The Beatles album

Album   Released Publisher Rating
LOVE (Special Edition) 2006 EMD Int'l
LOVE (Bonus DVD) 2006 Toshiba EMI
The Capitol Albums, Vol. 2 (Longbox) 2006 Apple/Capitol/EMI
Let It Be... Naked (Japan) 1970 EMI Music Distribution
Let It Be... Naked 1970 EMD Int'l
In the Beginning: The Early Tapes 1970 Universal Distribution
In the Beginning 1970 Universal Motown
Abbey Road (2009 Remaster) 1969 Capitol Records
Revolver (US) 1966 EMD Int'l
Rubber Soul (2009 Remaster) 1965 Capitol Records
Rubber Soul (US) 1965 Capitol Records
Help! (US) 1965 Capitol Records
Something New (Deluxe) 1964 Blue Horseshoe
A Hard Day's Night (US) 1964 EMI Music Distribution
Back to the topLOVE (Special Edition)
Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide
Released:
November 21, 2006
Label:
EMD Int'l
Rating:
Styles:
AM Pop
Contemporary Pop/Rock
British Psychedelia
Psychedelic
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Merseybeat
If boiled down to a simple synopsis, the Beatles' LOVE sounds radical: assisted by his father, the legendary Beatles producer George, Giles Martin has assembled a remix album where familiar Fab Four tunes aren't just refurbished, they're given the mash-up treatment, meaning different versions of different songs are pasted together to create a new track. Ever since the turn of the century, mash-ups were in vogue in the underground, as such cut-n-paste jobs as Freelance Hellraiser's "Stroke of Genius" -- which paired up the Strokes' "Last Night" with Christina Aguilera's "Genie in a Bottle" -- circulated on the net, but no major group issued their own mash-up mastermix until LOVE in November 2006. Put in those terms, it seems like LOVE is a grand experiment, a piece of art for art's sake, but that's hardly the case. Its genesis lies with the Beatles agreeing to collaborate with performance dance troupe Cirque du Soleil on a project that evolved into the Las Vegas stage show LOVE, an extravaganza that cost well over 100 million dollars and was designed to generate revenue far exceeding that. During pre-production, all involved realized that the original Beatles tapes needed to be remastered in order to sound impressive by modern standards when pumped through the huge new theater -- the theater made just with this dance revue in mind -- and since they needed to be tweaked, they might as well use the opportunity to do something different with the familiar music, too: to remix and re-imagine it, to make LOVE be something unique to both the Beatles and Cirque du Soleil.

Keep in mind the Cirque du Soleil portion of the equation: George and Giles Martin may have been given free reign to recontextualize the Beatles' catalog, but given that this was for a project that cost this wasn't quite the second coming of The Grey Album, where Danger Mouse surreptitiously mashed up The White Album with Jay-Z's The Black Album. This isn't an art project and it isn't underground, either: it's a big, splashy commercial endeavor, one that needs to surprise millions of Beatles fans without alienating them, since the mission is to please fans whether they're hearing this in the theater or at home. And so, the curious LOVE, a purported re-imagining of the most familiar catalog in pop music, winds up being less interesting or surprising than its description would suggest.

Neither an embarrassment or a revelation, LOVE is at first mildly odd but its novelty soon recedes, revealing that these are the same songs that know you by heart, only with louder drums and occasionally with a few parts in different places. Often, what's presented here isn't far afield from the original recording: strip "Because" down to its vocals and it still sounds very much like the "Because" on Abbey Road -- and that arrangement is actually one of the more drastic here. Whether they're songs as spare and stark as "Eleanor Rigby" or "Yesterday," as trippy as "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" or as basic as "Get Back," the songs remain the same, as do most of the arrangements, right down to the laughter and sound effects sprinkled throughout "I Am the Walrus." There's only one cut that has the thrilling unpredictability of a genuine mash-up and that's a cut that blends together "Drive My Car," "The Word" and "What You're Doing," punctuated with horns from "Savoy Truffle"; a chorus from one song flows into the verse from another, as keyboards and percussion from all three, plus more, come together to make something that's giddy, inventive and fresh. But that's the exception to the rule, since most of this delivers juxtapositions that seem obvious based on the concept of the project itself: it doesn't take a great leap of imagination to set the melody of "Within You Without You" to the backing track of "Tomorrow Never Knows," since both derive from the same psychedelic era and share similar themes.

Throughout LOVE, songs are augmented by samples from roughly the same phase in the Beatles career, so "Strawberry Fields Forever" is enhanced by "Penny Lane," "Hello Goodbye," "Piggies" and "In My Life," but not "There's a Place," "It Won't Be Long," or "I Feel Fine," selections that could have been truly startling. It also would have been startling if those snippets of "Penny Lane" and "Hello Goodbye" were threaded within "Strawberry Fields," in a fashion similar to "Drive My Car/The Word/What You're Doing," but they're added to the end of the song, a move that's typical of the Martins' work here. With a few exceptions scattered throughout the record, all the mash-ups are saved for the very end of the song, which has the effect of preserving the feel of the original song while drawing attention to the showiest parts of the Martins' new mixes, giving the illusion that they've changed things around more than they actually have.

Not that the Martins simply add things to the original recordings; that may be the bulk of their work here, but they do subtly change things on occasion. Most notably, they structure "Strawberry Fields" as a progression from the original demo to the finished single version (a move that is, admittedly, borrowed from Anthology 2) and they've used an alternate demo take of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," to which George Martin has written a sympathetic new string arrangement. It also has to be said that the craft behind LOVE is impeccable: it flows as elegantly as the second side of Abbey Road, which is an achievement of no small measure. But there lies the rub: even if LOVE elicits a certain admiration for how Giles and George have crafted their mash-ups, it elicits a greater admiration for the productions and arrangements, which display far more imagination and audacity than the mixes here. Take a song as seemingly straightforward as "Lady Madonna," a Fats Domino tribute so good the man himself recorded it. This mix highlights weird flourishes like the carnival-esque vocal harmonies of the bridge -- things that were so densely interwoven into the original single mix that they didn't stand out -- but by isolating them here and inserting them at the front of the song, the Martins lessen the dramatic impact of these harmonies, just like how the gut-level force of McCartney's heavy, heavy bass here is tamed by how it's buried in the mix. The original has an arrangement that where this gets to the good part immediately, then stays there, a problem that plagues all of LOVE.

Here, the arrangements have everything pushed up toward the front, creating a Wall of Sound upon which certain individual parts or samples can stand out in how they contrast to the rest. This means that LOVE can indeed sound good -- particularly in a 5.1 Surround mix as elements swirl between the front and back speakers, but these are all window-dressing on songs that retain all their identifiable elements from the original recordings. And that's the frustrating thing about this entire project: far from being a bold reinvention, a Beatles album for the 21st century, the Martins didn't go far in their mash-ups, creating new music out of old, turning it into something mind-blowing. But when there's a multi-multi-million dollar production at stake, creating something truly mind-blowing is not really the goal: offering the familiar dressed up as something new is, and that's what LOVE delivers with big-budget style and flair, and more than a touch of Vegas gaudiness. It's an extravaganza, bright and colorful and relentless in its quest to entertain but beneath all the bluster, LOVE isn't much more than nostalgia masquerading as something new. [EMD Int'l issued a Special Edition in 2008.]
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Because N/A N/A
2 Get Back N/A N/A
3 Glass Onion N/A N/A
4 Eleanor Rigby/Julia N/A N/A
5 I Am the Walrus N/A N/A
6 I Want to Hold Your Hand N/A N/A
7 Drive My Car/The Word/What You're Doing N/A N/A
8 Gnik Nus N/A N/A
9 Something/Blue Jay Way N/A N/A
10 Being for the the Benefit of Mr. Kite!/I Want You (She's So Heavy)/Helt N/A N/A
11 Help! N/A N/A
12 Blackbird/Yesterday N/A N/A
13 Strawberry Fields Forever N/A N/A
14 Within You Without You/Tomorrow Never Knows N/A N/A
15 Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds N/A N/A
16 Octopus's Garden N/A N/A
17 Lady Madonna N/A N/A
18 Here Comes the Sun/The Inner Light N/A N/A
19 Come Together/Dear Prudence/Cry Baby Cry N/A N/A
20 Revolution N/A N/A
21 Back in the U.S.S.R. N/A N/A
22 While My Guitar Gently Weeps N/A N/A
23 Day in the Life N/A N/A
24 Hey Jude N/A N/A
25 Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) N/A N/A
26 All You Need Is Love N/A N/A
Back to the topLOVE (Bonus DVD)
Review by , All Music Guide
Released:
November 21, 2006
Label:
Toshiba EMI
Rating:
Styles:
Contemporary Pop/Rock
British Psychedelia
AM Pop
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Merseybeat
Psychedelic
If boiled down to a simple synopsis, the Beatles' LOVE sounds radical: assisted by his father, the legendary Beatles producer George, Giles Martin has assembled a remix album where familiar Fab Four tunes aren't just refurbished, they're given the mash-up treatment, meaning different versions of different songs are pasted together to create a new track. Ever since the turn of the century, mash-ups were in vogue in the underground, as such cut-n-paste jobs as Freelance Hellraiser's "Stroke of Genius" -- which paired up the Strokes' "Last Night" with Christina Aguilera's "Genie in a Bottle" -- circulated on the net, but no major group issued their own mash-up mastermix until LOVE in November 2006. Put in those terms, it seems like LOVE is a grand experiment, a piece of art for art's sake, but that's hardly the case. Its genesis lies with the Beatles agreeing to collaborate with performance dance troupe Cirque du Soleil on a project that evolved into the Las Vegas stage show LOVE, an extravaganza that cost well over 100 million dollars and was designed to generate revenue far exceeding that. During pre-production, all involved realized that the original Beatles tapes needed to be remastered in order to sound impressive by modern standards when pumped through the huge new theater -- the theater made just with this dance revue in mind -- and since they needed to be tweaked, they might as well use the opportunity to do something different with the familiar music, too: to remix and re-imagine it, to make LOVE be something unique to both the Beatles and Cirque du Soleil. Keep in mind the Cirque du Soleil portion of the equation: George and Giles Martin may have been given free reign to recontextualize the Beatles' catalog, but given that this was for a project that cost this wasn't quite the second coming of The Grey Album, where Danger Mouse surreptitiously mashed up The White Album with Jay-Z's The Black Album. This isn't an art project and it isn't underground, either: it's a big, splashy commercial endeavor, one that needs to surprise millions of Beatles fans without alienating them, since the mission is to please fans whether they're hearing this in the theater or at home. And so, the curious LOVE, a purported re-imagining of the most familiar catalog in pop music, winds up being less interesting or surprising than its description would suggest.

