While Capitol Records intentions were completely commercial rather than artistic, that didn’t mean they didn’t put some thought into which songs to axe from their LP releases. The most obvious example of this is the US version of Rubber Soul where Capitol not only removed the heaviest sounding songs from the record, but also add two acoustic tracks from Help! to try and give the impression that The Beatles were cashing in on this new “folk-rock” craze that was big in 1965.

This is good to keep in mind as we play everybody’s favorite game: “The one-disc white album.” I could see Capitol records may end up playing a very similar game as they did back in 1965. Focusing on the big hit single (which was not on the album) Hey Jude, Capitol focuses on a the more acoustic ballads from the self-titled double album.

Thanks to the pastoral nature of the Beatles’ Indian retreat there are several animal themed tracks on this album, although Everybody’s Got Something To Hide Except For Me and My Monkey and The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill were a bit too hard-edged for this set. If Capitol had been given the Escher Demos, they might’ve added Child Of Nature to this collection as well. Given the more solo nature of many of these tracks, there’s not a lot of Ringo, or even George, on most of this album – although the softest Harrison composition, Long, Long, Long was included.

The problem with reducing the White Album to a single disc – even if you’re a greedy, money-making concern like Capitol Records, is that you have to cut a lot of good songs. And that’s just leaving cash on the table. There’s no way they were going to let that happen.