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The Beatles

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14:22 / 04.01.05

I ended up getting several Lennon & Yoko Ono albums. I'm just a late '70s kind of guy.

14:45 / 04.01.05

So you still don't have a beatles LP!

go now pick one at random- take it home and enjoy... (judging by your tastes i'd also get the big version of magical mystery tour- i am the walrus etc) don't dismiss the McCartney songs- don't forget Helter Skelter is one...

14:59 / 04.01.05

Everybody keeps mentioning all things must pass as a great solo record. What about Cloud Nine? Ha, just kidding. All things must pass is wondeful. Apple Jam.

Sometime in new york city is my favorite of lennon's solo records, the live disk is totally sick. i think i read somewhere that his back up band was the mother of invention?

12:35 / 23.11.06

So, anyone been digging the 'new' Beatles album? I got it myself least night, and while I wasn't expecting to be, I was totally bowled over by how good it was. Usually I find 'digitally remastered' stuff to sound either thinner than the original recording or barely noticable. However, with 'Love' the first thing you're going to notice is the new mix and how clean and crisp everything sounds.

It's a really bloody good record too. Think of it pretty much as a 'best of' meets an all-Beatles mash-up mix and you're close, and some of the best moments on the album come from the unexpected mixing of songs, like Blackbird seguing into Yesterday or the way She's So Heavy explodes out of Mr Kite. It's a real head-bobber from start to end and is one of those great retrospective albums that allow you to wallow in nostalgia as well as appreciate the music for it's freshness and vitality.

Honestly, if you even mildly interested in the Beatles I can't see how you'll regret getting this. Thoughts?

21:56 / 23.11.06

I'm of two minds.

1) I've listened to the Beatles' albums so many times that end of one song MUST lead into the next song. So for example, once I get to the end of Because, that must lead into You Never Give Me Your Money. I hear the beginning of the song in my head before I hear the actual song. So therefore, I find this album to be quite jarring. The songs are mashed up, like they're just thrown at each other.

2) On the other hand, they are thrown together quite skillfully. This is the Jackson Pollock of aural experiences. There's fun to be had in trying to pick out each individual piece of song and where they come from.

Another thought. Considering Lennon's fascination with audio experimentation, do you think he would approve of this project, or would he be disgusted at its attempt to cash in on the family name? Really, this album is not necessary and adds nothing to The Beatles' legacy.

03:38 / 24.11.06

BUY ABBEY ROAD.

lord nuneaton savage

08:09 / 24.11.06

Hmmm, what would Lennon's response be? Withering sarcasm perhaps?

Seriously though, Lennon's penchant for audio experimenation occured during a very brief period i.e. the late 6ts. By the time he got to the solo albums it was back to blues in a basket. Yoko however...

The old "who was the genuine avant-gardist in the Beatles" argument can be won by listening to the solo albums. There's some whacked-out shit from the Wings/Macca axis.

12:30 / 25.11.06

Oh god yeah - you should check Ram out - that's the natural progression from Abbey Road, not Imagine! Ram is one of the finest 'post-Beatles' Beatles albums out there.

17:01 / 26.11.06

I think Sgt. Pepper's suffers from the cultural baggage associated with it. I was maybe thirteen the first time I actually sat down and listened to it the whole way through, and I was disappointed because all I had ever heard was ZOMG this is the greatest most classicest and essentialest album ever, and it of course could not live up to it.

Once you relieve yourself of that notion, however, it is a fantastic little album. Yeah, I could never hear "Fixing a Hole" or "She's Leaving Home" again and not shed a tear, but all the songs are so unavoidably enjoyable as long as you're not thinking, in the back of your mind, "Yes, this is a good time, but it's not the (religious experience/alpha and omega of popular music) I was promised." I think The Beatles themselves suffer from the same problem, frankly. They've become a hallowed institution instead of a really good band.

