An attempt to sell a previously unreleased taping of the Beatles performing in a club before becoming the Fab Four has been branded as a “garden variety bootleg recording” by lawyers of the iconic band’s surviving members who are seeking to block the unauthorized publication.

Miami Lakes company Fuego Entertainment Inc. has eight tracks performed by The Beatles in 1962 at the Star Club in Hamburg, Germany and wishes to release them in the form of an album titled “Jammin’ with The Beatles and Friends, Star Club, Hamburg, 1962,” the Associated Press reports.

The songs include Paul McCartney performing “Lovesick Blues” by Hank Williams, and McCartney and Lennon singing together on “Ask Me Why.”

Fuego Entertainment’s president, Hugo Cancio, claims it is unfair to Beatles fans out there not to have access to this material. “It's unfair to millions of Beatles fans not to allow this recording to be put out,” he told the Associated Press. “The world deserves to hear these tracks.”

Apple Corps, which represents the Beatles, has a completely different opinion though. The company says the songs were recorded without permission; to top it all, it is not even a quality recording and thus “dilutes and tarnishes the extraordinarily valuable image associated with the Beatles.”

“This appears to us to be a garden-variety bootleg recording,” Apple Corps lawyer Paul LiCalsi said.

Cancio is adamant though that the taping was legal. “Don't claim that these were just bootlegged,” said Cancio. “It's not like today, that you just go in with a phone or a blackberry and you record.”

“The fact is that we have it; they don't, and that is what's bothering them,” Cancio concluded.

He also expressed surprise at being sued, claiming his company and Apple Corps had been in “good-faith conversations” until recently. The lawsuit is seeking $15 million (£7.6 million) in damages.

Also named in the lawsuit is Jeffrey Collins, a partner of Cancio who obtained the recordings. It is unclear how Collins obtained the recordings.

Of the original Fab Four, only two members are still alive: Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney. John Lennon was fatally shot in 1980 by a deranged fan while George Harrison passed away in 2001 from lung cancer.