Neither an embarrassment or a revelation, LOVE is at first mildly odd but its novelty soon recedes, revealing that these are the same songs that know you by heart, only with louder drums and occasionally with a few parts in different places. Often, what's presented here isn't far afield from the original recording: strip "Because" down to its vocals and it still sounds very much like the "Because" on Abbey Road -- and that arrangement is actually one of the more drastic here. Whether they're songs as spare and stark as "Eleanor Rigby" or "Yesterday," as trippy as "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" or as basic as "Get Back," the songs remain the same, as do most of the arrangements, right down to the laughter and sound effects sprinkled throughout "I Am the Walrus." There's only one cut that has the thrilling unpredictability of a genuine mash-up and that's a cut that blends together "Drive My Car," "The Word" and "What You're Doing," punctuated with horns from "Savoy Truffle"; a chorus from one song flows into the verse from another, as keyboards and percussion from all three, plus more, come together to make something that's giddy, inventive and fresh. But that's the exception to the rule, since most of this delivers juxtapositions that seem obvious based on the concept of the project itself: it doesn't take a great leap of imagination to set the melody of "Within You Without You" to the backing track of "Tomorrow Never Knows," since both derive from the same psychedelic era and share similar themes.

Throughout LOVE, songs are augmented by samples from roughly the same phase in the Beatles career, so "Strawberry Fields Forever" is enhanced by "Penny Lane," "Hello Goodbye," "Piggies" and "In My Life," but not "There's a Place," "It Won't Be Long," or "I Feel Fine," selections that could have been truly startling. It also would have been startling if those snippets of "Penny Lane" and "Hello Goodbye" were threaded within "Strawberry Fields," in a fashion similar to "Drive My Car/The Word/What You're Doing," but they're added to the end of the song, a move that's typical of the Martins' work here. With a few exceptions scattered throughout the record, all the mash-ups are saved for the very end of the song, which has the effect of preserving the feel of the original song while drawing attention to the showiest parts of the Martins' new mixes, giving the illusion that they've changed things around more than they actually have.

Not that the Martins simply add things to the original recordings; that may be the bulk of their work here, but they do subtly change things on occasion. Most notably, they structure "Strawberry Fields" as a progression from the original demo to the finished single version (a move that is, admittedly, borrowed from Anthology 2) and they've used an alternate demo take of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," to which George Martin has written a sympathetic new string arrangement. It also has to be said that the craft behind LOVE is impeccable: it flows as elegantly as the second side of Abbey Road, which is an achievement of no small measure. But there lies the rub: even if LOVE elicits a certain admiration for how Giles and George have crafted their mash-ups, it elicits a greater admiration for the where this gets to the good part immediately, then stays there, a problem that plagues all of LOVE.

Here, the arrangements have everything pushed up toward the front, creating a Wall of Sound upon which certain individual parts or samples can stand out in how they contrast to the rest. This means that LOVE can indeed sound good -- particularly in a 5.1 surround mix as elements swirl between the front and back speakers, but these are all window-dressing on songs that retain all their identifiable elements from the original recordings. And that's the frustrating thing about this entire project: far from being a bold reinvention, a Beatles album for the 21st century, the Martins didn't go far in their mash-ups, creating new music out of old, turning it into something mind-blowing. But when there's a multi-multi-million dollar production at stake, creating something truly mind-blowing is not really the goal: offering the familiar dressed up as something new is, and that's what LOVE delivers with big-budget style and flair, and more than a touch of Vegas gaudiness. It's an extravaganza, bright and colorful and relentless in its quest to entertain but beneath all the bluster, LOVE, All Music Guide
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Because 2:44 Lennon, McCartney
2 Get Back 2:05 Lennon, McCartney
3 Glass Onion 1:20 Lennon, McCartney
4 Eleanor Rigby/Julia 3:05 Lennon, McCartney
5 I Am the Walrus 4:28 Lennon, McCartney
6 I Want to Hold Your Hand 1:22 Lennon, McCartney
7 Drive My Car/The Word/What You're Doing 1:54 Lennon, McCartney
8 Gnik Nus 0:55 Lennon, McCartney
9 Something/Blue Jay Way 3:29 Harrison
10 Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!/I Want You (She's So Heavy)/Helt 3:22 Lennon, McCartney
11 Help! 2:18 Lennon, McCartney
12 Blackbird/Yesterday 2:31 Lennon, McCartney
13 Strawbery Fields Forever 4:31 Lennon, McCartney
14 Within You Without You/Tomorrow Never Knows 3:07 Harrison, Lennon, McCartney
15 Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds 4:10 Lennon, McCartney
16 Octopus's Garden 3:18 Starr
17 Lady Madonna 2:56 Lennon, McCartney
18 Here Comes the Sun/The Inner Light 4:18 Harrison
19 Come Together/Dear Prudence/Cry Baby Cry 4:45 Lennon, McCartney
20 Revolution 2:14 Lennon, McCartney
21 Back in the U.S.S.R. 1:53 Lennon, McCartney
22 While My Guitar Gently Weeps 3:46 Harrison
23 A Day in the Life 5:08 Lennon, McCartney
24 Hey Jude 3:58 Lennon, McCartney
25 Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) 1:22 Lennon, McCartney
26 All You Need Is Love 3:38 Lennon, McCartney
27 Because (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
28 Get Back (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
29 Glass Onion (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
30 Eleanor Rigby/Julia (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
31 I Am the Walrus (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
32 I Want to Hold Your Hand (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
33 Drive My Car/The Word/What You're Doing (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
34 Gnik Nus (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
35 Something/Blue Jay Way (DVD) N/A Harrison
36 Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!/I Want You (She's So Heavy)/Helt N/A Lennon, McCartney
37 Help! (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
38 Blackbird/Yesterday (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
39 Strawbery Fields Forever (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
40 Within You Without You/Tomorrow Never Knows (DVD) N/A Harrison, Lennon, McCartney
41 Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
42 Octopus's Garden (DVD) N/A Starr
43 Lady Madonna (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
44 Here Comes the Sun/The Inner Light (DVD) N/A Harrison
45 Come Together/Dear Prudence/Cry Baby Cry (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
46 Revolution (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
47 Back in the U.S.S.R. (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
48 While My Guitar Gently Weeps (DVD) N/A Harrison
49 A Day in the Life (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
50 Hey Jude (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
51 Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
52 All You Need Is Love (DVD) N/A Lennon, McCartney
Price: $24.98     273 Reviews
FIRST TIME EVER SPECIAL EDITION will include both the stereo CD and a BONUS AUDIO DVD packaged in a digi-package with O-card. The DVD is audio only and will contain 81 minutes o...
Back to the topThe Capitol Albums, Vol. 2 (Longbox)
Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide
Released:
April 11, 2006
Label:
Apple/Capitol/EMI
Rating:
Styles:
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Merseybeat
Contemporary Pop/Rock
AM Pop
The second installment of Capitol's long-awaited, ongoing series of reissues of the Beatles' American albums covers the four Fab Four albums Capitol released in 1965: The Early Beatles, Beatles VI, Help!, and Rubber Soul. The first of these, The Early Beatles, was a quick roundup of all the material from Please Please Me that hadn't been put on an American LP and it appropriately plays like a truncated and jumbled version of their debut; it's fun, but lacks the momentum and punch of their British debut. Beatles VI, whose very title suggests the ferocity of Beatlemania, since it's their sixth LP in just over a year, relies heavily on their fourth British LP, Beatles for Sale, pulling six songs from that album ("Kansas City," "Eight Days a Week," "I Don't Want to Spoil the Party," "Words of Love," "What You're Doing," "Every Little Thing"), adding to the mix a couple of new songs that would later show up on Help! ("You Like Me Too Much," "Tell Me What You See"), a pair of Larry Williams covers ("Bad Boy," "Dizzy Miss Lizzie"), and "Yes It Is," originally released as the B-side to "Ticket to Ride." Since it's culled exclusively from late 1964 and early 1965 material, the album winds up holding together better than some of the grab bags from 1964, and since the newer material is lighter than the excised material from Beatles for Sale -- "I Don't Want to Spoil the Party" may be weary, but without the gloomy opening triptych of "No Reply," "I'm a Loser," and "Baby's in Black," the remaining songs from this album don't quite feel as dark -- Beatles VI winds up as a pretty fun snapshot of the waning days of the peak of Beatlesmania.

