RARE EMI STUDIO ISSUE George Harrison ALL THINGS MUST PASS boxed set - Beatles

	£		133
	$		176

GEORGE HARRISON All Things Must Pass boxed set

Studio Engineer’s copy with letter of provenance

Apple STCH 639 boxed set of 3 vinyl records and poster.

This auction has been re-started after a little problem and now appears on all Ebay sites, not just the UK site. Apologies for any inconvenience, all relevant shipping rates are below. It is now a 7 day auction (not 10 days) and finishes a day earlier than before.

This early copy of the All Things Must Pass album was sent to me directly from the EMI pressing plant in Hayes at the time the album was originally released in 1970. At the time I was working at the EMI Studios in Abbey Road as a staff engineer. I had joined the studios a few months earlier and one of my first jobs was to provide support for the out of hours sessions (of which there were many) for the new George Harrison album. This boxed set (complete with the “royalty free” factory sample stickers) was given to me for my contribution to the album sessions and would therefore have been one of the very earliest production copies pressed.

With the set I am including a letter of provenance signed by myself which includes the scans of the labels. As the non-removable factory sample stickers were placed on the labels individually by the staff at the Hayes pressing plant in Middlesex, it would be very difficult to find two records with the stickers in precisely the same place on the label. In any case only a few “factory sample” sets would have left the pressing plant and it is even possible that no others have survived after this time.

Should any other “factory sample” All Things Must Pass boxed sets exist, my copy can be uniquely identified by examination of the position of these stickers on the labels and the scans of the labels are therefore part of the letter of provenance which can be seen below and forms part of the auction. I have left out some of the detail in the letter for this auction but the buyer will of course have the full information with my signature. I would prefer not to identify myself here, but some people might know me as the designer of the “frequency translator” used on Pink Floyd’s DSOTM.

To answer the obvious question – why does this set not have George’s signature – it’s important to understand the culture in the studios at that time. Artists like GH came to the studios to work and not to sign records and it would have been pretty uncool and somewhat irritating if engineers started behaving like the general public. Apart from that it just never occurred to me I’m afraid, I was very happy to be given my own personal copy and didn’t even think about asking for a signature.

I don’t remember everything after nearly 42 years but in connection with “All Things Must Pass”, one particular memory deserves a mention here.

Most of the sessions were conducted late at night and in the early hours of the morning. I can remember the final re-mix of one of the tracks, “Apple Scruffs”, which finished in the daylight at around six in the morning, the session having started some time late the previous evening. The little group of Apple Scruffs (who had been standing out at the front railings throughout the night so as to catch sight of George leaving the studios) had been invited into studio 3 control room to hear the final version. So we played it for them at full volume and then GH leant back in his chair, turned his head and asked our three young teenagers - standing shell-shocked just inside the door - if they liked it.

But the three girls didn’t seem to have a lot to say. They were lost for words and nodded their appreciation.

George, looking slightly put out by the silence (and perhaps very slightly worried) just said “I hope you like it, I wrote it for you”. There was another dumbstruck but appreciative silence. Then they were ushered out again, back to the pavement, as quietly as they had arrived. And it was time for us all to go home.

Somewhere there are three Apple Scruffs - now in their late fifties - who would remember that morning. I’m sure they would have bought the album when it came out – perhaps they even still have it. And I wonder if they managed to get George's signature...

I played this album perhaps a couple of dozen times in the early seventies, since when it has been carefully stored away. Checking it out recently, it plays extremely well. Visually the records are almost indistinguishable from new, although a bright light will reveal the presence of minor surface hairline scuffs of the type caused by sliding the records out of the inner sleeves. The third record “Apple Jam” has fewer of these as it was only played once or twice. The inner sleeves are apparently very vulnerable to creasing and seam splits. It is almost as though the inner sleeve is stressed every time the record is removed and replaced. These ones have some very minor thumb creases and an early stage seam split (a few millimetres) at the centre of one of the seams. (Three inner sleeves having 9 seams).

The poster has been unfolded briefly only once or twice and is therefore in mint condition. The box is without defect of any kind other than some very minor discolouration which can be seen in the scan below. It would probably be difficult to find other copies of the early pressings of this album in this condition, and I put this down to the fact that the set has had a single owner and has been carefully stored for around 40 years. I don’t think I need to check but in anticipation of the obvious question I have inspected the matrix numbers and all six are of course first pressing –1 matrices.

The item will be enclosed in bubble wrap and shipped within a sturdy outer box. The shipping quotes below are for courier type tracked services with signature on delivery and include insurance for loss or damage for the full final value, whatever that might be.

These shipping rates are the only rates that will apply to this auction. I don’t want to use any service that does not have full tracking, insurance & confirmation of delivery.

UK £10.00 European countries £20.00 All other countries £30.00