Yellow Submarine is the tenth studio album by the English rock band the
Beatles, released on 13 January 1969 in the United States and on 17 January 1969
in the United Kingdom. It was issued as the soundtrack to the animated film of
the same name, which premiered in London in July 1968. The album contains six
songs by the Beatles, of which "Yellow Submarine" and "All You Need Is Love"
had previously been released as singles. The remainder of the album was a
re-recording of the film's orchestral soundtrack by the band's producer,
George Martin. The project was regarded as a
contractual obligation by the Beatles, who were asked to supply four new songs
for the film. Some songs were written and recorded specifically for the
soundtrack, while others were unreleased tracks from other projects. The album
was issued two months after the White Album and was therefore not viewed by
the band as a significant release. Yellow Submarine has since been afforded
a mixed reception from music critics, some of whom consider that it falls
short of the high standard generally associated with the Beatles' work. It
reached the top 5 in the UK and the US, and has been reissued on compact disc
several times. Background and recording
The album arose from contractual obligations for the Beatles to supply
new songs to the soundtrack to United Artists' animated film Yellow Submarine.
Having recently completed their album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band in
April 1967, the group showed minimal enthusiasm for the project. Along with
the music for their Magical Mystery Tour TV film, the Yellow Submarine soundtrack
was part of a period that author Ian MacDonald later described as the band's
"regime of continuous low-intensity recording ... it had a workaday quality
about it – an intrinsic lack of tension which was bound to colour the resulting
material." Only one side of the album contains
songs performed by the Beatles; of the six, four were previously unreleased.
"Yellow Submarine" had been issued in August 1966 as a single, topping the UK
chart for four weeks, and had also been released on the album Revolver. "All You
Need Is Love" had been issued as a single in July 1967.
Of the unreleased tracks, the first to be recorded was George Harrison's "Only
a Northern Song", during the sessions for Sgt. Pepper. It was taped in
February 1967 but subsequently shelved, along with an unfinished instrumental
written by Harrison. The song was originally titled "Not Known" and the
lyrics reflect Harrison's dismay at being merely a contracted songwriter to
the Beatles' publishing company, Northern Songs.
"All Together Now" was recorded in a single session on 12 May 1967,
specifically for the film project. The title came from a phrase Paul McCartney
had heard as a child, to encourage everyone to sing music hall songs. He
later described the song as "a throwaway".
The band recorded Harrison's "It's All Too Much" in late May 1967. The Beatles
had unlimited studio time to experiment and record whatever songs came to hand
at Abbey Road, but this session took place at De Lane Lea Studios. The
original take ran for over eight minutes, and Harrison briefly quoted a
line from the Merseys' 1966 song "Sorrow".
John Lennon's "Hey Bulldog" was recorded on 11 February 1968 and evolved from an
initial intent to shoot a promotional film for the single "Lady Madonna". Like
"All Together Now", it was specifically recorded with the film soundtrack in
mind. The track's ending featured a jam session after the point where a fade-out
was intended in the final mix, which was kept in the finished version.
Side two features a re-recording of the symphonic film score composed by Martin,
specifically for the album. The recording took place with a 41-piece
orchestra over two three-hour sessions on 22 and 23 October 1968 in Abbey Road,
and edited down to the length on the LP on 22 November. Martin's arrangement
quoted from his earlier work for the Beatles; for example, "Sea of Time"
includes a brief extract of a melody from "Within You Without You" from Sgt
Pepper. Release
The film received its worldwide premiere in London in July 1968, by which time
the Beatles were busy working on their eponymous double album, The Beatles,
commonly called "the White Album". Ultimately, the Beatles were
enthusiastic about the finished film, and did more to associate themselves
with it after release. Having been delayed so that it would not clash with
the release of The Beatles, Yellow Submarine was issued by Apple Records on
13 January 1969 in the US and on 17 January in the UK. The album was issued
in stereo only in the US, while the UK album was available in both stereo and
mono, although the mono version is simply a fold-down rather than a
specific mix. Since "All You Need Is Love" had been rush-released a single,
it did not have an official stereo mix. Although the track was released on the
US LP Magical Mystery Tour, an official stereo mix of the track was not made
until 29 October 1968 for the album. In the US, 8-track tape versions featured
"Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" as an extra song on side two.
= Artwork= The artwork on the sleeve contains a
drawing of the Beatles as featured on trailer posters, created by Heinz
Edelman. The same basic design was used for the UK and US covers, though the UK
jacket contains the words "Nothing is Real" just below the album's title,
while the US version did not. On the back of the cover, the UK album
contained a review of the White Album written for The Observer by Tony Palmer.