That's one of the reasons I like this Love album, is because taking the songs out of the context they've existed in untouched for forty years stirs the fires a bit. "Come Together" is a song I've always liked, but it's never excited me because I've heard it a million times and I know where it comes in on Abbey Road and how long it lasts. "Come Together" is an institution. But when it shows up unexpectedly after a bit of "The Inner Light," has a bit of polish and then segues into a different song, it gets you listening to the song again instead of just hearing it. Now I can go back to it on Abbey Road and maybe appreciate it even more. Or maybe not. But when matt says he finds the album jarring, I think it's a success on the part of the CD for being able to surprise you with forty-year-old music that you already own.

I lurve the Beatles.

22:45 / 26.11.06

I think the "cultural baggage" you talk about is maybe more the echoes of the cultural impact this music made? It may have seemed like hype, but if you're talking about context, imagine that music coming out at that time. Now the sounds and style have ingrained themselves into the musical language to the extent that now we are somewhat inured to the impact. Kind of like "9/11 changed everything, dude" it's "Sgt. Pepper's changed everything". Along with most of their albums as they came out. Back then, everyone was waiting to see what the Beatles would do next, and they rarely disappointed. And only a few other groups came close to the amount of long-term influence they have had. The music may not seem as mind-bending as it did when it was new, but it still is outstanding music, even today.

04:55 / 27.11.06

Well, yes. There's a certain academic appreciation that comes of imagining what hearing "Strawberry Fields Forever" in the car radio for the first time in 1966 (67?) was like for those of us who weren't there. But the point I was trying to make is that approaching a Beatles album with the self-conscious notion that it is "important" tends to reduce it to a historical document, rather than a collection of highly enjoyable tunes. The music is not as mind-bending as when it was new, so there ought to put less focus on that aspect of the "Pepper legacy" and more on whether or not the actual songs are any good. Which I think they are, without necessarily having to be "the greatest" or "most influential."

I think we agree, right?

15:06 / 03.12.06

I agree with your Historical Document Hypothesis.

I have not owned or listened to a Beatles record in full (apart from inheriting a copy of the White Album when I was young that is now, well, somewhere). I never really liked the Beatles, not helped by various exes and people who were perfectly nice but happened at the time to be extremely irritating to me loving them.

However, just out of interest I bought the 'new' album today. I've listened to it once, while travelling, and it gives me none of the psychologically-allergic-reactions I may have had before listening to them.

(That's all I can say right now but I'll listen again and come back about the actual, y'know, music)...

08:24 / 05.03.10

I've never really been able to bring myself to, I'm afraid. I associate them with a set of grimy memories that have always sat awkwardly with my internal picture of myself. That is, of course, a roundabout way of saying that I've never quite been able to shake my distaste for the band, the feeling that they are somehow inherently hyper-naff, even when, in recent years, I've been able to see their merits considerably more clearly.

07:07 / 03.12.10

I know what you mean. I used to feel the same way. And I have friends that still don't like them. eh so so they ripped off some poor black americans music, they expanded upon it in a lot of ways. sorry for the ugly truth there (also joking).
I also heard a friend once say "I don't care how great their production value was for it's time". Which I totally agree with. That would be a stupid reason to like a band.
But if you put your personal issues aside you either like there sound and there songs or you don't. I have another friend whom basically said "I don't like them because my parents liked them and I had to listen to that shit growing up". But I don't think he's really listened to them since his prepubescent teenage angst phase kicked in.
I personally like them a lot. And that doesn't make me a prat. They wrote really great, amazing, deep and moving songs. I really don't like anything before '!Help'. I know it's cliche but I quite enjoy the so called drug years, which I believe started with '!Help' and and got stronger (the drugs and the music) throughout the years. Everything before 1965 is what I consider to be the 'Golden Era's' equivalent of a boy-band.

07:22 / 03.12.10

oh and i wanted to say how redundant it almost seems even discussing the beatles anymore. this thread was started in 2003 by someone writing (and I'm paraphrasing) "I like the beatles but I don't know what albums to get". Uh how about getting all of them off the internet for free and listening to them and figuring out which ones you like for your self. then you can go out and buy the ones you like on vinyl if you feel the need to waste your money because the 2 cool ones are dead and the other 2 don't really need anymore money if anyone wants to complain about that. besides MJ bought the masters and then sold them to sony when he was going broke. if you like crap you'd buy 65 and earlier if you like good music you'd buy !help and later. once again though all totally irrelevant.

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