Paul was the dominant creative force in the Beatles from Sgt. Peppers on.

That created a great deal of tension in the band. While John was semi checked out and devoting his time to his two mistresses Yoko and Heroin, he was still one is the greatest creative forces in popular music and still more prolific than the vast number of songwriters.

Meanwhile, George was turning into a major creative force as well.

Add to that Paul’s debacles with Magical Mystery Tour and Apple Corps, the latter almost bankrupting the Beatles.

The other three Beatles saw their band becoming Paul’s band, and didn’t like it.

For a while John envisioned a new band with George and Ringo and himself, with Klaus Voorman on bass and possibly Billy Preston. That combination actually played together on exactly one song — a Ringo song “I’m the Greatest”, written by John.

John wanted to play at the Concert for Bangladesh, which would have meant playing with George, Ringo, Klaus and Billy as well as Eric Clapton, who John included earlier as part of the Plastic Ono Band.
Yoko demanded John not play without her, and George refused to invite her. That supposedly was a big part of both John’s rift with Yoko that sent him off with May Pang and also John’s rift with George.

From a commercial point of view, Paul was not only a more prolific writer but also far more popular with people who actually bought records. John was getting into the avant- garde and was writing more interesting songs which didn’t sell well.

I don’t think The Beatles have aged well. Especially their later albums. Lots of the lyrics make no sense and they seemed like they were trying too hard to fit into the psychedelic era.

A good example of the difference between songwriting and poetry.

Even in translation, poetry is much, much more:

MY LIFE

You’re going someplace without me, my life.
You’re rolling away.
And I’m still waiting to make my move.
You’ve taken the battle somewhere
Abandoning me on the way.
I never followed, I stay.
Where you are leading me,
I can’t plainly see.
The very little that I want,
you never bring to me.
Because of this emptiness, I want
So many things, almost the infinite…
Because of this emptiness,
that you never fill.

What Was the Beatles’ Worst Effort? As I’ve commented here before, “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” ftw–or ftl I guess? In my family’s book anyway…

https://www.unz.com/isteve/happy-80th-birthday-to-paul-mccartney/#comment-5398724

“Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup”
Incidentally, this is the image I keep when saying the Sanctus Eucharistic Prayer “Heaven and Earth are full of Your Glory…”
I don’t care for Lennon, but those lyrics have struck a “chord” with me ever since listening to the Beatles in college.
Neil Finn referenced that lyric in the far superior Don’t Dream It’s Over, “There is freedom within
There is freedom without
Try to catch the deluge in a paper cup”

Let It Be was probably their weakest album. A friend of mine who has been a student of the Fab Four going on 5 decades says the high quality of songs on Abbey Road is partly due to the somewhat pedestrian nature of LIB. Sort of like Paul and John said, “let’s make up for that clunker with a great one”. But, I said, Abbey Road came before LIB. To which he replied, “RELEASED before, RECORDED after!”

A number of Beatles fans I know say Abbey Road is their favorite. Still waiting for someone to say the same about Let It Be.

Worst effort? Hm, there’re probably quite a few subpar efforts that only sold because of the Beatles’ star power.

I prefer to think about and listen to their grand slams:

Prefer this version:

“One After 909” is a sloppy mess.

What makes it even worse is comparing it to earlier versions the Beatles recorded but didn’t release.

To me, one of the interesting things about the group was the evolution of their musical abilities from the time they hit the scene until the breakup. They had noticeably improved quite a bit. Oh, and Yellow Submarine was pretty awful.

paul was as talented as you could want but there was always an undercurrent of glib cheapness to him. he needed lennon around to call him on that. see, eg, wings or his awful christmas song.

OT:

anna khachiyan didn’t even lead with a steve sailer article this time on red scare.

she just started talking about how she wanted to do “an art project” of steve sailer in long wool coat in the black and white style of a brioni campaign. like this, i suppose:

and dasha had to be reminded of who james carville is. thank god we’re at the point where adults don’t remember a time when he was considered important.

The Beatles were not happy about the way the Phil Spector produced ‘Long and Winding Road’ turned out. Paul still bears a grudge about it. But on the other hand, what did they expect given Spector’s penchant for over complication and over production?

Anyway, it’s hard now to think of the song without the angelic choirs and dramatic pauses now – radically different to his McCartney intended it.

Certain Beatles songs such as ‘A Little Help from my Friends’ and ‘Ob la di ob la da’ were perhaps rendered more memorable by other artistes.

One reason Across the Universe didn’t become as big of a hit as it might have is probably the “jai guru dava, ohm” pre chorus. It fits perfectly well melodically, but I’m guessing the words threw some listeners off.

Also, the transitions between lines in the verses, e.g. from “they slither wildly as they make their way across the universe” to “pools of sorrow waves of joy…” involves a sort of awkward, tossed-in half measure (or a measure of 6/4, depending on how you want to slice it), with the guitar playing a 7 chord for a couple beats while nothing really happens. That’s the sort of thing that more workshopping could have ironed out.

The recording does feel a bit unfinished, but I always considered that part of the song’s charm. It has a bit of a “lo-fi” quality, like some of John’s solo work.

You can imagine a beefed up version with more input from the other Beatles—say, Paul providing melodic counterpoint in the bass line, George throwing in some tasteful licks, perhaps on the sitar, more harmonies on the pre chorus—but… I’m not sure that would have made it a better song. I consider it one of their very best, just the way it is.

Political seriousness.
———-
OT — Years ago, anon on 4chan said: “The covid death counts are exaggerrated. Hospitals are receiving federal money for each death blamed on covid, so deaths which are clearly due to something else are counted as ‘covid’ if covid is ‘present.’” Then two years went by. Yesterday mainstream respected epidemiologist Daniel Halperin said in Time magazine … what anon said.
https://archive.ph/bRK8o

For over a year, it has been apparent that many hospitalizations officially classified as being due to COVID-19 are instead of patients without COVID symptoms who are admitted for other reasons but also happen to test positive. Since nearly everyone is still routinely swabbed upon hospital admission (although the largest infection control organization has recommended against doing so), many patients with other conditions also receive a positive test result, especially during the ongoing Omicron surges—thereby overstating the number of hospitalizations tabulated as caused by COVID-19. UCLA researchers who examined Los Angeles County Public Hospital data discovered that over two-thirds of official COVID-19 hospitalizations since January 2022 were actually “with” rather than “for” the disease.
A rigorous Massachusetts assessment determined that a comparable proportion of COVID hospitalizations were in fact incidental to the coronavirus. An attending physician at Emory Decatur Hospital (and former president of Georgia’s chapter of the Infectious Diseases Society) cited by Dr. Wen estimates that some 90% of patients diagnosed with COVID at his hospital are now instead being treated for another illness. Wen also quoted Tufts Hospital’s epidemiologist, who similarly observes that recently the proportion of patients hospitalized for COVID-19 has been as low as 10% of the number reportedly having the disease. All this is fully consistent with the reality that by March 2022 over 95% of people had already been infected or vaccinated or typically both, and the resulting robust population immunity combined with the less virulent nature of Omicron results in far fewer severe outcomes.

I’d have to say “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” is their, or McCartney’s, worst effort. It’s overproduced schlock. And he put the others through hell recording it.

McCartney’s new mix/remastering of the LIB album, LIB Naked, goes some way in reducing it’s problems. He got rid of Phil Spector’s overdone orchestration. He definitely improved The Long and Winding Road and Across the Universe.

They were both a lot better together. Paul’s post-B output has ten mehs to one decent and 0.5 classics, if that.

Yes Paul was the driving force of the band but he’d be the Beatle I’d least like to have met. Smug and condescending to his core.

The other three all had some traits that would at least be fun to spend some time with. John had a sharper humor and underrated cynicism that the “Imagine” myth papers over. George was serious and hardworking and actually believed the Hindu practices that other celebrities invoked in trendy bullshit.

And of course Ringo was the life of the party and a normal guy who didn’t become an ass or develop any ugly characteristics despite being surrounded by musical geniuses all the time.

As to their worst efforts, some of the early songs were “boy band” fluff: Chuck Berry without much wit, and less libido. The early ‘60s weren’t good for rock music in general and the Beatles’ transformation between 1965 and 1970 is unprecedented, when you think about where they started.

Lennon was a commie, and like all commies a hypocrite and a coward.

