Beatles - Yesterday And Today - 2nd State Butcher Cover. Capitol Stereo ST2553

	£		586
	$		776

Released in the US by Capitol Records on June 15th 1966 the album was issued to radio stations and stores in advance of release and caused such an uproar with the original design sleeve that it was quickly recalled although not before some copies hit the racks and were sold.

For the first time three Beatle tracks - Dr. Robert And Your Bird Can Sing & Im Only Sleeping - appeared in the States before they were issued in the UK on Revolver. This led to earlier mixes of the tracks being used than those that appear on Revolver & they sound very different in places.

As so many copies of the offensive cover had already been manufactured it was decided that rather than scrap these covers and reprint a different picture slick showing the group around a luggage trunk would be printed and pasted over the offensive sleeve.

As news spread of the picture underneath people tried to peel off the new slick to reveal the picture underneath with varying success.

A Butcher cover as issued by Capitol in its natural state is known as a first state copy. Very few copies were sold in stores.

There were twenty times more mono copies than stereo copies produced making a stereo copy such as this extremely rare.

A Butcher cover with the trunk cover slick pasted over the top is known as a second state. If you look carefully at the white area on the right hand side of the sleeve as indicated in the photo, Ringos black V-neck sweater can be seen showing through the thin replacement slick.

Finding these second state covers is now actually becoming much more difficult as advances in the quality of professional peeling methods has led to more and more of the trunk cover slicks being removed thus creating third state sleeves.

A Butcher sleeve with the trunk cover slick peeled off is known as a third state. It was very rare that a trunk cover slick could be removed without damaging the Butcher picture underneath although advances in technology have led to more and successful peels hitting the market.

Condition:

The Sleeve: EXCELLENT 

Ringos black sweater is clearly visible in the white area of the pasted over trunk cover so this is therefore quite obviously a genuine second state Butcher sleeve.

Mostly covered in shrink wrap which has split on front lower right area as shown in the photo. This has been left as is due to the fact that it is keeping the sleeve clean in the areas it still covers.

The important front of the sleeve is still nice and white. 

With second state sleeves becoming ever harder to find this is sure to be a positive investment as well as filling a valuable slot in your personal collection.

The Vinyl: EX +

The labels are rainbow rim in design with the perimeter text inside the colourband.

The vinyl remains very pleasing with an excellent sheen with just a couple of fine surface scuffs and the odd surface hairline visible, with none deep enough to interfere with play. It retains the unfailing playablity often only found in original sixties pressings. Having playtested I can confirm that sonically it still sounds very nice indeed with just a couple of clicks evident at times. None of the musical content is exclusive to this pressing & it is identical musically to the stereo reissues on both CD and vinyl. Many collectors find a nice sleeve like this one and upgrade the vinyl from a regular trunk sleeve issue . The vinyl is in a plain white sleeve.

A fantastic opportunity to purchase this highly sought after and rare record which is treasured by serious collectors. 

Tracklisting:

01. Drive My Car

02. Im Only Sleeping

03. Nowhere Man

04. Dr Robert

05. Yesterday

06. Act Naturally

07. And Your Bird Can Sing

08. If I Needed Someone

09. We Can Work It Out

10. What Goes On?

11. Day Tripper

FORMAT: Vinyl LP

RECORD LABEL: Capitol

CATALOGUE No: ST2553-Stereo

COUNTRY: USA

YEAR: 1966

Due to the high value of the record, I will post by recorded and signed for delivery.

The start price is approximately half of the end price of similar copies sold recently. Well presented copies such as this do not come up for grabs too often.  I purchased it at a UK auction from the estate of a previous resident of the USA. Many of the other records in this collection were also US releases from the 60's and 70's.