Earlier this week a memory was triggered about the song There's A Place, an Isley Brothers cover by the Beatles, and how special it was to me when I was young. It was the B-side of Twist and Shout, which was just one of countless top hits for this foursome who spearheaded the British Invasion. The week Twist and Shout was released in March 1963 it instantly became one of five Beatles songs that filled the Top Five slots on the chart. It's hard to be a #1 hit when you are already #1 with something else, eh?
As I thought about these things it crossed my mind that it might be an interesting exercise to determine what my favorite songs were on each of the albums produced by The Beatles during their somewhat amazing, but short, lifespan. To accomplish this I visited a Beatles Discography website to make the selections.
What I found was that in the beginning there were British releases which I didn't have, though most of the songs were similar. All that being said, here were my selections, based on these criteria: how I felt when I played them in my youth, and how they make me feel when I think back on them today.
1963
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| Notice anything special about this photo? |
There's A Place
Wonderful, simple, melodic... and heartfelt.
Harmonica intro and outro with nice harmonies. The song indeed would bring me to a place in my mind when I was a little older.
Amazing what they accomplish in less than two minutes.
1963
With The Beatles
Hold Me Tight
Released on Nov 22, 1963, the day of JFK's assassination. (C.S. Lewis and Aldous HUxley both died that day as well, fwiw)
This was their first album released in U.S.
Loved this song. A classic riff with innocent intimate lyrics. I especially love those chord transitions in the bridge.
Many of these early Beatles albums were mirrors with minor changes, released in Britain and U.S. separately.
1964
Introducing... The Beatles
Do You Want to Know a Secret
Again, only two minutes long. George has a nice voice and it's sweet.
At this time in my life I identified with George, who seemed the quiet Beatle, self-conscious or self-effacing, the one in the shadows.
1964
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| This was my first Beatles album. |
I Saw Her Standing There
Who doesn't like this one? Put on your dancing shoes.
1964
The Beatles Second Album
You Really Got A Hold On Me
This is a painfully beautiful song about a boy who is oh so hooked.
Smokey Robinson wrote the song and turned it into a Top 10 hit in 1962. The Beatles covered it on this album, as did many other groups afterwards.
I enjoy the way they harmonize, especially on "hold me," delivering restrained emotion throughout. It's what they did so well, sensual without being lascivious.
Was that Paul going for that high note at the end?
1964
A Hard Day's Night
If I Fell
Another simple, sweet, lyrical tune from their first film. Watching the video, looking back on these boys, it has to have been a heady experience, the sudden fame, in the center of that fierce spotlight.
1964
Something New
"Komm, Gib Mir Deine Hand"
I took German in 7th and 8th grade, so I will select this song only because it reminds me of that time in my life and a good friendship that began then.
1964
Fourth Studio Album?
I'm A Loser .
John's got the lead vocal here and you can already hear the development in his delivery. This melancholy would become a theme that would thread through much of what he later created.
1965
Beatles '65
This is practically the same album as Beatles For Sale, so I will pick the song that precedes the above favorite, No Reply. Some heartbreak creeping in on these later albums. I love the middle section, the chord and tempo change with the vocals crushing it.
1965
Beatles VI
I Don't Want To Spoil the Party
Lennon, revealing more alienation and inner pain... and who of us has never felt this way? Come on, be honest.
Of note: Buddy Holly's "Words of Love" on Beatles VI may be the last cover the Fab Four recorded for their albums.
1965
You've Got To Hide Your Love Away
This album was the official soundtrack for the movie Help! I went to see the movie with the girl across the street. Probably my first date. A couple days later the boy across the street asked her to go steady. She said yes. I cried on my pillow, my 13th birthday, and said to myself, "So this is what it's like to be a teenager." (Yes, a bit melodramatic.)
While Dylan was writing and recording songs that were eight, ten and twelve minutes long, and even longer, The Beatles were still writing songs for the pop charts, which meant for radio, and three minutes was max. Hence the quantity of two minute songs on these albums.
December 1965
Rubber Soul
Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)
This is an album that many say presaged the future development of the Beatles. Others point to Revolver. It's been frequently cited that Dylan's influence is distinctly present in this song. George plays a sitar part here, the first time the instrument from India had been incorporated into Western rock.
What I liked about the Norwegian Wood, though, was the storytelling. What happened and what didn't and why? Several years passed before I would learn about these kinds of things from experience.
August 1966
Revolver
Good Day Sunshine
After singing about love and relationships for a half dozen albums they had now turned the corner. The first song, George Harrison's Taxman is not about boys and girls. A majority of the songs avoid the subject of love.
Cheery harmonies, sunny uplifting mood music., Good Day Sunshine is one of my three fave wake-up songs.
May 1967
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| An album cover as ground-breaking as the album. |
A Day in the Life
Nothing like it... Every song a gem. As far as I'm concerned this album is seamless perfection. From start to finish you are in a flow. I would select the whole thing here as a favorite but choose A Day in the Life as a microcosm of the whole.
November 1967
Magical Mystery Tour
Strawberry Fields Forever
The day Magical Mystery Tour came out I went to Frank Capelli's house after school. We ripped the cellophane off the album and played side one, then side two. We already had the 45 with Strawberry Fields and Penny Lane. And by the time the album came out we were quite familiar with that strange ending with what sounds like a railroad approaching and receding and what sounded like John saying, "I buried Paul."
November 22 1968
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| Yes, it was a white album. |
I like the sequence from Yer Blues to Helter Skelter on side three.
So many great songs... If the measure of "what is your favorite album" would be re-phrased to, "What Beatles album have you played the most since the 60s?" I would have to say The White Album. Let It Be would probably be tied with Beatles For Sale in second place, not distant but not close either. Probably has to do with associations.
While My Guitar Gently Weeps stands the test of time as a truly great song from this album, too. George Harrison purportedly wrote it as an exercise in randomness inspired by the I Ching, but it seems too premeditated to me. A poignant message.
January 1969
Yellow Submarine
All You Need Is Love
This was a single and was also the final track on Magical Mystery Tour. It begins with the French National Anthem, invests the lyrics with the history of philosophy, and by the time we reach the end, with past, present and future all converging, the song trails off, marching into the infinite. John Lennon here celebrating with a message that will evolve from the personal to the global when later he and Yoko ask us to "Give Peace A Chance."
George Harrison's It's All Too Much may be a little dated today but it was another song from the album and film that gave me goosebumps. (Maybe you had to be there.)
September 1969
Side 2 Medley Sun King to The End
Like Sgt. Pepper, they reprised the seamless medley motif, and though Come Together and some of the other songs are great, this medley on side B was especially rich. They had become distinctly The Beatles, true creators, one-upping themselves yet again.
May 1970
Let It Be
Across the Universe
John Lennon yielding to a different flow here. Seems like I found comfort in this song while dealing with my own painful moments. The irony is that my world was indeed changing, even as I sang a contrary note. Perhaps this is what John was doing as well, for it was the end of the Beatles and the birth of four solo careers. By the time the album was released John and Yoko had sailed off to a new shore.
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Related LinksMy Dinner with George (All in a Dream)
Interview with Dutch Beatles Authority Chantal de Paus
Was Peter Best the Best?
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