Beatles'65

8T.2228.2B.1 is the first black shell incarnation of Beatles'65 in Canada on the 8-Track format, and a transitional one: the black Ampex Datapack shell still carries the white slick of 8T.2228.1.2, with the full album cover art and the "MANUFACTURED AND DISTRIBUTED BY CAPITOL RECORDS (CANADA) LTD." line, and the same white bottom edge label crediting the four Beatles by name over 8XT-2228. Only the shell colour changed. This variation was issued in stereo.

Availability

This variation was available around 1970-1971, once Ampex had switched to black shells but while stocks of the white slicks lasted. It was replaced by the all-black tape with the black target-logo slick (see 8T.2228.3.1), which ran until 1973.

General Information

These later 8-Track tapes from 1970 were not manufactured by Capitol (Capitol hired subcontractors until 1976, as they were doing for vinyl records before they opened their own pressing facility in Mississauga). These black shell Datapack tapes featured a black Ampex Datapack shell with a Canadian paper slick, white at first and then black. Canadian black shell tapes were housed in a generic cardboard Capitol slip case with CAPITOL markings on the front and back (APPLE markings for Apple albums).

As with the other variations, the song You Can't Do That (the B side of the Can't Buy Me Love single, and an album track on The Beatles' Second Album) was added to the 8-track to bring programme 4 up to the length of the other three, a common practice on the format. Every Canadian 8-track of Beatles'65 carries it.

Pressing Information

Capitol of Canada subcontracted Ampex of Canada Limited in a suburb of Toronto, to manufacture these Canadian 8-Track tapes. As Piers mentions in his Discography pt. 2 book, the Ampex of Canada 8-track tapes were manufactured in Canada using plastic “Datapack” shells (the shell model that was produced under licence from Data Packaging Corp. in the USA). These generic shells were unbranded, allowing companies to present the cartridges as their own in-house productions (source: P. Hemmingsen, The Beatles’ Canadian Discography part. 2 and 3).

The Ampex Datapack format was used in white, then black, until 1973 when Capitol turned to "Lear Jet" instead of Ampex for 8-Track tape production.

8T.2228.2B.1 has markings as follows:

• Black plastic shell
• Long gripper cavity
• A deep "U" shaped slot on the top left back side
• 5 clip holes holding the two halves of the shell together
• White paper slick, cover art design (same as 8T.2228.1.2)
• White paper title label on the bottom edge with the four artists' names and 8XT-2228

Cover and packaging

The "all black" Datapack tapes were packaged in a standardized generic slipcase featuring "Capitol" text and logos (shown below, front and back). Earlier models appear to have been made from a thicker, darker cardboard, whereas later versions used a thinner, almost white type of cardboard.