The legacy of The Beatles transcends generations and strides unfettered throughout cultural divides. The mere point out of the identify, and the person members, useless or alive, opens doorways and builds bridges all over the world (as Paul McCartney is fond of claiming, “no one is Beatle-proof”). However neither are they excellent.
The problems taken with The Beatles are many, assorted and never all the time of their very own making. There’s the crushing ubiquity, in fact, coupled with the patronising finality with which Beatles followers declare them the ‘greatest’ or, worse nonetheless, ‘most essential’ group in historical past.
There are the unbearably twee moments within the again catalogue (Yellow Submarine, say, or Octopus’s Backyard, or Rocky Raccoon). The recollections of McCartney mugging by Yesterday. The tailor-made fits. The whimsical movies. The screaming.
However step again from the context. Clear your head of the fog of hyperbole. Enable your self to take heed to The Beatles as a band somewhat than as a cultural phenomenon, and also you’ll bear in mind simply how a lot angle, wit, sweat, eloquence, melody and – maybe above all – sheer variety they packed into their brief profession.
It’s affordable to say you hate some Beatles songs; albums, even. However to say there’s nothing of their staggeringly eclectic catalogue that strikes you is tantamount to admitting you’re tired of music itself.
After all, the context all the time catches up with you in the long run. At a time when hottest performers had been nonetheless mouthing the phrases of the Brill Constructing writers, The Beatles (together with Bob Dylan) led the best way for any band who ever seized the reins of their artwork, strived to deal with the bodily, non secular and political world round them, and compelled themselves to evolve within the face of economic strain to remain the identical. The Beatles did all that, in simply eight years, and left behind a pile of tunes that merely towers over different artists.
Right here, then, are the very best albums by The Beatles, and due to this fact a few of the greatest albums ever to fly the flag of rock’n’roll.
…and one to keep away from
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