Strange but true: TheBeatles American record company decided not to release their albums.
Instead, Capitol chopped them up to generate more product.
Nobody at the label had any idea that future generations would revere these records as sacred artistic units.
The Beatles at London Airport in 1964: Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Ringo Starr, and John Lennon (from left)Evening Standard/Getty Images
No, Capitol just wanted to squeeze more funny paper out of the moptops before the bubble burst.
American fans got different versions than the rest of the world.
The U.S. albums have been forgotten by history, but theyre a crucial part of the Beatles story.
Theyre the albums that made America fall madly in love with the Fab Four.
Its a vinyl release on 180-gram audiophile vinyl, coming out on Nov. 22 by Apple Corps Ltd./Capitol/UMe.
John, Paul, George, and Ringo playedThe Ed Sullivan Showon Feb. 9, 1964.
The album in the shops wasMeet the Beatles a hodgepodge of singles, B sides, and album tracks.
Fans flipped for hits likeYesterday … and TodayandBeatles VI,which didnt exist in the U.K. Every album beforeSgt.
Peppergot sliced apart the U.S.Revolvercut three of the best John songs.
The U.S. LPs dropped out of sight; theyve been out of print as separate albums since 1995.
Most of todays fans have never heard them.
But in so many ways, the U.S. albums were even more influential than the real ones.
Theyre the records that the Beach Boys heard.
The ones that Smokey Robinson heard.
The ones that Stevie Wonder and Carole King and Marvin Gaye took as an artistic challenge.
(Brians copy began with Ive Just Seen a Face, not Drive My Car.)
Capitol had no such qualms.
Hes a shadowy figure in Fabs history, but fans tend to curse his name.
So he remastered them.
He had rejected these singles, Reeves says.
The company forced his hand to put them out.
But he figured he was going to redo them all and make them different.
So he made some alterations to what was happening across the pond.
Dexter had a heavy hand in the studio.
I dont want to be negative about it, but theres strange decisions he made.
Thats why the U.S. albums had their own sound issues for this edition to overcome.
Dexter definitely changed things, Reeves says.
First of all, he took these stereo tapes and he folded them to mono.
He folded everything down.
He certainly used those beautiful Capitol echo chambers a little bit to enhance that sound.
Thats putting it mildly.
Yeah, its in the Lincoln Tunnel, Reeves laughs.
Theres a few songs that are striking like that.
How did one man get to tinker with what were fairly major albums?
Dont you think that is a total New Jersey boss move?
The guy must have had some Jersey in him.
Now, was he a genius or was he a villain?
The U.S. pressings were also notorious for the crummy-sounding fake-stereo effects.
We always called it pseudo stereo, Reeves says.
But man, those tapes are less than optimum.
He was pretty vocal about that.
We were trying to figure out which tape we should use, Reeves says.
The Dexter versions or the Abbey Road ones?
The consensus from Apple was that they wanted to put out these unique U.S. masters.
We found the original set and not any copies of them especially not any of the pseudo stereo copies.
And thats what we cut from.
It would have been easier to just arrange the Abbey Road mixes to re-create the American versions.