The review was introduced by a few liner notes by Apple press officer Derek
Taylor. The US cover contained a fictitious illustrated biography by Dan
Davis of the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, in which the ensemble's
battle with the Blue Meanies was compared to three other epic struggles
in the history of the English-speaking world: Beowulf's struggle to save the
Heorot mead hall, King John's signing of the Magna Carta and Thomas Jefferson's
writing of the Declaration of Independence.
= Unreleased EP= After mixed response to the album upon
release, the Beatles considered releasing Yellow Submarine as a
five-track mono EP without the film score but including the then-unreleased
"Across the Universe" as a bonus track. The EP was mastered but never issued.
The original running order for the EP was "Only a Northern Song", "Hey
Bulldog" and "Across the Universe" on side one, with "All Together Now" and
"It's All Too Much" on side two. = Reissues=
The first compact disc release appeared in August 1987. It is consistent with
the English version of the LP. The running order is the same, with "Sea of
Time" and "Sea of Holes" as separate tracks; the "Nothing Is Real" subtitle
remains intact, and the review of the White Album with Taylor's introduction
is included inside the CD insert. The album appeared in a revised version
on 13 September 1999, coinciding with the remastered re-release of the film.
Titled Yellow Submarine Songtrack, it dispenses with the George Martin
orchestrations, and includes the six Beatles songs from the original album,
along with an additional nine songs, all completely remixed for this disc.
The original album was remastered and reissued, along with the rest of the
Beatles' catalogue, on 9 September 2009. This release included both the UK and US
sleeve notes. The mono mixes of the four songs that were intended for the
unreleased EP were released for the first time on the Mono Masters
collection as part of the box set The Beatles in Mono.
Reception In contrast to the animated film, Yellow
Submarine was not generally considered to be a significant release. Issued two
months after The Beatles, it was one of the few Beatles releases that failed to
top the charts in either the United Kingdom or the United States, peaking
instead at number 3 and number 2, respectively. In Canada, Yellow
Submarine topped the RPM national albums chart for two weeks, ending the White
Album's 12-week run at number 1. On America's Billboard Top LPs chart, it
was kept from the top by the same album. Recalling the release in a
special-edition issue of Mojo magazine, Peter Doggett writes that "The papers
got all trippy for Yellow Submarine". Beat Instrumental bemoaned the paucity
of new material by the band, but added: "be not of bad cheer. The George Martin
score to the film is really very nice, and two tracks by George Harrison redeem
the first side. Both [songs] are superb pieces, considerably more enthralling
than the most draggy All Together Now, a rather wet track." In a review for
International Times, Barry Miles considered Martin's score "superbly
produced" and, of the songs, wrote only of "It's All Too Much", which he
described as, variously, "Endless, mantric, a round, interwoven, trellised,
tessellated, filigreed, gidouiled, spiralling" and "Happy singalong music".
According to Beatles historian Mark Lewisohn, however, the band were "mildly
criticized at the time" for failing to provide their customary "excellent
value-for-money" with the soundtrack album.
More recently, AllMusic critic Richie Unterberger has written of Yellow
Submarine: "The album would have been far better value if it had been released
as a four-song EP ... with the addition of a bonus track in "Across the
Universe" ... No one would argue that there's a huge amount more than meets
the eye there, but listening to the original album anew 40 years on, one is
still struck by how mostly second-rate, and recycled and rejected Beatles
material still sounds so good." Writing for Pitchfork Media, Mark Richardson
opines that "the Yellow Submarine soundtrack is like the work of a
supremely talented band that couldn't really be bothered" and describes "Hey
Bulldog" as "a tough and funky piano-driven rocker, [and] by a good
margin the best song here". Richardson concludes: "But as an album it's
ultimately forgettable, which is something the Beatles so rarely were
otherwise." PopMatters' David Gassman views Martin's
selections as "kind of twee and inconsequential" and the four new songs
on side one as "fascinating", adding that "The material's tossed-off origins
give it a character unlike any other Beatles album." While noting that the
soundtrack was superseded with the 1999 release of Yellow Submarine Songtrack,
Gassman writes: "No matter how you get them, though, the otherwise unavailable
songs on this album ought to be part of any thinking Beatles fan's collection."
Alex Young of Consequence of Sound writes: "as a whole, Yellow Submarine is
a delightful album, even if it's still a less-than-acceptable inclusion in the
Beatles canon", though he criticised the inclusion of Martin's score which he
felt should have been sold as a separate release.
Track listing All songs written and composed by
Lennon-McCartney, except "Only a Northern Song" and "It's All Too Much",
by George Harrison. All songs written and composed by George
Martin, except "Yellow Submarine in Pepperland", by Lennon-McCartney.
Certifications BPI certification awarded only for sales
since 1994. Notes
Footnotes Citations
Sources Further reading
Lewisohn, Mark. The Complete Beatles Chronicle. Chancellor Press. ISBN
0-7607-0327-2. External links
Official website