Help! and Rubber Soul were the first U.S. LPs to bear the same titles (along with roughly the same artwork) of their U.K. counterparts, but they still had distinctly different running orders than the albums released in Britain. The American version of Help! is designed as a soundtrack to the film of the same name, containing selections from the movie's Ken Thorne-written score interspersed between the Beatles songs. Where the U.K. Help! had 14 tracks, including music not heard in the film, the U.S. Help! is 12 tracks, with only seven songs from the group -- just the songs actually heard in the film. The result is a distinctly different listening experience, one that's certainly not as satisfying as the U.K. LP, yet there is a certain charm to Thorne's exotica-tinged, swinging-'60s score, particularly to the James Bondian fanfare that opens the album, that helps make the U.S. version of Help! a fun nostalgia trip. The American Rubber Soul is also different than its British cousin, removing four songs from the U.K. version ("Drive My Car," "Nowhere Man," "What Goes On," "If I Needed Someone") and replacing them with two tunes from the U.K. Help! ("I've Just Seen a Face" and "It's Only Love"). The new tunes open up each side of the record, but the sequencing remains roughly the same as it is on the U.K. version, yet the U.S. LP does wind up with a subtly different feel than its British counterpart; by opening with the folky "I've Just Seen a Face" and omitting rockers and trebly pop songs, Rubber Soul winds up feeling like the Beatles' reaction to America's folk-rock movement of 1965, which is a feel that some listeners prefer.

As on the first Capitol Albums box, each of the four albums contains the original stereo and mono mixes for each LP (initial pressings contained incorrect mono mixes for Beatles VI and Rubber Soul, which were folded down for the stereo mixes instead of the original mono mixes, but this error was quickly corrected). Where several of the 1964 LPs on the first set were bathed in echo and were in fake stereo, the four 1965 records -- with the exception of The Early Beatles, which has such an extreme hard pan on its fake stereo that it is a bit difficult to listen to on headphones -- were not dressed up in as much post-production studio trickery and the stereo sounds natural, so the mixes aren't as disorienting as they were on, say, Second Album. There are some subtle differences between mixes -- and one not-so-subtle difference: the stereo version of "I'm Looking Through You" begins with a false start -- but most of these will only be noticeable only to the hardcore fans, who are indeed the target for this set. And like last time out, they should be pleased with this set, despite its flaws, chief among them the packaging. Like Capitol Albums, Vol. 1, this set has an ugly front cover that makes it seem like a Reader's Digest exclusive, the cardboard on the slipcase as well as the individual mini-LP reproductions feels flimsy (and Help!, which was originally a gatefold, is not a gatefold here), and the set feels like it could have been put together with more care. That said, there are some improvements this time around. The set has been issued as a (roughly) CD-sized box, which is preferable to the longbox of the first set, and Bruce Spizer's notes do an excellent job detailing the histories of these American LPs. And, of course, the sound is much, much better than the sound on the CDs for the regular albums, which are now nearly 20 years out of date. That sound, along with the nostalgic joy of getting these American incarnations on CD, is the main reason the hardcore fans will be more than happy to forgive this set its few flaws and simply enjoy the many pleasures of this collectors-oriented set.
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Love Me Do (Stereo) 2:21 Lennon, McCartney
2 Twist and Shout (Stereo) 2:36 Medley, Russell
3 Anna (Stereo) 2:57 Alexander
4 Chains (Stereo) 2:26 King, Goffin
5 Boys (Stereo) 2:27 Farrell, Dixon
6 Ask Me Why (Stereo) 2:28 Lennon, McCartney
7 Please Please Me (Stereo) 2:02 Lennon, McCartney
8 P.S. I Love You (Stereo) 2:05 Lennon, McCartney
9 Baby It's You (Stereo) 2:41 Williams, Bacharach, David
10 A Taste of Honey (Stereo) 2:05 Scott, Marlow
11 Do You Want to Know a Secret (Stereo) 2:01 Lennon, McCartney
12 Love Me Do (Mono Version) 2:21 Lennon, McCartney
13 Twist and Shout (Mono Version) 2:36 Medley, Russell
14 Anna (Mono Version) 2:57 Alexander
15 Chains (Mono Version) 2:26 King, Goffin
16 Boys (Mono Version) 2:27 Farrell, Dixon
17 Ask Me Why (Mono Version) 2:28 Lennon, McCartney
18 Please Please Me (Mono Version) 2:02 Lennon, McCartney
19 P.S. I Love You (Mono Version) 2:05 Lennon, McCartney
20 Baby It's You (Mono Version) 2:41 Williams, Bacharach, David
21 A Taste of Honey (Mono Version) 2:05 Scott, Marlow
22 Do You Want to Know a Secret (Mono Version) 1:56 Lennon, McCartney
23 Kansas City (Stereo) 2:40 Leiber, Stoller
24 Eight Days a Week (Stereo) 2:45 Lennon, McCartney
25 You Like Me Too Much (Stereo) 2:37 Harrison
26 Bad Boy (Stereo) 2:21 Williams
27 I Don't Want to Spoil the Party (Stereo) 2:35 Lennon, McCartney
28 Words of Love (Stereo) 2:06 Holly
29 What You're Doing (Stereo) 2:31 Lennon, McCartney
30 Yes It Is (Stereo) 2:41 Lennon, McCartney
31 Dizzy Miss Lizzie (Stereo) 2:54 Williams
32 Tell Me What You See (Stereo) 2:38 Lennon, McCartney
33 Every Little Thing (Stereo) 2:09 Lennon, McCartney
34 Kansas City (Mono Version) 2:40 Leiber, Stoller
35 Eight Days a Week (Mono Version) 2:45 Lennon, McCartney
36 You Like Me Too Much (Mono Version) 2:37 Harrison
37 Bad Boy (Mono Version) 2:21 Williams
38 I Don't Want to Spoil the Party (Mono Version) 2:35 Lennon, McCartney
39 Words of Love (Mono Version) 2:05 Holly
40 What You're Doing (Mono Version) 2:31 Lennon, McCartney
41 Yes It Is (Mono Version) 2:41 Lennon, McCartney
42 Dizzy Miss Lizzie (Mono Version) 2:55 Williams
43 Tell Me What You See (Mono Version) 2:38 Lennon, McCartney
44 Every Little Thing (Mono Version) 2:05 Lennon, McCartney
45 Help! (Stereo) 2:39 Lennon, McCartney
46 The Night Before (Stereo) 2:36 Lennon, McCartney
47 From Me to You Fantasy (Stereo)(Instrumental) 2:07 Lennon, McCartney
48 You've Got to Hide Your Love Away (Stereo) 2:12 Lennon, McCartney
49 I Need You (Stereo) 2:31 Harrison
50 In the Tyrol (Stereo)(Instrumental) 2:25 Thorne
51 Another Girl (Stereo) 2:08 Lennon, McCartney
52 Another Hard Day's Night (Stereo)(Instrumental) 2:31 Lennon, McCartney
53 Ticket to Ride (Stereo) 3:07 Lennon, McCartney
54 The Bitter End/You Can't Do That (Stereo)(Instrumental) 2:25 Lennon, McCartney, Thorne
55 You're Gonna Lose That Girl (Stereo) 2:18 Lennon, McCartney
56 The Chase (Stereo)(Instrumental) 2:30 Thorne
57 Help! (Mono Version) 2:39 Lennon, McCartney
58 The Night Before (Mono Version) 2:36 Lennon, McCartney
59 From Me to You Fantasy (Mono Version)(Instrumental) 2:07 Lennon, McCartney
60 You've Got to Hide Your Love Away (Mono Version) 2:12 Lennon, McCartney
61 I Need You (Mono Version) 2:31 Harrison
62 In the Tyrol (Mono Version)(Instrumental) 2:24 Thorne
63 Another Girl (Mono Version) 2:08 Lennon, McCartney
64 Another Hard Day's Night (Mono Version)(Instrumental) 2:31 Lennon, McCartney
65 Ticket to Ride (Mono Version) 3:07 Lennon, McCartney
66 The Bitter End/You Can't Do That (Mono Version)(Instrumental) 2:25 Lennon, McCartney, Thorne
67 You're Gonna Lose That Girl (Mono Version) 2:18 Lennon, McCartney
68 The Chase (Mono Version)(Instrumental) 2:27 Thorne
69 I've Just Seen a Face (Stereo) 2:06 Lennon, McCartney
70 Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) (Stereo) 2:06 Lennon, McCartney
71 You Won't See Me (Stereo) 3:23 Lennon, McCartney
72 Think for Yourself (Stereo) 2:19 Harrison
73 The Word (Stereo) 2:47 Lennon, McCartney
74 Michelle (Stereo) 2:44 Lennon, McCartney
75 It's Only Love (Stereo) 1:56 Lennon, McCartney
76 Girl (Stereo) 2:30 Lennon, McCartney
77 I'm Looking Through You (Stereo) 2:30 Lennon, McCartney
78 In My Life (Stereo) 2:26 Lennon, McCartney
79 Wait (Stereo) 2:14 Lennon, McCartney
80 Run for Your Life (Stereo) 2:25 Lennon, McCartney
81 I've Just Seen a Face (Mono Version) 2:06 Lennon, McCartney
82 Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) (Mono Version) 2:06 Lennon, McCartney
83 You Won't See Me (Mono Version) 3:23 Lennon, McCartney
84 Think for Yourself (Mono Version) 2:19 Harrison
85 The Word (Mono Version) 2:47 Lennon, McCartney
86 Michelle (Mono Version) 2:44 Lennon, McCartney
87 It's Only Love (Mono Version) 1:56 Lennon, McCartney
88 Girl (Mono Version) 2:30 Lennon, McCartney
89 I'm Looking Through You (Mono Version) 2:30 Lennon, McCartney
90 In My Life (Mono Version) 2:26 Lennon, McCartney
91 Wait (Mono Version) 2:14 Lennon, McCartney
92 Run for Your Life (Mono Version) 2:20 Lennon, McCartney
Price: $69.98     128 Reviews
THE BEATLES "THE CAPITOL ALBUMS VOL. 2" includes the four albums released by Capitol Records in 1965: The Early Beatles, Beatles VI, Help! (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) & th...
Back to the topLet It Be... Naked (Japan)
Review by , All Music Guide
Released:
May 08, 1970
Label:
EMI Music Distribution
Rating:
Styles:
Rock & Roll
Singer/Songwriter
Contemporary Pop/Rock
Album Rock
AM Pop
Of all the Beatles albums, none has garnered as much controversy and speculation as Let It Be. Released as their final album in May 1970, the record began its life as a back-to-basics affair called , which was intended to show the Beatles as a stripped-down rock & roll band after the excesses of Sgt. Pepper and The White Album. They weren't just going to record an album -- they were going to tape a documentary of the rehearsal and recording of the album, which would conclude with their first live performance since 1966. To facilitate filming, the band abandoned the home turf of Abbey Road Studios and hunkered down at Twickenham Film Studios, where Michael Lindsay-Hogg filmed endless hours of the band jamming, bickering, recording, and fighting. Throughout it all, the Beatles recorded so much material -- with much of it being no more than sloppy rehearsals and unfinished takes -- that neither the group nor its longtime producer, George Martin, had any desire to cobble together a releasable album, so the task was handed over to engineer Glyn Johns. As the group was recording Abbey Road, Johns crafted a sequence that captured the raw, unfocused nature of the sessions by splicing conversational asides between new songs, revived songs, covers, and brief, jokey tunes. This pretty much mirrored the feel of the sessions, and the record got fairly close to release -- including an airing of an acetate on a Boston radio station -- before it was scrapped at the last minute. Soon, the project mutated into Let It Be as Phil Spector, who had been working with John Lennon on solo projects, was brought in to finalize the project. By and large, he retained the original spirit behind the project, right down to the inclusion of dialogue and jokes, but he did overhaul three songs significantly, most notoriously Paul McCartney's "The Long and Winding Road," which he wrapped in syrupy strings and choirs. This is the version of Let It Be that was released as the Beatles' final album, and McCartney made his displeasure with the final product, particularly "The Long and Winding Road," known. Over the years, fans pined for an official release of while McCartney rumbled about revising Let It Be (even after a string-less "The Long and Winding Road" appeared on 1996's Anthology 3), and when the Beatles announced the release of Let It Be... Naked it seemed that the desires of both camps would finally be satiated. Unfortunately, that wasn't quite the case.

