1966

Once the "Rubber Soul" LP was released in December 1965, The Beatles had the time to take a bit of a well deserved break for the first time in years. In the meanwhile, two EPs were released: the first Parlophone EP (GEP 8946) was released three days after the "Rubber Soul" LP on December 06 1965 and was entitled "The Beatles Million Sellers". This EP was designed for the Christmas market and consisted of all five (at the time) million selling songs from years gone by. The line up consisted of "She Loves You", "I Want To Hold Your Hand", "Can't Buy Me Love" and "I Feel Fine". This left only "A Hard Day's Night" which was previously issued on an EP anyway.

The very first Beatles vinyl release for 1966 was put out on March 04 1966 and was once again a Parlophone EP (GEP 8948). The title of this EP was "Yesterday" and consisted of four songs from the previously released second sountrack Parlophone "Help!" LP. The EP was probably released due to the popularity of the title track at the time. The four songs have the lead vocals sung by the different Beatles: "Yesterday" sung by Paul; "Act Naturally" sung by Ringo; "You Like Me Too Much" sung by George and "It's Only Love" sung by John.

The Beatles also took the time at the end of November 1965 to film some promo clips for the new single "Day Tripper/We Can Work It Out" as well as some previous hits such as "Help!", "Ticket To Ride" and "I Feel Fine". All of these promos were shot at Twickenham Film Studios in London.

The Beatles had one last task to complete before resuming recording sessions at EMI studios. This task was to have the Beatles overdub and "sweeten" the film work which consisted of film footage taken during their previous year's "Live At Shea Stadium" film from August 1965. The Beatles assembled at CTS Studios on January 05 1966. Paul overdubbed his bass track for "Dizzy Miss Lizzie", "Can't Buy Me Love", "Baby's In Black" and "I'm Down". John had to overdub the organ solo on "I'm Down" as well. The whole band re-recorded the following live tunes: "I Feel Fine" and "Help!". The film soundtrack of "Shea Stadium" uses the audio live version of the Beatles' "Twist and Shout" not from Shea, but from one of the 1965 Hollywood Bowl shows. Also, the audio for the live version of "Act Naturally" is actually the commercial studio recording !!!

Once this task was complete, the Beatles did not assemble into EMI studios until the beginning of April 1966. One new LP consisting of original material, one "greatest hits" LP and two singles were released during 1966 (in the UK). These recording will be discussed in the upcoming posts. Stay tuned.