SA11 An “A Hard Day’s Night” UK LP Front Cover Fully Signed By All Four Beatles On The Day Of The Album’s Release, July 10, 1964
Description
On July 6, 1964, the Beatles attended the Royal World Premiere of their first feature film, A Hard Day’s Night, at the London Pavilion in Piccadilly Circus. Four days later, on the afternoon of July 10th, they boarded a flight at London’s Heathrow Airport for their triumphant return home to Liverpool for the Northern Premiere of the film. They arrived in late afternoon at Speke Airport to the screams of 3,000 fans. A brief press conference was held, followed by a police-escorted drive to the city centre along a route lined with an estimated 200,000 people, roughly a fourth of the entire population of Liverpool. The motorcade arrived at the Town Hall at a little before 7pm, where 20,000 fans gathered in the streets outside. Here, they were given a civic reception hosted by The Lord Mayor, Alderman Louis Caplan, and attended by 714 city officials, friends and family members. During the celebration, the group stepped out onto the balcony of the Hall and waved to the throngs milling in the street below. At 9pm, they left in a Austin Princess limousine for the Odeon Cinema, where the Liverpool charity premiere showing of A Hard Day’s Night took place. At 1:30am, after the premiere, a limousine ride back to Speke Airport and another round of civic ceremonies, they took a return flight to London.
July 10th is noted not only for the Beatles’ Liverpool homecoming for the film premiere, but also the release of their third studio album, A Hard Day’s Night, the first side of which contained seven songs from the film’s soundtrack. If ever there was a high spot in those early days of global success, this was it. As the four most recognized faces on the planet, the boys were brimming with confidence over their recording career and the accolades they’d received for the film. On that very morning of the LP release, before leaving Heathrow Airport for Liverpool, they signed for their attending flight stewardesses unlaminated cardboard flats of the new LP cover. The accompanying photo shows Paul McCartney preparing to board the flight for Liverpool. The two stewardesses shown to the right of Paul are each clutching their newly-autographed LP flats. The attendant nearest to Paul is holding the very LP that is being offered here. An enlargement of the LP from the photo is provided for closer inspection of the location of the signatures and the positioning of the individual letters.
Owning this signed A Hard Day’s Night LP flat is as close as you can get to owning a signed copy of the LP and, in one important respect, is perhaps better. Because the British albums had glossy laminated front covers, the Beatles found it difficult, if not impossible, to sign the front because ballpoint pens would not take to the glossy surface. The vast majority of fully-signed British LPs (any title) were signed on the unlaminated back cover, often on top of the liner notes — and those signed on the front have signatures that are generally difficult to see and often incomplete (due to pen skips). This flat, however, was signed on the front cover graphics, making it a far more desirable presentation piece.
As of this writing, there are no known A Hard Day’s Night UK LP covers signed by all four Beatles on the front cover, and approximately ten known examples fully-signed on the back. On this classic cover (featuring four rows of five head shots, set up as though they were frames from a movie), each Beatle has signed beautifully in black ballpoint pen on the row where his respective image appears.
Consider, too, the supreme rarity of having photographic provenance for any signed Beatles piece. Instances where visual proof of authenticity is available in the form of photographic evidence simply never happen, making the photo verification for this signed LP flat all the more astonishing. You can’t ask for better provenance for a Beatles signed piece than having that piece appear in a photo with one or more of the Beatles.
Adding to the rarity of this piece is the fact that 90% of authentic Beatles autograph sets were signed in 1963 when the band members were still reasonably accessible to their fans. Items signed once they had achieved global fame are relatively few in number because they were generally sequestered, inaccessible and unapproachable.
Here is a chance to own the front cover of a classic Beatles album, signed on the day of release and at a time when The Beatles were on top of the world, celebrating their first film — successful, young, exuberant, creatively prolific and with so much more to achieve.