As the title should make clear, Let It Be... Naked is . Where was designed to be deliberately loose, complete with ragged performances and spoken asides, Naked is a deliberately professional piece of work, with all of the rough edges smoothed down. Consequently, it's not so much an archival release, but more like the audio equivalent of George Lucas' Star Wars special editions, complete with controversies along the lines of Han Solo not shooting Greedo first. Let It Be is recognizable in its Naked form, but it's been cleaned up, mixed up, and altered, gaining the superb "Don't Let Me Down" at the expense of "Dig It" and "Maggie Mae," as the song sequence has been shuffled and the dialogue has been cut out completely (perhaps Paul wasn't too keen on John's mock "and now here's Hark the Herald Angels come" preceding "Let It Be"). Those are merely the obvious changes, too. Throughout the record, there have been edits, splices, and polishes, some of which are a little disarming, such as the lack of the coda on "Get Back" (including no "hope we passed the audition" from John) and a different guitar solo on "Let It Be" (a solo different than either the single or album version). Most of the changes are subtle -- a correction there, an added lick here -- but they usually can be felt, even if the overall sound of most of the tracks hasn't changed all that much. The exceptions, of course, are the three songs Spector overhauled: McCartney's "The Long and Winding Road," Lennon's "Across the Universe," and George Harrison's "I Me Mine." Paul's song does indeed sound better and less saccharine in this arrangement, and it is a marked improvement. John's tune -- now in its third distinct incarnation, the most of any Beatles song -- is also different and an improvement, benefiting from the simpler arrangement, but it isn't a revelation along the lines of "Road." George's song is fine in this version, but in Spector's hands, it felt like a harbinger for All Things Must Pass, and is arguably just as good on the original album as it is here. The rest pretty much sounds very close to how it did on the original album, only with much better fidelity -- so much better that it raises the questions why the Beatles' entire catalog hadn't been remastered yet (ideally, it would be released as hybrid SACDs mastered with DSD, much like how the catalogs of the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan were).

