Criteria | whatifthebeatles.com

Criteria Overview

Song Selection Criteria

Songs selected for Beatle albums should be commercially viable.
Songs selected for Beatle albums must fit the Beatles' oeuvre, even as it evolves.
Songs that are less commercially viable or that don't fit the Beatle oeuvre will be available for solo albums.
Only studio versions of songs will be included on LPs.
No duets with non-Beatle performers will be included on Beatle albums.
Songs by writers other than the Beatles, and songs written in collaboration with a Beatle will be allowed.
Songs will not be excluded on the basis of a bias against the subject of the song.
The deaths of John Lennon and George Harrison would not preclude their unreleased recordings being released years after their deaths.

Time Rules

Songs selected for an LP (or later, a CD) must fit into the time limitations of the media.
The number of songs selected for an LP is conditioned by the limitations of the media.
A song cannot appear on an alternate history LP earlier than its release date in actual history.
A song cannot appear on a CD before September 1984 when Bruce Springsteen's Born in the USA was released in the United States. After September 1984 new LPs, and re-releases of older LPs could be configured for distribution on compact discs.

History Rules

The chronology of historical events occurring in the alternate universe will remain largely the same as in actual history.
Songs listed on alternate reality Beatle albums will be considered demos made by a single Beatle and studio musicians.
Songs listed on alternate reality solo albums will be considered finished versions.
Some songs released in actual history will not be included on alternate history LPs.
Songs that were allegedly written as a result of issues between individual Beatles will still exist in the alternate reality.
Post-Beatle bands from our reality will never be formed.
With the death of John Lennon, the Beatles as a creative entity would cease to exist.
The death of George Harrison would close the book on post-Beatle collaborations.

Album Artwork and Photography Rules

As a rule of thumb, I try to select photos from the same year as the release of the fictional LP, or slightly earlier, if that information is available.
As with song choices, a photo should not appear on an album before the photo was taken in the actual world. However there needs to be a little wiggle room built into the decision making process.
- The copyright date on a photo can sometimes not be determined using Google image search or TinEye. In such instances the decision whether to use a photo on an album comes down to whether the photo seems plausible given the album's release date.
- When the copyright date is available online, it is often for the current owner of the rights to distribute the photo. In the decades since the photo was originally taken, ownership of the rights to the photo may have changed many times.
- Given the vast number of photos taken of Lennon, McCartney, Harrison and Starkey over the decades, determining the name of the photographer and the date the photo was taken, although possible, is not worth the amount of time that would be required in off-line research given the non-commercial nature of this project.
There's no purpose served by quibbling over subjective artwork or photography choices. I recognize that you are entitled to your opinion, and I ask that you return the favor. (See the section on subjectivity below).

Jump to Notes on Subjectivity and Plausibility below.

Criteria Details

Song selections should be commercially viable.

The songs selected for the albums released as The Beatles should be songs most likely to sell records. This is because The Beatles were, first and foremost, a business entity. They were formed so that the four members of the band could earn their living as musicians. Their breakup, and continued acrimony, was primarily financial in nature. Artistic innovation was a later, secondary consideration. Artistic tensions contributed to the breakup, but it was the financial implications of Allen Klein's management that drove a wedge between them.

Songs that are less commercially viable, or that don't fit the Beatles oeuvre, will be available for solo albums.

Historically, the most commercially viable songs were chosen for their LPs, while more esoteric material was relegated to solo albums (e.g. George Harrison’s “Wonderwall Music” or John Lennon’s “Two Virgins.”)

Only studio versions of songs will be included on LPs.

No live versions of songs will be included. An exception will be made for "Give Peace a Chance" since no studio version was ever recorded.

No duets with non-Beatle performers will be included on Beatle albums.

This primarily applies to Paul McCartney's duets with Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder and Carl Perkins. An exception will be made for "Whatever Gets You Thru The Night" which features a vocal by Elton John. This differs from the McCartney duets in that Elton John never sings lead on the song, though his harmony line is very present in the mix.

Songs by writers other than The Beatles, and songs written in collaboration with a Beatle will be allowed.

The Beatles have a long history of recording other people's material, primarily during their touring days. With the new fictional legal agreement minimizing the financial imperative to record their own songs, The Beatles could afford to take a more inclusive view of songwriting.

Songs selected for an LP or a CD must fit into the time limitations of the media, if possible.

A 12" vinyl long-playing record (LP) playing at 33-1/3 revolutions per minute (rpms) can contain a maximum of 25 minutes of recorded sound per side, for a total of 50 minutes per disk.
An audio compact disc (CD) can hold a maximum of 74 minutes of recorded sound.
There may be exceptions to this rule because we are unable to edit any song on playlists available from streaming music services. However, in an alternative universe, the songs could be edited for length to insure that they would fit within the limitations of the media, if the edits were not substantial.
Where the selections on one side of an LP runs a little over the 25 minute limitation, this overage cannot exceed 30 seconds per side of an LP. Similarly the overage cannot exceed 30 seconds for an entire CD.

