Never thought of myself as a Beatles fan ... but

Never thought of myself as a Beatles fan, as raised up on lyrics like the Clash's "no Beatles or the Rolling Stone" era late 70s new wave .....
anyway .... I now have two Beatles LPs, both on vinyl, picked up when crate digging in Charity Shops ....St Peppers lone Heart Club Band and the other week I picked up Rubber Soul .... St Pepeprs had become a bit of a favorite of mine ... and I've just had my 1st listen to Rubber Soul, and thats a bit of a corker as well.
So anyone care to recommend any other Beatles Albums, and why?

 

Revolver is the one between Rubber Soul and Pepper, so I think there's a good chance you will like that one. They're all great, I'd start at the beginning and do them chronologically. You are in for a treat. Nothing wrong with liking the Clash too. Lennon and Strummer, were not such different people in many ways.

 

Agree with Mr C. Start at the beginning with Please Please Me through to Let It Be (although Abbey Road was actually their final recording) and you'll be astonished at how much they achieved in about the time it takes a modern band to make one album.

 

All of them. Even their worst stuff was better than most of their contemporaries' good stuff. They had a handful of poor songs smattered across their albums, but even some of the poorer songs work well within the context of the respective albums. Other major artists had poor albums or even poor decades!

Get Revolver next, then Abbey Road, then A Hard Day's Night, then The Beatles (White Album), then Past Masters, then Magical Mystery Tour, then Help, then Please Please Me, then With The Beatles, then Beatles For Sale, then Let It Be, then the two BBC sessions CDs, then the three Anthology CDs, then Yellow Submarine. If you get them in that order you can just stop when you are not enjoying them any more. Although if you stop before Yellow Submarine at least download the track Hey Bulldog. If, however, you get to the end, you'll be a convert and will probably have started reading books about them. So if there's anything you have read about that sounds interesting and it's, ahem, not available on Amazon, let me know and I'll do you a copy.

Or you can drift into their solo work then. But beware and don't start buying their solo albums willy nilly, cos each of them has done enough rubbish to put you off if you listen to the wrong ones. Paul has done four really great solo albums and a couple of good ones, John one really great one and a few very good ones, George one really great one and a few good but inconsistent ones and Ringo one good one. After that you'd be best advised cherry picking songs from the rest of their albums.

And I'd pretty much advise staying away from anything made by their offspring or spouses!

I like The Beatles. A lot.

 

I'd go for the later stuff myself I love the White Album and Let It Be though Revolver is also fantastic as is Abbey Road. I'm less keen on the earlier stuff but still moments of genius.

 

I don't get it why most people seem to rate "Revolver" as the best Beatles album. I think it's actually my second least favourite, the worst being "Beatles For Sale". Of course, even those two are still great albums...

Oh, I forgot "Let It Be"... and "Yellow Submarine" isn't a proper album.

 

It goes in circles. In the 80s it was widely accepted that Sgt Pepper was their best, but it swung in the 90s to Revolver. Over the past few years it has swung again and Abbey Road is now viewed by many as their best. Abbey Road is astonishingly good, even with Maxwells Silver Hammer and Octopus's Garden on there. Actually, I quite like Octopus's Garden. Just listen to the drumming on Come Together though and it blows all these stupid 'Ringo was a rubbish drummer' arguments out of the water.

To answer your question about Revolver, all the songs stand up individually. Yes, even Yellow Submarine. And then you have to put it in the context of when it was released. Just a couple of years after Beatle For Sale, where they were still doing cover versions of things like an old Frankie Vaughan number. Only Dylan and, to a lesser extent, The Beach Boys were anywhere close to them at that time. But apart from the Eleanor Rigby/Yellow Submarine double A-Side there were no other singles on Revolver, and yet there are so many songs on there that are so well known - Taxman, And Your Bird Can Sing, Got To Get You Into My Life, Here, There And Everywhere, Tomorrow Never Knows (which was more or less the template for Oasis). Their closest UK rivals at the time were the Stones, but most people (or your average man on the street at any rate) would be hard pressed to name a Stones album track until around 1968 (when the Stones moved up a gear and into proper greatness by stopping trying to copy The Beatles!).

 

Best band ever, just ridiculous how many songs/albums that are regarded as some of the best ever made (rightly so) came from them in such a short space of time.

