[MUSIC & ENTERTAINMENT]. The Beatles Yesterday And Today, likely professionally peeled third state mono "Butcher" album, unsealed but with original shrinkwrap.

Beatles album cover approx. 12 1/4 x 12 1/4 in. (some soiling and bumping to edges and corners, unsealed yet with original shrinkwrap present). Vinyl record and original sleeve included (working condition unknown).

Released in 1966, the Beatles' studio album Yesterday and Today was the group's ninth album issued with Capitol Records. The controversial original cover image, seen here, features the members of the band posing with large pieces of raw meat and baby doll parts, including heads without bodies and bodies without heads. Fittingly, this cover became widely referred to as the "butcher cover."

Reception to the cover from distributors and retailers was hostile, with many citing concern about how the image, apparently originally intended as "'pop art' satire," might be interpreted, leading Capitol Records to recall the album and reissue it with a new cover design. New cover slicks were printed, and in some cases the original slicks were removed and replaced with the new ones, but in many other cases, the new slicks were simply pasted over top of the originals. This has led to the existence of 4 different versions, or "states" of the album on the market today: original issues that were never replaced or pasted over, issues with the new slick pasted over the original, issues that had the new slick pasted over the original and then removed or "peeled" somewhere along the line, and finally issues that have only ever had the new slick attached.

Though there appears to be no debris or obvious signs of having been peeled, the horizontal lines of variation most visible in the white jackets of the subjects suggest that this may be a professionally peeled example rather than a true "first state" example.

This lot is located in Cincinnati.