust when it comes to accurate news and information about planned future releases. I don’t know where Roger Stormo (who is based in Norway) gets his information from, but it is usually correct well out from any officially released news. In his latest post Wogblog is saying that the next two confirmed releases in The Paul McCartney Archive Collection series will be Paul’s first solo album “McCartney”, and the album that came out ten years later (and was recorded in a similar fashion at home studios), “McCartney II”.

“McCartney” (1970) will be available in two forms: as a 2 CD set, and as a 2 CD plus 1 DVD deluxe set with a 100 page book.

“McCartney II” (1980) will also be available in two forms: as a 2 CD set, and as a 3 CD plus 1 DVD deluxe set with a 100 page book.

I’m guessing the books will be just like the book format used for the recent deluxe packaging of “Band on the Run” (2010). There is no talk of vinyl pressings yet – hopefully they will be announced soon. No release dates are yet available for both collections.

Wogblog had the inside running on all the details for that “Band on the Run” set very early. It was the first release in the Archive series, so there’s reason to believe he could be onto something here too.

Beatles on CD – “1962-1966” – the Red Album

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Last time I posted on getting a bargain on the HMV box set of “Sgt Pepper”. This comes from back in 1987 when the Beatles catalogue was released on Compact Disc for the very first time. EMI used their UK record store chain HMV to release all the titles in special, limited edition 12″ box sets.

The other set I was able to get at the same time was “The Beatles 1962-1966” (which was issued later – in 1993).

This is a limited edition box with the catalogue number BEACD25/11. It contains the well-known Red Album double CD set, and comes with a large-format 12-page colour booklet featuring song reviews, a 16″ x 24″ colour poster of the band (posed in front of a big US flag), and a special metal badge.

The front of the box looks like this:

Note the original price sticker still attached. When you take off the lid, this is what you see:

This is the 12-page booklet, and it is different to the small booklet which comes with the CD itself. It features some great photos, a short essay, and a song-by-song commentary by Andy Davis from Record Collector magazine:

Next in the box there’s a large poster:

Then comes the CD itself, held in place by a special cardboard holder with a slot just right for the CD and it’s outer cardboard sleeve. There’s a small thumb-slot at the bottom to help you get the CD out. This box, by the way, is thicker so that it can accommodate the jumbo-sized double “Red” CD :

Also in the box is a small metal pin or badge:

As already mentioned, the CD’s which come with this are in the red jumbo-sized double CD holder – which comes with a booklet:

Inside the lid of the HMV box there’s a limited edition stamped number:

See also the “Sgt Pepper” HMV box set.

 

Beatles on CD – The “Sgt Pepper” Box Set

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When the Beatles catalogue came out on Compact Disc for the first time back in 1987 it was a very big deal and the British record store chain HMV (which has close ties back to the Beatles record company EMI) released a series of limited edition 12” x 12″ box sets to mark the occasion. These boxes look just like those which contain 12″ LP’s so I guess there was a certain symbolism in releasing them in this way – the boxes containing CD’s indicating a move forward from the LP to the Compact Disc.

In all there were 12 individual box sets containing either individual or grouped CD’s, plus there was also a large (and expensive) HMV box housing every Beatle CD title then available.

You can see here all the “Beatles on CD” HMV Box Sets (minus “Abbey Road”) above. These (except for the 1962-1966 and 1967-1970 sets) all came out in 1987.

The box numbered BEACD25 contained “Please Please Me”, “With The Beatles”, “Hard Days Night” and “For Sale” on CD, plus a 224-page book ‘The Book Of Beatle Lists’, plus a Beatles fact sheet.

BEACD25/2 contained “Help”, “Rubber Soul” and “Revolver”, plus a reprint of Beatles Monthly No. 12 and a Beatles fact sheet.

“Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band” (BEACD25/3) had the album with a slipcase, an 8-page ‘behind the scenes’ booklet, the 12″ cut-outs sheet and  a badge.

The “White Album” (BEACD25/4) featured an individually numbered double CD album, a 12-page glossy booklet and a badge.

BEACD25/5 was “Yellow Submarine” and came with an insert, a cut-out ‘Yellow Submarine’ model, and a fact-sheet, while “Magical Mystery Tour” (BEACD25/6) had a 12-page booklet, a large fold out colour poster and badge.

“Abbey Road”  (BEACD25/7) comprised the 17-track CD album, two different posters, a badge and an 8-page booklet.

The “Let It Be” HMV box has a 12-page booklet and badge, and has the catalogue number BEACD25/8.

The “Past Masters Vol.1” and “Vol. 2” came in separate boxes – each with a badge and a 12-page booklet with pictures and track-by-track details. These were numbered BEACD25/9 and BEACD25/10.

Finally, when they were released in 1993 the “Beatles 1962-1966” Red Album and the “Beatles 1967-1970″ Blue Album also came in separate boxes containing the double CD sets, a 12-page colour booklet featuring song reviews, a 16″ x 24” colour poster and a badge. These were numbered BEACD25/11 and BEACD25/12 respectively.

