The Beatles Plus 50 It was fifty years ago today…

Today the Magical Mystery Tour LP was released in the United States, its track listing as follows:

Side A:
Magical Mystery Tour
The Fool on the Hill
Flying
Blue Jay Way
Your Mother Should Know
I Am the Walrus

Side B:
Hello Goodbye
Strawberry Fields Forever
Penny Lane
Baby You’re a Rich Man
All You Need Is Love

This meant that Beatles fans in the US got to hear the six songs that would comprise the MMT double EP — not scheduled for release in Britain until December 8 — 10 days ahead of their UK counterparts.

“Hello Goodbye” was also released as a separate single, backed as in the UK with “I Am the Walrus.” The cover looked like this, with all four Beatles mustachioed, and George sporting a Satanic-looking chin beard:

If you could time travel and sit in a busy American record store today, how many people would you see buying the album and how many the single? And how many would buy both, just because it was necessary to have everything The Beatles put out, as Capitol Record executives chortled and rubbed their hands like movie villains? “You say goodbye to your money,” they would giggle gleefully, “and I say hello.”