No, i wasnt sitting down and doing a proper listen. I just remember being surprised that it was rather punchy and great sounding pressing as i was expecting a more lifeless and dull experience.
No Collection of Beatles Oldies for the US at the end of 1966, but, at least, a full-page ad in Billboard to let The Colonies know they hadn't been forgotten!
Cool ad, with its not-too-subtle reference to their most recent release. (But what is a "happy over Christmas"?) Of course, the U.S. non-release of the album was hardly the Beatles' call. They had been pretty vocal about their unhappiness with Capitol's Dexterity in handling the U.S. catalog, and Oldies wasn't their idea either - it was strictly a label decision, because EMI was alarmed at the slowing of the band's output. I continue to be perplexed that Capitol, which had previously been overeager to exploit the band's material, passed up an easy opportunity for Christmas album sales. They were perfectly happy to release two Beatles albums less than two months apart earlier in the year, and had pressed up acetates for a double LP compilation as early as mid-1964. Granted that a U.S. hits album might have had a somewhat different track list, but the new contract didn't kick in until 1967 so they shouldn't have had trouble tweaking the compilation a little bit. And Capitol did issue the collection on its Mexican subsidiary, so they clearly knew about it and didn't have any kind of misgivings about the very idea of the album. Whatever the reason that the U.S. became one of the few major markets not to release the collection, copies are out there now (I first learned about Oldies when I found a used copy, which I immediately bought, in the 1980s) and it's now out of print everywhere which sort of levels the playing field. I rarely play vinyl, and Andrew from Parlogram Auctions says the sound isn't that great anyway, due in part to the long running time, but it lives on as a homemade playlist and stereo/mono twofer CD-R.
Interesting video. To paraphrase: "The Beatles opposed this, but, having no new product, and a contract requiring they deliver two albums per year, there was not much they could do." But, could they have done this: Also from Billboard in December of 1966. Does anyone know if a live album was considered for Christmas 1966?
The Beatles and George Martin had previously decided that the Hollywood Bowl tapes weren't up to scratch. Martin had to do a lot of work on the tapes a decade later to get them to a state he considered worthy of release. In early 1966, they did some polishing of the Shea Stadium audio for a TV special, but I haven't heard that an audio release was ever considered. There were no other multi-track live recordings of the Beatles, so there wouldn't have been any raw material for a live album. (Plus they had just decided not to tour anymore; a live album might have increased demand for further concert appearances, which the Beatles had no intention of doing.)
If they wanted to put out a live album, they should have put out either the Sweden (Autumn 1963) or Washington Coliseum (Feb. 1964)... or combined both into one release. Then we wouldn't have to hear the "The Beatles weren't any good live" bullpucky ever again!
What a different time ! With a title 'A Collection of Oldies' drawing from only up to 3 years previous, it just proves how prolific The Beatles were. What...7 albums to pick from ? Bands over the last several decades were lucky to put out ONE album in 3 years. Isn't the criteria for 'oldies' in music about 30 years or better ? The availability of the stereo tunes made this essential for those who could get it. I got an Australian/Micronesian Parlophone/EMI release, The Beatles Greatest Hits Volume 2 from a friend who bought it on Guam in the late 60s that had clean, dry stereo versions of She's a Woman and I Feel Fine I'd never heard before somewhat unique like the Collection of Oldies record. Kinda funny they did a fake stereo mix of She Loves You for the CoO release ! I wonder who produced that !
Probably because (1) it was largely redundant; and (2) unlike the Red and Blue albums, it wasn’t band-approved at the time of release. (Having said that, I have to say I expected it to come out as part of the 1987 CD rollout.) I don’t think EMI ever considered releasing mono broadcast soundtracks as records. The Coliseum show works as a film, but the isolated audio has some imperfections. And the Sweden gig, while better recorded, wasn’t album length. Plus, those recordings weren’t covered by the EMI contract, so they’d have had to license the tapes. Non-starter under 1966 conditions.
Either one of those would’ve been great; thank goodness they didn’t put out any of the ‘66 performances out on an album. It would not have done their rep as a live band *any* good whatsoever.
Besides, the Red Album includes all the tracks from A Collection Of Beatles Oldies, excepting "Bad Boy" which was out of place anyway (though I understand why it was included). Maybe if they had released a second volume of Oldies in 1970 (including 1967-70 material) the Red & Blue compilations wouldn't have existed. They could have been exported to US in the '70s; or proper collections for the US market could have been released.
I'm going to recreate this in iTunes tonight, using Mono box versions. I'm curious to hear the comp's running order.
As always I love your photos but this pressing of Oldies to my ears, is a very mixed bag. Some tracks, at best, sound ok. But being that the album lacks punch to begin with, this EAS pressing makes it that much flatter sounding with overblown high end bordering on sibilance on some songs. But I love it as a compilation; my very first copy which I no longer have, was a mono Greek pressing on Parlophone (the photo on the back was in black and white). I wish they’d do an RSD pressing comprised of the ‘09 mono masters.
You should squeeze Please Please Me in there. It should actually have been included in place of either Bad Boy or Michelle neither of which were singles in the UK.
I've done the same thing in iTunes, and the album is short enough that both the mono and stereo versions fit onto one CD-R.* I think the track selection and running order work pretty well. And that's not just my Beatle Bias showing through - I've picked up a number of non-canon Beatles compilations and some of them definitely work better than others. The best, in my opinion, is the German/Dutch Greatest from 1965: I find a number of others to be considerably less effective, like Australia's Essential. But everyone will have their own preferences, and custom-built digital playlists are trivially easy to compile from a technical standpoint (as opposed to the mental effort of selecting and sequencing tracks). *I made the regrettable decision to use a "fake stereo" "She Loves You" from the Capitol Albums CD set for the sake of authenticity. I wouldn't do that again. I suppose I'll re-compile the set if recent reports of a forthcoming true stereo version are correct.
Got both of those; I love compilations from various countries….especially great sounding ones like Beatles Greatest; for some songs it used the US master such as for I Feel Fine….and they work beautifully on here, reverb and all.