His legacy is Yoko Ono.

Great choice, but I still hold out for MMT. Sorry…I just loved that album.

I think LIB is a fine little album. For the worst, I’m not sure but if you close your eyes and randomly point to the White Album song list you are likely to select a good candidate for worst song.

Fiona Apple’s 1998 cover was a brilliant reimagining of the song, and most covers by women since then are more influenced by that than by the original.

Ringo’s first wife, Maureen, said Ringo was very much like the comic strip character Andy Capp. The sort of lad who liked to hang out with his mates and drink a lot. Except substitute music for soccer

When Rory and the Hurricanes were performing in Hamburg, they were often part of the same set as the Beatles. Ringo liked the Beatles music better and sometimes liked to hang out with the Beatles. Pete Best didn’t hang out with his band mates. When Pete was not available to play, Ringo would occasionally fill in for him. The other Beatles realized that not only was Ringo a much better drummer but that they enjoyed his company much more

Worst effort would be Wild Honey Pie. For something more substantial in length, Honey Pie.

One could also make a case for Revolution #9.

Yes, the White Album is an inconsistent mess.

Paul wasn’t happy. He felt Spector ruined his songs. The Long & Winding Road maybe needed the strings and choir, but I think he ‘naked’ version of Let It Be is superior to the original mix. You can really hear the band’s harmonies without the added stuff, and they sound really good together.

For the worst, some of their early songs were rushed without much thought. I don’t ever need to hear Mr. Moonlight again.

get back does include good litmus test for where you lean:

get back vs. don’t let me down.

get back is a well done paul boogie. but don’t let me down has soul. you believe john but not paul.

in the words of george carlin, “the wrong two beatles died first.”

also love john’s call out of mick and the stones in the interview. ‘this guy is talking about the beatles? mick?’

and, “who cares if george quits? we’ll just replace him with eric clapton.”

Fiona Apple does what I believe to be the very best cover of “Across the Universe”.

> paul was as talented as you could want but there was always an undercurrent of glib cheapness to him. he needed lennon around to call him on that. see, eg, wings or his awful christmas song.

There is a bit of fakeness to Paul, but there’s also self-destruction, nihilism, and self-importance to John.

I think modernity is a path John would have supported more than Paul, which is to say that I think John’s personality is ultimately more destructive than Paul’s.

Of course, I don’t know either of them, so take with a grain of salt.

The Beatles music will remain popular forever.
The Beatles movies, not so much.

Lots of filler on the White Album. It could have been a good single-disc album.

Beatles Best: Let It Be, Revolution, I Saw Her Standing There
Beatles Worst: Rocky Raccoon, Yellow Submarine, Blackbird

George also had some notable songs on Abbey Road, so there was a real confluence of creativity for that opus.

Hey, there was that German guy (born in Bonn, 1770) who had a pretty good creative period from age 32-42. You ever come up with a theory on that? Mine is that the classical genre has so many more layers than the rock genre, it just took LVB more time to unpeel them and in turn, reveal his genius. At least, that’s my story.

They released a stripped-down version of the album in 2003, and “Across the Universe” sounds far better on that record.

Why did you find the line “Nothing’s gonna change my world” sad? I thought it was just a reference to the hippie Krisha/Buddhist religion they were all into for a time. I remember reading about that stuff back in the day…lots of talk about letting thoughts and emotions just flow in an out, across the universe, if you will.

I’ll say it: Let It Be was my favourite, but not the finished Phil Spector product … Peter Jackson did no great service to bringing the sessions to life, but instead gave a rather limited taste that leaves the viewer/listener wanting more … completion. Too many damned fragments. The aborted Get Back album from 1970was a pretty good collection of finished product, but without the interesting interaction bits.

Abbey Road was produced by George Martin. Need one say more about why it was a superior studio album?

Beatles’ worst effort? You Know my Name.

I don’t get popular dismissal of early Beatles. The Cavern Club through “Help” is the real deal, pure rock’n’roll, Chuck Berry plus the Everly Brothers. Berry invented the structure but the only thing he had on the Beatles was better recording sound. The Beatles were every bit as urgent and rocking, as millions of hot, sweaty girls attested to.

I was in the room during Sullivan in ’64 but too young to care. I began to listen to them as a young adult, originally the art-rock tunes starting with Revolver, Hey Jude, Sgt. Peppers, etc.; they were evocative of memories growing up.

Then I found the “Red” album, 1962 – 1966. McCartney, probably George Martin, too, liked the occasional show tune but a few ballads only lay in relief to definitive rock. John Lennon himself said, Nobody could touch us. I still like the White Album but even an early obscurity like their “Leave My Kitten Alone” jumps out of the speakers and makes me dance across the kitchen.

Let It Be was probably their weakest album

Of course, that depends on what you’re counting as an “album.” It was certainly better than some of their early compilation records, and better than Magical Mystery Tour and Yellow Submarine (I don’t count either one as an album). But yeah, I’d rank it below Rubber Soul, Revolver, Sgt Pepper’s, The White Album, and Abbey Road.

Let It Be had two great songs on it—Let It Be and Across the Universe, two very good songs on it—Get Back and Don’t Let Me Down, and two pretty good songs—I’ve Got a Feeling (more like “I’ve got a hard on,” as John quipped) and Two of Us. I’ve also always had a soft spot for One After 909, although it gets a lot of hate. It’s one of the first songs they ever wrote together.

I Me Mine is George at his most annoyingly pious. For You Blue is fine as filler (“go Johnny go”).

I never liked The Long and Winding Road, so I never got worked up over how Phil Spector murdered it. I thought it was Paul at his most maudlin and self-indulgent. Actually no, that would be She’s Leaving Home on Sgt Pepper’s, but TLAWR is a close second.

Hey, he could have compared you to current-day DiCaprio.

“Paul was the driving force of the band but he’d be the Beatle I’d least like to have met. Smug and condescending to his core.”

This seems rather unfair. Paul was a naturally talented musical gent who also had the leg’s-up thru growing up in a musical family. Plus he also had the good luck of being around good musical influences throughout his early years. Good on him: he was smart and sharp, and plus he was in the right place at the right time. Had he not met Lennon, you could pretty much swap him out for Ray Davies. What he didn’t have, and what Lennon did, was the personal experience of severe emotional torture, and forcing it into his art. This is what makes Paul seem bland and glib and easy (which he isn’t), compared to Lennon.

Paul is a perfectly good artist; Lennon is almost the definitionary definition of “tortured artist.” Don’t you dare make fun of Lennon’s pain: you have no idea what you’re talking about.

PAUL: “Back in the USSR” (cheeky, tuff, funny, smart)
JOHN: “Dear Prudence” (insightful, weird, much better musical conception)

Ye pays yer dime, yer takes yer choice.

As to their worst efforts, some of the early songs were “boy band” fluff:

It was the “boy band fluff”, such as “Not a Second Time”, that first attracted notice that they were composers to be taken seriously. The tunes buried under tons of bells and whistles of their post-touring days are less impressive. (Sorry for the mixed metaphor.)

And of course Ringo was the life of the party and a normal guy who didn’t become an ass or develop any ugly characteristics despite being surrounded by musical geniuses all the time.

He was also the least Celtic of the four. Coincidence?

Robert Christgau said ‘Fool on the Hill’ might be the Beatles’ worst song, and he might have been right. It is rubbish.

Back when you still bought vinyl records, I sprung for first the red Greatest Hits album, and then the Blue one when I had the money. (Each was a double album.) That Red one had all the old simple pop songs that, at the time, I liked better. The Blue one had more of the “weird” (to me at the time) stuff.

I wanted nothing to do with all that Indian Guru crap, but than I listened to Across the Universe. Wow. My mind got lost in it almost like some of the best Dead songs! Then I had a someone bad occurrence happen, and I played that song a bunch of times – made me feel much better.

I strongly disagree about the one line. I think John was singing about his weird drugged-out state of mind, and it’s one in which he’d have liked to have stayed in.

.

Oh, worst Beatles effort? Yoko Ono? (You coulda’ done better!)

Certain Beatles songs such as ‘A Little Help from my Friends’ and ‘Ob la di ob la da’ were perhaps rendered more memorable by other artistes.

Someone rendered “With a Little Help from my Friends” better than the Beatles?

Who? I’d like to hear that version. Please don’t say Joe Cocker.

