Beatles 1 and Beatles 1+

26 Responses

  1. Mikko Suhonen says:

    You should take part in the lottery (or send a bill to Apple for your uncredited consultancy)! They followed very much your suggestions.

    You wrote about All you need is love: "When you see clips from this film as part of the promo for the new video collections, it doesn't look as good as the others. I don't know if they've transferred the original video tape again in 4k and colourised it over again, but it doesn't look like they have."

    One must remember that All you need is love was videotaped not filmed, so it is next to impossible to create a good looking color HD film from a 1967 black and white SD video broadcast. This one stands out unfavourably because it is the only colour video on this set, the others were either filmed in colour or videotaped in black and white. So there is little they could have done to All you need is love, unfortunately.

  2. Bob Gassel says:

    Great piece and great release…of course everyone will have little quibbles. Mine is that
    I wish that they had used the original audio from the "All You Need Is Love" Our World performance.

  3. Foxx says:

    Great release. My quibble is that I don't like remixes.

  4. BWSmythe says:

    / At least Apple got their hands on an original VT version, and not the lousy telerecording the BBC have always used over the years. A better colourisation may have helped – though we have yet to see it properly…

  5. Mr. Paul says:

    Thanks for this great news, Roger…
    Do you know if the full Our World introduction to All you need is love…be included…with George Martin talking and the orchestra arriving…..it really, in my opinion, adds context and flavour to the broadcast…

  6. Brian Fried says:

    My one quibble here: you mention Shea and Let It Be as the other two desired releases… but not The Beatles cartoons! Surely fans want those too, right?

  7. wogew says:

    I think American fans are the ones most likely to want the cartoon series available, whereas the others I mentioned are wanted by all fans everywhere. Neil Aspinall hated the series, and bought the rights and the video tapes to lock them away to ensure they wouldn't be seen on TV again. And by not including a video made from the cartoons (like I suggested), it seems things will stay that way.

  8. J. D. says:

    Hmm. New stereo mixes of "Free as a Bird" and "Real Love"? That could be interesting. When the original mixes were made, there was no way to separate John's voice from the sound of his piano on the mono demos. Now that we've seen what Spectral Extraction can do on songs like "Love Me Do" and "She Loves You", maybe they'll apply this technique to the demos so we just hear the sound of John's voice against the newly recorded music.

  9. Mary says:

    As compliment: there are 3 (not 2) different versions for the 'Love me Do' video, now, we will have 4.
    For me, 'Please Please me' DO count as video, an there are 3 versions.
    'I Want to Hold Your Hand' DOES exist as promo! Version 1 was made in 1983 (20 Greatest Hits), version 2 in 1984. Version 3,4 and 5 were created in 1996/2000 and 2011 using Sullivan footage. ALL last 3 promos comes from Apple/EMI videos with ORIGINAL slates (not fakes like the 'Old Brown Show' video), the 2011 version was not released to the media but does circulate.
    There are 4 different edits or versions for 'A Day in the Life'.. let's wait and see which one was used.
    3 (not 2) different versions for 'Lady Madonna', let's see which one we will get.
    Two different versions of 'Baby It's You', but we will get version 2.
    Two different versions of 'Real Love', but I'm sure we will get version 2 as well.
    Sad we won't get ALL the Intertel versions for 'We Can Work it Out' (3), 'Day Tripper (3),'Paperback' and 'Rain'.. (six and four versions of each, NOT counting any of the outtakes available to date)
    And for 'Don't Let me Down', the original 1970 video version (with unreleased 'Let it Be' film footage)could have been a better option, since the 'Naked' video was already seen and the other is not so well know.

  10. George Armstrong says:

    Just near the end of the Blu-ray/DVD trailer there is a shot of John from the 'Hey Jude' recording session that was filmed for the 'Music!' TV documentary. I can't think of any promo clip that used this footage apart from the re-edited version of 'Lady Madonna' seen in 'Anthology'. Let's hope 'Lady Madonna' is one of the original promo clips and not the 'Anthology' version.

  11. Mark McKendrick says:

    Hey Roger….

    As exciting as it is to see this video collection out at last and in the forms it has appeared, which are fantastic also, I have to say that I'm rather bemused by your comment: "After The Beatles' "Anthology" TV series, then head of Apple Corps Ltd, Neil Aspinall was asked what was up next, perhaps a video collection of The Beatles' promotional films? His reply was that it was "too obvious". Well, we're certainly glad things have changed with the new management."
    To say you're glad things have changed seems almost like a put-down. I sensed before his untimely death (that had Neil still been around) we'd have been a lot closer to seeing "Let It Be" on the market. Could I ask were that the case, would you still have been glad of the change of management? *tongue in cheek question*

  12. Blumen says:

    Roger: "Baby's In Black" should say "Baby It's You".

