50 years ago, as September turned to October in 1969, Green Bay was waiting for the Beatles.
It had been almost a year since the Beatles’ previous LP, the one they called “The Beatles” and the one everyone else called The White Album.
The Stiller Company, which had long sold records from its music department, in late September promised the “new Beatle LP” and listed a release date of Friday, Oct. 3. But Oct. 3 apparently came and went without that new Beatles record. For the next two weeks, the “new Beatle L.P.” was “coming soon!”
The Beatles’ new record apparently finally arrived in Green Bay sometime in the third week of October 1969, when the Stiller Co. ad listed the new “Beatle L.P.” as being in stock along with new albums from The Band, Tom Jones and, uh, one Laura Nyrol.
The new Beatles record, of course, was “Abbey Road.” Imagine, just imagine, the anticipation for that.
Fast forward 50 years to today. The recently reissued 50th anniversary “Abbey Road” shot up to No. 1 in the UK and to No. 3 here in the States. Apparently quite a bit of anticipation for that, too. Or was that just marketing hype?
I think I’m good with my copy of “Abbey Road,” which I bought used decades ago. (Mine appears to be a pressing from the Capitol Records plant in Jacksonville, Fla., though not a first pressing.)
I don’t want or need any of the seven formats in which it’s been reissued, though I hope my friend Timebomb Tom sells a bunch of them:
- Super deluxe edition with three CDs and a Blu-Ray, plus a book
- Double CD set with a second disc of demos and outtakes
- Single CD with just the stereo remix
- Triple LP box set with two additional discs of demos and outtakes
- Single LP with just the stereo remix
- Single picture disc LP with just the stereo remix
- Super Deluxe digital audio, with 40 tracks to stream or download in hi-res 96kHz/24 bit audio
Though I have always loved the Beatles and will always love the Beatles …
Though I have a dozen Beatles records (and have sold “Live at the Star-Club” and “Rock ‘n’ Roll Music, Volumes 1 and 2”) …
Though I have a bunch of wonderful Beatles memorabilia, particularly “Yellow Submarine” stuff, much of it given as gifts …
Though I recently bought rough, loved-to-death $1 copies of six Beatles LPs, including what appears to be a first Jacksonville pressing of “Abbey Road” …
I think I’m good with most everything Beatles now, too.
Janet just smiled when I said that to her the other day.
At some point, you have to say it’s all too much.
… Though I still want to visit Liverpool and London and stroll across the Abbey Road crosswalk some day.