Now if there are recordings of Willie Nelson or Johnny Cash putting their own spin on the song, please let us know.

Simple cheat sheet: Buddy Holly plus Little Richard plus AE Houseman minus Brian Wilson plus Arshile Gorky = Beatles.

Pete Best was the pretty boy who got all the female attention, which greatly annoyed the others. There was no danger of that with Ringo.

Ringo always knew his place and was careful not to overstep it. In the recent documentary I was surprised to see him playing piano, I had always assumed he was “just a drummer”. But it makes sense, as he was the only one of the four who received a proper musical education.

Oh, and you couldn’t just look up the lyrics back then, so I thought John was singing “Kangaroo days, ahhhhh”.

Hey, chronic Lyricosis is NOT a laughing matter!

what was the state of PA tech during their time? that Shea Stadium appearance in 1965 was a preposterous endeavor. no wonder Beatles fans always talk about the women at the shows screaming so loud they were drowning out the band. they had no stack. the watts in and decibels out had to be seriously low even by 1975 standards, 10 years later. did the Beatles ever play at even 100 decibels? a stadium full of people screaming is way louder than that. all the videos make it sound like they’re playing in the 90 decibel range. that’s not loud enough, even for 1960s pop rock.

The only reason “Across the Universe” was included on the Let It Be album is because John’s songwriting had deteriorated considerably by that time. The song was a good deal better than most of what John had to offer for the Get Back project (although “Don’t Let Me Down” was good, and I’ll never understand why it was left off the album). John’s other songs on the album don’t measure up, and can only be considered filler.

He [Ringo] was…the least Celtic of the four…

You must have missed the quote from Paleo Liberal:

Ringo’s first wife, Maureen, said Ringo was very much like the comic strip character Andy Capp. The sort of lad who liked to hang out with his mates and drink a lot.

Want to reassess?

Other considerations:
1. Mick Jaegger: Normal? Not an ass? “Celtic?” ???
2. Liverpool is not an Anglo-Saxon stronghold except for their use of the English language. Unless they’ve been totally overrun by immigrants, typical Liverpudlians are primarily descended from Celtic speaking peoples (British/Welsh, Irish, Scots, …).

Worst song: Why Don’t We Do It in the Road? A throw away song that the Beatles dared their fan base to like.

There’s a debate in rock as to whether or not the best music has to be complicated to be good: e.g., Prog Rock vs. Punk. Paul tended to write the most complicated, and in my opinion, the most beautiful Beatles songs: Penny Lane, Martha My Dear, Golden Slumbers, etc. John’s writing oftentimes started with the blues, which led to simpler ditties such as Come Together, Revolution, and Yer Blues.

It appears John’s creative juices were nearly exhausted after Sargeant Pepper’s… Perhaps his drug use was muddling his brain too much to write great music. Maybe John resented Paul for the latter’s continued high productivity in the later Beatles years.

Post Beatles, Paul McCartney and Wings procduced some great music, while John dabbled in the studio with his talentless hack of a wife. Paul demonstrated once again in the post-Beatles period that he was the dominant force in music.

Revolution 9 (Remastered 2009) · The Beatles

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolution_9

https://ultimateclassicrock.com/worst-beatles-songs/

Worst Beatles song is Mr Moonlight.

I thought everyone knew that.

The Beatles have not aged well. Too much of their stuff comes across as cringey/treacly/forced these days. Some of their earliest work still has that spark, though. There’s more magic dust in I Saw Her Standing there than Sgt. Peppers. The Stones on the other hand–their deep cuts and medium cuts still have that edge.

Hmm. Stirring up old Beatles controversies, delving into Kennedy assassination conspiracies and driving like grandma’s: you guys might wanna consider newer material and less old ladylike standards of behavior.

Generally whoever wrote most of the song, Paul or John, sang lead, although both were credited as song writers.

Paul could write some great songs, (Back in the USSR, anyone?), but he wrote a lot of fluffy stuff. John’s cynicism calmed down his worst tendencies.

When Rory and the Hurricanes were performing in Hamburg, they were often part of the same set as the Beatles. Ringo liked the Beatles music better and sometimes liked to hang out with the Beatles. Pete Best didn’t hang out with his band mates. When Pete was not available to play, Ringo would occasionally fill in for him. The other Beatles realized that not only was Ringo a much better drummer but that they enjoyed his company much more</blockquote

Purported that when he was asked who was a better drummer John said “Pete was a better drummer, Ringo was a better Beatle”.

wiki: In 2012, “The Fool on the Hill” was ranked the 420th-best classic rock song of all time by New York’s Q104.3.[68] In 2006, Mojo ranked it 71st in the magazine’s list of “The 101 Greatest Beatles Songs”.[69] In 2018, the music staff of Time Out London ranked it at number 34 on their list of the best Beatles songs.[70]

FYI: You do know that Christgau is an idiot? NOT respected at all–a joke!

I love Across the Universe and precisely for the reasons John rubbishes the song in THIS quote. It is the atonal quality. Something about which much ink has been spilled regarding the Beatles and John in particular, that he introduced atonality in their songs because he liked it so much in country music (older country music). From what I think I know about John I would hesitate to declare this a definitive statement from him given his tendency to mess with interviewers especially, for awhile, when the subject of McCartney came up.

John was the second best songwriter of all time, just behind Paul.. but you’re right about across the universe.. Great song really great

Joe Cocker, Chris Stainton, and Jimmy Page’s rendition of With A Little Help From My Friends puts the original to shame.

If you type some of Steve’s tweets into a free GPT model and then put someone’s comment at the end, you can get it to reply to stuff as Steve:

“A lot of the Beatles’ later work (starting from “Help!”) was written as tongue-in-cheek satire of drug-addled hippies. I thought some of it was good, and maybe it is only in hindsight that it doesn’t sound that fresh to younger ears.”

The tweets list prompt can be found here: https://pastebin.com/NZfrkEKw

There’s also a link at the top to a free GPT playground unrelated to ChatGPT.

Not a single vote for Rocky Raccoon? In that Playboy interview (which we read over and over again on my dorm floor when it came out), Lennon goes out of his way to claim that it was all Paul’s idea and that he wouldn’t have touched the Gideon’s Bible thing with a mile long pole.

When I put the Beatles channel as a favorite on XM I found out that I don’t want to hear any of it anymore

The Beatles worst song : Within You Without You by George Harrison.

Certainly the worst and most-skipped track on the Sgt Pepper album.

A quick search on Youtube show the relative popularity of Beatles songs.

https://www.youtube.com/@TheBeatles/videos

Don’t Let Me Down (on the roof of the Apple offices) current fave with 420M views!

Revolution 9

I hate that song. Absolutely despise it. Frankly, I’d rather listen to a troop of rabid howler monkeys cutting each other up with chainsaws.

This young lady has a fantastic voice and loves doing Beetle’s covers.

I love Across the Universe and precisely for the reasons John rubbishes the song in THIS quote. It is the atonal quality.

“Out of tune” aka “atonal.” “Modern” and “postmodern” art (painting, music, sculpture, architecture) is promoted by Jewish “critics” to make Jewish deficiencies (no eye or ear for beauty) into special, higher “talents.” “You just don’t appreciate it, goy.”

Compare:

“It’s a feature, not a bug.”

Alvy Singer: “I can’t help it, I’m anal.”
Annie Hall: “That’s a polite word for what you are.”

Oh brother, throw a dart at any song on the White Album and it will likely be complete garbage.

Lowlights include:
Savoy Truffle
Rocky Raccoon
Why don’t we do it in the road

The Beatles are 10-15% of the reason I do not remember the 60’s fondly.

There’s a YT video where someone has edited together the title drop or main riff of every Beatle song, in reverse order of popularity (measured by number of downloads). I listened to the whole thing. I don’t recall the details, but IIRC it’s interesting to see what people like, or at least are willing to download. The bottom I think is mostly the old “boy band” stuff, not “Revolution 9” as you might expect, although some of it crops up higher up as well. I guess it depends on what shows up on TV or commercials and then people seek it out.

Nah; it was light-hearted, cheerful stuff. The worst popular music is always earnest rubbish.

“Hold Me Tight” in 1964 got a lot of criticism because Paul McCartney was singing way out of tune. The song sounds terrible.