  13. Martin says:

    To say things have changed for the better under Jeff Jones at Apple is not, I don't think, any disrespect to Neil Aspinall. If the back catalogue has been remastered in both stereo and mono,the vinyl remasters (again, both mono and stereo) have finally surfaced , the music is now on iTunes and now a definitve video compilation, how can it not be a change for the better? I loved (most of) Alex Ferguson's time as manager at Old Trafford, but that doesn't mean I disliked previous boss, Ron Atkinson, or how he did things. Because I liked him at United too. Another example is The Stones: they did improve with Mick Taylor in the early 70s (certainly as a live band), but that doesn't take anything away from their 60s glory days with Brian Jones. Well, we're certainly glad things have changed with the new management is basically saying we're glad that Beatles fans are finally getting some decent stuff. It's nothing negative.

  14. Martin says:

    Anyway, Aspinall or Jones, they were/are both very good at their job.
    And anything's better than Klein (or his lot) having his hands on the Fabs legacy

    Nice one, Macca…

  15. Mark McKendrick says:

    Martin…

    One didn't say anything was "negative". Please re-read. Thanks.

  16. Unknown says:

    This release is going to be a monster. I can't wait for the deluxe Blu Ray to arrive. Every indication is that this project was done right , first class all the way, as any Beatles set should be.

  17. Mark McKendrick says:

    Jimmy King….

    Quite right, Sir.

  18. wogew says:

    Of course I mean no disrespect to Neil Aspinall, I liked him. But he was such an integral part of the Beatles, I think he looked upon himself as a kind of "fifth Beatle", which I believe lead to him making business decisions on behalf of the group without consulting the board of directors some times. "Let It Be" was resurrected and scrapped before release several times when he was in charge. I'm not saying that was his decision, on the contrary – he was behind the restoration in 1992 and 2003. I do believe Olivia or Yoko may have objected to Let It Be being released. But opportunities like a promo video collection may not even have occurred to Yoko, Olivia, Paul and Ringo when Aspinall just offhandedly nixed the idea. Anyway, the releases we have so far seen during CEO Jeff Jones' time with Apple have been good. Apple have finally been able to partake in the re-release of "A Hard Day's Night" on DVD and Blu-ray, whereas in the past they had no involvement with the various home video releases of that one at all. Furthermore, we have seen the Beatles remastered in 2009, with mini-documentaries, finally an Apple-Apple deal was struck for iTunes (Aspinall did not have a good relationship with the Apple computer company) the US albums and the Japan albums came out on CD, the UK vinyl LP's were released remastered both in stereo and mono, and particularly the decision of staying all-analogue for the mono albums was as unexpected as it was great. But surely, the decision of finally releasing the promotional films and the remixing of Beatles 1 is by far the biggest accomplishment in my book. And I don't think we would have had all these tings with Aspinall leading the Apple Corps Ltd company. His biggest baby was "The Long and Winding Road" documentary which finally came to fruition as The Beatles Anthology, and he was happy with that. "Let It Be…Naked" was Paul's idea, "Love" was George's, and the decision of making "Love" a mash-up album came from Giles Martin's idea which again turned Ringo on – and the other three sided with Richy here. The Beatles RockBand came through Dhani Harrison's initiative.

  19. Unknown says:

    I have this eerie feeling that it was George Harrison's dying wish to keep the Let It Be movie unreleased and that Olivia and Dhani are doing what they can to respect his wish. As far as I know George was very negative about the movie.

    I also suspect that the Harrison estate is the reason The Beatles is not on any streaming platforms. John, Paul and Ringo are all represented on Spotify etc. with basically/almost their entire back catalogues, but no sign of George's music (except for some live albums he participated on). Perhaps it's Olivia's vote that's withholding The Beatles from being available on streaming platforms?

  20. Terence Daniel Collier says:

    For You Blue and Two of Us are both big misses. It looks amazing though i don't, and never have, liked the '1' concept. anyone want to see a brief clip of the amazing Two of Us video vimeo.com/9727284

  21. Thomas says:

    is this one of the 3 Hello Goodbye?
    this one here is with pantomime
    youtube.com/watch?v=WALLLcfN1rk

  22. Anonymous says:

    if they ever do decide to release the cartoons,they should redo those awful voices of john and george.paul and ringo were ok.but the guy who did john and george was not even close to sounding like them.those need to be redone.

  23. Garry says:

    The 4:3 aspect ratio on The Beatles+1 DVD is a right pain in the ass. I hate it. Makers should have given the viewer the choice of 16:9 or half the bloody screen black if you want it i.e. 4:3. Cropping is not an issue. The recent ITV show 'The Nations Favourite Beatles Song' showed Beatles in 16:9. There was no difference in quality, The Beatles did not look elongated or 'squashed'. I spent just over £34 on this and now I hate watching it.

  24. wogew says:

    Use the zoom button on your TV remote until the picture covers your screen. Same difference. It they had presented them in 16:9 on the other hand, those of us who prefer to see the full picture would not have had the ability to zoom out. Presenting videos that were shot in 4:3 in 16:9 is exactly why people hate the McCartney Years release.

  25. Mark McKendrick says:

    Oh dear. Well said Roger.

  26. Mikko Suhonen says:

    I think that 4:3 is the right aspect ratio for material originally screened at 4:3. But why Free as a bird, which is 16:9, has been letterboxed into 4:3 rather than play it in full 16:9 is beyond me.

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