Over 50 rare nuggets from the Fab Four's earliest (1958-1964) days, included the fabled Decca audition tape that the label, to it's eternal dismay, rejected, plus early Quarrymen recordings (That'll Be the Day), a version of Love Me Do with Pete Best on drums, a demo of Can't Buy Me Love, You Know What to Do (the second song George ever wrote) and many more essential, oft-bootlegged-but-never-sounding-so-good Beatles rarities.



This is the first release in a three-part series that essentially amounted to the three surviving Beatles officially sanctioning the release of tracks that had been bootlegged for years. Thus, you get some of their earliest recordings as teens; the tracks they cut in Hamburg, Germany; their Decca audition tapes (which were rejected); and, finally, alternate takes and works in progress of songs that are now part of the world's consciousness. Oh, yeah, you also get "Free As a Bird," the John Lennon track the other Beatles "finished" in 1995; it's out of context in the company of some of the group's early classics. Beatlemaniacs, of course, love exploring this stuff, but the three Anthologies are hardly a place for beginners to start their explorations.



Track Listings

Disc: 1

1 Free As a Bird

2 We Were Four Guys... That's All

3 That'll Be the Day

4 In Spite of All the Danger

5 Sometimes I'd Borrow... Those Still Exist

6 Hallelujah, I Love Her So

7 You'll Be Mine

8 Cayenne

9 First of All... It Didn't Do a Thing Here

10 My Bonnie

11 Ain't She Sweet?

12 Cry for a Shadow

13 'Brian Was a Beautiful Guy... He Presented Us Well

14 I Secured Them... A Beatle Drink Even Then

15 Searchin'

16 Three Cool Cats

17 The Sheik of Araby

18 Like Dreamers Do

19 Hello Little Girl

20 Well, the Recording Test... By My Artists

21 Besame Mucho

22 Love Me Do

23 How Do You Do It

24 Please, Please Me

25 One After 909 (Sequence)

26 One After 909

27 Lend Me Your Comb

28 I'll Get You

29 We Were Performers... In Britain

30 I Saw Her Standing There

31 From Me to You

32 Money (That's What I Want)

33 You Really Got a Hold on Me

34 Roll Over Beethoven



Disc: 2

1 She Loves You

2 Till There Was You

3 Twist and Shout

4 This Boy

5 I Want to Hold Your Hand

6 Boys, What I Was Thinking

7 Moonlight Bay

8 Can't Buy Me Love

9 All My Loving

10 You Can't Do That

11 And I Love Her

12 A Hard Day's Night

13 I Wanna Be Your Man

14 Long Tall Sally

15 Boys

16 Shout

17 I'll Be Back (Demo)

18 I'll Be Back (Complete)

19 You Know What to Do

20 No Reply (Demo)

21 Mr. Moonlight

22 Leave My Kitten Alone

23 No Reply

24 Eight Days a Week (Sequence)

25 Eight Days a Week

26 Kansas City/Hey Hey Hey Hey