One reason Across the Universe didn’t become as big of a hit as it might have is probably the “jai guru dava, ohm” pre chorus. It fits perfectly well melodically, but I’m guessing the words threw some listeners off.

It’s Jai Gurudeva, Om.

Christgau really dislikes Paul’s music

Ram ( 1971) is a classic.

Someone rendered “With a Little Help from my Friends” better than the Beatles?

Who? I’d like to hear that version. Please don’t say Joe Cocker.

Tommy Eyre

There are some fantastic songs on Let it Be (I’ve Got a Feeling and Across the Universe being my favorites) but it’s certainly a flawed album. That said, when I think of what The Beatles “weakest effort” was, I think you have to start from the moment after they created their first masterpiece: A Hard Days Night (i.e., nobody would seriously answer the question what is their “weakest effort” with Please Please Me or With the Beatles even though those are objectively the Beatles two “worst” albums).

Anyhoo, by that criteria, I’d say their “weakest effort” by far was Help! There are three songs (Help!, Yesterday and Ticket to Ride) that are Mt. Rushmore-level pre-Rubber Soul masterpieces, with The Night Before and You’re Going to Loose That Girl really solid. The rest of the album…not so much. There’s some real flab on side two (minus Yesterday, of course). My gut feeling is that the Beatles just wanted a (much deserved) vacation and making up a film where they got to go skiing in the Alps and swimming in the Bahamas sounded like a really swell idea and half the music ended up being kinda an after thought.

Plus (like all white musicians) they ripped off People of Color

Meanwhile the big question remains unanswered (and even unasked).

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2023-01-20/new-wealth-tax-introduced-california

On January 19, a new wealth tax was introduced in the California Legislature. Assembly Constitutional Amendment (ACA) 3 was introduced by Assemblyman Alex Lee (D-Palo Alto)

To whence will iSteve flee?

I don’t think The Beatles have aged well. Especially their later albums. Lots of the lyrics make no sense and they seemed like they were trying too hard to fit into the psychedelic era.

Correct.

The Beatles stuff is really time+place stuff. I can not think of anything they did that has any sort of shelf-life. Even now the Beatles are not much on “Classic Rock”. And of the oldster stuff the kids are willing to listen to or have picked up–the Beatles are basically non-existent.

You can go through the Billboard top 100 from each year of the 60s and pick out maybe 3-5 songs that plausibly some people might be think this is good and want to listen to or musicians might want to cover in 50 or 100 years. The Beatles will be none of these.

When we Boomers die, the Beatles will die with them. Their only revival will be in movies parsing the 60s trying to illuminate the great unraveling.

Supposedly George Martin wanted to cut the White Album in half. He wanted to take about half of the album for immediate release, save a quarter for half of a future album, and trash about a quarter.

Trouble is, the Beatles had been so prolific in the past that their contract required a ton of music to be released. By that time they had spent so much time in India and then months recording, so to keep up with their contract it had to be a double album.

Abbey Road was produced by George Martin. Need one say more about why it was a superior studio album?

Martin is the real “5th Beatle”. Anyone who is a) truly musical, and b) well acquainted with Beatles production lore (ie via the “Beatles Recording Sessions” coffee table book), is well aware that it’s Martin’s contribution that profoundly conditioned future pop music production values.

Besides being the super producer and mixdown genius, he did virtually all of the arrangements (strings, horns, etc), and frequently played keyboards (e.g. “Good Day Sunshine”).

Runner up is Emerick. Note also that some of biggest producers of the 70s – Glyn Johns (Who’s Next), Alan Parsons (Dark Side of the Moon) – cut their teeth as tape ops (and the like) at Abbey Road.

Lennon was dismissive of Martin, quipping “What has he done since then? What is he doing now?” Besides the fact that Martin, already in his 50s, produced the Wings material, along w/Jeff Beck, there is great irony to Lennon’s comment, given that the question “what did you do after the Beatles?” doesn’t leave Lennon looking great. Drinking himself into a stupor w Nillson doesn’t count for much, nor does recording the screams of the ugliest, least talented woman in musical history – and his final album is a retro, old timey R&R piece of crap.

“Second: The Beatles’ recording isn’t very good.”

One main reason: Phil Spector. Spector produced Let it Be, and overproduced it with strings and other things that John didn’t like. On the Beatles’s Rarities album released in early ’80’s, the original version without Spector’s influence is included. Yet one more example that Phil Spector when he dealt with genuine artists above his teen bubble gum paygrade, tended to suck.

John Lennon never wanted to be a sidekick to anyone. He wanted to be the one with chief attention focused on himself. Certainly wasn’t about to cede the lead title to McCartney.

They were both a lot better together.

They kept each other honest. Everyone else was too busy worshipping them to offer criticism. Well, except George Martin. But he was older.

The Beatles have been deliberately suppressed. Their music is too intelligent. You wouldn’t understand.

The Long and Winding Road and She’s Leaving Home are great, unique, complex.

You have the taste of the typical rock critic. Fatuous.

““Hold Me Tight” in 1964 got a lot of criticism because Paul McCartney was singing way out of tune.”

Music falls victim to in-tune pedantry like any other form of expression. In-tune as often equates to dull as otherwise. Muzak is reliably in tune.

Even now the Beatles are not much on “Classic Rock”.

That says more about “classic” rock than about the Beatles. The stations around here play noisy crap from about 1975 onward.

The early Beatle tunes were innovative, but the puppy-love lyrics hold them back. Much of their “middle period” is solid songcraft, and would be fine in the hands of performers who had any respect for the form, were any extant.

What’s mystifying is the high regard for their weak stuff. “Yesterday” is inferior to “World Without Love”, which Paul wrote for his girlfriend’s brother. “A Day in the Life” is little different from “Another Day”, which John savaged on his own solo album: The only thing you done was yesterday / And since you’ve gone you’re just another day. Why anyone plays “Come Together” anymore is beyond me. It sucked at the time.

I’ll take “From Me to You” any day.

Easy, Let it Be

Someday — maybe twenty years from now — somebody is going to do a sociological analysis of the Covid hysteria.

…it was interesting — would have been more interesting if one hadn’t had to put up with it…for years. I was tired of it six weeks after it started.

Toot my own horn here…

https://colinwrightssite.wordpress.com/2020/03/16/this-is-starting-to-seriously-irritate-me/

“Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup
They slither wildly as they slip away across the universe
Pools of sorrow, waves of joy are drifting through my opened mind
Possessing and caressing me”

Pretty deep for me. I like my dorm-room philosophy stream-of-consciousness a little more accessible.

The other three were half-Irish– Spike Milligan called them a bunch of Micks, and McCartney later said Spike got it right. Welsh and Scottish were in the mix as well.

Andy Capp was a Geordie. If Ringo resembled him, that helps make my point. Tyneside is near one Celtic land, Liverpool is by four.

“Don’t Let Me Down” was good, and I’ll never understand why it was left off the album[.]

What?

The later music was conceived and listened to as albums. The White Album is all one song, full of anomalies and artifacts and epiphenomena. Oh, forget it. Everything is fragmented into bite-size sound-bytes nowadays (like taking a White Album song out of its context) and then analyzed to death. Ruins everything. Just like you are doing.

Did their worst effort involve a fiddle?

I tend to like early Beatles better than later psychedelic Beatles, but I have to honestly say I prefer the Let It Be version of 909 over the earlier one. It’s looser, less formulaic (and Billy Preston’s piano line [which is the foundation of the later one] is catchy as hell).

I guess I’d explain it by pointing out that I guess I like the tight structure of rock songs circa late 50’s/early 60’s over the psychedelic more unstructured stuff of, say, 67/68, but performed with the more ad-lib style that psychedellia brought to the formerly rather stiff structured rock n roll genre pre-Beatles. That is, psychedelia Stones was worst Stones, but post-psychedelia, more ad-libbing, but back-to-basics blues-based song structure Stones of late-60’s/early 70’s was best Stones and was way better than their early blues based song-structure Stones pre-psychedelia.

Also, CCR was a back to traditional rock/blues song structure of late 50’s/early 60’s band, but was was way better than any of the pre-psychedelia blues/rock n roll songs they were emulating because they brought along the looser ad-libbing that the psychedelia explosion brought.

It’s such a bad Beatles song that it’s not even a Beatles song. It was a cover of a song recorded by Dr. Feelgood And The Interns.

