Discography

Official CD catalogue

In 1987, EMI released all 12 of The Beatles' studio albums – as originally released in the UK – on CD worldwide. (North American releases were on EMI's American subsidiary, Capitol Records.) It was a considered decision by Apple Corps to standardise The Beatles catalogue throughout the world. Because there were tracks that appeared in the UK only on singles and EPs, but not on any of the original UK LPs, it was necessary to create three further CDs containing the missing tracks in order for all their recordings to be available on CD.



One CD was of a 1967 US compilation album that featured the 6-track 1967 UK EP Magical Mystery Tour and the various singles released in that year. The other two CDs were new compilations that gathered together all the other singles, EP tracks and recordings from 1962–1970 that had not been issued on the original British studio albums.





Abbey RoadMagical Mystery Tour - 8 August 1987

Past Masters, Volume One - 7 March 1988

Past Masters, Volume Two - 7 March 1988

According to EMI and the Guinness World Records, The Beatles have sold in excess of one billion units (1,010,000,000, including cassettes, records, CDs and bootlegs).



Beginning in 2004, the US album configurations were released as a series of box sets from Capitol Records (The Capitol Albums, Volume 1 and Volume 2); these included both stereo and mono versions based on the mixes that were prepared for vinyl at the time of their original 1960s releases.





Song catalogue

Main article: Northern Songs

In 1963 Lennon and McCartney agreed to assign their song publishing rights to Northern Songs, a company created by music publisher Dick James. The company was administered by James' own company Dick James Music. Northern Songs went public in 1965, with Lennon and McCartney each holding 15% of the company's shares Dick James and the company's chairman, Charles Silver, held a controlling 37.5%. In 1969, following a failed attempt by Lennon and McCartney to buy the company, James and Silver sold Northern Songs to British TV company Associated TeleVision (ATV), from which Lennon and McCartney received stock.



In 1985, after a short period in which the parent company was owned by Australian business magnate Robert Holmes ? Court, ATV Music was sold to Michael Jackson for a reported $47 million (trumping a joint bid by McCartney and Yoko Ono), including the publishing rights to over 200 songs composed by Lennon and McCartney.



A decade later Jackson and Sony merged its music publishing businesses. Since 1995, Jackson and Sony/ATV Music Publishing have jointly owned most of the Lennon-McCartney songs recorded by The Beatles. Sony later reported that Jackson had used his share of their co-owned Beatles' catalogue as collateral for a loan from the music company. Meanwhile, Lennon's estate and McCartney still receive their respective songwriter shares of the royalties. (Despite his ownership of most of the Lennon-McCartney publishing, Jackson has only recorded one Lennon-McCartney composition himself, Come Together which was featured in his film Moonwalker.)



Although the Jackson-Sony catalogue includes most of The Beatles' greatest hits, four of their earliest songs had been published by one of EMI's publishing companies prior to Lennon and McCartney signing with Dick James — and McCartney later succeeded in personally acquiring the publishing rights to Love Me Do, Please Please Me, P.S. I Love You and Ask Me Why from EMI.



Harrison and Starr did not renew their songwriting contracts with Northern Songs in 1968, signing with Apple Publishing instead. Harrison later created Harrisongs, which still owns the rights to his post-1967 songs such as While My Guitar Gently Weeps and Something. Starr also created his own company, called Startling Music. It holds the rights to his two post-1967 songs recorded by The Beatles, Don't Pass Me By and Octopus's Garden.



The Beatles are one of the few major artists who have not released their recorded catalogue through online music services (for example; iTunes, Napster, etc.). Apple Corp's dispute with Apple Computers (the owners of iTunes) over the use of the name Apple has played a particular part in this. An uneasy truce between the two companies broke when Apple Computers opened the iTunes Store, after which Apple Corp sued Apple Computers. This was resolved in February 2007, with Apple Computer owning the Apple name but licensing it back to Apple Records.