Beatles Cover FAQ
The Guiness Book of World Records reportedly lists Yesterday as the song with the most cover versions, although we've been able to verify that. However, Yesterday has more cover versions, by far, than any other song in the set of cover albums in the CoverTogether database.
"Maggie Mae" is the only one we've been unable to find a cover of. (Note that although Laibach lists it on its cover of Let It Be, they actually covered a German folk song, not "Maggie Mae".)
Please Please Me, With The Beatles, A Hard Day's Night, Rubber Soul, Revolver, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles (The White Album), Abbey Road, and Let It Be. (See Album Tributes for details.) We have not been able to locate any album tributes for Beatles for Sale, Help!, Magical Mystery Tour, Yellow Submarine, or any of the post-breakup albums.
The earliest ones we know of are The Chipmunks Sing The Beatles Hits and Off The Beatle Track (by Sir George), both of which were released in 1964. The exact release date of The Chipmunks' album is unknown, so we can't tell which one came first.
It's hard to know for sure, but based on the fact that it was one of the earliest of all Beatles cover albums and the fact that it still sells well (based on its Amazon sales rank), a very likely candidate is Chet Atkins Picks on the Beatles.
Yes:
- The Beatles covered "Long Tall Sally", which was written and first recorded by Little Richard. Richard covered "I Saw Her Standing There".
- The Beatles covered "I Got a Woman", which was written and first recorded by Ray Charles. Ray covered "Yesterday", "The Long and Winding Road". Also, he covered "Till There Was You", which was covered by The Beatles.
- The Beatles covered "You Really Got a Hold on Me", which was written and first recorded by Smokey Robinson. Smokey, like Ray - and nearly everyone else - covered "Yesterday".
Yes. Bob Dylan recorded a cover version of Yesterday. (It used to be available on YouTube but it has been removed.) Mae West record Day Tripper and Twist and Shout.
Fittingly, on Sgt. Pepper's, Bob is shown as a cardboard cutout, and Mae is shown as a wax dummy.