early albums. help needed please

[peteb71]

i have been given 3 beatles albums to try and sell for my aunt. they are 'please please me', 'with the beatles', 'a hard days night'. i have been on various websites and found that the copy of 'pleas please me' could be worth quite a bit of money. i think by what is on the disc, inner sleeve and outer sleeve that is a 6th preesing which some websites are selling for up to £350. the other 2 albums were coming in at about £20 to £30 each. could someone please help me to confirm this and let me know where is the best place to sell these at the best possible price. any help would be much appreciated. thanks, pete

i have just looked at a nother website and found that my copy of 'with the beatles' is the rare copy with the spelling mistake on the song title' you really gotta hold on me'. any help again would be great thanks.

[Harbidge]

Okay - here's a rundown for each record...

Please Please Me

When the LP was initially released it was pressed with a Gold type label (Gold on black). These were available for about a month before the style changed to silver type with PARLOPHONE written in yellow (a yellow on black). There are two different variations of this label because half way through production with these labels Dick James Mus. was bought by another publishing company whose name escapes me right now and Northern Songs was created. Thus, the first batch had four Len / Mc compositions credited to Dick James and the second batch had them credited to Northern Songs. Easiest way to work out which copy is to look at track one, side one. These gold label pressings are known as the 1st pressing.

The 2nd pressing is of the first Yellow / black labels to appear had two mis-prints on them and are incredibly difficult to get ahold of. Due to a printing error the small '33 1/3' after the matrix number on the gold labels wasn't removed and so for a short time the label had it printed twice - both there and at the top. EMI realised that it was unnecessary to have both and so took the small 33 1/3 off. These pressings also omitted the 'Recording First Published 1963' on the left.

The 3rd pressing is where the 33 1/3 has been removed but the 'Recording first Published 1963' is still not there.

The 4th pressing is where the Recording First Published 1963 has been added to the label.

The 5th pressing is where the 'Sold in the UK' statement has been added under the PARLOPHONE name but the rimtext still starts with 'The Parlophone Co. Ltd.'.

The 6th pressing has the Sold in the UK text and the rimtext now starts with 'The Gramophone Co. Ltd'. The 'Recording First Published' test has also been shorted to a P within a circle. A couple of the extremely early pressings however did escape with Sold in the UK, Gramophone AND Recording... I've only ever seen this once though.

THe 7th pressing is where the Sold in the UK text was removed following a change in tax laws and the rimtext still begins with Gramophone.

The 8th pressing is where the label underwent a complete re-design and PARLOPHONE was turned into smaller White letter with a white £ symbol at the top. It was also encased within a silver box. This is the Silver on black label. The original pressings had Gramophone in the rimtext and one white boxed EMI logo.

The 9th pressing had the word Gramophone changed in the rimtext to EMI. There is still only 1 EMI boxed logo.

The 10th pressing had an extra EMI logo put at the top of the label.

There are others but these are by far the most common out there.

Each pressing came out during these years...

1st - 1963
2nd - 1963
3rd - 1963
4th - 1963-1964
5th - 1964-1965
6th - 1965-1969
7th - 1969
8th - 1969-1971
9th - 1971-1974
10th - 1974 til around the 80's.

Valuewise (assuming that the copy is in EX condition), each pressing is approximately worth:

1st - Mono: £500 Stereo: £4,000
2nd - Mono: £500 Stereo: £4,000
3rd - Mono: £150-£180 Stereo: £400
4th - Mono: £50 Stereo: £150-£200
5th - Mono: £30 Stereo: £100
6th - Mono: £40 Stereo: £70
7th - Mono: £70-£100 Stereo: £50
8th - Mono: £200 Stereo: £10-£15
9th - Mono: - Stereo: £10
10th - Mono: - Stereo - £10

[Harbidge]

With the Beatles

When this LP was originally released there were a number of spelling errors. These were:

- 'You Really Got a Hold on Me' was mis-spelt as 'You Really Gotta Hold on Me'
- The credit for 'You Really Got a Hold on Me' was mis-spelt as Domion instead of Dominion
- The credit for Money was mistakenly given as 'Jobete'.
- When the credit for Money was changed from Jobete to Dominion a remnant of the Jobete credit (NCB) was accidentally left on to the Dominion credit (almost immediately removed).

Just about all of these mistakes occured when the record was first released and by the time the matrix number was chaned from 1N/1N they had all been cleared. The Domion spelling error only seems to be something that occured on the Stereo pressings.

