United Artists records only had the rights to issue a soundtrack LP of Beatles music from the movie A Hard Day's Night and not singles. However, they did issue two 45s in 1964 containing the four instrumentals by George Martin that were on the soundtrack LP, A Hard Day's Night/I Should Have Known Better, and the one pictured, Ringo's Theme (This Boy)/And I Love Her.
		Another favorite of the Liverpool mersey beat fans, the Fourmost was Brian Epstein's sixth group, signed in June 1963. Their first hit was the Lennon and McCartney song Hello Little Girl in 1963. They released this version of Here, There and Everywhere in late 1966 after the Beatles version was released on Revolver.
		A studio group from New York City popular during the disco craze, the Wing and a Prayer Fife and Drum Corps. had its only top 40 hit in December 1975 with Baby Face. Their disco version of Eleanor Rigby the following year did not chart. I wonder if they thought people would think they were Paul McCartney's group...
		Besides appearing with the Beatles on Get Back and Let It Be, Billy Preston made two albums produced by George Harrison on the Apple label, and four singles. My Sweet Lord was Billy's last Apple single, and was released right after George's version in December 1970.
		Billy Preston didn't have a pop hit on his own until he recorded Outa-Space for A&M Records in 1972. Then, almost exactly a year later, Billy had his first number 1 hit, Will It Go Round In Circles. This was its flip side, Billy's second Beatles cover, Blackbird, released May 1973.
		This one hits the jackpot! Eight Beatles covers on one side of a 45! Stars on 45 was a group of Dutch session vocalists and musicians. In 1981, their Stars on 45 Medley was number 1 for 14 weeks. Inspired by how DJs tied songs together in discos, the Stars on 45 Medley was a medley of Beatles songs recreated to a single disco beat. The instrumentation and vocals, especially the John vocals which were sung by Bas Muys, were strikingly similar to the original Beatles recordings.
		Many artists, famous and also not so famous, covered Beatles records. I found this in the unsorted 45 bins of my favorite record store. It is an instrumental version of Lady Madonna and looks like it was made as a giveaway for the Holiday Inn hotel chain. But your guess is as good as mine.
		Like I said, part of the fun of collecting is searching for these things. This 45 caught my eye in a thrift store immediately. Of course, as you can see, it's not Beatles related at all, and was included here just for fun. This version of P.S. I Love You was written by famous composer Johnny Mercer. Song titles are not copyrightable, and this sort of confusion in repeating of song titles is pretty common.

Some of the historical info on this page is from the books The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll and The Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits by Joel Whitburn.

This page was created August 27, 1999.