Ultra Rare Trax was a series of bootleg recordings of the Beatles, featuring studio outtakes, that first appeared in 1988. [1] It took advantage of a legal loophole known as the "protection gap" that allowed bootleggers to release old recordings due to ambiguous copyright laws. [2] In all, eight volumes were produced. [3] It was not the first Beatles bootleg to appear on compact disc but it was the first one to achieve widespread attention with bootleggers, because its sound quality showed what digital remastering was capable of. [4]
The bootleg appeared after John Barrett, an engineer at Abbey Road Studios, performed an audit of the material in the studio's archives in 1984 and made backups onto tape with the strict condition that they were not to be copied or sold. However, a Dutch collector managed to purchase some studio tapes for $20,000, which were subsequently resold to a German fan, Dieter Schubert. Schubert believed that any studio recordings made before Germany's ratification of the Rome Convention in 1966 were public domain in that country, and therefore decided to create his own bootleg label, Swingin' Pig, and released his titles on CD. The logo and name were based on the earlier Trademark of Quality bootleg label that regularly featured William Stout's artwork on its covers. [4]
One bootlegger claimed it to be "the single most important release in the history of CDs ... the quality just blew people's minds". [4] Author Clinton Heylin believes some tracks on the Ultra Rare Trax series sounded even better than the then recent CD reissues of official material from EMI. [5]
EMI Records, which held copyrights to the Beatles' studio recordings, was unhappy that somebody had effectively stolen work they held the rights to and released it. A representative was "mortified" to discover that the first volume of Ultra Rare Trax contained previously unreleased recordings of "I Saw Her Standing There" and "Strawberry Fields Forever", and the original 1963 recording of "One After 909" that was intended for Please Please Me . EMI representative Mike Heatley said in an interview with ICE Magazine that he had no idea how a bootlegger had managed to obtain such high-quality recordings. [5] The bootleg also convinced fans that there was far more unreleased material in the EMI vaults than was previously thought. [6]
Some of the material on the Ultra Rare Trax series was subsequently officially released on the Anthology series in the mid-1990s, though Michael Callucci, writing for Classic Rock magazine, claims the original bootlegs are still worth hearing as they contain material not on the official release. [3]
The Beatles' bootleg recordings are recordings of performances by the Beatles that have attained some level of public circulation without being available as a legal release. The term most often refers to audio recordings, but also includes video performances. Starting with vinyl releases in the 1970s, through CD issues in the late 1980s, and continuing with digital downloads starting in the mid 1990s, the Beatles have been, and continue to be, among the most bootlegged artists.
Bob Dylan is the debut studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on March 19, 1962 by Columbia Records. The album was produced by Columbia talent scout John H. Hammond, who had earlier signed Dylan to the label, a controversial decision at the time. The album primarily features folk standards but also includes two original compositions, "Talkin' New York" and "Song to Woody". The latter was an ode to Woody Guthrie, a significant influence in Dylan's early career.
The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions is a 1988 reference book on the English rock band the Beatles written by Mark Lewisohn. It was published by Hamlyn in the UK and by Harmony Books in the US.
A bootleg recording is an audio or video recording of a performance not officially released by the artist or under other legal authority. Making and distributing such recordings is known as bootlegging. Recordings may be copied and traded among fans without financial exchange, but some bootleggers have sold recordings for profit, sometimes by adding professional-quality sound engineering and packaging to the raw material. Bootlegs usually consist of unreleased studio recordings, live performances or interviews without the quality control of official releases.
Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits Vol. II, also known as More Bob Dylan Greatest Hits, is the second compilation album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on November 17, 1971 by Columbia Records. With Dylan not expected to release any new material for an extended period of time, CBS Records president Clive Davis proposed issuing a double LP compilation of older material. Dylan agreed, compiling it himself and suggesting that the package include a full side of unreleased tracks from his archives. After submitting a set of excerpts from The Basement Tapes that Davis found unsatisfactory, Dylan returned to the studio in September 1971 to recut several Basement songs, with Happy Traum providing backup.
Spunk is a bootleg demo album by the English punk rock band The Sex Pistols. It was originally released in the United Kingdom during September or October 1977.
The Led Zeppelin bootleg recordings are a collection of audio and video recordings of musical performances by the English rock band Led Zeppelin which were never officially released by the band, or under other legal authority. The recordings consist of both live concert performances and outtakes from studio sessions conducted by the band. Many hundreds of Led Zeppelin bootlegs exist, and are widely collected by fans.
"Peace of Mind" is the title given to a song of unknown origin that has been attributed as a 1967 recording by the Beatles on bootleg recordings. The song has the sound quality of a home-produced demo, and was supposedly recovered from a rubbish container at Apple Corps headquarters in 1970.
Live at the BBC is a 1994 compilation album featuring performances by the Beatles that were originally broadcast on various BBC Light Programme radio shows from 1963 to 1965. The mono album, available in multiple formats but most commonly as a two-CD set, consists of 56 songs and 13 tracks of dialogue; 30 of the songs had never been issued previously by the Beatles. It was the first official release by the Beatles of previously unreleased performances since The Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl in 1977 and the first containing previously unreleased songs since their final studio album, Let It Be, in 1970.
