Re: [Harp-L] Harmonica Hater

[Ken Deifik <kenneth.d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> Dexter argued against releasing it (his last official act I believe)

I didn't know the harmonica part, but I heard much of the rest from a 
couple of guys I worked with in the late 60's who had been salesmen at 
Capitol when the Beatles broke.  But Dexter was apparently with Capitol for 
quite a while after 1964.

They told me that Dexter put himself in charge of the American Beatles 
releases after he was forced to release them at all.  He was credited on 
most of the albums.

Dexter was responsible for doing the American album run-downs, which were 
the standard - and quite sub-standard - Capitol releases all the way 
through to the CD era,  and the Beatles' people forced Capitol to 
standardize on the original English releases.

We were always told that the 14 song albums were not allowed in the US - 
total baloney, it was just another way to make more money selling more albums.

According to my friends Dexter was also responsible for the execrable 
"duophonic" fake stereo Beatles albums, and was the ears behind the 
generally miserable masterings for the American market.  He hated rock and 
roll in general.  When I was a teenager I couldn't understand why the 
Beatles records sounded so muddy next to the great American rock and roll 
records.  Thought it was a British thing, but most British records of the 
time also sounded better to me.

Amazingly the Beatles produced a tremendous percentage of Capitol's cash 
for decades after.  The first records I was ever part of were originally 
for Capitol - and none of them ever came out.  Management was an incredible 
mess, because the tsunami of Beatles money made good management completely 
unnecessary.