The Return of Beatlemania, 40th Edition

While way too much hype has surrounded the very recent 40th anniversary of Woodstock, another 40th anniversary passed this week with little fanfare: 20 August 1969 was the last time all four Beatles were together in the same studio (recording "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" for Abbey Road).

Well, brace yourself for what promises to be the biggest Beatles marketing blitz since the original Beatlemania of the 60's: on 09/09/09, Harmonix in partnership with Apple Corps will release The Beatles: Rock Band:



In a rather interesting and extensive article in last Sunday's New York Times Magazine, the aspirations for this launch are nothing short of bringing an entire new generation (that would be old farts like me) to the video game format.

On the same day, Capitol/EMI will release the first completely remastered digital versions of The Beatles catalog on CD in a variety of flavors (way too much detail can be found here).






















And if that were not enough, it is widely believed that an Apple (that's the computer company one) announcement scheduled also for 09/09/09 will unveil the long-awaited availability of the entire Beatles catalog on the iTunes Music Store.

It's going to be interesting to see if The Beatles can have yet another significant impact on pop culture after all these years. I'd say never count them out! If the cover of the new Rolling Stone is any indication, it's already starting.

Inevitably there will be new video clips revealed, maybe even another "lost track" or two will pop up. Fearing that this may already be developing into a typical, 2009-style media over-saturation campaign, I thought I'd get this little tidbit out there, discovered while reading the on-line version of the above mentioned New York Times Magazine article... enjoy it before it's too late!