John And Yoko - Wedding Album - Box Set

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Wedding Album is the third and final in a succession of three experimental albums by John Lennon and Yoko Ono. It followed Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins and Unfinished Music No. 2: Life with the Lions. In Britain, the album was released credited by "John and Yoko", without last names mentioned. In America, it was released credited by "John Ono Lennon & Yoko Ono Lennon."

Wedding Album was initially released on Apple on 20 October 1969 in the US,[nb 1] and 7 November 1969 in the UK.[nb 2][2] The record came as an elaborate box set designed by John Kosh, including sets of photos, drawings by Lennon, a reproduction of the marriage certificate,[nb 3] a picture of a slice of wedding cake (inside a white sleeve), and a booklet of press clippings about the couple.[2] It also included a Mylar bag that had the word "Bagism" printed on it.[9] The album did not chart in the UK, but managed to peak at number 178 in the US, staying on the charts for three weeks.[2][10] Regarding the limited success, Lennon later addressed it saying, "It was like our sharing our wedding with whoever wanted to share it with us. We didn't expect a hit record out of it. It was more of a... that's why we called it Wedding Album. You know, people make a wedding album, show it to the relatives when they come round. Well, our relatives are the... what you call fans, or people that follow us outside. So that was our way of letting them join in on the wedding".[4] The album was available on vinyl, cassette tape and 8-track tape, each with the same deluxe packaging. The album was also advertised through magazine print advertisements, which Lennon and Ono's previous two albums had not been. The album was reissued in 1997 through Rykodisc with three bonus cuts – two of them B-sides by The Plastic Ono Band composed by Ono. The album was reissued again in March 2019 on Sean Lennon's Chimera label in collaboration with Secretly Canadian. This edition was released with the two original tracks. The release commemorated the 50th anniversary of the famous Bed-In in the Amsterdam Hilton Hotel in March 1969.[11]

Melody Maker critic Richard Williams was given two single-sided test pressings for his review (which appeared on the front page of the November 15th issue). Each had a blank side featuring only an engineer's test signal, but Williams mistook it for a double album.[12] In his review, he noted that sides two and four consisted entirely "of single tones maintained throughout, presumably produced electronically", and that the pitch of the notes appeared to change slightly. Lennon and Ono sent a telegram to Williams thanking him for his review and writing: "We both feel that this is the first time a critic topped the artist. We are not joking." - Wikipedia

Japanese release on Odeon Records with Japanese OBI strip. Stereo EAS 80702