So, the big question: was the whole Let It Be... Naked endeavor worth it? The answer is, yes...kind of. There's little question that this was an avenue worth pursuing, since neither nor Let It Be really were finished, and both fans and the band desired to set the record straight. But Naked set the record straight; it further clouds the waters by presenting a third version of the sessions, one that is no more accurate than the original album. It could be argued, in fact, that without Lennon's wiseass remarks and larks like "Dig It" it feels less like the sessions, which were ramshackle (in fact, they were directionless, as the bonus "Fly on the Wall" disc reveals). But it is also true that Naked is a finished album, with polished intros and outros, and is overall slightly stronger on a track-by-track basis. These changes make it a sleeker, slicker album, but it's hard not to miss the off-the-cuff aura of Let It Be, which contained more character and revelations than this revised version. After all, even with the changes and edits, the biggest differences boil down to the resequencing, the lack of joviality, and the de-Spectorized three. And since Let It Be was initially an unfinished album, cobbled together by associates of the Beatles, not the bandmembers themselves or their producer, it doesn't make a great deal of difference if the order is changed, especially since this was also mixed and produced by associates of the band, not Paul himself, and the main takes are those on the original album, which themselves weren't all that different than what was on . It all boils down to interpretations of an unwieldy session that was abandoned out of frustration at the end. This is a valid, entertaining interpretation of the Let It Be sessions. But, contrary to the sticker selling the album, this is not necessarily "Let It Be...as it was meant to be. The band's cut from the original sessions." The dogged seriousness of Naked contradicts the let-it-all-hang-out intent of the sessions or the warts-and-all Let It Be film. Though it is still faithful to much of the feel of Let It Be, the presentation of Naked, All Music Guide
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Get Back N/A Lennon, McCartney
2 Dig a Pony N/A Lennon, McCartney
3 For You Blue N/A Harrison
4 The Long and Winding Road N/A Lennon, McCartney
5 Two of Us N/A Lennon, McCartney
6 I've Got a Feeling N/A Lennon, McCartney
7 One After 909 N/A Lennon, McCartney
8 Don't Let Me Down N/A Lennon, McCartney
9 I Me Mine N/A Harrison
10 Across the Universe N/A Lennon, McCartney
11 Let It Be N/A Lennon, McCartney
Back to the topLet It Be... Naked
Review by , All Music Guide
Released:
May 08, 1970
Label:
EMD Int'l
Rating:
Styles:
Rock & Roll
Singer/Songwriter
Contemporary Pop/Rock
Album Rock
AM Pop
Of all the Beatles albums, none has garnered as much controversy and speculation as Let It Be. Released as their final album in May 1970, the record began its life as a back-to-basics affair called , which was intended to show the Beatles as a stripped-down rock & roll band after the excesses of Sgt. Pepper and The White Album. They weren't just going to record an album -- they were going to tape a documentary of the rehearsal and recording of the album, which would conclude with their first live performance since 1966. To facilitate filming, the band abandoned the home turf of Abbey Road Studios and hunkered down at Twickenham Film Studios, where Michael Lindsay-Hogg filmed endless hours of the band jamming, bickering, recording, and fighting. Throughout it all, the Beatles recorded so much material -- with much of it being no more than sloppy rehearsals and unfinished takes -- that neither the group nor its longtime producer, George Martin, had any desire to cobble together a releasable album, so the task was handed over to engineer Glyn Johns. As the group was recording Abbey Road, Johns crafted a sequence that captured the raw, unfocused nature of the sessions by splicing conversational asides between new songs, revived songs, covers, and brief, jokey tunes. This pretty much mirrored the feel of the sessions, and the record got fairly close to release -- including an airing of an acetate on a Boston radio station -- before it was scrapped at the last minute. Soon, the project mutated into Let It Be as Phil Spector, who had been working with John Lennon on solo projects, was brought in to finalize the project. By and large, he retained the original spirit behind the project, right down to the inclusion of dialogue and jokes, but he did overhaul three songs significantly, most notoriously Paul McCartney's "The Long and Winding Road," which he wrapped in syrupy strings and choirs. This is the version of Let It Be that was released as the Beatles' final album, and McCartney made his displeasure with the final product, particularly "The Long and Winding Road," known. Over the years, fans pined for an official release of while McCartney rumbled about revising Let It Be (even after a string-less "The Long and Winding Road" appeared on 1996's Anthology 3), and when the Beatles announced the release of Let It Be... Naked it seemed that the desires of both camps would finally be satiated. Unfortunately, that wasn't quite the case.

As the title should make clear, Let It Be... Naked is . Where was designed to be deliberately loose, complete with ragged performances and spoken asides, Naked is a deliberately professional piece of work, with all of the rough edges smoothed down. Consequently, it's not so much an archival release, but more like the audio equivalent of George Lucas' Star Wars special editions, complete with controversies along the lines of Han Solo not shooting Greedo first. Let It Be is recognizable in its Naked form, but it's been cleaned up, mixed up, and altered, gaining the superb "Don't Let Me Down" at the expense of "Dig It" and "Maggie Mae," as the song sequence has been shuffled and the dialogue has been cut out completely (perhaps Paul wasn't too keen on John's mock "and now here's Hark the Herald Angels come" preceding "Let It Be"). Those are merely the obvious changes, too. Throughout the record, there have been edits, splices, and polishes, some of which are a little disarming, such as the lack of the coda on "Get Back" (including no "hope we passed the audition" from John) and a different guitar solo on "Let It Be" (a solo different than either the single or album version). Most of the changes are subtle -- a correction there, an added lick here -- but they usually can be felt, even if the overall sound of most of the tracks hasn't changed all that much. The exceptions, of course, are the three songs Spector overhauled: McCartney's "The Long and Winding Road," Lennon's "Across the Universe," and George Harrison's "I Me Mine." Paul's song does indeed sound better and less saccharine in this arrangement, and it is a marked improvement. John's tune -- now in its third distinct incarnation, the most of any Beatles song -- is also different and an improvement, benefiting from the simpler arrangement, but it isn't a revelation along the lines of "Road." George's song is fine in this version, but in Spector's hands, it felt like a harbinger for All Things Must Pass, and is arguably just as good on the original album as it is here. The rest pretty much sounds very close to how it did on the original album, only with much better fidelity -- so much better that it raises the questions why the Beatles' entire catalog hadn't been remastered yet (ideally, it would be released as hybrid SACDs mastered with DSD, much like how the catalogs of the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan were).

So, the big question: was the whole Let It Be... Naked endeavor worth it? The answer is, yes...kind of. There's little question that this was an avenue worth pursuing, since neither nor Let It Be really were finished, and both fans and the band desired to set the record straight. But Naked set the record straight; it further clouds the waters by presenting a third version of the sessions, one that is no more accurate than the original album. It could be argued, in fact, that without Lennon's wiseass remarks and larks like "Dig It" it feels less like the sessions, which were ramshackle (in fact, they were directionless, as the bonus "Fly on the Wall" disc reveals). But it is also true that Naked is a finished album, with polished intros and outros, and is overall slightly stronger on a track-by-track basis. These changes make it a sleeker, slicker album, but it's hard not to miss the off-the-cuff aura of Let It Be, which contained more character and revelations than this revised version. After all, even with the changes and edits, the biggest differences boil down to the resequencing, the lack of joviality, and the de-Spectorized three. And since Let It Be was initially an unfinished album, cobbled together by associates of the Beatles, not the bandmembers themselves or their producer, it doesn't make a great deal of difference if the order is changed, especially since this was also mixed and produced by associates of the band, not Paul himself, and the main takes are those on the original album, which themselves weren't all that different than what was on . It all boils down to interpretations of an unwieldy session that was abandoned out of frustration at the end. This is a valid, entertaining interpretation of the Let It Be sessions. But, contrary to the sticker selling the album, this is not necessarily "Let It Be...as it was meant to be. The band's cut from the original sessions." The dogged seriousness of Naked contradicts the let-it-all-hang-out intent of the sessions or the warts-and-all Let It Be film. Though it is still faithful to much of the feel of Let It Be, the presentation of Naked, including the slight bits of modern-day editing, reveals that it is revisionist history, not the final word. Which doesn't hurt it as a record -- these are great songs, after all -- but it is a bit disappointing that this long-awaited project wasn't executed with a little more care and respect for the historical record.

