The Beatles second – and final – UK single of 1968 was an all-time classic. ‘Hey Jude’, with ‘Revolution’ on the b-side, was also the group’s first on their Apple label.
The single was issued as Apple R 5722, although the catalogue number followed Parlophone’s convention, and the rights remained with the EMI subsidiary.
Furthermore, Philips were sub-contracted to press a number of extra copies, as EMI were unable to meet public demand. The Philips copies had the Apple logo on the label, but had a press-out centre with three prong. The Apple/EMI version had a solid label.
Hey Jude spent 16 weeks on the UK charts from 7 September. It spent two weeks at number one from 11 September, before being knocked off by Mary Hopkin’s Those Were The Days, produced by Paul McCartney and released on this day as Apple 2.
At seven minutes and 11 seconds, Hey Jude was the UK’s longest number one single until 1993. Its success encouraged artists and radio stations alike to throw out the unwritten rule that singles should be no longer than three minutes.
I seem to remember an interview with Paul McCartney , possibly on the old BBC radio series ‘The Beatles Story’ which was aired in the early 1970’s in which he recounts writing the title ‘Hey Jude’ on the ‘windowlened’ widows of the Apple shop in an ad hoc promotion stunt. The stunt backfired as someone took offence at this and threw a brick through the window. Apparently it reminded them of the anti Jewish graffiti that was daubed by the Nazis on Jewish owned shops in the 1930’s. Does anyone else remember hearing this ?
That story was told in Anthology, and can be read on this page.
I am almost sure McCarthur Park was longer than Hey Jude.
Hey Jude was deliberately edited to be one second longer than Macarthur Park.
Macarthur Park ran for about 10 seconds longer and was released about five months earlier, but may not have been a number single.