It was fifty years ago today...

[JimN]

Friday 4th January 1963:

Diamonds / Footstomp (Decca 45-F 11563), credited to Jet Harris & Tony Meehan, is released in the UK.

The UK majors (all four of them) used to release records on a Friday in those days. I remember reading about the impending publication just before Christmas 1962 and keeping some of the money I was given for Christmas until the 4th of January. I bought the record, unheard, on the day of release, from one of the NEMS shops in Liverpool, where I was served by Clive Epstein.

Until about then, it wasn't uncommon to see Brian Epstein in the main NEMS store, but he was seen less and less after early '63. The Beatles' second single Please Please Me was released exactly one week later than Diamonds (Friday 11th January). Diamonds hit the number one spot within three weeks of release: the world was waiting for that disc. Please Please Me took six weeks to hit the top (and it did hit the top in every chart except that of Record Retailer).

JN

[cockroach]

I hope you wrapped up well when you went out to buy the record Jim- that was an absolute frozen cold snowed-in bastard of a winter, as I vividly recall!

Three months after, my family and I emigrated to Australia, and at 13, I got my first guitar en route, when the ship stopped in Aden, of all places...

When I got to Oz, after a month at sea, I heard the follow up (Scarlett O'Hara) on the local radio! I was plunking away on my little acoustic with single note lines at first, but an older chap at the migrant hostel who played told me 'you've gotta learn CHORDS mate, .....chords, chords chords!!'

[GoldenStreet]

45-F 11563 was actually Decca's first release of 1963, as the Tornados' Globetrotter / Locomotion With Me (45-F 11562) was issued in late December 1962. I well remember that winter as I had just become the proud owner of my mono copy of Out Of The Shadows, after seemingly endless weeks of saving up my pocket money!

Bill

[GoldenStreet]

Please Please Me took six weeks to hit the top (and it did hit the top in every chart except that of Record Retailer).
JN

Has this not always been a debatable issue? The Guinness book of British Hit Singles has always given the highest chart position as no.2.

Bill

[JimN]

Please Please Me took six weeks to hit the top (and it did hit the top in every chart except that of Record Retailer).
JN

Has this not always been a debatable issue? The Guinness book of British Hit Singles has always given the highest chart position as no.2.

Bill

The "official" chart (as referred to by the BBC, etc) was the NME chart until about 1961. This changed when the Record Retailer (a trade paper) chart became the "preferred" version. There were others; Melody Maker, for instance, used to publish a top 50 at the time.

Be clear about the methodology: the charts were never a definitive painstaking list of exactly how many records were sold in a week. They were compiled, like most statistics, on the basis of returns - taken on trust - from a small sample of retail outlets which was believed to be reasonably representative. But the press all used different samples, though no doubt with some overlap - it would be hard to conceive of a Liverpool sampling point which didn't include the NEMS shops. It would also be hard to think of a sampling method which included multiple shops in, say, Widnes, or Chorley or Wallasey. The music press were, to some extent, vigilant for signs of fixing. Unexplained large sales in one area of the country but not others might look suspicious - and ran the risk of being peremptorily left out for that particular week. This may have disadvantaged The Beatles, who obviously had a proportionately larger following in the NW of England than they did elsewhere.

Please Please Me got to the top of every chart except Record Retailer. How likely is it that Record retailer was correct and all the others wrong?

JN

[Jay Bass]

Looking at the official Singles chart for This week 5/1/1963
Cliff and The shadows at Number 1 with The next time
knocking Elvis Presleys Return to sender Off The top.
Duane Eddy at number 5 "Dance With the The guitar man"
the Shadows at number 7 "Dance On"
The Tornados at number 9 "Telstar"
what a great chart .

The official Chart For March 1963 Shows Please Please me at No 2 And Summer Holiday At no 1

jay

[GoldenStreet]

Thanks, Jim. Record Retailer was subsequently relaunched as Music Week.

This is a quote from David Roberts's editorial for the 16th edition of British Hit Singles (2003). Maybe, there's a clue here!

PPM.JPG (13.94 KiB) Viewed 4594 times

Bill

[noelford]

...an older chap at the migrant hostel who played told me 'you've gotta learn CHORDS mate, .....chords, chords chords!!'

How right he was, too. I'm really surprised at how many people try to learn to play without bothering with chords, which are the building blocks of melody.

[Fenderman]

Looking at the official Singles chart for This week 5/1/1963
Cliff and The shadows at Number 1 with The next time
knocking Elvis Presleys Return to sender Off The top.
Duane Eddy at number 5 "Dance With the The guitar man"
the Shadows at number 7 "Dance On"
The Tornados at number 9 "Telstar"
what a great chart .

The official Chart For March 1963 Shows Please Please me at No 2 And Summer Holiday At no 1

jay

I've been arguing this point for years with my family, 'Please please me' made number 2 NOT number 1 as them and everyone else seems to think. Wasn't there 2 charts published at that time?

[Jay Bass]

Hi Roy
Jim N
has covered the reason for the confusion in in the posting above.
But officially from the charts used at the time The Beatles First number one record is" From Me To you"
regards
Jay