Beatles Sgt. Pepper Title Track Outtake Released

With the release of The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band 50th anniversary packages coming up on May 26, Capitol Records has released the first of numerous rarities that will be included on the sets.

The outtake of a stripped-down version of the album’s opening title track is missing much of the additional instrumentation (no horns or crowd laughter) and includes studio chatter from John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison.

Toward the end of this take, the Beatles can be heard tossing spoken bits into the song, including Paul’s echo-enhanced voice saying, “I feel it, I feel it, oh baby now I feel it … Gotta be free now.”

Listen to the “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club band” outtake

The Super Deluxe Edition

The outtake first appeared on the website of The Guardian in England. The reissue, which will be released in several configurations, includes numerous bonus tracks. The “Sgt. Pepper” title track outtake offers a fascinating glimpse into the manner in which the Beatles experimented relentlessly in the studio at the time, fine-tuning and attempting different ideas until they—and producer George Martin—honed a recording until it was to their liking.

Related: The 6-disc set is already #1 at Amazon

The Pepper reissues feature the album newly mixed by Giles Martin (George’s son) and Sam Okell, a 144-page book with liner notes from Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, and 34 previously unreleased recordings. Among those are numerous takes of “Strawberry Fields Forever” and “Penny Lane,” which were released as a single prior to the album’s release.

Disc one of the six-disc edition features the 2017 stereo mix of the album. Discs two and three are the complete early takes from the sessions, sequenced in chronological order of their first recording dates. Disc four consists of Sgt. Pepper and bonus tracks in mono. Discs five and six are DVD and Blu-ray and include a making-of documentary, promo films, surround-hound and High-Resolution Audio tracks and more.

Watch the trailer for the Pepper anniversary edition

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Jeff Tamarkin

Best Classic Bands Editor Jeff Tamarkin has been a prolific music journalist for more than four decades. He is formerly the editor of Goldmine, CMJ and Relix magazines, has written for dozens of other publications and has authored liner notes for more than 80 CDs. Jeff has also served on the Nominating Committee of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and as a consultant to the Grammys. His first book was 'Got a Revolution! The Turbulent Flight of Jefferson Airplane.' He is also the co-author of 'Shell Shocked: My Life with the Turtles, Flo and Eddie, and Frank Zappa, etc.,' with Howard Kaylan.

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