As has already been said there's a FEW poor songs but they're rare. Even the songs regarded as filler songs on their album would be most other bands big hit if they'd released it. Can't begin to tell you what the best song/album is because it changes on mood and they really covered a wide range of styles. You should just listen to all of them, they were special

I also like The Beatles. A lot.

 

All of what you said. They were the best band in the history of music. Plus they wrote loads of stuff for other people too. We will never see their like again.

 

As much as I love the Beatles, (and that's a lot!) if we are talking quality output in a shprt space of time, no-one can beat Bob Dylan's first 7 albums 1962-66. Even the Beatles would admit that. Maybe Daniel Johnston is the only one who could come close.

Gordon's right. Pepper, White album, Revolver, currently Abbey Road - all take turns in being the best. It helps to sell copies of Mojo, Q, etc...

 

With the Beatles is my favourite, it was their second studio album (i think) every track on that album you just think "wow, they make most artists efforts at making an album today look proper crap" or words to that effect anyway

 

You are 50 years behind lad.

 

Revolver is not one of my favourites but it has some incredible songs on it. The guitar sound and production in general is also seminal, just an album that spawned an entire indie sound. Bright, is how I would deem it. And silver.

Lennon's songs on it are wry and brilliant and Here there and everywhere is a total melodic classic.

If you like Rubber Soul you'll like Revolver; they're like sibling albums

 

My quick take:

The early albums have lots of stuff that by other bands would be a bit throwaway, and yet each album has stone cold beautiful moments. The Beatles just doing anything has some kind of freaky alignment of harmony and soul that sounds incredible. So I'd agree that any album is worth listening to.

Rubber Soul is the first album I think is really brilliant. I talked about Revolver above. Sgt. Peppers is obviously incredible in terms of recording innovation, English eccentricity and songcraft.

After that you get the Magical mystery Tour which is a bit of a hotch potch of quirky psychedelia and bona fide world conquering singles.

The White Album is probably my favourite album enduring over the years. It is more like a double album of solo projects but has so much variety on it: pastoral folk like Blackbird, and whimsical 20s songs and proto metal Helter Skelter by McCartney, really soulful but cynical songs by Lennon. Harrison coming into his own for the first time . You'll hate bits, and love lots probably. I love the production on that album so much, it's stunning. And as I'm a Lennon man, I think it's possibly his finest hour as a Beatle.

Let it Be as they were disintegrating is a faux -live album- they were all falling out and so it never quite worked out that way, but like all their stuff it has good performances and songs on it. Big hits, but augmented by Phil Spector's strings much to McCartney's chagrin.

Abbey Road was my favourite album as a teenager. It has a whole atmosphere imbued by it being consciously their last album. It has truly beautiful songs on it and tons of harmonic production and moog synthesisers. Side two is a seguing medley of brilliant pop which is at turn moving (golden slumbers) and then dark or perverted (polythene pam/ mean mr mustard).


The Beatles are a proper one-off experience. Glad you got past the hype to discover them. Depending what you're into I would recommend lennon's Plastic Ono Band album as one of my top 5 favourite albums ever: raw incredible soulful music

 

'Best band ever, just ridiculous how many songs/albums that are regarded as some of the best ever made (rightly so) came from them in such a short space of time.

As has already been said there's a FEW poor songs but they're rare. Even the songs regarded as filler songs on their album would be most other bands big hit if they'd released it. Can't begin to tell you what the best song/album is because it changes on mood and they really covered a wide range of styles. You should just listen to all of them, they were special.'

'All of what you said. They were the best band in the history of music. Plus they wrote loads of stuff for other people too. We will never see their like again.'

Is correct.

 

In terms of Daniel Johnston, you'll have to lay some on me. I love Continued Story ( HI How are you) and have the one that is with it which I like, not as much tho.

 

Try some Rolling Stones as well - 'Exile on Main Street' & 'Sticky Fingers' especially.

 

There's also the films if you haven't seen them. A Hard Day's Night is my favourite. Then Help!, Yellow Submarine. Then Magical Mystery Tour, which wasn't much cop.

 

good shout lad, up there for me as well, Imagine wasn't quite as good but some unreal moments. Lennon was a genius. McCartney is too, but John had an edge that set him apart.