Beatles: Do you ever reappraise their albums?

Funny ' The only two albums I bought real time Abbey Road and Let It Be i preferred LIB over AR.I had the LIB box with photo book. Felt that AR was not as good as the White double( a bit of a anticlimax actually), or Sgt Pepper. Recently ....I've decided I think AR could be their best album. Have you ever had a Beatles album reappraisal ?

 

Listened to The Beatles At The Hollywood Bowl recently - sounds better than I remembered.

 

I went from preferring their 64 stuff, to preferring their 67-69 stuff, to preferring their 65-66 stuff, to where I am now, preferring their 63-66 stuff.

 

All the time. I like early Beatles much more now then I did as a kid!!

 

I didnt like Hold Me Tight 40 years ago and I still dont like it.

 

About a year or two ago I decided that I Want To Hold Your Hand and She Loves You were really never topped by anyone, and added them to my band's setlists.

 

I listened to the Star Club tape for the first time in years and decided it was the bootleg of the century. Then again, maybe that doesn't really count as "one of their albums".

 

Nope...I loved each and every one when I first heard them all those years ago, and I still do. The only thing that changed is my favorite album went from being Revolver to the White Album.

 

For me, Revolver was just another in a long line of great Beatles album back in the 60s, but not one of the top two or three. I'll confess that when I joined the forum and started reading all the praise for it, I did do a re-evaluation and have now concluded that it really is a masterpiece.

In my defense, the Canadian version I grew up with was missing quite few key tracks.

 

Same here: the main reconsideration is primarily around ranking. Revolver popped straight to the top when I finally heard the UK version (somehow, not until it came out on CD!!!), but MMT is creeping back in toward the top.

I do regularly try to reevaluate the white album because so many people I respect say it's their favorite -- so I've listened to it far more times than I otherwise would have, and I just don't see it getting better. I might give it a rest for a while and spend more time playing the ones I still like better.

 

Fair enough! I'd always liked the White Album, but ranked Rubber Soul, Hard Day's Night, Revolver, Abbey Road, and Pepper above it. However, the older I got, I discovered just how rich and varied it is. It also has a sound completely unique to itself and is such a sprawling record with so many hidden curios tucked into every nook, cranny, and corner that even listening with headphones almost 30 years after first hearing it reveals new things. A shame they couldn't name it A Doll's House as they'd intended, it really would have been a perfect (and appropriate) title.

 

Nope. I bought them as they were being released and take each one for what it means to me. Loved hearing the evolution of the Beatles.

 

I don't consciously reevaluate their albums but I suppose they do get juggled around a bit.

I used to rank the White Album high up...but don't know whether it was the looped 8-track that the guy in the adjoining room (while in the navy) had. Over and over and over and..., but am a bit burned out on it. I think that must have come out as a double 8 track. Because I find I'm really familiar with 2 sides and not so much the rest!

I love Glass Onion from Anthology, though. So I reevaluated that song, off the charts.

Still not much of an early Beatles guy...though love I Saw Her Standing There. Maybe I should reevaluate that time frame.

 

Been buying their records since I was a kid (when they were a new band), and have subsequently repurchased the vinyl when I got my first "real" system, then on CD, then the reissues and everything else that Apple keeps releasing... I have to keep re-appraising them for insurance purposes...

 

I always loved Rubber Soul and Revolver, along with the singles from that period more than anything before or after, and I still feel that way today. I've come to appreciate the White Album and Let it Be more and more, but nothing can touch the stuff from '65-'66.

 

Now that you mention it, if they'd treated it as an outtakes album, I'd be saying, "Dang! This has some of their best stuff on it! How did this not end up on a regular album???"....rather than, wow, this really isn't fully baked at all. Two thirds of it just doesn't cut it for me.

Which is FINE for something called A Doll's House. It doesn't carry the weight that an album called The Beatles does. For that matter, if they'd just stuck with the singles they released from it, maybe added one or two more, and collected it on the Hey Jude album (which outsold Let It Be at the time) with a bunch of other non-album singles of the time....I dunno, I don't mean to insult it, but I really might feel fonder of it if it was SUPPOSED to be seen as a combination of singles and sketches.

So there you go. A reappraisal. LOL I let you know how it fits.

 

Yes, I used to love Abbey Road as a kid. Now I think it's possibly the most overrated album of all time by any artist. Only three of the songs really speak to me.

 

I went through a very long period where their early albums began to sound very dated to me, and I just stopped listening except for AB and LIB, Four or 5 years ago I saw RAIN and The Fab Four, and both of these tribute bands reenergized and reinterested my love for all periods of the Beatles catalog. It's an extraordinary run of albums, and their music is timeless when one stops to really listen to it. They were one hell of a band!

 

No, I've never reappraised The Beatles' albums. I first heard each of them in my pre-teen and early teen years and each was an absolute gem. The wonderful moments experiencing those albums in my youth is burnt into my psych and completely clouds any attempt at re-evaluation. I might listen for specific details such as how the instruments are distributed in one mix vs another or whether or not I can identify who is playing the lead on a given track but the complete albums are as brilliant IMHO as they ever were. I am still of the notion that the worst Beatle tune on any of their given albums is better than the best track on many other artists albums. I will listen to "Revolution #9", for example, with much more interest than I would any Phil Collins album cut. (with apologies to P.C. fans - I realize there are many who have the reverse opinion and that's the way it should be).

 

Which three?

 

I reappraise everything I listen to, most of the times I listen to it.

 

That is in my top three Beatles albums, there so much energy and they're playing with such gusto I don't even mind the occasional bad note or the shaky Fidelity. And there are several good sounding gray area digital versions of that release floating around these days, far superior to the original vinyl.

 

Constantly. I've been living with these albums my entire life, so I'll go through periods where I favor this album or that but then I'll get burnt out on them and gravitate towards something else. I've gone through the whole "Oh, Sgt. Peppers isn't all that" phase and now I'm getting back to "You know, it really is pretty special (particularly in mighty mono, with "Strawberry Fields" and "Penny Lane" on top!)".

I wouldn't go quite that far, but I do think it's one of their more overrated releases. . . for now!

 

Yes all of them, what's helped in recent years was the 2009 remasters (Ringo & Paul sound better) & my stereo. It has to be said I am more receptive to them now.

 

The run on the second side of "Because", "Money" and "Sun King" really does it for me.

For some reason I don't rate the two Harrison compositions as highly as most. Not sure why. I love "Badge" unreservedly.