Revolver
The Beatles
1966: Parlophone/Apple CDP7 46441 2
I have a really tough time with the Beatles. On the one hand, they were revolutionary and prolific songwriters. On the other hand, they often sang so badly off-key it brings tears of pain to my eyes, and they wrote some appallingly fluff pop. So even though its blasphemous as well as tacky to say, I confess the Bee Gees and Peter Frampton did a better job with some of their songs for that ghastly movie of Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band in the late 70s. (And I hasten to emphasize the word some, there, although Mrs Millers unforgettable rendition of Hard Days Night stands in a category of its own [thankfully].)
This album is a good example of what drives me batshit about them: some great great songs dimished by imperfect pitch and lazy stylized singing, some possibly-great songs putting ideas into tantalizingly brief forms, and some complete crap. And then theres Yellow Submarine in the next category down.
But Taxman, Doctor Robert, She Said She Said, and Love You To are so close to the genius level of pop its aggravating. I suppose if Id heard them at the time, on the equipment of the time, I might have a higher opinion of them. Then again I might just be pissed off at The Beatles for so nearly killing the U.S. folk scene. In the meantime I find myself in the embarrassed position of having to prefer other peoples cover versions of some of their songs, versions which bring out the quality that was written in and never achieved in the original recordingsPhil Collins made Tomorrow Never Knows a work of art on Face Value, for example.
Comments © 2005 Mark Ellis Walker, except as noted, and no claim is made to the images and quoted lyrics.