 |
... |  |
|
The 'CBS' Contract Pressing In 1966 a variety of Parlophone albums were pressed with a type of label ridging that was not typical of the era. Were they actually a contract pressing? Short answer. No. You see them on popular Internet Auction sites... "MEGA RARE CBS BEATLES CONTRACT!!" and, when you see the auction, the label has this type of indentation on it:
How ANYBODY can confuse this with a 1966 CBS pressing is beyond me. CBS presses were flat with a rough, textured, unlaminated inner part. This label is wholly smooth. You can see with the 1966 CBS comparison label comparison here there's absolutely no visual similarities between either label. When you get a contract pressing the album pressed by the other plant tend to receive their certain characteristics. For example, the Decca press of 'With the Beatles' has the typical Decca Ridge and smaller 'polo' circle around the spindlehole. Another example is the Philips press Hey Jude single with the Philips-characteristic of a three-prong push-out centre. If CBS had really pressed this album then the label would have no taxcode around the spindlehole and have a rough texture to it. Then there's the obvious EMI giveaways. It has the KT taxcode imprinted around the Spindlehole - something that only EMI presses ever had. It has the EMI stamper codes matching with the GRAMOPHLTD counting - something that only EMI presses ever had... So, with all of the typical EMI characteristics, why are people trying to sell these as a 'CBS Contract'!? But where does this interesting variation actually come from? Since it has all the EMI markings then it's an EMI press, but where have we seen such indentations before....? Why, yes! Of course! In the early 60's. Let's compare the 'CBS Contract' to an original Parlophone press of 'Please Please Me' on the Gold / Black label...
Doesn't this look like the more plausible answer to explain the label indentations? As an educated guess, We reckon that EMI pulled some of their older pressing machines out of retirement, possibly because the current machines were working at the time on the soon-to-be-released Revolver? It'd make sense; pressing the smaller-selling albums on the older but still perfectly usable machinery rather than pay another record label to press a small run off for them. Another way to show that this is NOT a CBS pressing is to show you this pressing recently seen on eBay...
Notice the identical indentations on the label? Now, I'm pretty sure that India didn't have a CBS plant out there that they contracted to press copies of this album. Our guess is that EMI India were given older pressing machines (like the metaphorical hand-me-downs) to print their LPs on. So the technology that was pressing the 1962-1963 EMI LPs was now in India pressing the 1965-1966 LPs. I certainly don't think that EMI India would have asked CBS UK to run off a batch or two. This is not a 'CBS Pressing', not in the slightest. I have no idea why they're being selled as such - maybe because of mistaken identity, maybe because one person said they were and the idea has travelled, or maybe because it looked a little unusual and 'contract presses' sell for more than a standard press does... Saying all this though, these particular variations are incredibly hard to find and deserve a premium price of their own. To date only two Beatles albums have been found in this variation and they're Revolver and Rubber Soul. Examples of them are below.
Written by Mike Harbidge |
||
 |
... |  |
.
.
