The Beatles’ announced the release of a limited edition, “Yellow Submarine” 7″ picture disc. The vinyl release, coming July 6, features the title song b/w “Eleanor Rigby.”
The news is related to the return of the beloved animated film, Yellow Submarine, which will arrive in theaters this summer for the 50th anniversary of the film’s original release. (The original Jan. 15 announcement only mentioned the U.K. and Ireland for a July 8 showing in “glorious surround sound” and “stunningly remastered” 4k. Since then, markets around the world will be screening the film for a limited run.)
The images on the 7″ picture disc are taken from the high resolution 4k restoration of the film. Pre-order the 7″ in the U.S. here; in the U.K. here.
On its release in 1968, Yellow Submarine was instantly recognised as a landmark achievement. The film combined pioneering animation techniques, dazzling visual invention, witty dialogue and of course glorious music.
The film announcement noted the “big-screen revival will give generations of audiences the golden opportunity to revisit Pepperland.”
The film was originally released on July 18, 1968. It had its world premiere in London’s Piccadilly Circus the night before, with all four Beatles in attendance. The one-day theatrical release will undoubtedly mean that the remastered title will also be released on DVD and Blu-ray.
As the story goes: “Once upon a time … or maybe twice, there was an unearthly paradise called Pepperland. 80,000 leagues beneath the sea it lay, or lie, I’m not too sure.”
From the Jan. 15 announcement: “Directed by George Dunning, and written by Lee Minoff, Al Brodax, Jack Mendelsohn and Erich Segal, Yellow Submarine began its voyage to the screen when Brodax, who had previously produced nearly 40 episodes of ABC-TV’s animated Beatles TV series, approached The Beatles’ manager Brian Epstein with a unique vision for a full-length animated feature. “Yellow Submarine, based upon a song by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, is a fantastic tale brimming with peace, love, and hope, propelled by Beatles songs, including “Eleanor Rigby,” “When I’m Sixty-Four,” “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds,” “All You Need Is Love,” and “It’s All Too Much.” When the film debuted in 1968, it was instantly recognised as a landmark achievement, revolutionising a genre by integrating the freestyle approach of the era with innovative animation techniques.
“Inspired by the generation’s new trends in art, the film resides with the dazzling Pop Art styles of Andy Warhol, Martin Sharp, Alan Aldridge and Peter Blake. With art direction and production design by Heinz Edelmann, Yellow Submarine is a classic of animated cinema, featuring the creative work of animation directors Robert Balser and Jack Stokes with a team of animators and technical artists.”
“I thought from the very beginning that the film should be a series of interconnected shorts” remembers Edelmann. “The style should vary every five minutes or so to keep the interest going until the end.” These styles included melding live-action photography with animation, 3-dimensional sequences and kaleidoscopic “rotoscoping” where film is traced frame by frame into drawings. The entire process took nearly two years, 14 different scripts, 40 animators and 140 technical artists, ultimately producing a groundbreaking triumph of animation.
YELLOWSUBMARINE ” 7″ PICTURE DISC. ORDER HERE:
USA ??: H E R E .
UK ??️H E R E .