[The bonus disc, "Fly on the Wall," contains 20-plus minutes of excerpts from the countless hours of tapes from the sessions. No song is heard in its entirety -- most are heard in shambolic snippets of 30 seconds or less -- and even if the fidelity is considerably cleaner than that on the monumental (and monumentally boring) nine-disc Get Back Journals, it's still hard to make out the conversations on this disc, and even hardcore Beatles fans will likely tune out this disc after a few minutes. It would have been better if this set was released with a disc devoted to Let It Be... Naked, All Music Guide
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Get Back 2:34 Lennon, McCartney
2 Dig a Pony 3:38 Lennon, McCartney
3 For You Blue 2:27 Harrison
4 The Long and Winding Road 3:34 Lennon, McCartney
5 Two of Us 3:21 Lennon, McCartney
6 I've Got a Feeling 3:30 Lennon, McCartney
7 One After 909 2:44 Lennon, McCartney
8 Don't Let Me Down 3:18 Lennon, McCartney
9 I Me Mine 2:21 Harrison
10 Across the Universe 3:38 Lennon, McCartney
11 Let It Be 3:55 Lennon, McCartney
12 Fly on the Wall 21:58 Harrison, Lennon, McCartney, Starr
Back to the topIn the Beginning: The Early Tapes
Review by Steve Leggett, All Music Guide
Released:
May 04, 1970
Label:
Universal Distribution
Rating:
Styles:
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Merseybeat
Contemporary Pop/Rock
Early Pop/Rock
AM Pop
The Beatles were recorded in Hamburg in 1961 backing up British singer Tony Sheridan on a series of fairly generic tracks that would never have seen the light of day had the Beatles not exploded onto the world's pop stage a year and a half later. Then, of course, these recordings were issued in countless packages, a process that still continues nearly a half century later. The Beatles are featured alone on two tracks, "Ain't She Sweet," with a John Lennon vocal that hints at things to come, and an intriguing instrumental, "Cry for a Shadow," written by Lennon and George Harrison.
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Ain't She Sweet 2:15 Ager, Yellen
2 Cry for a Shadow 2:25 Harrison, Lennon
3 When the Saints Go Marching In 3:21 Traditional
4 Why 3:00 Compton, Sheridan
5 If You Love Me, Baby 2:56 Singleton, Hall
6 What'd I Say 2:40 Charles
7 Sweet Georgia Brown 2:07 Bernie, Pinkard, Casey
8 Let's Dance 2:35 Lee
9 Ruby Baby 2:53 Leiber, Stoller
10 My Bonnie 2:43 Traditional
11 Nobody's Child 3:57 Traditional
12 Ready Teddy 2:02 Calca, Blackwell
13 Ya Ya, Pts. 1-2 5:10 Dorsey, Robinson
14 Kansas City 2:38 Ballard
Price: $10.98     3 Reviews
Budget price collection from Spectrum of Tony Sheridan backed by the Beat Brothers, aka The Beatles. 14 tracks. 1993.
Back to the topIn the Beginning
Review by Andrew Hamilton, All Music Guide
Released:
May 04, 1970
Label:
Universal Motown
Rating:
Styles:
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Merseybeat
Contemporary Pop/Rock
Early Pop/Rock
AM Pop
In the Beginning features the early Beatles -- John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Pete Best (Ringo was with Rory Storm & the Hurricanes) -- backup singer Tony Sheridan shows up on some rock remakes, and there's a rare Lennon/Harrison collaboration, "Cry for a Shadow," featuring Harrison's striking tonal guitar licks on a jazzy bop instrumental similar to a Phil Upchurch cut. "Ain't She Sweet," led by Lennon, is the only non-Sheridan lead. But this is nothing to celebrate, since Sheridan imitates a popcorn Buddy Holly on the poorly recorded and uninspiring tracks, with the instrumental and "Why," a fluffy ballad he co-wrote, the only exceptions. Originally released on album in 1970, these tunes have undergone repackaging-itis ever since. Cut in Hamburg, Germany, during the summer of 1961, the single "My Bonnie" b/w "The Saints" was initially issued by Polydor and credited to Tony Sheridan & the Beat Brothers; though John, Paul, George, and Pete gigged as the Beatles, Polydor revised their name because "Beatles" sounded like the German slang word for penis (pronounced ) and they didn't need the controversy. The record sold 180,000 copies in Germany and the United Kingdom; in the U.K., the label credit read Tony Sheridan & the Beatles. This CD illustrates the unpredictability of the music industry; Sheridan was being groomed for stardom, not the Beatles, who functioned as glorified session musicians. And though he recorded more sides for Polydor and became a singer/producer/writer of some note, Sheridan's success never matched the meteoric rise to fame and fortune enjoyed by a band of guys he liked enough to give their first break as studio musicians.
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Ain't She Sweet 2:14 Ager, Yellen
2 Cry for a Shadow 2:25 Harrison, Lennon
3 Let's Dance 2:36 Sheridan, Lee
4 My Bonnie 2:43 Traditional, Pratt
5 Take Out Some Insurance on Me, Baby 2:55 Singleton, Hall
6 What'd I Say 2:42 Charles
7 Sweet Georgia Brown 2:32 Bernie, Pinkard, Casey
8 When the Saints Go Marching In 3:21 Traditional
9 Ruby Baby 2:55 Leiber, Stoller
10 Why 3:01 Sheridan, Crompton, Compton
11 Nobody's Child 3:56 Foree, Coben, Traditional
12 Ya Ya, Pts. 1-2 5:10 Dorsey, Levy, Lewis, Robinson
Price: $11.98     15 Reviews
Back to the topAbbey Road (2009 Remaster)
Review by Richie Unterberger, All Music Guide
Released:
September 26, 1969
Label:
Capitol Records
Rating:
Styles:
Rock & Roll
Hard Rock
Prog-Rock
Psychedelic
Contemporary Pop/Rock
Album Rock
British Psychedelia
Sunshine Pop
AM Pop
The last Beatles album to be recorded (although Let It Be was the last to be released), Abbey Road was a fitting swan song for the group, echoing some of the faux-conceptual forms of Sgt. Pepper's, but featuring stronger compositions and more rock-oriented ensemble work. The group was still pushing forward in all facets of its art, whether devising some of the greatest harmonies to be heard on any rock record (especially on "Because"), constructing a medley of songs/vignettes that covered much of side two, adding subtle touches of Moog synthesizer, or crafting furious guitar-heavy rock ("The End," "I Want You (She's so Heavy)," "Come Together"). George Harrison also blossomed into a major songwriter, contributing the buoyant "Here Comes the Sun" and the supremely melodic ballad "Something," the latter of which became the first Harrison-penned Beatles hit. Whether Abbey Road is the Beatles' best work is debatable, but it's certainly the most immaculately produced (with the possible exception of Sgt. Pepper's) and most tightly constructed. [This reissue of Abbey Road has been digitally remastered. It comes packaged with replicated original U.K. album art, an expanded booklet containing original and newly written liner notes, and rare photos. Limited quantities of the CD are embedded with a brief documentary film about the album.]
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Come Together 4:19 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
2 Something 3:02 Harrison
3 Maxwell's Silver Hammer 3:27 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
4 Oh! Darling 3:27 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
5 Octopus's Garden 2:50 Starr, Starkey, Starkey
6 I Want You (She's so Heavy) 7:47 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
7 Here Comes the Sun 3:05 Harrison
8 Because 2:45 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
9 You Never Give Me Your Money 4:02 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
10 Sun King 2:26 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
11 Mean Mr. Mustard 1:06 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
12 Polythene Pam 1:12 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
13 She Came in Throught the Bathroom Window 1:58 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
14 Golden Slumbers 1:31 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
15 Carry That Weight 1:36 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
16 The End 2:21 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
17 Her Majesty 0:27 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
18 Abbey Road Mini-Documentary (Multimedia) N/A N/A
Price: $18.98     1201 Reviews
The classic original Beatles studio albums have been re-mastered by a dedicated team of engineers at Abbey Road Studios in London over a four year period utilising state of the art...
Back to the topRevolver (US)
Review by Bruce Eder, All Music Guide
Released:
August 05, 1966
Label:
EMD Int'l
Rating:
Styles:
AM Pop
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Psychedelic
Contemporary Pop/Rock
British Psychedelia
A funny thing happened to the Revolver album on its way to the U.S. marketplace in the spring and summer of 1966 -- it somehow managed to lose three songs, all written and featuring lead vocals by John Lennon. In its U.S. incarnation, Revolver was downright strange -- and unique. In some ways it's the perfect counterpoint to The Beatles' Second Album, another U.S.-only creation -- on that 1964 release, John Lennon dominated the lead vocals, while here, Paul McCartney owns five of the lead vocals (and six of the songs, as composer) on the U.S. album's 11 tracks, and George Harrison has three. Meanwhile, John Lennon's voice and songwriting have just two places on the album, thus making the U.S. version of Revolver the only Beatles album in creation in which George Harrison is featured more prominently as a singer and songwriter than John Lennon. (And that is not necessarily a complaint, but nevertheless it's an extraordinary detail for most Beatles fans that, had Capitol Records executives been thinking more clearly, might have been taken into account in mid-1966.) Thus, in raw math alone, the album is bizarre -- though mere numbers ignore the fact that the two Lennon songs that are here still come off as astounding, amazing pieces of music today, never mind how they seemed in 1966, and were placed for maximum impact, at the end of each side.

Revolver was, of course, planned by the Beatles and their producer, George Martin, as a 14-song LP, and was released that way in the U.K. and Europe in early August of 1966. But as was usually the case in those days, EMI's U.S. division, Capitol Records, had other ideas based on its own needs, and the record's shape in the U.S. involved decisions made months before Revolver's release. At that time, the company got early access to three of the songs from the upcoming LP, "Doctor Robert," "And Your Bird Can Sing," and "I'm Only Sleeping," all written by John Lennon. At the time, Capitol was sitting on a few "orphaned" tracks, including freestanding singles ("Yesterday," "Nowhere Man," "Day Tripper") and B-sides, which had never been on a U.S. album, plus a handful of songs that had been pulled off of the modified and reconstructed Rubber Soul, and which had never been released in America. As there was this relatively long gap between Rubber Soul and Revolver, Capitol wanted to exploit those songs, which didn't quite add up to an album -- and they ended up throwing in the three Revolver tracks by Lennon and issuing the whole spliced-together mess in early June of 1966 as Yesterday...and Today.

With "Doctor Robert," "And Your Bird Can Sing," and "I'm Only Sleeping" already used there, they were unavailable for Revolver in the U.S. when it was released in August, with the result that Americans got an 11-song LP that was still pretty amazing, if with a considerably different balance. Opening with Harrison's "Taxman," the record moves on to the ornate McCartney string-driven "Eleanor Rigby" and, absent John Lennon's moody "I'm Only Sleeping," takes a turn to the East with Harrison's sitar- and tabla-based "Love You To," and then goes back to McCartney territory on the ballad "Here, There and Everywhere" and the Ringo Starr-sung "Yellow Submarine" (originated and mostly written by McCartney). And five songs in, Lennon finally gets a hearing on one of the two boldest songs on the record, "She Said, She Said" -- which, strangely enough, is strong enough so that his profile isn't quite as badly compromised on the first side of the record as those song slots would lead one to expect.

