Beatles, The - The Early Beatles

The Early Beatles does not represent its songs in the sequence -- or in their exact content -- that its makers intended; not by a long shot. That said, this is also the way that tens of millions of listeners in the U.S. did hear this material between 1965 and 1983. And of course, any means by which one gets to hear 11 1963-vintage tracks by the Beatles is OK. Whatever particular order or specifics of the songs, the listening experience will stack up well against any other 11 songs by anybody else who was walking around back then. So this record still rates high, though not as high as it might, because it isn't the ideal format for the music. By way of explanation, when the Beatles' earliest recordings for EMI's Parlophone Records in England were originally offered to Capitol Records -- EMI's American outlet -- in 1963, there was no interest, based on the poor performance of virtually any British rock & roll on the American charts up to that time. Instead, EMI signed licensing agree