Beatles albums with no singles... but what if?

Excellent point. It makes me wonder

On the contrary, I think they might have capitalized on the collaboration and released the single as The Beatles with Eric Clapton, like they did in early 1969 with the "Get Back" single credited to The Beatles with Billy Preston.

 

Very interesting.

 

It Won't Be Long / All My Loving
Eight Days A Week / Every Little Thing
Nowhere Man / Michelle
Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds / Only A Northern Song
Birthday / Don't Pass Me By

 

Come on guys...it’s just a little passing distraction to get you through another day...no ones saying let’s go back and reevaluate ever decision the Beatles made for singles and albums. It’s just a fun little game! Sheesh!!

 

Highly unlikely since Clapton was signed to a different label than the Beatles were, and most likely couldn't be credited, just like Harrison couldn't be credited for his playing on Cream's Badge (instead it was L'Angelo Mysterioso). McCartney and Harrison had a few pseudonyms they used when playing sessions in the 60s so as to not get in trouble with EMI who held their exclusive recording rights.

Also there's how/where things are credited. A featured/guest artist's label *might* allow a player to be credited in fairly small print on an album release from another label, but balk at the idea of their artist (whose services they own exclusively for the length of their recording contract) being co-credited equally with another artist on a different/competing label.

I'd say the chances of a single A-Side (released by EMI) getting a prominent label credit reading 'The Beatles and/with/featuring Eric Clapton' would have been nil, as Polydor wouldn't have stood for it.

 

Clapton wasn't even credited on the album, possibly due to Clapton's reluctance or contractual reasons as was common at the time where an artist was either uncredited or listed with an alias (e.g. "you know who"). I could be wrong, but I don't remember knowing that Clapton was on the record until many years later. Of course this was long before the internet when information didn't travel quite as fast. But even on the radio I don't remember hearing it mentioned until probably well into the 70s. Preston was different, not a one-off like Clapton, brought in to fill things out (cool things down) on the sessions and a possible live performance to follow, certainly with the Let It Be film highlighting his presence.

 

Maybe the 45 label credit could have read : ' The Beatles...with God '

 

Fair play, you got me.. I apologise for being snarky .... !

I think the challenge to find a single to drop to make way for one of the album tracks is a fair one though... .. I would take All My Loving over From Me To You at a pinch.. I've always regarded All My Loving as core Beatles maximum impact repertoire from the early days.

 

"All I Have Got To Do"
"Eight Days A Week"
"Michelle" / "Drive My Car"(double A side)
None, I can't stand "Sgt Pepper's", if at all, maybe, and it's a HUGE maybe: "When I'm 64"
"Cry Baby Cry"

Except from "Sgt Pepper's", great albums, by the way

 

Sadly, I only have vinyls of the 2nd Lp of the White Album and "Sgt Pepper's" myself..., luckily the others are available on Spotify...

 

All My Loving
Eight Days A Week
The Word
A Day In The Life
While My Guitar Gently Weeps

 

I guess I'm bored.

With The Beatles - All My Loving/Money
Beatles for Sale - Eight Days a Week/Every Little Thing
Rubber Soul - Michelle/Nowhere Man
Sgt Peppers (This one is hard for me, none of these songs say "singles" to me) - Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds/When I'm Sixty-Four
White Album - Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da/Everybody's Got Something To Hide Except Me And My Monkey

 

All My Loving
Eight Days A Week
Nowhere Man
Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds
Dear Prudence

 

I think the Sgt. Pepper/A Little help From My Friends would have been a huge A side in 1967 (Lovely Rita on the B side).

 

Ok, well, I have to say, that I don't feel like any of these 3 songs is good, but opinions especially about music can be different...

 

Respected...agree to disagree (to be clear though, while I do think-objectively- it's a very well written/recorded song, I'm not super nuts about ALHFMF, myself...I just think it would have been a very successful single at the time).

 

Respected, as well... ok, but I have to say that I personally don't so much think of these songs as well written and recorded, I mean compared to just for example the songs on the White Album...

 

Ok, I'll give it a go:

With The Beatles - "All My Loving/All I've Got To Do"

Beatles For Sale - "No Reply/I'll Follow The Sun"

Rubber Soul - "Drive My Car/In My Life"

Sgt Pepper's - "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds/When I'm 64"

The Beatles (White Album) - "Back In The U.S.S.R./While My Guitar Gently Weeps"

 

Yeah but...what if you could take all the artwork of both the EMI and Capitol products, and what the hell, the EMI EP's too, and shook 'em all out making reasonably-lengthed albums with as many of those titles and artwork as you needed, re-sequenced not for just one age/era-group's nostalgic preferences, but instead based on the actual tracks that belonged within the scale of however-many albums you needed to end up with (and maybe an EP or two to bridge gaps between specific album projects)...all instead sequenced for pure entertainment and validity.
Just think:
-no arguing as to whether an album should have 14 or 12 tracks
-no restrictions keeping single releases off LP's
-no carping about whether Ringo "ruins" an album just for getting a vocal or two
-no carping about whether John or Paul got the most tracks, since we all know they got the lions' share in the catalog anyway
-no yanking tracks out of timelines to fill a hole in an album side
-no filling film soundtracks with titles that didn't have anything to do with a movie
-no need for Collection Of Beatles Oldies, The Beatles Again! or any configurations of Past Masters

You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the one starting yet another one of these imaginary-world threads every eight minutes for the past 17 years...

 

For what it's worth, I've always had a problem with Sgt. Pepper in terms of how it was recorded and i do much prefer The White Album. But i think the fact that they had to cram all of that "information" into four tracks had a lot to do with its' shortcomings..but we may be talking about two different things here...either way, no matter. It's all good.

 

After the acclaim it got at the time from With The Beatles:

Not A Second Time / Don't Bother Me (give George an early confidence boost for his writing)

A live favourite from Beatles For Sale:

Baby's In Black / I'll Follow The Sun

Pre-empting the Summer of Love from Rubber Soul:

The Word / I'm Looking Through You

An epic that would have blown even more minds as a single from Pepper:

A Day In The Life / Fixing A Hole

A universally valid message and catchy song from the White Album:

Birthday / I'm So Tired

 

Birthday would have probably made for a very successful single. When The White Album first came out, the main NYC AM hit station played many of the WA tracks in rotation for a couple of months after its' release. The ones which got the most consistent airplay were Ob-la-di (big surprise there), USSR, Rocky and Birthday.

 

I like the idea of “Don’t Bother Me” as a B-side, but I feel like it would have been too early to do so - at this stage, as far as everyone was concerned (including George really) John and Paul were the songwriters in the band and I’m not sure they would have been willing to do it.

 

They weren't even giving the Lennon / McCartney songs or covers he sang much attention then, though Do You Want To Know A Secret was on the massive selling Twist and Shout EP.

 

Could we have seen One Afrer 909 as a B-side to It Won’t Be Long?

How About:

All My Loving/Not a Second Time