Side two brings listeners back to McCartney with "Good Day Sunshine," which here is not followed by Lennon's exuberant "And Your Bird Can Sing" -- instead, it's more Paul on the exquisitely textured "For No One" (which introduced a lot of young listeners to the sound of the French horn, courtesy of Alan Civil). Then, in place of the absent wry Lennon song à clef "Doctor Robert" (all about a real-life London physician who was free with his prescriptions for pills), the album moves to Harrison's guitar showcase "I Want to Tell You"; Paul gets another hearing on "Got to Get You into My Life" ( which, along with "Good Day Sunshine," was one of the two "lost" singles from the album); and, finally, John closes out the whole abbreviated long-player with "Tomorrow Never Knows" -- and, as with the first side, the song is almost strong enough to have made up for some of Lennon's reduced presence elsewhere.

When most Americans first heard Revolver in 1966, they were delighted with its nearly 28 minutes of music. In 1966, they weren't thinking of the Beatles' music as "art" any more than Capitol Records was, and didn't realize it was supposed to be more like 35 minutes of music, with a rather distinctively wry and poetic compositional voice weaving in and out of the McCartney-generated pop. The "missing" Lennon songs were already out there on Yesterday...and Today, so Americans only missed them in context and juxtaposition here, and this album missed some of their impact as personalized statements and trippy, punchy rock & roll (especially "Doctor Robert" and "And Your Bird Can Sing"). What was here was still a masterpiece (albeit a reduced one), and an odd curio from a time when the Beatles were getting much more serious about their music than their record label was prepared to be -- a factor that would change once the money started rolling in and the press clips building up from Sgt. Pepper's in the year that followed, and the bandmembers started to throw their weight around where it also counted a great deal, with the company's management as well as the studio engineers.
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Taxman 2:36 Harrison
2 Eleanor Rigby 2:11 Lennon, McCartney
3 Love You To 3:00 Harrison
4 Here, There and Everywhere 2:25 Lennon, McCartney
5 Yellow Submarine 2:40 Lennon, McCartney
6 She Said, She Said 2:39 Lennon, McCartney
7 Good Day Sunshine 2:08 Lennon, McCartney
8 For No One 2:03 Lennon, McCartney
9 I Want To Tell You 2:30 Harrison
10 Got to Get You into My Life 2:31 Lennon, McCartney
11 Tomorrow Never Knows 3:00 Lennon, McCartney
Back to the topRubber Soul (2009 Remaster)
Review by Richie Unterberger, All Music Guide
Released:
December 03, 1965
Label:
Capitol Records
Rating:
Styles:
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Psychedelic
Folk-Rock
Contemporary Pop/Rock
AM Pop
While the Beatles still largely stuck to love songs on Rubber Soul, the lyrics represented a quantum leap in terms of thoughtfulness, maturity, and complex ambiguities. Musically, too, it was a substantial leap forward, with intricate folk-rock arrangements that reflected the increasing influence of Dylan and the Byrds. The group and George Martin were also beginning to expand the conventional instrumental parameters of the rock group, using a sitar on "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)," Greek-like guitar lines on "Michelle" and "Girl," fuzz bass on "Think for Yourself," and a piano made to sound like a harpsichord on the instrumental break of "In My Life." While John and Paul were beginning to carve separate songwriting identities at this point, the album is full of great tunes, from "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)" and "Michelle" to "Girl," "I'm Looking Through You," "You Won't See Me," "Drive My Car," and "Nowhere Man" (the last of which was the first Beatles song to move beyond romantic themes entirely). George Harrison was also developing into a fine songwriter with his two contributions, "Think for Yourself" and the Byrds-ish "If I Needed Someone." [The 2009 remastered reissue comes with a mini-documentary about the making of the album, as well as expanded liner notes detailing the recording process.]
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Drive My Car 2:28 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
2 Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) 2:04 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
3 You Won't See Me 3:19 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
4 Nowhere Man 2:43 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
5 Think for Yourself 2:18 Harrison
6 The Word 2:43 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
7 Michelle 2:42 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
8 What Goes On 2:48 Lennon, McCartney, Starr, Starkey, Starkey, McCartney
9 Girl 2:31 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
10 I'm Looking Through You 2:26 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
11 In My Life 2:26 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
12 Wait 2:14 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
13 If I Needed Someone 2:22 Harrison
14 Run for Your Life 2:23 Lennon, McCartney, McCartney
15 Rubber Soul Mini-Documentary (Multimedia) N/A N/A
Price: $18.98     702 Reviews
The classic original Beatles studio albums have been re-mastered by a dedicated team of engineers at Abbey Road Studios in London over a four year period utilising state of the art...
Back to the topRubber Soul (US)
Review by Zac Johnson, All Music Guide
Released:
December 03, 1965
Label:
Capitol Records
Rating:
Styles:
AM Pop
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Psychedelic
Folk-Rock
Contemporary Pop/Rock
In a stroke of marketing whimsy, Capitol Records removed four songs from the U.K. edition of Rubber Soul, and added two songs from the U.K. Help! in an attempt to offer a more "American" release. Surprisingly enough, the reworked U.S. edition holds together better than its British counterpart. Obviously inspired by the folk-rock sound blossoming in the States, the songs on the U.S. Rubber Soul show the influence that the sound of the Byrds and the songwriting of Bob Dylan were having on the Beatles. The songs added from Help! (the pleading acoustic "It's Only Love" and the rollicking opener "I've Just Seen a Face") change the entire feel of the album, making it more earthy and textural. By dropping the piano-driven "Drive My Car" and the stark "Nowhere Man," the U.S. edition stands as a much more organic and warm musical whole, enduring as by far the most intimate Beatles album until Let It Be was released in 1970. [Some pressings of the U.S. edition were released with an odd "false start" at the beginning of "I'm Looking Through You," a fact that is sure to prick up the ears of die-hard Beatles fans upon first listen.]
Track # Track Time Composer
1 I've Just Seen a Face 2:04 Lennon, McCartney
2 Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) 2:00 Lennon, McCartney
3 You Won't See Me 3:19 Lennon, McCartney
4 Think for Yourself 2:16 Harrison
5 The Word 2:42 Lennon, McCartney
6 Michelle 2:42 Lennon, McCartney
7 It's Only Love 1:53 Lennon, McCartney
8 Girl 2:26 Lennon, McCartney
9 I'm Looking Through You 2:20 Lennon, McCartney
10 In My Life 2:23 Lennon, McCartney
11 Wait 2:13 Lennon, McCartney
12 Run for Your Life 2:21 Lennon, McCartney
Back to the topHelp! (US)
Review by , All Music Guide
Released:
August 06, 1965
Label:
Capitol Records
Rating:
Styles:
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
AM Pop
Psychedelic
Folk-Rock
Contemporary Pop/Rock
One week after Parlophone Records in the U.K. released the Beatles' fifth British album, Help!, a 14-track LP containing seven songs performed by the group in the motion picture of the same name, and seven other new recordings, Capitol Records in the U.S. released what it billed as the original motion picture soundtrack to the film, containing the seven movie songs, but deleting the other tracks in favor of excerpts from the instrumental score composed and adapted by Ken Thorne. Since the beginning of the Beatles' recording career, their releases at home in England had differed markedly from the records that came out in America, not only early on when Capitol, like Parlophone (a subsidiary of the major label EMI), declined its options on Beatles discs, leading to their being licensed to such companies as Swan and Vee Jay, but also after Capitol assumed responsibility for U.S. versions as of the single "I Want to Hold Your Hand" at the start of 1964. Standard record company practice differed in the two countries. In Britain, songs issued on singles were usually not repeated on LPs; in America, they frequently were. British LPs tended to have 14 songs; American ones only 11 or 12. As a result, Capitol reconfigured and retitled Beatles releases for the U.S.; where Parlophone put out Please Please Me (1963), With the Beatles (1963), A Hard Day's Night (1964), and Beatles for Sale (1964) prior to Help!, Capitol, using much the same material, squeezed out Meet the Beatles! (1964), The Beatles' Second Album (1964), Something New (1964), Beatles '65 (1964), The Early Beatles (1965), and Beatles VI (1965). (It's even more complicated than this, of course, but space does not permit a more complete discussion.)