I am reasonably certain that it is the last cover they recorded to make it on to a Beatles album. It was the penultimate song recorded during the Beatles For Sale sessions, and the last one, Leave My Kitten Alone, was omitted from it.

It’s such a bad Beatles song that it’s not even a Beatles song. It was a cover of a song recorded by Dr. Feelgood And The Interns.

I am reasonably certain that it is the last cover they recorded to make it on to a Beatles album. It was the penultimate song recorded during the Beatles For Sale sessions, and the last one, Leave My Kitten Alone, was omitted from it.

He plays piano…but only the white keys.

I play guitar, A – D – E.
I don’t play bass ’cause that’s too hard for me.
I play the piano if it’s in C.
And when I go to town I wanna see all three

From “Early 1970” by Richard Starkey, B-side of “It Don’t Come Easy”.

Andy Capp => Duck Test => Celt

Even Tyneside has a very strong “Celtic” (i.e., British) ancestry.

Leo rocks here:

I remember that in an interview from decades ago, Macca admitted that having pain and adversity in life causes one to produce greater art. Then he said, but who wants to go around living in a crisis all the time? 😆

Well- who aged well?

Oh, worst Beatles effort? Yoko Ono?

Someone wrote here that Yoko Ono was Curtis LeMay’s greatest miss.

There probably ought to be an album entitled Worst of the Beatles. Naturally it would be a collector’s item. This song possibly should have been dedicated to John Lennon’s first wife, but regardless of that, though it is a moving elegy to married life, it is rarely played at weddings.

A lot of McCartney’s post-Beatles stuff has gotten some critical reassessment from folks not tied as much to the Beatles like Christgau and Marcus. Ram was trashed but now has a lot of adherents.
Even McCartney II (out-take Secret Friend by electronica fans). There’s something good on most McCartney albums post Beatles, often having to wade through the rest:

McCartney, the first solo album, had That Would Be Something, tossed off catchy folk-blues. The Grateful Dead would cover it live (more Deadheads here than I realized judging by the recent comment section).

Ram I’d say my current favorite is Eat at Home, Buddy Holly-esque.

A Ram out-take on the remake of of The In-Laws soundtrack is A Love for You (features the fuzz bass from Think for Yourself by the Beatles).

Skipping Red Rose and Wild Life, Band on the Run got trashed by Christgau, but he later admitted Jet was “fun”. Marcus loved this album.

Venus and Mars had Rock Show and Magneto and Titanium Man. Sure, more fluff too. You Gave me the Answer just another in his string of music hall numbers he could toss off seemingly at will since when I’m 64 or Your Mother Should Know. Or Melanie’s Goodbye (which McCartney wrote. He produced Those Were the Days, her giant hit, after hearing it done by someone else in a London nightclub).

He tossed off the B side to Listen What the Man Said in one night. Daytime Nightime Suffering, Linda’s favorite.

Another B side, Girls’ School (the old perv).

Wings essentially were right up there as arena rock ’70s stars. Although yeah, it’s Paul.

Junior’s Farm, Helen Wheels. Hi Hi Hi. Not profound but whatever.

The ’80s, meh. Put it There was Good. Some of Tug of War.

Christgau actually lied Run Devil Run, mostly ’50s covers. No Other Baby But You was great. The Carl Perkins cover, Movie Magg, Coquette (Fats Domino).

Wings of a Nightengale, which he wrote for the Everly Brothers.

Going back to the Beatles Paul could always break out a good impression of early rockers. That’s Alright Mama etc. He and George do te Everly’s in Don’t Ever Change (which Goffin and King wrote for the Everly’s but they turned it down). I’m Down Little Richard style. Even on Abbey Road in Your Never Give Me Your Money he breaks into Elvis for the “outta college money spent, see no future, pay no rent” part.

For me they were as Beatles best just as they started to morph between early stuff and Rubber Soul. Some of the stuff on Beatles for Sale, like What Your Doin’.

Lennon’s I Don’t Want to Spoil the Party. McCartney says he contributed some of that, but who knows? Lennon sings lead, and sounds of a piece with that era. Nothin’ for me here, so I will disappear.” “I’ve had a drink or 2 and I don’t care.” A morose, obsessive. Lennon’s vocals and McCartney’s high harmonies, George’s Chet Atkins gretsch solo. Brit rockabilly. They were doing rock and roll almost since it started.

The Beatles worst effort? How ’bout their least effort?

Back when I was listening to classic rock at work, I would say ‘Paint it Black’ was the earliest song that would get played sorta regularly. Which seems about right, it sounds modern (mostly because of the much maligned [in that period] Brian Jones’s sitar).

The early Beatle tunes were innovative, but the puppy-love lyrics hold them back. Much of their “middle period” is solid songcraft, and would be fine in the hands of performers who had any respect for the form, were any extant.What’s mystifying is the high regard for their weak stuff.

With a nod to Huxley, part of the Boomers’ God complex is an inordinate fondness for Beatles.

If you don’t enjoy Within you Without You, you need stronger weed 😉

The Beatles stuff is really time+place stuff. I can not think of anything they did that has any sort of shelf-life.

I can name at least 40 Beatles songs that are brilliant and will be around for hundreds of years.

This IMO is the greatest love song of all time (and compositionally very complex):

“The one line chorus ‘Nothing’s gonna change my world’ is perhaps the saddest lyric ever written.”

Not sure why you think that.

I think any of these is sadder:

“Ah’m tired of livin’
An’ skeered of dyin’”

or “I hurt myself today
To see if I still feel”

or “All the lonely people
Where do they all come from?”

or “They will never forget you ’til somebody new
comes along”

Speaking of the Beatles, Sean Ono Lennon is pretty based. His Twitter is worth a follow.

Tweets by seanonolennon

McCartney later confessed that most of his immediate post-Beatle output was left “unfinished”. Apparently he was just lazy. His Christmas song is attractive but annoying, but it is annoying because it is attractive and unfinished. The frustration of an unfulfilled promise.

A few Decembers ago, I heard a couple of ladies sitting at the open piano at our airport playing a nice lilting tune which was familiar. I racked my brain trying to identify it, then it came to me: it was Lennon’s Christmas tune. And it actually is a tune, shorn of his at times bitter vocals and lyrics. Makes a good waltz.

I think there is something to that. I rate Abbey Road much lower than I used to, and I rate Sergeant Pepper lower. I always thought The Beatles (the white album) to have been 1 great album bloated into 2 mediocre albums.

So I think Revolver is their best, with Rubber Soul perhaps second best. I definitely prefer to listen to the first 5 (British albums) over the final 4 (British albums).

With a nod to Huxley, part of the Boomers’ God complex is an inordinate fondness for Beatles.

No, I’m a Tin Pan Alley buff slightly older than Steve (“Tin Pan Alley” to include its Broadway and Hollywood spawn). I judge popular music against a high standard. Lennon-McCartney met that standard a number of times. Few others of their ilk, or of those that came in their wake, managed to do so. Few of them even tried.

Bach was long ignored following his death, while several of his sons were celebrated across Europe. Dad regained his reputation once that “generation” of detractors itself passed on. This will likely happen with the Beatles as well. However, it won’t be their pretentious late stuff that will attract the yet-to-be-born. It will be the catchy “boy band” tunes.

Indeed so: they kept each other honest.

Their strengths were complementary. Paul was the gifted craftsman who took on many popular genres and made truly fine songs in those styles (“Yesterday”, “Got to Get You into My Life”). But John was an innovator who actually created new forms (“Tomorrow Never Knows”, “Strawberry Fields Forever”).

Paul’s weakness was, as has been mentioned a number of times in this thread, his tendency to the superficial and indeed twee (“Granny shit” in John’s immortal phrase). John’s weakness was a lack of discipline (see “Revolution 9” and Ono, Y.).

But they kept each other’s excesses under control, at least most of the time. They also made important contributions to each other’s songs, such as Paul’s bass lines to a number of Lennon’s pieces.

Paul’s talent still had a few years to run when The Beatles split (McCartney, Ram, Band on the Run) but a decade after that he was releasing excrement like “Say, Say, Say”. Even so, it is more than John could claim. It is telling that the best record he released after 1970 was his covers album, Rock ‘n’ Roll.

What he didn’t have, and what Lennon did, was the personal experience of severe emotional torture

I think that McCartney lost his mother before John did.

