The Beatles Bootleg Recordings 1963 "Album" Released Today...

[Midpack]

I knew the "album" would include different versions/arrangements of previously released (production) songs, but I assumed there would also be some new songs. I just saw the track list on iTunes this morning, and it appears it's 59 tracks, all previously released songs, with lots and lots of duplicates ($40 if you want the whole "new" album). Guess the incomplete outtakes might be amusing to hear, but not enough so to buy. So it appears there's nothing new of value to this lifelong Beatles devotee, especially since I already have the earlier Live at the BBC and Past Masters sets.

Many of you probably already knew, but it's interesting to read about the reasons for this release, all centers around copyright laws evidently. So this "album release" is really a legal maneuver and little else?

Last month, music copyright was extended to 70 years. However, unreleased material only has 50 years of copyright protection. So anything recorded by the Beatles (and other artists) in 1963 and not yet in the public domain would automatically lose protection in 2014. By putting these old recordings out, however briefly and obscurely, Apple have now established copyright for the next 70 years. Which is probably about how long you will have to wait to hear them.

This exercise has not been about saving lost gems for future exploitation so much as protecting the Beatles brand. Without this little maneuver, a flood of cheap, sub-standard Beatles albums would have soon started appearing, with profits going to any enterprising salesman who could think of a catchy way to market the freely accessible songs. The tracks, already widely bootlegged and owned by real Beatles obsessives, are mainly alternative, lo-fidelity BBC recordings of songs available on the Beatles' At The BBC albums, and alternative takes from early studio sessions (there are three versions of There’s a Place, none substantially different to the version on Please Please Me).

There are only two songs worth hearing among the 59 and they have been so widely bootlegged in the past that they can easily be found on Youtube and other music sites. Bad to Me is a light acoustic demo of a song The Beatles gave to Billy J Kramer. It’s fun to hear it being sung by John Lennon with an innocent zest but it has never been officially released because the only extant copy is an acetate that hisses all the way through. I’m in Love is an even rougher demo of John Lennon playing piano and singing a song The Beatles gave to the Merseybeats. And that’s it.

Different link http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/...eatles-1963-bootlegs-go-up-on-itunes/4108361/

 

[Brett_Cameron]

Interesting. I wonder what else will fall out of the woodwork in the future.

 

[ERD50]

Very interesting. I'm not a super-big Beatles fan, so I'll pass anyway, but I often really enjoy the alternate takes. It sometimes shines a light into the creative process (I love the alternates and jams from the Layla/AOLS Boxed set).

The copyright angle is really something. It amazes me that copyrights are extended so much longer than patents. What's with that?

And from wiki:

This law, also known as the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, Sonny Bono Act, or (derisively) the Mickey Mouse Protection Act,

I think I also read that the copyright can pass to the estate/heirs? Crazy.

-ERD50

 

[Mulligan]

Very interesting. I'm not a super-big Beatles fan, so I'll pass anyway, but I often really enjoy the alternate takes. It sometimes shines a light into the creative process (I love the alternates and jams from the Layla/AOLS Boxed set). The copyright angle is really something. It amazes me that copyrights are extended so much longer than patents. What's with that? And from wiki: I think I also read that the copyright can pass to the estate/heirs? Crazy. -ERD50

I would enjoy the opportunity to buy outtakes and cutting room floor music from Let it Be and Abbey Road sessions as there is hours of that stuff hidden away I have read. But the early years, I am not interested in.

 

[steelyman]

I got several (about 20) bootleg CDs in the mid-2000s that covered lots of years. Most are titled "Unsurpassed Masters". Two songs that stick with me are an early version of "I'm Looking Through You", slower than the release but still rocks, and a longer version of "Dig It" on which Billy Preston preaches on the organ. Great stuff!

 

[Midpack]

I would enjoy the opportunity to buy outtakes and cutting room floor music from Let it Be and Abbey Road sessions as there is hours of that stuff hidden away I have read. But the early years, I am not interested in.

I've wanted to buy a legal copy of the Let It Be movie for much the same reason, but it's not available that I know of. I have seen it for sale online, but each time it looks sketchy, like an illegal poor quality bootleg. I did see it when it was originally in theaters, but not since. It might be more interesting now with the passage of so much time.

 

[Mulligan]

I've wanted to buy a legal copy of the Let It Be movie for much the same reason, but it's not available that I know of. I have seen it for sale online, but each time it looks sketchy, like an illegal poor quality bootleg. I did see it when it was originally in theaters, but not since. It might be more interesting now with the passage of so much time.

Midpack, I bought it off Amazon a few years ago, and I see it on there occasionally. It came in a legitimate looking package, but it has to be some type of bootleg off a laserdisc copy from the days when it was a legitimate release back in the 1980s. The picture quality is not bad but the audio is not high quality. If you run your DVD system through a stereo system like I do, it will sound like a loud version of a tube tv speaker (mono). I'm glad I bought it though. Every now and then they talk about remastering it but then it doesn't happen. McCartney just remastered his Wings Over America concert "Rockshow" from the 70s this past summer. Maybe he is getting closer to doing this project.

 

[David1961]

I agree it would be nice if this new "album" would contain some new songs. I bought the Beatles Anthology CDs when they came out and still listen to the previously unreleased songs (I love "Leave My Kitten Alone" and "If You've Got Troubles") but never listen to the alternate versions of their previously released songs.