I got a bargain the other day – I was able to get the “Sgt Pepper” HMV box and the “Beatles 1962 – 1966” – both practically mint copies. I’ll give you a close up look at the “Sgt Pepper” box set here, and post on the “62-66” red box next time.

You can see the front of the box above – and it features a different photograph from the one used on the CD. When you take the lid off this is what you first see:

This is an 8-page booklet with lots of photographs taken at the photo shoot for the famous cover of “Sgt Pepper”. There’s also some text about each song. Here are couple of pages from the booklet:

Underneath that there’s the same “Sgt Pepper” cardboard cut-out sheet which came with the original copies of the LP version:

Then comes the CD itself, held in place by a special cardboard holder with a slot just right for the CD and it’s outer cardboard sleeve. There’s a small thumb-slot at the bottom to help you get the CD out:

Also in the box is a small metal pin or badge:

The CD that comes with this is the original release with the cardboard sleeve, booklet with additional info, and an insert that has details of all the faces used in the famous Peter Blake photograph of the band standing with all their heroes:

Inside the lid of the HMV box there’s a limited edition stamped number:

Next post we’ll take a look at the “Beatles 1962-1966” HMV Limited Edition box set.

Abbey Road – Crossing to be Heritage Listed

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The zebra crossing made famous by the Beatles has just been designated a site of national significance by the British government. Fans from around the globe flock to the crossing every day to have their photo taken walking over Abbey Road, just down from the EMI studios of the same name. The Abbey Road studios became almost a home-away-from-home for the Beatles and was where they recorded just about all their greatest songs.

The story of the heritage listing (which means it will be preserved forever from change) has been picked up by media around the world.

Here’s how the BBC World Service covered it this morning:

Paul McCartney says he’s pleased with the news, and that for him it caps off what has been a run of recent success: “It’s been a great year for me and a great year for the Beatles and hearing that the Abbey Road crossing is to be preserved is the icing on the cake.”

The photo-shoot for the album which put the pedestrian crossing on the map took just ten minutes to complete. On a sunny day on August 8th, 1969 photographer Iain Macmillan took what would become one of the best-known, copied, and parodied album covers of all time.

Getting ready to cross

People today can’t get the exact same look as the Beatles got for their cover for two reasons. First is that the crossing is not in exactly the same place it was back in 1969, and second is that Iain Macmillan was about ten feet up on a ladder. He took just six photos and it was the fifth one that was used for “Abbey Road”.

Starting the famous walk. Paul is in bare feet and getting nicely out of step....

There is a webcam (run by Abbey Road Studios) that looks over the crossing now 24 hours a day –  so even if you can’t get to London you can experience it virtually any time you like. The latest release to bear the photo that put a zebra crossing on the map is the remastered CD of “Abbey Road” – which came out last year in the new look with the white strip down the left-hand side. The legend lives on:

Paul McCartney – Tripping the Live Fantastic (Highlights)

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Well, there are always some surprises in the Beatles and Beatles-related collecting game.

I’ve had a vinyl copy of Paul McCartney’s “Tripping the Live Fantastic – Highlights” LP for many, many years. In fact my copy – in mint condition by the way – dates from the time it was first released way back in 1990. It’s a single LP with 12 tracks, a cut-down version of the full, triple-LP version. The cover looks like this:

The LP I have is on the Australian black and silver Parlophone/EMI label:

I always thought that the “Highlights” LP had an identical track-listing to the compact disc and so have never paid much interest in getting that particular disc….until about a week ago when I decided to look on the Internet for a copy of the full “Tripping the Live Fantastic” 3-LP version to add to the collection. (Turns out these are pretty rare and subsequently expensive, and so I am still looking….).

I did discover, by accident really, that the single CD version of  “Highlights” comes with additional tracks that are not on the single LP “Highlights” version I have had for twenty years now. In fact there are 17 tracks on the CD version, with six extra tracks than the LP (although the LP has one song not on the CD “Put It There”), and so I decided to bid for a copy online and here it is:

Tripping the Live Fantastic - Highlights CD (front cover)

Tripping the Live Fantastic - Highlights CD (rear cover)

“Tripping” is a live disc of songs McCartney recorded in different locations around the world, as he says “….from Rio to Glasgow, Tokyo, through most everywhere and back again…”.

The CD song list is:  1. Got To Get You Into My Life (Not on LP),  2. Birthday,      3. We Got Married (Not on LP),  4. Long And Winding Road,   5. Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,  6. Can’t Buy Me Love,  7. All My Trials (Not on LP),  8. Things We Said Today (Not on LP),    9. Eleanor Rigby,  10. My Brave Face,  11. Back In The USSR (Not on LP),    12. I Saw Her Standing There,          13. Coming Up,   14. Let It Be,   15. Hey Jude,    16. Get Back,                                  17. Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight/The End (Not on LP).

This is a really nice mint copy of the “Highlights” CD. Its a UK pressing – I think. I say that because the label is a bit confusing. In the small print around the CD outer is says “Manufactured in England by EMI”, but just under the catalogue number it says “Made in Austria”.  Weird.

I am still on the lookout for the 3-LP vinyl version, or maybe a nice copy of the double CD full version of the release. Or maybe both! Will let you know how I go….

Cool photo of Paul from the CD Booklet