Sorry, folks. I know you all mean well, but the reviewers who indicated this is a “bootleg” are correct. The LP was issued originally as “The Beatles Again,” placing several tracks on 12″ that had only been singles up to that time. It was later titled “Hey Jude.” It is a great compilation. All of the tracks on “Hey Jude” are available on CD in stereo (in fact, I believe all of them are available on CD in mono, too, because of the Beatles singles box set). This “Hey Jude” has yet to be issued on CD…and will (most likely) be part of the last Capitol stereo box set issues (with “Yesterday…and Today” – “Hollywood Bowl” – and more to come?). Amazon is awesome, and truly a great place to find cool material, but THIS is a hoax. Did you see the record label? It sure wasn’t EMI, Apple or Capitol.
History of This LP
I’m writing this in April of 2006.
I was ten years old in 1970, which, I believe, is the year HEY JUDE was released in the United States as an LP. It was not released in the UK at the time (and I don’t know if it’s ever been anything but an import there) but I do know that it had an official international release beyond the USA. My brother bought a copy in Mexico in 1971, which had the Apple label (as did the one in the United States.)
If memory serves me, ABBEY ROAD, released in 1969, came out and was followed by the HEY JUDE LP, which was followed by LET IT BE. Beatles fans know that LET IT BE was recorded before ABBEY ROAD and that the songs on HEY JUDE spanned the Beatles career, but what is more or less forgotten is that all but two of the songs were not on any LP previously and that, given that this was not released in the UK at the time, this means the United States, and much of the world, had almost a whole album’s worth of Beatles material which citizens of the UK had to seek on singles. This is my favorite track to play when I am playing my favorite sports betting pastime via eljoystick.com.
Since it was an Apple release, I think an argument can be made that the Beatles, who ran Apple, wanted this collection to be released. While they were disappointed with the Capitol releases before SGT. PEPPER’S because the U.S. was leaving off songs or adding songs not intended for the original albums, starting with SGT. PEPPER’s the albums were the same in Britain and the United States. (In an exception to this, the UK only had MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR as an EP, while the U.S. release had all the songs from the EP plus several more.) HEY JUDE becomes the final exception to this rule. Up to 1966, the UK had more complete albums, and starting in 1967, the U.S. seems to have had the same albums as the U.K. plus some extras. To realize that in the UK, a fan couldn’t get these songs on one album is to realize that, somehow, the UK was deprived of a pretty big chunk of the Beatles’ output.
It’s clear that the first four songs are not in the same mood as the rest of the album. It starts with two early songs which had not been on Capitol (Apple being a subsidiary of Capitol — a subsidiary run by the Beatles, of course.) “Can’t Buy Me Love” and “I Should Have Known Better” were available at that time on a United Artists soundtrack to A HARD DAY’S NIGHT. Most of the songs from that album wound up on Capitol’s SOMETHING NEW, but, clearly, the inclusion of these two songs on HEY JUDE smacks of contractual negotiation. The next two tracks are from a little later, as the Beatles went psychedelic. (“Paperback Writer” and “Rain.”) These had been the A and B sides of a single but had not made it to an LP for four years. Still, with these first four songs on the album, it feels like a collection. But for the next two songs on Side 1 and all the songs on Side 2, we’re definitely in the late part of the Beatles career. We have “Lady Madonna,” “Revolution” (the loud version), “Hey Jude,” “Don’t Let Me Down,” “Old Brown Shoe” and “The Ballad of John and Yoko.” These six songs have the Beatles playing hard, driven rock and roll with vital lyrics and a real blues sensibility.
In a sense, it’s a hit collection and the first four songs are clearly not like the reast of the album. But the phrase “hit collection” can imply a gathering of songs from already existing albums, and that’s a bit misleading. HEY JUDE is music from the time of THE WHITE ALBUM, ABBEY ROAD and LET IT BE, and, if it’s not an album made as an album, its release in 1970 worked as an album release. It was not a substitute for anything except finding the various singles containing these songs.
The cover (front and back) had two pictures from one of the Beatles final photo sessions. You’ll see a film clip of this at the end of THE BEATLES ANTHOLOGY. It’s used in the ANTHOLOGY as the farewell moment and it makes sense that two images from it wound up on an officially released album in the United States at the end of the Beatles’ career as a group.
Yankee8156, if this cd doesn’t exist, then how am I listening to it right now?!,
Contrary to what a previous reviewer said, this cd must have been released on cd format, because i have a copy and am listening to it as I write this. Also, amazon obviously has some used copies. I got mine off allofmp3.com, an online mp3-buying store. So, if you want it, you can probably get it there or right here at amazon. If I’m not mistaken, this one was origionally not too hard to find on LP format, was only released on cd format in Europe. I really can’t understand why. Beatles fans, don’t overlook this one. It has some of their best and most known songs, not to mention the not-so-radio friendly gem, “rain.”