As a fan who bought his first Beatles single in the autumn of 1963, very early for an American kid, months before the Ed Sullivan show, I hereby declare:

Let It Be was their worst album. The White Album contains a lot of filler, but the good stuff on it is sublime.

I have spoken.

I judge popular music against a high standard. Lennon-McCartney met that standard a number of times. Few others of their ilk, or of those that came in their wake, managed to do so.

Indeed, your fondness is ordinate. On the other hand, “the high regard for their weak stuff” is inordinate.

Lennon’s later solo efforts like “Instant Karma” and “Nobody Told Me” anticipated a much more contemporary rock sound:

I can imagine two reasons “Across the Universe” isn’t as famous as “Strawberry Fields Forever” or “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.”

I can imagine a third reason: Phil Spector produced the recording instead of George Martin. If John didn’t like the way his song turned out, it’s his fault for not insisting Martin produce. Surprisingly, Paul McCartney hated the way Spector produced the entire Let it Be album so in the 2003 he released a very lightly produced and edited version of all the songs as Let it Be – Naked. The result is stunning, and you get to compare Across the Universe on an equal footing with the rest of the album. Across the Universe is deeply impactful and, in my opinion, just as moving as any of the other tunes. It doesn’t seem in any way inferior in performance quality.

Fun fact. From Me to You was the first Lennon/McCartney composition to hit the US Top 100. It was a cover by Del Shannon, who toured with them in England in the spring of ‘63, and heard them perform it. Lennon pleaded with him not to do it. He thought it was the song that would launch them in America.

When we Boomers die, the Beatles will die with them.

My experience is different: I know a lot of millennials who like the Beatles. And it seems to me that they’ve stayed popular for way longer than, say, Elvis ever did.

Lots of the lyrics make no sense…

I don’t think that most people care much about the lyrics though.

Plus, most rock lyrics are insipid.

Stones fan myself…but evertime I hear Imagine i want to punch a liberal in the face!

Best cover of Beatles song:

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=peter+sellers+olivier&view=detail&mid=F3049A44C4DE636DB51AF3049A44C4DE636DB51A&FORM=VIRE

John Lennon more or less invented the psychedelic era so obviously he wasn’t trying to “fit in” to it. Also, their music has aged beautifully, especially their work in ’65 and ’66. You are probably relatively young – under 40 – and definitely your taste in pop music is vulnerable to ridicule.

I never could stand the Beatles. Their lyrics seldom went beyond the banal or pretentious. Lennon’s voice was grating. The best of their work was mediocre. They could never hold a candle to the Beach Boys. George was the exception. George could have been okay if he had been with a different group.

“I dig a pony” is pretty trash. And “Rocky Raccoon” has the worst lines in Rock and Roll history:

Her name was Magill
And she called herself Lil
But everyone knew her as Nancy

One after 909 wasn’t bad considering it was their first song written together. It was parodied by Spinal Tap:

But Paul’s mother was a positive force (Mother Mary in Let it Be is her, not Mary the Mother of God). Plus Paul’s father was stable and positive. John’s mother was often severely unstable, and her family wanted nothing to do with John’s father, who took to the sea. So John had no parental anchor; his mother’s sister and her husband, a childless couple, played the role.

I expected his mother to ruin him, but he does seem to have a good deal of sense. His music is not worth much, if any, time.

“Piggies” on the White Album is a contender for the Beatles’ worst song.

Everywhere there’s lots of piggies
Living piggy lives
You can see them out for dinner
With their piggy wives
Clutching forks and knives to eat the bacon

The contempt is ladled on a bit thick.

Inspired by the line “What they need’s a damn good whacking”, Charles Manson’s followers left clues about the song at the Tate–LaBianca murders in 1969.

Sean Ono Lennon doesn’t like to be called based.

He says he is neither based nor woke; he is bespoke.

I, personally, am a non-woke liberal who raised hackles among my fellow liberals by not being woke. That may make me seemed based. Until I point out that global warming is real and the entire “hoax” BS came from massive amounts of money paid by fossil fuel companies, often by the Saudis, to right wing politicians and media.

But hey, “based” and “woke “ are just pseudo religions imposed on us by billionaires who want to divide us so we will do their bidding

The Sargent Pepper a;bum. I hate every song on that album.

Worst Beatles song is not up for debate. The ‘winner’ is Revolution No. 9.

OTOH, you could argue that it’s so bad it can’t count as a “song.” Apparently, they had some unused vinyl space on The White Album, so they filled it up with random sound effects. Weak.

Plus (like all white musicians) they ripped off People of Color

Good! I hope the people of color starved to death afterwards.

It’s Jai Gurudeva, Om.

Jaggy rutabaga, In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida, whatever.

I am he as you are he and you are me and we are all together

Ahh, there you are sweetheart! We’ve missed you lately.

Plus (like all white musicians) they ripped off People of Color

Good point, as usual. From Beethoven and Mozart to Wagner and Stravinsky, they all ripped off Africans! Though come to think of it, Beethoven’s black now, right? So was he ripping off himself? What a tangled web.

Well, he’s a famous rock critic. Familiar with his subject, anyway.

The 101 Greatest Beatles Songs? Do they have the ‘Top 50 Woody Allen movies?’

How about a naked version of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” for all the aging Xers here on iSteve?

(I’m a flaky millennial, myself.)

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-11681217/Getting-Pfizers-Covid-booster-flu-shot-day-raise-risk-STROKE.html

When we Boomers die, the Beatles will die with them.

I would bet you big money that you’re wrong about that. But, by the defining terms of the wager, we’ll both be dead by the time a winner could be declared. So I’ll just say I disagree, and leave it at that. My kids, Gen X’ers, like The Beatles, as do their friends.

It is telling that the best record he released after 1970 was his covers album, Rock ‘n’ Roll.

I reckon Imagine is a tad overrated too but not up to Rock ‘n’ Roll?

That’s crazy man!

Furthermore, he’d just released in 1970 the best of the post-Beatles solo albums in John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band, what more do you want?!

Help!

First, while Lennon wrote it in 1967, it wasn’t fully released until the “Let It Be” album in May 1970 […] by which point the Psychedelic Sixties were over.

I am I really the only one here who finds this statement ludicrous?

Well, who aged well?

Tony Bennett.

This reminds me. Can someone please explain the legal mechanism by which California proposes to tax people who moved out of the state several years ago?

Post Beatles, Paul McCartney and Wings procduced some great music, while John dabbled in the studio with his talentless hack of a wife.

Indeed, I have never heard a good explanation of John and Yoko, an ugly untalented woman. Even dimwit Prince Harry, with perhaps similar Mommy issues, has better taste in shrews.

Tosh.

https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2019/10/26/the-beatles-remain-a-pop-culture-phenomenon-even-among-gen-z-fans.html

You’re gonna “loose” that girl? Maybe you ought to not make this insanely common spelling error while trashing a fine Beatles album.

When I was a kid, our family used to amuse ourselves while doing the dishes by making up bizarre parody fake-lyrics to Beatles songs (later on we also did this with Queen). You should have heard the insano-versions of “Paperback Writer”. But one of my favorites was a riff on “And I Love Her”…

Bright are the stars that shine,
Dark is the sky.
I know that Frankenstein
Can never die.

Bright are the stars that shine,
Black is the void.
I know that Frankenstein
Must be destroyed.

How about a naked version of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” for all the aging Xers here on iSteve?

Boomers did it better

There’s more magic dust in I Saw Her Standing there than Sgt. Peppers.

Agreed. Sgt. Peppers was the start of their downhill slide. I was amazed, even as a yout, at the slobbering over that record. None of the songs could hold a candle to the chorus in this:

or this:

Since we’re being all pedantic up in here, may I point out that one doesn’t really sing “out of tune” — one sings off key. Musical instruments play out of tune.

C’mon, man! We don’t have to drag the Joos into the Beatles!

Peter Jackson’s Get Back documentary makes clear that by 1969 Paul, who was 20 months younger than John, was, deservedly, the Beatles’ dominant force, while John had devolved to Paul’s best sidekick, chiming in with many helpful clever ideas.

From Lennon’s perspective, after the death of Brian Epstein in August 1967, the Beatles lost their unifying force. Lennon didn’t want to step in and take over favouring a more consensual approach to their music making decisions, whereas McCartney was in full concept album mode after peaking with Sgt. Pepper’s album.