The number of songs selected for an LP is conditioned by the limitations of the media.

Andrew Grant Jackson, in his work Still the Greatest selected 14 songs per album because that was the traditional length of Beatle albums. In fact, the number of songs, even on their earliest recordings, were determined by the limitations of the media. In the case of 12" vinyl, that was 25 minutes per side.

Songs listed on alternate reality -Beatle- albums are to be considered demo recordings.

These songs would be re-imagined, re-interpreted, and re-recorded by the Beatles themselves.
The musicians that played on the "demo" versions would, in most cases, be replaced by The Beatles for the final version.
On rare occasions, "guest" musicians would appear on the final version and get credited for their work.
Most musicians playing on the "demo" versions will not be credited.

Songs listed on alternate reality -solo- albums are to be considered finished versions.

As far as is possible, personnel will be given credit as they are credited in our reality.

The chronology of events occurring in the alternate universe will remain largely the same as in actual history.

The more the alternate history diverges from our actual history, the less plausible the alternate history can seem. Since the goal here is to present a plausible alternative recording history for The Beatles, I believe it will be more credible when the overarching historical context is recognizably close to our own.
The first Music CD released in the United States was Bruce Springsteen's Born in the USA in September 1984.

A song cannot appear on an alternate history LP earlier than its release date in actual history.

The release date of a song, LP, CD, etc. in actual history is a fixed moment in time.
A song's release date takes precedence over any presumed date the song was written.
Writing a song is a process that unfolds over time. It is not a fixed moment in time.
Songs can be recorded long after they were "written," and can be released long after they were recorded.

Some songs released in actual history will not be included on alternate history LPs.

That's because many songs really should not have been released in actual history either. (Wings "Wild Life," anyone?)
Those songs will be locked away in a repository for unreleased songs called "The Vault."
The Vault may one day be posted to the website, just to prove the premise.

Songs that were allegedly written as a result of issues between individual Beatles will still exist in the alternate reality.

The motivation for writing the songs would be something other than the Beatles break up in actual history.
Examples: "Too Many People," "How Do You Sleep?," "Isn't It A Pity."

Songs will not be excluded on the basis of a bias against the subject of the song.

This rule is for those who would prefer to exclude songs written for Yoko Ono. It won't matter here if a song was written to Yoko, Julia, Prudence, or Miss O'Dell (all real people).

Post-Beatle bands from our reality will never be formed.

In the alternate reality the music careers of the four Beatles were defined by their work as The Beatles and their solo records.
Since The Beatles continued to make records, there was no reason to form other bands.
Songs by these bands will either be incorporated into the new Beatle albums, included in new solo albums, or relegated to The Vault.

Regarding the death of John Lennon.

With the death of John Lennon, the Beatles as a creative entity would cease to exist.
Any new releases by the remaining Beatles would not carry the Beatles name.
The only exception would be the release after John's death of a previously unreleased song on which all four Beatles performed.

Regarding posthumous releases.

The deaths of John Lennon and George Harrison would not preclude their unreleased recordings being released years after their deaths. In our reality, Lennon's Milk and Honey and George Harrison's Brainwashed were released posthumously.

Regarding the death of George Harrison.

The death of George Harrison would close the book on post-Beatle collaborations. Paul and Ringo would not choose to carry on as a duo. They would instead only release solo projects, with the rare collaboration between the two.

Subjectivity and Plausibility

Subjectivity

All art is subjective. A work of art is intended to provoke a response from the person encountering it. Because art provokes a subjective response, there is no such thing as an objective opinion about a work of art. It all comes down to "I like it," or "I don't."

Who am I kidding? By "a work of art" I mean "a song."

A debate between people who have differing subjective opinions about a song, while occasionally interesting, is ultimately futile. So that's just not going to happen here.

You are, of course, entitled to your subjective opinion, as am I. If we differ on the inclusion or exclusion of a song on one of this website's fake Beatle albums, so be it.

There are criteria by which I've made my selections. Read them so that maybe, even if we disagree, you can see why I chose the songs I chose. We may not agree, but I'd like you to see that there is method in my madness.

Plausibility

The goal of an alternative history is to create a narrative that seems like it could have happened if the actual history had only unfolded a little bit differently. To be plausible, the fictional aspects of the alternative history can't stray too far from the actual history upon which they are based. Plausibility requires consistency. Consistency requires rules.

Subjectivity

Criteria