Apple Records

APPLE RECORDS
 
 
Apple Records  is a record label founded by the Beatles in 1968, as a division of Apple Corps Ltd.  It was initially intended as a creative outlet for the Beatles, both as a group and individually, plus a selection of other artists including Mary Hopkin, James Taylor, Badfinger, and Billy Preston.  In practice, by the mid-1970s, the roster had become dominated with releases by the former Beatles as solo artists.  Allen Klein managed the label from 1969 to 1973.  It was then managed by Neil Aspinall on behalf of the four Beatles and their heirs.  He retired in 2007 and was replaced by Jeff Jones.  (More from Wikipedia)
 
 
George Harrison released a series of wonderful instrumentals in 1968 called Wonderwall Music; the music is the soundtrack for a film called Wonderwall (which I have never seen) and later inspired the title of the gorgeous 1995 hit song by Oasis, “Wonderwall”.  This album is the first solo album by a member of the Beatles and also the first release on the band’s label Apple Records.  George Harrison undertook the album to introduce Indian classical music to rock and pop audiences, and he primarily collaborated on the project with a classical pianist and orchestral arranger named John Barham.  
 
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The George Harrison song “All Things Must Pass” was originally recorded by Billy Preston – under the name “All Things (Must) Pass” – on his 1970 Apple Records release Encouraging Words.  The lyrics were inspired by a 1968 poem by a different sort of guru, Timothy Leary called “All Things Pass”, a psychedelic adaptation of a classical Chinese text called the Tao Te Ching.  
 
(September 2014)
 
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Carolina in My Mind” is one of James Taylor’s best known and most critically praised songs and is a frankly homesick remembrance of growing up in North Carolina (Chapel Hill specifically). He wrote the song while recording at the Beatles Apple Records studios in London. The song appeared on his 1968 debut album for Apple, James Taylor. Wikipedia says of this song: “Strongly tied to a sense of geographic place, ‘Carolina in My Mind’ has been called an unofficial state anthem for North Carolina. It is also an unofficial song of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, being played at athletic events and pep rallies and sung by the graduating class at every university commencement.”
 
(August 2015)
Last edited: March 22, 2021