Sixty Years On, Rubber Soul Is a Hit Again

The Beatles released a new edition of Rubber Soul on October 2. Within a week, the 1965 album was competing with this year's biggest new records.

On the latest Billboard 200, Rubber Soul re-entered at No. 4 with 58,000 equivalent album units. It's the album's first week in the American Top 10 since April 1966. The last time it appeared anywhere on the chart was January 2016. Only Taylor Swift's The Life of a Showgirl, Drake's HABIBTI and Olivia Rodrigo's you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love sold more that week. Rubber Soul finished ahead of Morgan Wallen's I'm The Problem.

A Near Miss at Home

In the U.K., the Beatles looked set to win outright. Early in the week, the Official Charts Company's first midweek count had Rubber Soul at 19,348 sales, more than 2,000 ahead of the nearest new release. A win would have been the group's first No. 1 album since Abbey Road returned to the top in October 2019.

The Manchester-area band Blossoms caught up by the end of the week. Their Songs From The Wedding Cake took No. 1, the band's fifth chart-topping album, and Rubber Soul settled at No. 2. The Beatles still had a consolation: Rubber Soul sold more vinyl than any other album that week and topped the Official Vinyl Albums Chart.

A record that spent eight weeks at No. 1 in 1965 lost the top spot by a few thousand copies in 2026.

What's in the Box

The reissue is more than a new pressing. Producer Giles Martin and engineer Sam Okell made a new stereo mix from the original four-track tapes. They used the "de-mixing" technology first developed for Peter Jackson's Get Back, which can separate instruments that were recorded together on one track. There are also new Dolby Atmos mixes.

The full box comes as 4 CDs or 5 LPs with an 88-page book, including an introduction by Paul McCartney. Alongside the new mix, it has the original mono mix and a rebuilt version of the 12-track Capitol LP that Americans bought in 1966. A disc of session outtakes and home demos includes John Lennon's unfinished demo "Little Girl," which had never been heard before. Two preview singles, the first take of "Michelle" and a songwriting work tape of "Day Tripper," came out over the summer.

Keeping Company With Swift

The timing is neat. In the same week Rubber Soul went back into the Top 10, Swift reached her 100th week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. That makes her the only act besides the Beatles to reach that number. The Beatles still hold the record with 132 weeks at No. 1, and that total includes the six weeks the American Rubber Soul spent on top in early 1966.

Rubber Soul was the album where the Beatles stopped being just a singles band and started making albums meant to be heard as a whole. Sixty years later, a lot of people are still buying it.