Still, the rearranging of Help! for U.S. release was a special case, a different concept altogether from the British version. Capitol executive Dave Dexter, Jr. earned a producer's credit for mixing the material up, and the changes were apparent right at the start. The album began not with a Beatles performance, but with a version of "The James Bond Theme," reinforcing the idea that the movie was a spoof of the James Bond films. The theme was given a slight Indian flavor, also presaging a major element in the film. Then the track segued into the Beatles' title track. The lively Paul McCartney-sung "The Night Before" was followed by another score cue, "From Me to You Fantasy," a Thorne arrangement of the Beatles' "From Me to You" combined with some ominous instrumental music and more Indian instruments. The Beatles' "You've Got to Hide Your Live Away" and "I Need You" came next, and then the instrumental "In the Tyrol," which borrowed from Richard Wagner's overture to the third act of Lohengrin. "Another Girl" was followed by "Another Hard Day's Night," nothing less than a version of "A Hard Day's Night" as played on Indian instruments. "Ticket to Ride," already a number-one single, gave way to "The Bitter End/You Can't Do That," more symphonic background music adapted in part from the Beatles composition. And after the final Beatles track, "You're Gonna Lose That Girl," came "The Chase," another all-Indian piece. As this description suggests, the soundtrack to Help! can actually be seen as the earliest instance of the influence of Indian music on a Beatles record.

The alterations were not restricted to the music itself. The LP was released in a gatefold sleeve, leading Capitol to charge an extra dollar to consumers. It also had some odd differences. In the photograph on the cover, the members of the Beatles appeared in a different order than they did on the British cover -- left to right -- George Harrison, Ringo Starr, John Lennon, and Paul McCartney, instead of Harrison, Lennon, McCartney, and Starr. (It has been suggested that, in their physical positions, they are spelling out H-E-L-P in semaphore signals and that the U.S. order thus mixed the letters up. This is not true, although photographer Robert Freeman did try the idea at first.) Also, the song known as "You're Going to Lose That Girl" elsewhere is rendered here as "You're Gonna Lose That Girl," a more slangy, American way of putting it, and what Lennon actually sings. One may have to be a Beatles fanatic to care about such things, however. (Not that there aren't tens of millions of those, of course.) For most music fans, the American version of Help!, All Music Guide
Track # Track Time Composer
1 Help! 2:35 Lennon, McCartney
2 The Night Before 2:33 Lennon, McCartney
3 From Me to You Fantasy (Instrumental) 2:03 Lennon, McCartney
4 You've Got to Hide Your Love Away 2:08 Lennon, McCartney
5 I Need You 2:28 Harrison
6 In the Tyrol (Instrumental) 2:21 N/A
7 Another Girl 2:02 Lennon, McCartney
8 Another Hard Day's Night (Instrumental) 2:28 Lennon, McCartney
9 Ticket to Ride 3:03 Lennon, McCartney
10 The Bitter End 2:20 N/A
11 You're Gonna Lose That Girl 2:18 Lennon, McCartney
12 The Chase (Instrumental) 2:24 N/A
Back to the topSomething New (Deluxe)
Review by Bruce Eder, All Music Guide
Released:
July 20, 1964
Label:
Blue Horseshoe
Rating:
Styles:
Early Pop/Rock
AM Pop
Contemporary Pop/Rock
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Merseybeat
It was the summer of 1964, and it had been a whole three months (!!!) since a new Beatles album from Capitol Records -- The Beatles' Second Album, assembled from various sources -- had been released to eager U.S. fans (and topped the charts). In the meantime, in addition to doing a tour of the U.S., the group had released their debut movie, A Hard Day's Night -- but the U.S. rights to the soundtrack were owned by United Artists Records (that was, in fact, the basis for United Artists' original interest in producing the movie), which had duly released its soundtrack in late June (and saw it top the charts). Capitol didn't have the soundtrack rights, but it was allowed to use most of the songs from the film; and as it turned out, the Beatles had delivered as fine a body of songs for the movie as they had for any of their albums up to that point -- songs that, as Capitol executives soon discovered, worked just as well in their combination. And so Something New was released about a month after UA's soundtrack, and if it wasn't as strong as the two preceding U.S. albums, in any other context and circumstance it would have been a contender for best rock & roll album of the year. Grouped alongside the band's hard-rocking, first-rate covers of Carl Perkins' "Matchbox" and Larry Williams' "Slow Down," and topped out with their German-language rendition of "I Want to Hold Your Hand" ("Komm, Gib Mir Deine Hand"), which probably couldn't fit anywhere else, the Hard Day's Night material sounded fine, and few fans seemed to mind paying twice for the songs that overlapped between the two albums. And no one seemed to notice that this is where the 11-song Beatles' album comes into being, Capitol reasoning out that their material was so strong that they could get away with shaving off one track from the standard dozen, which became routine in the two years of U.S.-created releases that followed.

Actually, outside of the context of the film for which they were written and recorded, the Hard Day's Night material showed a remarkable growth in the band's range and sound in just a few months. George Harrison's 12-string Rickenbacker guitar, which was the group's biggest sonic innovation in the movie score, was a little reduced in profile without the movie's title track on hand, but it was still present, as was an unprecedented (for a rock & roll group) reliance on acoustic guitar sounds ("And I Love Her," "If I Fell"), and a range of ballads that showed greater emotional depth and seriousness than had been heard from too many rock & roll bands in 1964. And then there were the songs -- "Anytime at All," "Things We Said Today" -- that melded rock & roll with acoustic and low-wattage electric music into something uniquely exciting, although the better-represented showcase movie title track wasn't here, With the rocking "Matchbox" and the exuberant "Slow Down" punching up the middle, Something New gave fans their money's worth and then some, even if it was just a transitional collection in the history that followed. [A deluxe edition was also released.]
Track # Track Time Composer
1 I'll Cry Instead (Mono Version) 2:04 N/A
2 Things We Said Today (Mono Version) 2:35 N/A
3 Any Time at All (Mono Version) 2:10 N/A
4 When I Get Home (Mono Version) 2:14 N/A
5 Slow Down (Mono Version) 2:54 N/A
6 Matchbox (Mono Version) 1:37 N/A
7 Tell Me Why (Mono Version) 2:06 N/A
8 And I Love Her (Mono Version) 2:28 N/A
9 I'm Happy Just to Dance with You (Mono Version) 1:56 N/A
10 If I Fell (Mono Version) 2:19 N/A
11 Komm, Gib Mir Deine Hand (Mono Version) 2:24 N/A
12 I'll Cry Instead (Stereo) 2:04 N/A
13 Things We Said Today (Stereo) 2:35 N/A
14 Any Time at All (Stereo) 2:10 N/A
15 When I Get Home (Stereo) 2:14 N/A
16 Slow Down (Stereo) 2:54 N/A
17 Matchbox (Stereo) 1:37 N/A
18 Tell Me Why (Stereo) 2:06 N/A
19 And I Love Her (Stereo) 2:28 N/A
20 I'm Happy Just to Dance with You (Stereo) 1:56 N/A
21 If I Fell (Stereo) 2:19 N/A
22 Komm, Gib Mir Deine Hand (Stereo) 2:24 N/A
Back to the topA Hard Day's Night (US)
Review by William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide
Released:
July 10, 1964
Label:
EMI Music Distribution
Rating:
Styles:
Rock & Roll
British Invasion
Merseybeat
Contemporary Pop/Rock
Folk-Rock
Early Pop/Rock
AM Pop
The difference between this album and the U.K. Parlophone album of the same name is that the U.K. record is the Beatles' third regular album release (following Please Please Me and With the Beatles), while this album is a soundtrack recording from their motion picture. The U.K. album contains 14 new songs, some of which are heard in the movie, but the U.S. one contains eight Beatles songs, all from the film, plus four instrumental tracks (courtesy of Beatle producer George Martin) used as movie scoring. All those wonderful tunes you remember from the movie are here, from the title track and "Can't Buy Me Love" to "And I Love Her." Missing are non-movie tracks that Capitol Records parceled out on subsequent U.S. Beatles albums. Obviously, the album to buy is the U.K. version, and if you are a CD buyer, there's no problem: it's the only one available. Both the U.K. and U.S. versions are available on cassette, however, so be careful. The U.S. version notes that it is a soundtrack on the spine of the tape box.
Track # Track Time Composer
1 A Hard Day's Night (Vocal Version) 2:28 Lennon, McCartney
2 Tell Me Why (Vocal Version) 2:04 Lennon, McCartney
3 I'll Cry Instead (Vocal Version) 2:06 Lennon, McCartney
4 I Should Have Known Better (Instrumental) 2:16 Lennon, McCartney
5 I'm Happy Just to Dance With You (Vocal Version) 1:59 Lennon, McCartney
6 And I Love Her (Instrumental) 3:42 Lennon, McCartney
7 I Should Have Known Better (Vocal Version) 2:42 Lennon, McCartney
8 If I Fell (Vocal Version) 2:16 Lennon, McCartney
9 And I Love Her (Vocal Version) 2:27 Lennon, McCartney
10 This Boy (Instrumental) 3:06 Lennon, McCartney
11 Can't Buy Me Love (Vocal Version) 2:15 Lennon, McCartney
12 A Hard Day's Night (Instrumental) 2:00 Lennon, McCartney
Price: $15.98     297 Reviews
A Hard Day's Night was the first Beatles album of all-original material, and the first to feature George Harrison playing his Rickenbacker electric 12-string guitar (on the opening...
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