(Just Like) Starting Over: Remixing John Lennon Paul Hicks, Simon Hilton and Sam Gannon (2020) "As you move on with the series, do you think that you’ll continue with the template you started with Imagine, or continue with more adventurous remixes like this set? Simon: Yoko decided very purposefully to do Imagine first. It’s the most commercial album, but it also has a very defined sound to it that stands beautifully on its own. It doesn’t have the emptiness that Plastic Ono Band has, and it doesn’t have the mud that Some Time In New York City, Mind Games, and Walls and Bridges have, and it doesn’t have the 80s feel of Double Fantasy and Milk and Honey. When we get to the later albums, there’ll be a need for some bold decisions because I don’t think that we’ll want to recreate that soupy world they inhabited. Rather than polishing the diamonds, I think we’re going to be looking at re-cutting the diamonds slightly to make them even more beautiful. And you know, the original mixes still exist. Paul: We’re always trying to be very respectful of the originals. Simon: 100%. We’re always thinking and debating—what would John do? What would Yoko do? What’s the best for the track? We want to put John Lennon songs in front of a whole new audience that will love and interpret them in new ways. Wait until you hear the Atmos mixes!"
Being a poor college student and a raving Beatle Maniac really tend to conflict with each other, and particularly in the case of these Lennon reissues if I want to collect all of them..
Oops, yes you did. Sorry I missed it. I do agree though, a chronological order makes sense but I wouldn't be surprised at all if they deviate from that. That makes sense. Would that have affected the All Things Must Pass, Plastic Ono Band, and Let It Be anniversary sets at all since they all missed the 50 year mark?
As mentioned numerous times in various threads on this Forum: The Beatles (Apple) do not care a wit about the 50-year copyright issue. They release product according to their own plan and schedule, and are not worried about the copyright rule. They feel that they can avoid any repercussions (through litigation or other means)---and so far they have. As you noted, those deluxe sets for All Things Must Pass, Plastic Ono Band, and Let It Be all came out AFTER the 50-year copyright rule kicked in for each album. But they lost no sleep over this. They do not care.
I agree with you, but they also had at least two(?) secretive releases via streaming sites in 2019 and one other year, from memory.
There was once a copyright dump for 1963, done I think in 2012 or 2013. But since then, APPLE re-evaluated the situation and has refrained from anymore dumps. As for any secretive streaming releases in 2019: I am not sure if anyone here really knows what they were and who did them for what reason. They might have had something to do with Peter Jackson and/or Disney, and the Get Back film. There might be other factors involved. But Apple, in general, could not care less about the copyright rule with regard to audio box sets.
Thank you! That old 50-year Copyright excuse is so dead, and The Beatles obviously don’t care. Also, everything that can be bootlegged, HAS BEEN bootlegged, and I don’t see where it’s hurt sales one bit.
December 2013, 1 month after On Air: Live At The BBC, Volume 2 and 1 month before The U.S. Albums box.
Prior to All Things Must Pass, there was a short-lived stream that had enough components of the takes to register them as recognizable and broadcasted. Therefore, they fell into the 50 year mark. Plastic Ono Band was originally scheduled for 2020, as was Let it Be:50, so I would assume that the filings were done prior to the end of the year to indicate the copyright still continued. Apple does care. However, there are two important things to note: first and foremost, the Duran Duran case has shown copyright law in the United Kingdom only applies to songs that have not been sold to foreign ownership groups, and the sale of Northern Songs first to Michael Jackson and then Sony has put them in foreign hands – something that, even if Duran Duran's case is reversed on appeal, would allow Apple to argue that they had missed the deadline due to differences in legal application at the time (which can be retroactively covered by a dump)… and Apple would be aware of all that because there was the question of how Paul would argue to get his copyrights from Sony under those rules, which he ended up negotiating a settlement for that we're not aware of all the details; and, second, that the actual recordings are not owned by Apple but now (thanks to the sale of EMI) Universal, which means Universal has an obligation to protect the tapes as well… and that may lead to questions of who is more responsible. Apple also notably controls all representations of The Beatles' image, and any release that's unauthorized has the opportunity to challenge that image, giving them another option. That's different than, say, The Beach Boys' contract which will see the recordings revert to them unless a deal is made with PolyGram, or Dylan who is happy to let someone else handle the back catalogue. Post-Beatles are different. Pre-1970 recordings like Lennon and Harrison's Zapple releases as well as Live Peace in Toronto were still done as Beatles, and there was the expectation at the time that they belonged as side projects in the greater Beatle tent. Once McCartney is released as a separately recorded, separately released project, there is the fight over separation over Beatles and solo (hence Paul's lawsuit to dissolve Beatles Inc.) and MPL clearly owns those sound tapes and licenses for them. The other three have their Apple releases still at EMI, so it's a question of what was recorded separately and licensed (meaning the estates control the copyrights) or whether they remain at Apple. I would hazard a guess that both Sentimental Journey and Beaucoups Of Blues, which were originally intended to be released first, were also done as part of The Beatles, leaving Ringo to be the first recording by Ringo that goes into this second pile. That would open the windows for the estates to revisit these older LPs and – for the Lennons and Harrisons, both of whom having re-released them in recent decades – it's worth revisiting as super-deluxe sets to help them gain more sales.
