The Beatles: UK Response to US Capitol versions?

ah, use of the word "just" is almost always an interesting choice. They did not NEED to replace them in the same sequence. You imply that the choice of deleting the two songs in question had nothing to do with what they were replaced with. Again I don't KNOW that Capitol thought it was significant to start the album with I've Just Seen a Face. But you have nothing to suggest they JUST put it there.

 

Yes, we don't know what he was thinking. But I agree your take on Face is reasonable. As for Love I think your problem is with the quality of the lyrics, which is a fair point of view even it I think you are too harsh. I think the choice likely had more to do with tempo, the tempo of Love fitting the flow better than What Goes On which after all is not the most lyrically impressive song I can off hand think of.

 

There's trees on the front and the back and The Beatles are dressed casually, not in ties. It looks 'folky'. Couple of acoustic-guitar tracks start the album. That's about it.

 

What? It's Only Love is more "idiosyncratic and personal" than Yesterday? Yesterday is so idiosyncratic there was nothing remotely like that in the whole Beatles catalog up to that point. It's Only Love is just a teenage love song that could fit in any of the early albums.

You do realize all that wiki text about influence and reception refers to the original RS, right? The information about the US version is limited to a couple of lines where they explain the different configuration and sales.

Then you don't understand that one of the main traits of Rubber Soul is the step forward in lyrical and musical sophistication.

And if you listen to the album in stereo, there is a jarring difference between the way the two Help! leftovers are mixed (conventional stereo with centered vocals) and the rest of the album, in two-track style (far right-far left, big hole in the center).

 

We don't know for sure, but the fact that Dexter did not deviate at all from the original sequencing of the 10 songs he retained from the UK Rubber Soul suggests that he probably did not spend a lot of time thinking about sequencing.

There's no evidence that he deleted "What Goes On" because he didn't think it fit on the album, or because he thought it was inferior. He deleted it because he chose it as a b-side. It could well be that he liked the idea of another Ringo b-side, since it had worked out well with Yesterday/Act Naturally.

My main point though is that if Dexter were consciously thinking that the opening of side two was an important position that needed a great song, he would have put a better song in that spot, since there were several better songs on the album.

 

Are you saying It's Only Love is a musical dud?

He put it down in the rolling stone interview because the opening line made him cringe. But the song has a very mature subject, attitude and lyric. The first line is forgivable, because I never thought it was a barrier to the songs success, musically. It was a perfect opener for side two of RS. Sometimes a line is simple because it's stupid and sometimes it just is another line in a song. The opening line doesn't make it a bad song, unless you need it to to prove a point. The music on it is beautiful, or do you notice things like that in the midst of battle?

It is as good as the rest of RS, (Maybe excepting Lennons tryptich) and the lyrics of this and IJSAF sound like they are speaking to and about the other characters mentioned in the LP. The songs cut certainly don't make that connection.

Listen to Help again and see how the two songs fit on that LP. You don't think they sound older and wiser, and more like Rubber soul?

 

Folky is such a specific academic word in this context, that when you try to track it down you lose the thread anyway. It was more "personal." than folk, which was more revolutionary. IOL fit. So they didn't use all acoustic instruments on it? How does this mean anything for the argument?

 

Isn't US Rubber Soul the first album with no Ringo lead vocal on it? But that went by the wayside because of the "precedent" of Act Naturally? How does that follow?

I find it amusing that you think he PROBABLY was unconcerned about the lead off songs from both sides because he left the others alone despite having taken the two songs that formerly led off those sides from the album. I think you have no basis for saying that.

Again, I don't claim to know or for that matter care how much or little he thought about it as much as that the net result was so excellent. But I do think it likely Capitol did think a bit about what songs to lead off the two sides.

Finally I don't know what songs would have been better obvious choices to lead off side two. After all the Beatles themselves did not do so, instead having What Goes On in that role. What would have been better? I am thinking that the sort of mid tempo flow of Love is the better follow up to the slow Michelle ballad.

 

Well, there would be a master reel for each album side. Seems like putting the additional songs at the beginning (or end) of each reel is easiest.

 

No. Second Album, Beatles VI, Help!...

 

I would think that is a minor consideration.

 

I don't care about stereo vs mono or things like that.

 

Yeah, I don’t think What Goes On is the greatest, either, but it’s Ringo’s song and lyrically it’s no worse than It's Only Love. They’re both pretty mediocre, but I get that the former was "the Ringo song" and there are different standards for Ringo songs (a palate cleanser) and John songs (something hefty).

It's Only Love is a typically nice mid-60s Lennon melody with some of the worst lyrics he wrote after he began smoking pot. If anything, putting it right before "Girl" just underscores how poor the words are. "Was she told when she was young that pain would lead to pleasure/Did she understand it when they said that a man must break his back to earn his day of leisure/Will she still believe it when he's dead" vs "Just the sight of you makes nighttime bright/Very bright/Haven't I the right/To make it up girl?"

 

Maybe. But Dexter kept the order of the other songs the same, so he was hardly being creative.

 

Then how did it pass muster in the first place? I always thought Lennon was complaining too much about it. As if it wasn't his lyric to write! Maybe einstein might figure he could write another line if he didn't freakin like it. WTF.

Anyone ever listen to music anymore?

 

The US had about a year-long Ringo reprieve on LP, stretching from Beatles VI through Rubber Soul, until Yesterday and Today. But US listeners would still have endured his out-of-tune bellowing had they flipped over a couple of singles during this time.

 

Why did he choose it as a B side? Because it was a nice bauble to put there. IJSAF and IOL weren't baubles, or exploitable, got left behind and ended up on a new phase LP with more personal stuff. Makes sense to me.

 

Because they needed 14 tracks for Help and were in a rush. That’s kind of the whole point.

 

So the beatles audience just grew with them, and stayed the same from 1964 through 1970? The whole audience was 14 in 1964 and 20 in 1970?

People who were 30 in 1965 bought rubber soul. I suppose you could say they were 35 in 1970. Where are you going with this?

 

I'm glad I was in America in the Sixties, listening to the early Beatles American albums and singles via Capitol. I include AHDN with the instrumentals in that, as well.

 

You mean Lennon wrote a bad lyric and then let it get put out in the UK and the US. And this is someones fault except John Lennon's, how? IOW Capitol records is responsible for the qualtity control of the tunes lyrics?

 

You're confusing it with Run For Your Life, "I'd rather see you dead little girl than to be with another man" that's the opening line he hated.

On It's Only Love he was more general:

Hit Parader magazine:
"That's the one song I really hate of mine. Terrible lyric."

Playboy 1980:
"It's Only Love is mine. I always thought it was a lousy song. The lyrics were abysmal. I always hated that song."

 

Noooooooooo....Lennon wrote a bad lyric for a piece of filler intended for side 2 of the Help album. Six months later, Capitol records put it out as the lead track of the US Rubber Soul, a decision over which he had no control. 53 years later, people defended this decision as creating an album that's supposedly better than the UK Rubber Soul over which Lennon did exercise his share of quality control.

 

OK fair enough. But his passions and hatreds in the interviews don't always scan for me as a listener. I don't trust John on this song. He was wrong. After all he was the one who had to sing it. You have a different relationship to something then.

 

I wouldn't say so.
They didn't bother to edit in mono Ticket To Ride mix during mono cutting of the Help! soundtrack LP resulting in absolutely terribly sounding fold down version of the fake stereo version. Pure laziness.

Ondra