Please note: English is my second language, so don't be surprised by any mistakes! :)
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As You are probably know by now, songs 'Love Me Do' and 'P.S. I Love You' (the first EMI single by The Beatles) are in Public Domain in European Union since January 2013 because of the law that states that copyrights for a recording of the song (not to song itself! you still need to pay if you want to record a cover-version) expires after 50 years after it was recorded or remastered. Since then that period was extanded from 50 to 70 years by new copyright law, that was intended to protect The Beatles albums (that were recorded mostly in 1963 with exclution of the songs that were mentioned above) from falling into the Public Domain. So all this recordings won't be in Public Domain for at least 20 more years (and remember, that this period can be extended again, just like the infamous 'Mickey Mouse protection' copyright extending law in USA).
But - and that's nobody in the press is telling you - there iare enough pre-1963 recordings of The Beatles that are in public domain to create enitire new album. Most of them were never completely released on ane EMI albums, only some snippets of them were appeared on the Anthology series. I'm talking about The Decca Audition tapes from January 1 1962, the first studio demos that were rejected by the Decca recording label. Those recordings, by the way, are my favourite recordings from that era, and I am exited to get them not on the bootleg CD, but on official released one. Some other more obscured tracks from that year - live recordings on the BBC and a rehearsal tape from the Cavern Club and audio from their first TV appearance - are also in Public Domain now. With inclution of the two tracks from 1961, the only two Beatles tracks from Hamburg studio without Tony Sheridan on lead vocal, we are now have more than a hour of the recordibgs by The Beatles, that were mostly unreleased before. You, if you are living somewhere in European Union, can duplicate and destribute all this recordings without paying any royalties to EMI.
By now, there is at least one compilation that featuring mutch off this tracks (and, by unknown reason, also many Tony Sheridan tracks, than only some of them were recorded with Beatles as the backing band). This is 'I Saw Her Standing There' compilation by the 'Rock Melon Music LTD'. How good is the sound quality on this CD and how good is mastering? They are bad. Really bad. At first, the speed on the most of the tracks is completely off, some of them are to fast, the others are too slow. Record label that is not paying anything for their release does not bother itself to search for best sourses too. As a result, only 5 tracks from 49 on this CD-set were taken from lossless sourses. All other tracks (that is just slightly less than 90% of all tracks on this CDs) were soursed from upconverted mp3s. Don't waste your money on this release - you can download this recordings with mutch better quality from the internet.
And that's why this torrent is exist: it contains the best quality sourses for the Public Domain tracks of The Beatles I could find. Unfortunally, you can't use the remastered tracks in your release of Public Domain tracks. So, there is no stereo version of 'Ain't She Sweet' from the remastered album 'The Beatles First!', no thracks from Anthology and, of course, there is no 'Love Me Do' and 'P.S. I Love You' from the 09.09.09 remaster. I also decided to use mono mix of 'Cry For A Shadow' because else it would be the only stereo track on the whole compilation. So the sound is not absolutely best, but it also means that this versions are completely copyright-free, and EMI can't sue you for using any materials that they restored or remastered later.
I also decided not to make any covers for this release, because I don't have any public domain photos of The Beatles except for one from S visit that I took from thar Wikipedia page. I leaving this to the guys who would (if they would) publish material from this torrent.
Here is some info about all tracks that I have used in this compilation.
01 'Ain't She Sweet' - this track was taken directly from the 'Polydor' master tape that was auctioned on eBay in 2006 (you can find this exact version on bootleg 'The BZ Auction Tape'), and not from any official release. Absolutely copyright-free material. Recorded on June 22 1962 in Hamburg.
02. 'Cry For A Shadow' - mono mix, also unremastered and copyright free. Same date as previous track.
03-17. - tracks from the Decca Audition, all were taken from the bootleg 'Nevermind The Tremeloes ... Here's The Beatles' by Hobnail, that was soursed from that appears to be the one of the frist generation copies of the original master tape. All tracks are presented here were re-assembled in the way they most likely were performed. Those tracks are not altered, with one exception for 'Money (That's What I Want)' where damaged original intro of the song was changed to 'fake' restored version from some other bootleg. No copyrighted remastered sourses such as Anthology were used. All tracks were recorded on January 1 1962
18. 'Love Me Do' - this is version with Ringo on the drums that was taken from the different sourse from the one that was used on the 'Past Masters' compilation. Mastertape of this song is lost (most probably recorded over by EMI) so later they used needledrop of the original 45 single as a sourse. This is also a needledrop, but from the different record. The song was recorded on September 4 1962.
19. 'P.S. I Love You' - also a needledrop, as no direct copies other than officially released CD-versions from EMI are known. Recorded on September 11 1962.
20. 'How Do You Do It?' - an outtake from the day than 'Love Me Do' was recorded (September 4 1962). This version is taken from some obscured russian bootleg and is not soursed from Anthology CD.
Live tracks, mostly lo-fi. Should be mentioned on the sleeve as the bonus-tracks. No one of this tracks was released officially by EMI.
21. 'Some Other Guy' - audio from the first TV appearance of the group, recorded live in Cavern Club by Granada TV on August 22 1962. From the same russian bootleg.
22-24 - three of five rehearsal recordings that were made in Cavern Club somewhere in September of 1962 with Ringo on the drums. They are often dated at the same day as the recording of the 'Love me do' - September 4 1962. Other two tracks that were excluded from this CD are other takes on songs 'The One After 909' and 'Catswalk'.
25-27 and 27-30 - recordings from the BBC radio, from 'Teenager's Turn' and 'Here We Go', that were aired on Marth 8 1962 and June 11 1962. The sound is very lo-fi but extremely clear in this version. From the bootleg called 'The Lost Beebs' but without all the clicks that were on that release originally (they were removed manually, one by one).
31. The Beatles' first radio interview, recorded on October 27 1962.
That's all, folks! I have nothing more to say except for that I would love to see this recordings on CD at the come time (and to buy it to my collection!).
With best regards, Richi from 'Raskol' ('Crack') Records, September 1 2013.