 |
Beginning
in
1963, the Beatles started a holiday tradition of recording Christmas
messages for their fans. The recordings were edited and issued on
flexi-discs through the Official Beatles Fan Club in England. The
records were not available for sale, but were distributed free to
fan club members. In 1964, Beatles (U.S.A.) Ltd., the official national Beatles fan club in the United States, began sending the annual Christmas records to its members. This tradition continued through 1969, although the last two Christmas records were not group efforts, but rather were a series of separately recorded messages from each of the Beatles. |
| TITLE | THE BEATLES' CHRISTMAS
ALBUM |
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| CATALOG NUMBER | SBC-100 |
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| RELEASE DATE | Spring of 1971 /Not For Sale: Fan Club Members Only | ||||
| TRACK LISTING | SIDE 1 | SIDE 2 | |||
| DEC. 1963 (5:00) | DEC.
1967 (6:10) |
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| DEC. 1964 (4:05) | DEC. 1968 (7:55) | ||||
| DEC.
1965 (6:26) |
DEC. 1969 (7:42) | ||||
| DEC. 1966 (6:40) | |||||
| FRONT --> Click! | BACK --> Click! | SIDE 1 --> Click! | SIDE 2 --> Click! | DISK | |
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| INNER
SLEEVE |
FRONT COVER CLOSE UP | BACK COVER CLOSE UP | |||
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The
American version was packaged in a blue background cover. The front
side has five rows and five columns of cubes that have black and
white pictures of the Beatles. |
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On the back cover, The Official Beatles Fan Club P.O. Box address and designer's name were printed. | |
| BACK COVER CLOSE UP | |||||
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The
upper half of the back cover has black and white images of the front
covers to the 1964 through 1969 U.K. Christmas flexi-discs and "THE
BEATLES" in uppercase black letters outlined in white. The lower half has "CHRISTMAS ALBUM" in large uppercase white letters and black text in the lower left corner. Album design is credited to "GROCK IT!" and photo creations to Robert Bauman. |
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| LABEL CLOSE UP | |||||
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Both sides have the track selections and running times below the spindle hole. | |||
| LABEL CLOSE UP | |||||
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Catalogue
number "SBC 100" was printed at the left side of the spindle hole. |
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The records were pressed with standard Apple labels that have Apple perimeter print on SIDE-1. | |
| LABEL CLOSE UP | |||||
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"NOT FOR SALE" and "All rights" information appears in the lower part of the apples on each side. | ||||
|
OTHER
ITEM
|
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| - |
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| LABEL | Apple label | ||||
| MIX | MONO | ||||
| VINYL COLOR | BLACK | ||||
| PRESS
FACTORY |
Capitol's Whinchester factory | ||||
| MATRIX No. | SIDE 1 | SBC-1-100A.!. (hand etched) BellSounds logo (machine stamped) sf ─◁(hand etched) | |||
| SIDE 2 | SBC-2-100B.!. (hand etched) BellSounds logo (machine stamped) sf ─◁(hand etched) | ||||
| RECORD COMPANY'S NAME | Apple
Records, Inc. |
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| RECORDING PUBLISHED CREDIT | Copyright
1970 |
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| COVER FORM | Single
type. Housed in a cardboard jacket. |
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| INNER SLEEVE | Plain White sleeve | ||||
| COVER DESIGN/ PHOTO/ NOTES | Album Design: GROK IT! / Photo Creations:
Robert Bauman |
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| PRODUCER | Official Beatles Fan Club | ||||
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COMMENTS
|
On December 18 1970, The
Beatles Fan Club still existed although the Beatles had officially
announced the break up of the band earlier in the year. Since
recording activity had halted for the group as a collective unit,
there would be no chance of a new Christmas flexi being prepared.
Therefore, The Beatles Fan Club released a 12 inch vinyl compilation
mailed out to it's members entitled "From Then To You" in LP form.
The catalogue number for this LP is LYN 2153/54. "From Then To You"
was only released in the United Kingdom. In the U.S, the seven messages were issued as "The Beatles' Christmas Album" sent out by the fan-club around springtime 1971. It was the first time the 1964 and 1965 messages had been made available in the U.S. The American version was packaged in a blue background cover. The front side has five rows and five columns of cubes that have black and white pictures of the Beatles. The rows feature, from top to bottom, John, Paul, Geoge, and Ringo and the entire group. Moving left to right, the columns feature pictures are from 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969 and 1970. The rower right cube does not have a 1970 picture of the band as no group pictures were taken in 1970. Instead, the cube has "THE BEATLES CHRISTMAS ALBUM" in uppercase letters. The upper half of the back cover has black and white images of the front covers to the 1964 through 1969 U.K. Christmas flexi-discs and "THE BEATLES" in uppercase black letters outlined in white. The lower half has "CHRISTMAS ALBUM" in large uppercase white letters and black text in the lower left corner. Album design is credited to "GROCK IT!" and photo creations to Robert Bauman. The records were pressed with standard Apple labels that have Apple perimeter print on SIDE-1. Both sides have the track selections and running times below the spindle hole. "NOT FOR SALE" and "All rights" information appears in the lower part of the apples on each side. The trail off areas contain the Bell Sound logo, the initials "sf" and a hand drawn Winchester logo, indicating that the record was masterd by Sam Feldman at Bell Sound and manufactured by Capitol's Whinchester factory. |
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