Sessions is a cancelled compilation album of previously unreleased tracks by English rock band the Beatles, planned for release by EMI in 1985 but never issued officially, due to objections by the surviving Beatles. The album consists of 13 finished but unreleased Beatles songs. A planned single containing two of the tracks from Sessions – "Leave My Kitten Alone", backed with an alternative version of "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da" – was also left unissued. The idea was resurrected in 1995 as the greatly expanded three-volume double CDs The Beatles Anthology with an accompanying six-hour documentary.
Great White Wonder, or GWW, is the first notable rock bootleg album, released in July 1969, and containing unofficially released recordings by Bob Dylan. It is also the first release of the famous bootleg record label Trademark of Quality. Seven of the twenty-four tracks presented here were recorded with The Band in the summer of 1967 in West Saugerties, New York, during the informal sessions that were later released in a more complete form in Dylan's 1975 album The Basement Tapes. Much of the other material consists of a recording made in December 1961 in a Minnesota hotel room, studio outtakes from several of Dylan's albums, and a live performance on The Johnny Cash Show. It was the first time that these previously unreleased recordings came to the market; many more would be released in similar formats over the coming years, though most were single albums, not double albums like this record.
The Basement Tapes is the sixteenth album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan and his second with the Band. It was released on June 26, 1975, by Columbia Records. Two-thirds of the album's 24 tracks feature Dylan on lead vocals backed by the Band, and were recorded in 1967, eight years before the album's release, in the lapse between the release of Blonde on Blonde and the subsequent recording and release of John Wesley Harding, during sessions that began at Dylan's house in Woodstock, New York, then moved to the basement of Big Pink. While most of these had appeared on bootleg albums, The Basement Tapes marked their first official release. The remaining eight songs, all previously unavailable, feature the Band without Dylan and were recorded between 1967 and 1975.
Live'r Than You'll Ever Be is a bootleg recording of the Rolling Stones' concert in Oakland, California, from 9 November 1969. It was one of the first live rock music bootlegs and was made notorious as a document of their 1969 tour of the United States. The popularity of the bootleg forced the Stones' labels Decca Records in the UK, and London Records in the US, to release the live album Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! The Rolling Stones in Concert in 1970. Live'r is also one of the earliest commercial bootleg recordings in rock history, released in December 1969, just two months after the Beatles' Kum Back and five months after Bob Dylan's Great White Wonder. Like the two earlier records, Live'r's outer sleeve is plain white, with its name stamped on in ink.
Bob Dylan bootleg recordings are unreleased performances by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, that have been circulated throughout the public without undergoing an official, sanctioned release. It is commonly misconceived that bootlegs are only restricted to audio, but bootleg video performances, such as Dylan's 1966 film Eat the Document, which remains officially unreleased, are considered to be bootlegs. Dylan is generally considered to be the most bootlegged artist in rock history, rivaled only by the Grateful Dead.
The Bootleg Series Vol. 9: The Witmark Demos: 1962–1964 is a compilation album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, containing demo recordings he made for his first two publishing companies, Leeds Music and M. Witmark & Sons, from 1962 to 1964. The seventh installment of the ongoing Bob Dylan Bootleg Series, it was released on October 19, 2010 on Legacy Records.
"Santa-Fe" is a song that was recorded by Bob Dylan and the Band in the summer or fall of 1967 in West Saugerties, New York. It was recorded during the sessions that would in 1975 be released on The Basement Tapes but was not included on that album. These sessions took place in three phases throughout the year, at a trio of houses, and "Santa-Fe" was likely put on tape in the second of these, at a home of some of the Band members, known as Big Pink. The composition, which has been characterized as a "nonsense" song, was copyrighted in 1973 with lyrics that differ noticeably from those on the recording itself.
Golden Eggs is an unlicensed compilation of previously released recordings by English rock group the Yardbirds. The LP record album was originally issued in 1975 by Trademark of Quality (TMQ), a Los Angeles-based enterprise that specialised in bootleg recordings.
The Beatles Bootleg Recordings 1963 is a compilation album of 59 previously unreleased recordings by English rock band the Beatles, released on 17 December 2013, exclusively through the iTunes Store. While it was initially only available for a few hours, it later became available again for purchase. The release was timed to extend the copyright of the 1963 recordings under EU law by 20 years – the EU protects recordings for 70 years only if they are formally released.
Many recordings and performances by the Beach Boys have attained some level of public circulation without being available as a legal release, and several albums by the band or its individual members were fully assembled or near completion before being shelved, rejected, or revised as an entirely new project. Since the early 1980s, numerous rarities compilations and album reissues have been released with studio outtakes included as bonus tracks.
"Talkin' Bear Mountain Picnic Massacre Blues" is a song by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan. It was written by Dylan in June 1961, and recorded on April 25, 1962, at Studio A, Columbia Recording Studios, New York, produced by John Hammond. It is a humorous talking blues, which Dylan wrote after Noel Stookey gave him a press clipping about how the sale of forged tickets for a Father's Day picnic trip to Bear Mountain State Park had led to overcrowding and injuries.