BEATLES 1ST PRESS UK MONO REVOLVER LP

	£		124
	$		164

This Is the Mega Rare 1966 Original Beatles FIRST PRESS DELEATED MISPRESSING UK Mono Album titled “Revolver” on Yellow / Black Parlophone PMC 7009. The matrix is as follows Side1 XEX  605 – 2 & Side2 XEX 606 – 1. Track listing: 1) Taxman; 2) Eleanor Rigby; 3) I'm Only Sleeping; 4) Love You To; 5) Here There And Everywhere; 6) Yellow Submarine; 7) She Said She Said; 8) Good Day Sunshine; 9) And Your Bird Can Sing; 10) For No One; 11) Doctor Robert; 12) I Want To Tell You; 13) Got To Get You Into My Life; 14) Tomorrow Never Knows. This Massively Rare Mispressing is all the more rarer being that it comes complete with it’s Original First Issue flip back sleeve this is identified by two means firstly that after the words ‘Ernest J Day & Co Ltd’ the word ‘London’ is printed all later issues state ‘Patent Pending’ secondly the flip back to the side closed edge measures 18mm where as all later issues measure 15mm.               

This is the first album in a string of probably the finest products rock has ever given out. If Rubber Soul only treaded water in the matters of turning pop-rock into art-rock, then Revolver is the first major art-rock piece by the Fab Four - not conceptual yet, because it lacks an obvious linking theme, but the first utterly 'serious' album in rock. John has begun his experiments with LSD, and they resulted in the first openly psychedelic songs. The groovy thanatological 'She Said She Said' has never fascinated me, to tell the truth, because I've always felt it was somewhat overproduced; yet it was a milestone in the history of rock lyrics, as the first masked description of an acid trip and its, er, 'side effects'. But the apocalyptic 'Tomorrow Never Knows' was an even bigger milestone - basically, it's a rather simple, drooling melody that one'd expect from bands like the Velvet Underground (for a really, I mean really boring version check out Anthology II), but it's stuffed up with quite a lot of funny little noises obviously reflecting the state of mind in a... oh. You know where. First of all, John lets his voice pass through some gadget so that it manages to sound otherworldly; next, they record a 'wall-of-sound' background track with probably all the instruments they managed to get in the studio, and finally they spice it all up with backwards tapes and such-like stuff to make the most terrific, most representative musical image of a journey through your subconscious ever created by mankind. No kidding.

Hey! But... where have the ballads all gone? There is one on Side A - 'Here There And Everywhere', and it's beautiful, in the traditional McCartney style and sung in an unusually sweet and warm tone, and 'Good Day Sunshine' on Side B, with its peculiar marching rhythms and a great optimistic feel (put it on when you're planning to get out of your depression), but what else do we have? Dark depressing pessimism! Especially on two more McCartney tracks, the string-laden 'Eleanor Rigby' and the piano-driven 'For No One'. The former is Paul's first (and one of the most successful) attempts at a 'serious' song: sad lyrics about a lonely nun combined with a brilliant string quartet, it's my favourite ode to loneliness in the world. The latter is a lament about a broken love, but with serious lyrical undertones, as well: apparently, Paul wanted to have his own 'Girl' in the catalogue, and he almost succeeds.

Perhaps one of the best discoveries of the album is the final unraveling of George's songwriting talent in all its glory. Having shunned generic love ballads from his repertoire (in fact, he was the first of the band to do so, and from then on love thematics would be extremely rare in his compositions, 'Something' excluded), George instead donates us some reflections on the economic situation: 'Taxman' is, in fact, the Beatles' first serious social statement, and isn't it funny that it was penned by George the Shy, and not by John the Bad Guy? However, this is just a passing moment: George's other two contributions (and this is the only record to feature three Harrison originals, not counting the double White Album) prefer to tell us more about his inner state ('I Want To Tell You') and the cosmic mind in general ('Love You To'). The former was my best-loved song from the album when I was ten, for reasons which my ten-year-old mind certainly couldn't explain, and now I've just forgotten. But I love it all the same, maybe because it presents us with such a vivid picture of a stuttering, confused mind, and the song's dreary, dreamy mood only accentuates this. As for 'Love You To', it introduces George's row of Indian-inspired songs: like 'Norwegian Wood', it also features a sitar, but here George already starts exploiting it in the proper Eastern fashion, nevertheless making the song rock out.

Apart from that, what you get here is the most famous children song of all time in 'Yellow Submarine' (sung by Ringo, but don't worry: written by Lennon/McCartney, as usual). This song introduced me to the Beatles, in fact, at the age of four or five years when I was just starting to learn my English, and maybe (in an ideal vision of the past) it was one of the first literary pieces I ever translated? Who knows? It could have well been so! And what about the drowsiest tune on earth, 'I'm Only Sleeping'? This is MY song! I LOVE to sleep! In fact, I think the progressive part of humanity should consider forming a party of Sleep Lovers and make this their definite hymn.

In other words, yeah, you know what I'm going to say: there's absolutely nothing here to remind us of the fact that this is the same band that did Please Please Me three years ago. Even the album cover now is fully schizophrenic: four rough sketches of the Beatles' faces (almost unrecognizable, as a matter of fact) interspersed with lots of smaller photos of the Beatles and other persons; indeed, the cover to Revolver is the first step towards the cover to Sergeant Pepper. And, as usual, no filler.

The record labels are in stunning condition (see pictures) with NO wear, writing & barely any spindle marks at all. This superb album is pressed on thick heavy duty 60’s vinyl and still retains it’s just pressed look with a very shinny lustre. I have conservatively graded this album VG+ being that there are a few light surface marks which do create the odd crackle & pop but no more that normally associated on 60’s Vinyl. Simply Awesome. The flip back sleeve is in VG++ Condition with NO writing, NO ring wear & straight firm opening edges with NO feathering.        

The Greatest attention to packaging with all albums housed in aluminium framed box complete with bubble wrap & thick cardboard. The vinyl is also removed from the sleeve to ensure safe delivery.

Postage Costs:

UK First Class = £2.80 Recorded Delivery = £5.50 & Special Delivery (next day, insured up to £250) = £7.00

Europe Air Mail = £4.00 Insured = £8.00

Overseas, non Europe USA, Japan, Australia etc Air Mail = £6.50 Insured £11.00

Doubles add extra £1.00, triples add extra £2.00

Extra albums add £1.00 in the UK, Europe £1.30 & USA, Japan, Australia £1.75

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