Copies with a 4N/5N matrix are particularly hard to find. The most common matrix number out there is 7N/7N

Covers also had the 'Gotta' spelling error but these are much easier to find than the label errors.

Now, because the spelling errors can be found in a mixture it'd be almost impossible give each approximate value for each combination. However, the majority came in a set pattern. I'll list the most common variations...

Valuewise (for EX copies) are approximately:

Mono - With Jobete and Gotta errors: £70
Stereo - With Jobete and Gotta errors: £150
Stereo - With 'Domion' spelling error: £300
Mono - With Dominion credit for Money and additional NCB: £100 (I'm not sure on this since I've never seen another copy in my life!)
Stereo - With Dominion credit for Money and additional NCB: £300 (Again, another educated guess).
Mono - With corrected mistakes: £50
Stereo - With corrected mistakes: £100

Then the different variations where the label design was altered (Sold in the UK, Gramophone etc) all occured. Values given for the PPM pressings are about the same for WTB except for the 8th pressing - WTB wasn't pressed in mono on the silver label.

[Harbidge]

A Hard Days Night

The first pressings of HDN had a much rounder, thicker font on the label than PPM and WTB did. In early 1965 the font was changed back to the thinner, standard font - the second pressing (which is a little rarer than the first. You don't see many early copies with the thinner text). By the time that this LP had been released the 'Sold in the UK' statement was on all EMI albums.

By 1965 the rimtext had changed from Parlophone to Gramophone and in 1969 the Sold in the UK text was removed. In late 1969 the label design changed to the silver/black variation.

Approximate values for copies in EX condition...

Mono 1st press with thick, round text - £40-£50
Stereo 1st press with thick, round text - £80-£100
Mono 2nd press with thinner text - £50
Stereo 2nd press with thinner text - £100
Mono 3rd press with Gramophone rimtext - £30
Stereo 3rd press with Gramophone rimtext - £50
Mono 4th press with Sold in the UK omitted - £60-£70
Stereo 4th press with Sold in the UK omitted - £50
Stereo 5th press with silver label, Gramophone rimtext and one EMI logo - £20
Stereo 6th press with silver label, EMI rimtext and one EMI logo - £10
Stereo 7th press with silver label, EMI rfimtext and two EMI logos - £10

[Harbidge]

I hope this was what you were asking for. If there's anything else you'd like to know then please don't hesitate to ask. :-)

[peteb71]

thanks for all the information. from what you have told me i have found out i have a 4th press of PPM, the spelling mistakes on WTB are only "gotta" and the jobete and my HDN has got the thick text.
the only other information i need to know is where i can sell them for the best prices. i live in south east england and would be willing to travel probably as far as london. if anyone bknows of a good dealer in this area i would be very grateful. thanks pete

[Harbidge]

I wouldn't recommend selling them to a dealer - he will do everything he can to shaft you so that he makes maximum profit. Mind you, they do say that knowledge is power and if you know what the albums are worth why, most importantly why they are worth that much you could get a better deal.

I would say that your best bet would be to sell them on eBay but prices on there aren't hitting their full potential right now (unless you're one of the few big guys who're befriended by the big bidders). whereas an album could be worth say £30, sometime you'd be lucky to get a fiver for them.

[peteb71]

ok. thanks for all your advice. i will take it on board and see what i can do

[joenamherst]

There are really people out there that are willing to pay 20 pounds for vinyl? I guess that is about $40. Around here (western N.Y.) no one wants to pay more then a few dollars for vinyl because the market is flooded with them. I guess I'll check with e-bay!

[Harbidge]

People are prepared to pay a lot, lot more. My personal record is £1,100 / $1,800!

[Pepperland Kamer]

HARB IS GOD!

[Pepperland Kamer]

There are really people out there that are willing to pay 20 pounds for vinyl? I guess that is about $40. Around here (western N.Y.) no one wants to pay more then a few dollars for vinyl because the market is flooded with them. I guess I'll check with e-bay!


Oh man, are you kidding? have you ever seen the prices some records get in auctions? No one wants to pay more then a few dollars for vinyl so they must be boots or real common, but the collectible ones will get you big BIG BIG bucks!!

[sourmilkpinky]

HARB IS GOD!


shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh he will hear you :wink2:

[Harbidge]

HARB IS GOD!

I thought I'd best quote this before you came to your senses and edited it. :-P