A banned anti-war Beatles album cover is tipped to fetch more than £1,000 at auction.
The 1966 sleeve cover for 'Yesterday and Today' was withdrawn after it sparked outrage for its graphic images.
Known as the butcher’s cover, it shows the Fab Four in white coats sitting among dismembered baby dolls and raw meat.
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But the gory image sparked such outrage in record stores the LP bearing the butcher’s cover had to be withdrawn meaning it is incredibly rare.
A treasured copy of the cover is now going under the hammer and is expected to fetch between £800 and £1,200.
Claire Howell, music memorabilia consultant at Hansons Auctioneers, said: “The butcher’s cover album is among the holy grail of Beatles records due to its rarity.
“It's remembered for the controversy surrounding its original cover image which is a little bizarre and some might say gory thanks to those huge slabs of raw meat.
“It was later replaced by a shot of the band posed around a steamer trunk. That led to the original Capitol Records butcher’s cover LP becoming highly prized among collectors.
“Some of Capitol's pressing plants pasted the trunk image onto existing LP covers, which led some people to strip back the top layer of artwork in their search for the banned butcher cover.”
Yesterday and Today was released in the US and Canada by Capitol Records in June 1966.
The cover image was taken by photographer Robert Whitaker and the band insisted the photo was a statement against the Vietnam War.
Others interpreted it as The Beatles protesting the record company's policy of ‘butchering’ their albums for the North American market.
In response to retailer outrage, Capitol Records immediately withdrew the LP and replaced the cover image.
The Beatles Yesterday and Today butcher’s cover album will be sold on March 28.
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