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From 1969 until 1973 Allen Klein had been running Apple Records with quiet efficiency but he had never agreed to stay long term.  EMI’s distribution contract with Apple ended in 1975 and to all intents and purposes that was the end of Apple Records which was wound up in 1976.  George Harrison’s ‘This Guitar (can’t keep from crying’ was the last single released in February 1976.

In 1984 John Lennon and Ringo Starr each released a single and in the late 1980s Parlophone (The Beatles original label) begun to release old Beatles albums not featuring the Apple logo but it was during the 1990s and the heyday of the Compact Disc (CD) that the decision to re-release old Apple Records material was made at a level agreed by all concerned parties – Apple Records, The Beatles and EMI.  1995 also the release of ‘Free As A Bird’, an original, unreleased Beatles track which was relatively commercially successful.

Neil Aspinall had by this time taken over as Chief Executive and with subsequent re-release and successful marketing, the label began to be profitable once more.  There was no new material during this period but it had been twenty years since the original productions and there was now a whole new market out there.

The next big occurrence in the life of the label started off as a dispute and ended with another whole new marketing opportunity.  In 2006 a long-running dispute which had started in 1978 between Apple Records and Apple Computers finally entered the last leg.  Over the years the companies had argued about all manner of things related to logos, the music business, the similar names and computers.  In 2007 the matter was finally resolved to everyone’s satisfaction and now the opportunity arose to release The Beatles entire discography on the Apple’s iTunes platform.

So ended the thirty year feud and both companies emerged with new marketing opportunities to look forward.  The back catalogue was finally available in 2010.

It’s very hard to write a brief history of Apple Records without the post becoming dominated by The Beatles, but that’s what I’m going to try to do.  The Beatles are going to be mentioned all over the place but that’s how it has to be.

1968 was the year in which The Beatles began to take control of their own destiny and to market themselves.  Apple Corps Ltd was formed in this year as an umbrella company for several different Apple companies, including Apple Electronics, Apple Boutique and Apple Films, some of which came later.  Apple Records was the main component of this project though and it’s the one which still generates the income and publicity today.

In the early years of Apple Records,  The Beatles were still under contract to Parlophone in the U.K. and Capitol Records in the U.S.  This was not an issue because Apple Records was originally conceived to record and produce for new artists and these included contempories such as Mary Hopkin, Ravi Shankar and James Taylor.  The various members of the band discovered these artists themselves and quite often participated in recording.  The records produced by the label all featured the familiar half-apple logo in the centre.

By the second year of operation, it was clear that Apple Corps Ltd required some professional guidance and so began the involvement of Allen Klein, then the manager of The Rolling Stones.  Many of the side businesses were shut down and the label’s roster of artists was ‘streamlined’.  With Klein in charge the business was much more efficiently run and it was on much firmer ground by the time he left in 1973.

1973 was also the same year that EMI took over Parlophone and with it came the entire Beatles back catalogue although film and video clips were the property of Apple Records.  Until 1975 Apple Records also had a distribution deal with both EMI and Capitol Records for the United States.

Enjoy this early James Taylor….

Part Two follows….