The Beatles and the Abbey Road album makes UK chart history
The Beatles’ acclaimed Anniversary Edition returns Abbey Road to the top of the UK charts after 49 years, 252 days – setting a new Guinness World Record title.
The Beatles at ATV Elstree for the Morecambe and Wise Show, 1964.
“It’s hard to believe that Abbey Road still holds up after all these years. But then again it’s a bloody cool album.” – Sir Paul McCartney
The Beatles’ iconic Abbey Road album has returned to the top of the UK album charts after a record-breaking 49 years and 252 days, as fans around the world celebrate one of the most recognizable and cherished albums of all-time, fifty years after its release.
The chart-topping feat, which has been officially recognized as a Guinness World Record for the Longest time for an album to return to No.1 in the UK, saw Abbey Road return to the top of the official album charts for the first time since its initial 17-week run ended on January 31st, 1970. This new milestone for the album extends The Beatles’ own record, previously held by Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, which topped the charts in June 2017, after a gap of 49 years, 125 days.
The Beatles marked Abbey Road’s anniversary with a suite of beautifully presented and critically acclaimed Anniversary Edition packages released on Friday, September 27th. The album’s 17 tracks are newly mixed by producer Giles Martin and mix engineer Sam Okell in stereo, 5.1 surround, and Dolby Atmos, accompanied by 23 session recordings and demos, most of which were previously unavailable to the public.
The release was accompanied by a new music video for “Here Comes The Sun”, which features photos from the Apple Corps archive and photos and footage shot by Linda McCartney supplied by Paul McCartney.
Abbey Road’s anniversary has also been observed globally with events, bespoke pop-up shops and fan-activity in countries including; Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Netherlands, UK, and the states, which included the renaming of Los Angeles’ Vine Street crossing outside the Capitol Studios building in Hollywood, in a special ceremony hosted by Sir Patrick Stewart.
The period of 18,144 days between 31st January 1970 to 4th October 2019 can also be measured as 49 years, 8 months, 5 days or 596 months, 5 days or even 1,567,641,600 seconds. It also totals to 26,127,360 minutes or 435,456 hours or 2592 weeks. Now you know.
The Beatles’ Abbey Road Anniversary Edition topped the OCC UK album charts for week ending 10th October 2019.