One After 909 opens a window into an alternate history of the Beatles in the 70s where they brought in Billy Preston and just played some good old dirty rock and roll for a few years
The Beatles more-or-less invented a whole host of pop music tropes. So it makes sense that they'd also be among the first to try 'getting back to their roots.' And it worked about as well as you can reasonably hope for with that sort of thing
The #Beatles tried to recapture the feeling of being the world's best bar band with One After 909. And mostly succeeded open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
A very rare #Beatles song that's built around a riff, Birthday is a fun bit of rock and roll ephemera open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
An extremely faithful cover of a good Buddy Holly song, Words of Love is a nice piece of the #Beatles story, but doesn't do much to advance the argument open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
Great horns and a killer rhythm track, but slightly let down by the production. I'm not a big fan of the remasters, but Savoy Truffle is a rare exception where the newest version really is superior.
Savoy Truffle isn't one of the great George Harrison songs, but it plants the seeds for songs that ARE among his very best open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
In some ways, Revolver is the *most* experimental #Beatles album, which is a major selling point but also sometimes a minor detriment
Doctor Robert is probably the worst song on Revolver, which is a pretty stunning endorsement for Revolver open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
It's one the most trifling #Beatles songs, but there's a lot to love even when they're still finding their feet open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
George Harrison was a complicated man, and it would be pretty unfair to dismiss his genuine spiritual strivings as mere hypocrisy
Critics often like to dismiss George's 'preachy' songs, but they are generally pretty interesting. I Me Mine is a good example
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Soon enough, the Beatles would be reinventing rock and roll on their own terms. But you can already hear the seeds of that transformation in songs like this--which bridge the divide between past and future
Roll Over Beethoven is the sound of rock and roll inventing its own mythology. It's good and right that we have a #Beatles cover of it open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
Bungalow Bill is a pretty silly song. And it could never have appeared on any other #Beatles album. But it’s the opposite of ‘filler’ open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
It might be their schmaltziest song, but I still have a lot of time for Till There Was You. Especially the guitar solo open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
It's a little bizarre to hear this proto-punk band (fresh off a couple of years hopped up on speed and cavorting with prostitutes in Hamburg) playing something so precious. But that's the magic of the Beatles...they contain multitudes
Do You Want to Know a Secret is an imitation of earnestness, which can be a little hard to take seriously. But the underlying nervousness about being loved rings true open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
It's hardly an essential song, but as a representative example of their constructive memory during the Get Back sessions, it gets the job done
The #Beatles’ origin as a skiffle band isn’t something that shows up all that clearly in their more famous work, but it’s nice to have one clear reference to that history on the record open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
Devil in Her Heart isn't one of their most impressive covers, but it's a really sweet rendition, and a nice reminder of how much fun those early records really are
One of the many delightful pieces of early #Beatles lore is the fact that they were far more aware of obscure American R&B records than kids who actually grew up in America open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
For me, Tell Me What You See is most interesting as a rare example of them not quite nailing a song
For another band, Tell Me What You See might have been a mega-hit. For the #Beatles it was a bit of album filler open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
A Taste of Honey is a rather silly song, but it adds some interesting depth to the album, and is a nice demonstration of the group dynamic, and Paul's approach to music in particular
John loved to rag on Paul for his taste in old-timey music, but it's actually part of the strange magic that made the Beatles into #TheBeatles. A Taste of Honey is a great illustration open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
The physical medium through which you first experience a song can play a big role in how you hear it for the rest of your life. Something that's mostly been lost in this digital age.
Many people would list this among their favorite #Beatles songs, but for some reason, it's never quite managed to hold my attention open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
The list of #Beatles number ones in Germany is pretty funny
The first of a record-setting eleven number 1 songs on the German charts for the #Beatles. And the only one sung in German open.substack.com/pub/beatles2...