Hence all the concept type stuff from then onwards which Lennon hated. Lennon hated tons of stuff he later retracted, like that Playboy interview, but he really did hate medleys like side B Abbey Road, concept albums like Sgt. Peppers, Magical Mystery Tour, Let it Be and Abbey Road hence why he hated a lot of stuff from that time.

You can see in his awesome breakout album John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band the type of thing he loved and excelled. It’s a pity he then fell more and more under the controlling manipulative dominance of Yoko Ono. Just check out the cover of Mind Games (as well as the title) to know where his head was at by 1973. John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band is unrivalled by any of the Beatles solo work and is a top 50 album of all time in its own right, vastly more influential than its sales.

Even Ringo had better sales than Lennon and McCartney by ’73, which says a lot about commercial success vs artistic success. Revisit Ringo’s albums today and compare and contrast to either of Lennon and McCartney.

There’s a lot of pap in Sgt. Pappers onwards, but people should have seen right through that mother’s eyes. People tend to love McCartney, in hindsight, because he was so good looking and confident from ’67 onwards whereas Lennon was getting thinner and more obnoxious. Yet, song for song, Lennon’s tunes were superior if not as voluminous in quantity as McCartney. And they never plumbed the depths of a Maxwell’s Silver Hammer, or Rocky Raccoon*.

That being said, without getting all Kantian on the subject of subjectivity in music appreciation, it’s worth considering statements like this from from Reg Caesar, a valued and respected commenter: “Why anyone plays “Come Together” anymore is beyond me. It sucked at the time.”

My mind boggles at such an evaluation. Jaw on the floor, mouth agape.

So, if Sailer likewise reckons Lennon was just a sidekick to McCartney post ’67 even if “having John Lennon as your sidekick is pretty awesome.”, you just have to remain politely silent, keep shtum as my pop would say, and let it be.

People come at music from such different trajectories it’s impossible to reconcile some of the differences. In the end, all things must pass.

* I actually like Rocky Raccoon. Funny song. A kid’s song. Bizarre double album, White Album. From Rocky Raccoon to the execrable Revolution 9 closing out side 4, which is easily the worst “Beatles” effort.

“I don’t think that most people care much about the lyrics though.”

Well to be fair, I think the lyrics matter once in a while, when they hit a nerve, or coin a phrase that is meaningful to people.

“Scuse me, while I kiss the sky.”

“Round, round, get around — I get around.”

“Evil minds who plot destruction!” (for the record, that’s Terry Butler, not Ozzie)

“Hey! Ho! Let’s go!” (Douglas “Dee Dee” Colvin, not Joey Ramone)

“Don’t you know the crime rate’s going up, Up, UP, UPP, UPPPP!!
To live in this town, you must be tuff-tuff-tuff-tuff-tuff-tuff-TUFF!
Ya got rats on the West Side, bedbugs uptown,
What a mess! This town’s in tatters! I been shattered!”

“Blue, blue, electric blue,
That’s the color of my room,
Where I will live.”

“A squid eating dough in a poly-ethelyne bag is fast and bulbous — Got me?”

Neil is a great pop writer.

You and me got the whole thing sussed
Gray man is shadowing us
Wild conspiracies turn to dust

Hear the sound of cathedral bells
Cash ringing at the gates of Hell
And fairground hooligans push and swell

They’re the darkest days of a free man
Lying in the streets of Amsterdam
Nearly fell underneath the tram
But I picked myself up
Every temptation and device
All the diamonds and the spice
I would give anything for the sight
Of an honest man (Hey)

Eyes swim in emptiness
I was looking at a hotel guest
He blew me a big sarcastic kiss
And the Lord walked in
With a monocle and lips so thin
Saw the barman wink as he poured his brandy

They’re the darkest days of a free man
Lying in the streets of Amsterdam
Nearly fell underneath the tram
But I picked myself up
Every temptation up in lights
all the diamonds and the spice
Who could take profit from the vice
Of another man

Had the Edgar Winter record. My father made me spray paint over the album cover. “Not in my fucking house!!”

Well that helped. Now I understand maybe a third of the lyrics as opposed to a quarter previously. LOL

As long as there is interest in popular music, post-WWII, the Beatles will stand out. Anybody thinking otherwise is in denial or axe grinding.

The same goes for Elvis Presley. Elvis’ talent transcends rock music, a whole other thing. It’s not just aging boomers filing past Graceland’s gates at least twice a year.

At any point in the future “I Saw Her Standing There” or “Day Tripper” will grab an unsuspecting listener by the ear, just as will “Heartbreak Hotel” or “Suspicious Minds”.

Beatles worst song? Hey Jude, by far….

In 1975 David Bowie and John Lennon record Across the Universe using Bowie’s crack musical team from Young Americans, and the result is a muscular cover of the drippy original:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Across_the_Universe

Across The Universe (World Wildlife Fund Version / Remastered 2009) · The Beatles

Across The Universe (1970 Glyn Johns Mix) · The Beatles

Across The Universe (Take 2 / Anthology 2 Version) · The Beatles

Across The Universe (Take 6) · The Beatles

Indeed, your fondness is ordinate.

Thanks. But I posted from a tablette tactile, not an ordinateur.

What Was the Beatles’ Worst Effort?

It was never released, but an early, scrapped version of “Octopus’s Garden” was called “Cuttlefish’s Commode” and had rather dismal lyrics.

I don’t think The Beatles have aged well

You are absolutely full of shit.
You shouldn’t be commenting on music at all

You are in the same category as libtards who dismiss dead white males like Shalespeare or nitwits who say Magic and Bird couldn’t play in today’s NBA

Or you’re a troll

Rev 9 is too easy. It’s not even a song.

It’s a testament to how good the Beatles were that it’s hard to find a truly bad song in their entire catalogue. There are some throwaways but they too are pleasurable.

Not all the songs on Rubber and Revolver are great or top-notch but all are above-good.

The bad ones begin with Sgt Pepper, ironically their most celebrated album. She’s Leaving Home is really bad. Within You Without You is dull. Magical Mystery Tour has Blue Jay Way, another silly raga rock number.

White Album’s worst real song is Why Don’t We Do It In the Road?
(Because you’ll get run over while doing it, dummy.)

The original lyrics to “Sexy Sadie” were, “Maharishi! You little twat!” because Lennon was so pissed off when he went down to India with the Farrow sisters to study, erm, “Transcendental Meditation,” only to discover that the Maharishi was just in it to perv on the White girls. That is what “Dear Prudence” (possibly their best song) is about.

If there’s an actual good answer to “what is the worst Beatles song?” it is probably “Blue Jay Way”. And even though it’s a total dud, it’s still a lot better than the rest of you mooks could do.

The people who complain about stuff like “Revolution 9” have: a) never heard of Edgard Varese, and b) never wrote something as shocking and good as “A Hard Day’s Night” and so should keep their nancy-boy opinions to themselves.

If you can’t play the piano solo from “Benny the Bouncer” by ear, then you are too short for this ride.

Agreed. A very uneven album

Piggies
Mr Moonlight
Martha My Dear
Sexy Sadie
Yer Blues

Not exactly setting the world on fire with tracks like those.

My kids, Gen X’ers, like The Beatles, as do their friends.

So do my kids, born in this century. (And so far spared a “generational” label.) Though I wish they’d avoid the stuff from the later years.

It’s Jai Gurudeva, Om.

Sounds like he was drunk or stoned in the studio if that’s what came out.

Seriously, always thought it was Like a New Day ah, ohm. Just that he slurred his words.

One of the knocks vs Lennon as a credible singer is that he often slurred his words while singing.

Either ways, the song still sucks. And it didn’t chart on the top ten either.

Wow. 160 comments, and not one mention of “Hey Bulldog”. Maybe not the worst song, but certainly the blahest.

“You Know My Name, Look Up the Number” belongs near the top of the list, but is disqualified for being deliberately awful. The trophy should go to something offered in good faith.

