Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Anybody know about these CD's and where I might get them. Label is "The Swingin' Pig Records"

dunno.... but I have the records.

Usenet is your friend for this stuff.

rec.music.beatles seems to have a constant never ending series of posts of "hard to find" mp3s.

And then there's this: http://www.recmusicbeatles.com/public/files/faqs/rare.html

The best stuff from Ultra Rare Trax on Swingin' Pig has been released in the 'Anthology' series. If I remember correctly, the Antholgy CDs were released in response to the release of the Ultra Rare Trax CDs, which were the best quality Beatle bootlegs available at the time (1988-90?). I recall that those CDs led to rumors that unreleased Beatles masters were stolen from Abbey Road.

You can find them on EBay from time to time, but there has been numerous repackaging and better quality releases that have recently been surfacing..

Those are like the first bootleg "series" discs. Pretty good stuff, but most of it is available elsewhere now. It's still worth getting if you can.

Some have felt that the sound quality on the Ultra Rare series is often superior to the officially released Anthology stuff.

I was lucky enought to snap up all of those back in 1990 until about 1993. Four of them on CD, two on disc...green, in one case.

Didn't cost that much either...Record Runner (an appropriate name) on Bank Street in Ottawa carried them sorted in with the "regular" stock.

My old college roommate has all those on CD's and he sent me tapes of them many years ago (before I had a CD player). I still hear from him once or twice a year and I keep asking him to burn me CD copies, but that hasn't happened yet. Anyway, all my tapes are still boxed up from moving here - 8 years ago - so they're buried in a closet somewhere.

I really enjoyed the Ultra Rare Trax stuff, and yes a lot of it sounds quite good. Really interesting to hear how songs evolved through numerous takes too. The vocals-only version of "Because" will blow you away. You can hear (very slightly) a guitar track bleeding through headphones on that.

Also he sent me tapes (from his CD's) of several live shows too - Paris, Japan, etc. that are fantastic. Interesting because you can hear how tired they got over the years. The best live one is called "Stars of '63" which is a Swedish radio concert - it really shows how much those guys rocked, and the sound quality is great.

I'd sure love to find any/all of those CD's to buy - I'd buy them in a heartbeat.

Thanks to all for the info esp. Alan-great link-now I know these were considered some of the better 'legs. I've got volumes 1,4,5,6-looking for (obviously) 2 and 3. Can anyone tell me what I'm missing-list of tracks on each? Is there an alternate I can purchase that will give me all the tracks I'm missing -would "Anthology" do it? I heard "The Swingin Pig was shut down but were reissued with different packaging, under a different label (it's not easy to shut down those 'leggers . I've got the acapella "Because" it's on one of the volumes I have. Other standouts: Solo George acoustic "While my Guitar...", An "island flavor" Ob La Di...", a "mellower" I'm Looking Through You, A great ver. of "I Saw Her..."-maybe better that the one we all know, "Norwegian Wood" in a lower key I think, with a little extra sitar work (IMHO a little too much), The boys discussing the "Do Da Doo's" in "Do You Want To Know A Secret" (when they should come in with it). Last but not least-several "Strawberries".

O.K, I think I found on the web what "trax" I'm missing along with a history of the various 'legs. I have to go back and see but I think there is some duplication and I may have some of the same trax on the 1,4,5,6 I have.

I would say I have at least a couple of hundred Beatlegs (ergo my reliable frame of reference) and although the Ultra Rare Trax discs were good for the era in which they were released, all that stuff is available elsewhere and in better quality. There are still quite a number of good Beatleg dealers in the US and overseas. When I first discovered that I could get unreleased Beatles stuff (gasp!) I started ordering from Kiss the Stone in Singapore - long since defunct, but a great dealer with gobs of stuff from myriad artists.