Red and Blue t-shirts and postcards
The official Beatles stores are currently enticing customers by offering something exclusive, red and blue t-shirts to go with the red and blue albums due out this autumn. And some postcards. Back in 1993, when these albums made their CD debut, promotional items like these were only available as giveaways to record store employees, journalists and people who knew someone who knew someone. The most exiting promotional item was the press pack depicted below, which included a VHS video cassette with the following Beatles music videos: I Want To Hold Your Hand, Help!, Hello Goodbye and Fool On The Hill.
The full contents of the 1993 press pack:
– a red and blue Beatles presentation box
– two pages (one sheet) media information from Capitol Records. Inc. dated August 15, 1993, “The Beatles Greatest Hits on CD for the first time!”
– nine pages (five sheets) media information, Capitol Records, Inc. The Beatles Red & Blue CD George Martin interview with Mark Lewisohn”
– ten pages (five sheets) “Words From Apple”, Apple Corps Ltd. “The Beatles 1962-1966 and The Beatles 1967-1970” written by Mark Lewisohn
– The Beatles “Video Clips” VHS tape in a custom red & blue slip case, the VHS tape is labeled: “Beatles Press Presentation Red & Blue”
There’s currently one for sale over at ebay for a thousand dollars…
Last time EMI/Apple released these albums, they were promoted with TV ads. We’d be surprised if this doesn’t happen again. We’re also hoping for promo music videos to appear on TV.
We told you earlier that there will be a boxed set available, which holds both the red and blue album CD’s. This project seems to have been delayed, Amazon in the UK has a release date of November 29th for this item, eil.com says it will be available from November 22nd and only throughout the year, after which it will be deleted. The individual red and blue CD releases are still slated for October 18th over at Amazon, but still no sign of vinyl LP releases.
The Beatles official Stores:
I have one of these, and you are leaving out the best part…. 3 or 4 transparencies(color slides), oversized, which depict the Beatles at various stages throughout their career. New York photo 1964 in Wash D.C, 1964 photo shoot w/an orange backdrop, 1969 shot of the group at Tittenhurst(think Hey Jude album cover). I can't think of the 4th, so maybe there were only 3…..but those are the best part of the press kit,by far!