I just finished reading ‘The love you make “, an insiders story of the Beatles, 2 days ago, written by Peter Brown and Steven Gaines. I never was a big John fan, and this book clinched it for me. He really could be an ahole. I always thought that, of the 4, George put out the best solo work. Paul was too saccharine, and John too snide, so they did balance each other out. And even Ringo had his moments – going through a “jet set stage”. But I agree with the poster above who said good things about Magical mystery tour. I must have been about 10 when it came out, and I remember sitting on my front porch with a good friend, oohing and aahing over Paul, and listening to the album over and over. Fool on the hill, Your mother should know, and several others were my favorites. I’ve seen Paul in concert, and he delivers.

Sad!

And didn’t POC rip it off from Scots and Irish woodsmen? Who evolved it from military music?

But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao/You ain’t gonna make it with anyone anyhow.

R.G. Camara wrote:

Lennon was a commie, and like all commies a hypocrite and a coward.

His legacy is Yoko Ono.

Well, yeah, but aside from that…

Personally, I have never been able to understand how anyone could listen to “Imagine” without laughing.

Speaking as an actual millenial, you are correct. I just got into them in the last four years or so. I view them as the goat, and everything else I previously listened to now seems worse in comparison. I am hardly alone. If anything, the Beatles are increasing in popularity among millenials and zoomers.

We clearly have a lot of Beatlemaniacs here… but putting aside “Yesterday” was there really any Beatles’ tune as good as “Bridge Over Troubled Water”? Or “Sound of Silence”? Or, to be more light-hearted, “Georgy Girl”?

Let me be clear: I doubt there is anyone who hates every single song the Beatles recorded: if you hate “She Loves You” perhaps you love “Hey Jude.” And if you hate both of them, maybe you like ‘Yesterday.”

But I lived through Beatlemania: I remember seeing them on the Sullivan show in early ’64.

And the main thing I remember is a lot of teeny-boppers acting silly.

Isn’t an awful lot of Beatles’ nostalgia simply guys wishing they were teenagers again?

Hint: when all of us Baby-Boomers were teenagers, it wasn’t really all that great.

I’m not totally sure, but I think it would be by sticking their hooks into any assets that were left behind. Probably also by slapping a writ on the taxpayer if he dared to travel within the borders of California again.
I can’t think of any mechanism they could use if all the taxpayer’s assets had been liquidated and removed, and they didn’t set foot in the state in future

Have you ever thought of taking up songwriting?

“was there really any Beatles’ tune as good as “Bridge Over Troubled Water”? Or “Sound of Silence”?”

Lots of them. Hey Jude, Long and Winding Road, Norwegian Wood, She’s Leaving Home and those are just a few in the same wistful category as Troubled Water/Silence. Unlike S&G, The Beatles could write good songs evoking several emotive states. S&G not so much.

“She’s Leaving Home is really bad.”

She’s Leaving Home is really good. Paints an evocative picture of an increasingly new social phenomenon at the time, teens leaving their suburban homes for presumably (though not stated) more exciting urban locales, from the perspective of the injured party, the parents. Paul’s voice and the melody conveying the parent’s sadness without making the point explicit. I even suspect that our host has commented on this phenomenon before in the 1960s California hippy context.

No one wants to talk about the “Paul McCartney died in a car crash in 1966, that guys an impostor” conspiracy theory. I am bitterly disappointed.

Mr. Moonlight is a cover of a Dr Feelgood song. It was the Beatles taking a good song and making it better via the marvel that was John’s voice. Their most notable achievement of this kind, IMO, being the incredible Soldier of Love.

Their worst effort?

Blue Jay Way. Of course!

lol. Shut up you ignorant anti-Catholic bigot.

Ob-La-Di

Which I liked when done by Marmalade:

Which is jolly and light hearted and fun.

I listened to every Beatles album from first to last and the White Album was definitely my least favorite.

The one line chorus “Nothing’s gonna change my world” is perhaps the saddest lyric ever written.

Sung the way it was, any lyric would sound sad.

The cheery singing on Maxwell’s Silver Hammer doesn’t alter the fact it is about a hammer wielding maniac.

What did the Beatles think of Maxwell’s silver hammer?
In a 2008 interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Ringo Starr said, “The worst session ever was ‘Maxwell’s Silver Hammer. ‘ It was the worst track we ever had to record. It went on for f–king weeks. I thought it was mad.”

One could also make a case for Revolution #9.

That would be the first thing that would pop into my head if someone asked me for the worst Beatles song. In later years Paul seemed a little annoyed that John was the Beatle with the avant-garde reputation. He said he was doing things like Revolution #9 before John was but none of them were ever put on an album. We are probably fortunate in that respect.

For the worst, some of their early songs were rushed without much thought. I don’t ever need to hear Mr. Moonlight again.

Beatles had a childlike streak, Charming.

I’ll Follow the Sun, Here Comes the Sun, Sun King. And Mr. Moonlight.

It’s also arguably Lennon’s first truly strange song, leading the way to Tomorrow Never Knows and Strawberry Fields. It’s also, blissful and melancholy all at once.

was there really any Beatles’ tune as good as “Bridge Over Troubled Water”? Or “Sound of Silence”? Or, to be more light-hearted, “Georgy Girl”?

It was given away to Peter and Gordon.

but evertime I hear Imagine i want to punch a liberal in the face!

Man is the cracker of the world

Peter Jackson’s Get Back documentary makes clear that by 1969 Paul, who was 20 months younger than John, was, deservedly, the Beatles’ dominant force, while John had devolved to Paul’s best sidekick, chiming in with many helpful clever ideas.

Snooze

FYI: You do know that Christgau is an idiot? NOT respected at all–a joke!

I played bass guitar in a punk rock band in the late seventies that was so bad we would end up playing to empty rooms because the audience fled out the door when they heard us. After my band played at CBGB in New York, Christgau sent our lead guitarist a letter saying he heard a tape of the performance and thought that we were great!

No one wants to talk about the “Paul McCartney died in a car crash in 1966, that guys an impostor” conspiracy theory.

Well, check out the ear lobes, that clinches it!

Norwegian Wood. A perfect song.

Elvis’ last big hits were about the same time as the Jackson Five’s first big hits.

There was one week when Elvis, the Beatles and the Jackson Five all had songs in the top ten.

Trolling again are we, TD? You could at least be a little more subtle about it but, on second thought, that might be too much to expect.

Sorry, but can’t resist…

’65-’69 were their peak years. “Rubber Soul” through “White Album”. After that? Mehh! By ’70 they were effectively through, having been sunk by John’s old lady.

The people who complain about stuff like “Revolution 9” have: a) never heard of Edgard Varese,

http://preparedguitar.blogspot.com/2016/04/edgard-varese-idol-of-my-youth-by-frank.html
https://www.afka.net/Articles/1971-06_Stereo_Review.htm

L&M got the credit for “Across the Universe” but Harrison clearly provided a lot of “background radiation.”

I always thought of “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” as whimsical, or at least thought that’s what Lennon and McCartney were going for. But who would have guessed it was a Nostradamus-like premonition of 2020’s culture with its ending lyrics:

Happy ever after in the marketplace
Molly lets the children lend a hand (Foot)
Desmond stays at home and does his pretty face
And in the evening, she’s a singer with the band (Yeah)

Female dominant in the workplace, male transmania…

Yeah, White Album has:

Back in the USSR
Dear Prudence
Revolution
Helter Skelter

But the rest of it is meh to horrid, as I include those two you mention in the “horrid” category.

“was there really any Beatles’ tune as good as “Bridge Over Troubled Water”? Or “Sound of Silence”?”

Yeah: ALL of them. Yes, Virginia, even “Octopus’s Garden” and “Hey Bulldog”.

Ugh. Honestly. I don’t know where to start with you guys, so I’ll start where everybody starts….

Maybe fifty years from now we’ll catch up to “Einstein on the Beach” and The Wooster Group, but I reckon my head will explode and I’ll keel over dead long before that….

Jazz is a total unabashed rip-off of pibroch.

… not saying there’s anything wrong with Jazz standing on the shoulders of giants.

…but to answer the question within the subjective nature of popular music – Revolution 9. A major work that needs only one listen.

Allowing that the Beatles were two bands, early a rock’n’roll band, late an art-rock band, all their albums have something to offer. Even slight songs throughout their career had something not done as well elsewhere.

As previously noted, “Mr. Moonlight” has a helluva a vocal by Lennon. Not as good as “Leave My Kitten Alone”, though.

What musical instruments did people of color invent? the bongo drum?
What recording technology did people of color invent?