More Imperial-Era Hollies Reissues Headed Your Way

It’s Hollies-mania all over again! Back on February 15, we tipped you to a vinyl box set due April 19 collecting some of the Manchester quintet’s toughest-to-find tracks. But it gets better. On the same date that Sundazed releases the Lost Recordings and Beat Rarities box, the label will also continue its vinyl LP reissue series for the band with brand-new releases of Beat Group! and Bus Stop. These 1966 albums for Imperial Records were, respectively, The Hollies’ third and fourth American albums. The reissue of Beat Group!, in particular, is exciting as the album has been out-of-print for decades. Both titles will be heard in their original mono mixes.

As if that weren’t enough, U.K. label BGO Records will soon deliver a follow-up to its Bus Stop/Stop! Stop! Stop! two-fer which is comprised of the fourth and fifth Imperial titles.  The label will look backwards to combine the group’s first two American titles for Imperial, Here I Go Again (1964) and Hear! Here! (1965) onto one disc. These two titles were released stateside last year, on vinyl by Sundazed in mono. Ironically, BGO’s series seems to be neglecting Beat Group! for an overdue CD reissue.

Hit the jump for a bit of background on these four LPs, plus full track listings and discographical information!

While recording in Europe for Parlophone, The Hollies were signed to the Imperial label in America. 1964’s Here I Go Again was largely an American repackaging of the band’s first album for Parlophone, Stay with The Hollies. Five tracks were dropped from the British LP and three tracks replaced them to create a unique 12-track album, including singles “Here I Go Again” and “Just One Look,” The Hollies’ cover of the Doris Troy song. The LP performed so poorly, however, that Imperial declined to issue in America the band’s second U.K. album In the Hollies Style. When “Look Through Any Window” went Top 40 and finally broke the band in America in late 1965, Imperial issued a belated follow-up.  Hear! Here! was based on the Parlophone LP simply entitled Hollies. Hear! Here! removed the covers “Fortune Teller” and “Mickey’s Monkey” in favor of the band’s first American Top 40 single, “Look Through Any Window,” and Clint Ballard Jr.’s “I’m Alive,” another single. On the strength of these songs, the album charted, albeit only at No. 145. BGO’s two-fer will mark the first CD release of both Here I Go Again and Hear! Here!

The rare LP Beat Group! arrives in April as part of Sundazed’s 180-gram vinyl mono series. It was actually released in May 1966, one month prior to Would You Believe? in the U.K. A number of tracks from Would You Believe? unused on Beat Group! were held over for what would be the next American album, Bus Stop, and so Beat Group! drew on a number of sources, some as far back as 1964. Its version of “A Taste of Honey” was unique and not repeated in the U.K.; it is also a different version than the 1968 track heard on the box set The Long Road Home. Beat Group! ironically didn’t emphasize that aspect of the group’s evolving sound; there are smashing performances of Chip Taylor and Al Gorgoni’s rocking “I Can’t Let Go” as well as Buddy Holly’s “Take Your Time” and Isaac Hayes and David Porter’s “I Take What I Want,” plus forward-looking songs composed by the group. Of these, “Oriental Sadness” is mesmerizing, while “Hard, Hard Year” has a folk-rock appeal.

Sundazed’s next LP release, Bus Stop, arrived boasting the band’s Graham Gouldman-written hit single, their first track to go Top 10 in America. They also applied their trademark harmonies to Roy Orbison’s “Candy Man,” Simon and Garfunkel’s “I Am a Rock,” and the relocated “Mickey’s Monkey.” “We’re Through,” “Don’t Run and Hide” and “You Know He Did” showed off the band’s ever-growing abilities as songwriters. The Hollies would have just one more LP (Stop! Stop! Stop!) on the Imperial label before signing a new deal with Columbia’s Epic division.

Sundazed’s 180-gram mono LPs of Beat Group! and Bus Stop will arrive in stores on April 19, while BGO’s two-on-one release of Here I Go Again and Hear! Here! will finalize a release date shortly. It hasn’t been yet announced whether BGO’s CD will feature the albums in authentic mono or “fake stereo.”

Hollies, Here I Go Again/Hear! Here! (BGO Records BGOCD 973, 2011)

1. Here I Go Again
2. Stay
3. Memphis
4. Lucille
5. You Better Move On
6. Talkin’ ‘Bout You
7. Just One Look
8. Keep Off of That Friend of Mine
9. Rockin’ Robin
10. Do You Love Me
11. What Kind of Girl are You
12. It’s Only Make Believe
13. I’m Alive
14. Very Last Day
15. You Must Believe Me
16. Put Yourself in My Place
17. Down the Line
18. That’s My Desire
19. Look Through Any Window
20. Lawdy Miss Clawdy
21. When I Come Home to You
22. So Lonely
23. I’ve Been Wrong Before
24. Too Many People

Tracks 1-12 from Here I Go Again, Imperial LP 9266, 1964
Tracks 13-24 from Hear! Here!, Imperial LP 9299, 1965

Hollies, Beat Group! (Imperial LP 9312, 1966 – reissued Sundazed LP 5359, 2011)

1. I Can’t Let Go
2. That’s How Strong My Love Is
3. Running Through the Night
4. Oriental Sadness
5. A Taste of Honey
6. Mr. Moonlight
7. Don’t You Even Care (What’s Gonna Happen to Me)
8. Hard Hard Year
9. Take Your Time
10. Fifi the Flea
11. I Take What I Want

Hollies, Bus Stop (Imperial LP 9330, 1966 – reissued Sundazed LP 5360, 2011)

1. Bus Stop
2. Candy Man
3. Baby, That’s All
4. I Am a Rock
5. Sweet Little Sixteen
6. We’re Through
7. Don’t Run and Hide
8. Oriental Sadness
9. Mickey’s Monkey
10. Little Lover
11. You Know He Did
12. Whatcha Gonna Do ‘Bout It