Greg Hawkes Beatles

On toward the mid-'70s, it dawned on the powers-that-were at Capitol/EMI that millions of listeners had come of age since the breakup of the Beatles in 1970 and, thus, had never experienced the group except in a historical context. (This notion was aided by true tales of younger Wings fans discovering – to their amazement – that Paul McCartney had been "a member of another group"). All of the Beatles' albums were still in print and easily available (and routinely stocked by most record stores), but it was thought that some new excitement was needed, some fresh exposure, to re-introduce their work to these younger listeners…

Conventional wisdom holds that the Beatles intended Abbey Road as a grand farewell, a suspicion seemingly confirmed by the elegiac note Paul McCartney strikes at the conclusion of its closing suite. It’s hard not to interpret “And in the end / the love you take / is equal to the love you make” as a summation not only of Abbey Road but perhaps of the group’s entire career, a lovely final sentiment. The truth is perhaps a bit messier than this. The Beatles had tentative plans to move forward after the September 1969 release of Abbey Road, plans that quickly fell apart at the dawn of the new decade, and while the existence of that goal calls into question the intentionality of the album as a finale, it changes not a thing about what a remarkable goodbye the record is.

20 Greatest Hits is a compilation album featuring a selection of songs by The Beatles that were number one singles in the UK and US. It was released on 11 October 1982 in the United States and 18 October in the United Kingdom and marked the 20th anniversary of The Beatles' first record release, "Love Me Do," in the UK in October 1962…