I agree, as opposed to the Dylan team it looks like the Beatles camp are fairly relaxed about the copyright situation (sadly for us!). I do recall there being a blink and you miss it type copyright dump of All Things Must Pass / GH 1970 tracks. So I wonder if there have been things like that just we didn’t find out about it. It’s a shame though. Don’t get me wrong, it’s fantastic that the Beatles camp have finally got on board with Deluxe box sets with outtakes. Yet they still underestimate the hardcore audience who would love a full release of the sessions a la Dylan’s blue box (and they’d probably make more money too).
That's a lot of info to digest. I have no idea about all of legalities of the things that you mention, so I cannot comment whether I think they are even applicable or not. Too far above my pay-grade. Regardless, though, and whatever the reasons are, Apple does not feel it necessary to release material just because of a 50-year copyright deadline. They will release things according to their own internal schedule and plans, and will not be dictated by an outside copyright rule that has enough loopholes for them to work around. So that is what I meant when I said that "Apple does not care". Of course, Apple "cares" in general and employs a team of lawyers who are always protecting the Beatles in every way. Then again, maybe those lawyers are too busy with the Geoff Emerick stolen tape case to be watching the copyrights...
Dylan handed it over to a division of the label to run, and they want to profit as much as possible before the copyright is lost. Apple doesn't have to worry because (1) deals have been made over copyright management for the next decades, (2) lawyers seem to figure that the dump/foreign ownership extended the protection anyway – the US doesn't recognize the 50 year rule, which is why we're not seeing the same panic from US-based acts, and (3) if the copyright/control reverts to anyone because of the US law, it goes back to Apple as controller of the Beatles images. Moreover, one of Apple's directors – a certain man by the initials PM – believes you don't put it all out there, you piecemeal it out to maintain a revenue stream for decades to come. Maybe it's because one of his favourite artists is still putting out unreleased material (thank you, thank you very much). But we can expect that there's a longer term plan that just "Get it out before we lose the profit."
I realise this is a ridiculously pedantic reply by me, I say it more because I find it a surprising bit of trivia, but: Paul McCartney isn't actually a director of Apple, neither is Ringo. However, Olivia, Sean and Yoko all are. Paul and Ringo are represented by others as directors.
Sorry. But I would still say Paul has a very active voice in what Apple does – especially since the last few albums happen to double-dip for him revenue-wise thanks to the use of Linda's photo archives.
Beatles 1969 and 1970 collections were made. So was a John Lennon 1970 and 2 George Harrison 1969/1970 collections.
As far as music that was temporarily released, I'm most interested in the tracks that were supposedly of George with an acoustic at his mom's bedside in a hospital. At the time of release it was stated that this "performance" occured in 1969. None of these takes materialized on All Things Must Pass deluxe edition. Now I'm interested for a couple of reasons, but do see the entire thing as voyeuristic and way too intimate. There's no way someone as concerned with privacy as George would sanction this release. Now that I know this tape exists, I want to hear it - but would totally respect not getting the "right" to do so. But why was this released, if just temporarily, to begin with? Or did I fall sucker to a hoax?
I’ve seen The Beatles 1969 playlist, and Harrison’s 1970 dump. Any info on where to find what are on the others? Of course, for curiosity’s sake.
He's of course he's very active, probably the person with the single greatest power/influence in the company. I'm saying that he's not actually a director.
If you are suggesting these are the only reasons we got Let It Be, ATMP, and POB deluxes after their 50th anniversaries occurred, we’re in for a disappointing Revolver box, because no 1966 collection was made. I don’t think Apple really cares. Anyone who has remotely any interest in these deluxe sets will either a) stream them legally, b) purchase them legally, or c) illegally download them. What they won’t do is purchase a bootleg over a legit official release, which is supposedly the whole concern with this copyright issue.
There are a lot of unresolved questions in that thread. I really have no idea if this was legit. And I also don't know if this playlist (if legit) would hold up in court as a way to protect copyrights. And with Apple's $$$ and lawyers, I doubt anyone will bother to argue the opposite.
I might be wrong but aren't the copyright collections made because the record company knows what material is circulating in "bootleg" terms and want to ensure no "grey" area releases can be made using tracks that have fallen out of the 50 year copyright laws? Perhaps no 1966 collection was made due to there being very little Revolver era tracks currently available in the bootleg market - off the top of my head I can only think of "Paperback Writer" Tk 1 & 2 (instrumental), "Rain" unreleased mono mix which is slightly longer than the officially released version and poor quality monitor mixes of "For No One" and perhaps one or two others. The Revolver SDE will have access to the original sessions tapes (the bootleggers don't have these) and so I can imagine one or two outtakes/alternate versions of each album track and the 1966 standalone single will appear on the set. I also think we may get remixed/remastered versions of some of the material that appeared on anthology too.
The reason we’re getting all these SDEs is Jeff Jones’ hiring as Apple CEO back in 2007. From Wikipedia: Jeff Jones is a music industry executive best known as the CEO of Apple Corps, the company founded by The Beatles. Jones was formerly an executive vice president at Sony/BMG,[1][2] where he managed Sony's recorded catalogs, including repackaging classic albums.[3] At Apple Corps he has overseen Beatles projects such as the launch of TheBeatles.com,[4] the release of the band's remastered catalog on CD, iTunes,[5] and vinyl,[6] the DVD and Blu-ray releases of Help!, Yellow Submarine and Magical Mystery Tour, The Beatles: Rock Band, and the Cirque du Soleil collaboration, including the Grammy-winning Love album. He also produced the compilations The Beatles in Mono and The Beatles Stereo Box Set, for which he won the 2011 Grammy Award for Best Historical Album.
