The Beatles' "Rubber Soul" - Putting together the proper tracklist

Right, it has the original track list, but not the original mix. People should know that what is passing as the current UK Rubber Soul in the 'canon' is a 1987 digital remix. People have to use some source for a playlist.

 

Or maybe the reason to get all the material out quickly was that the contract expired in 1966, and The Beatles told them that they wouldn't let them butcher the albums anymore, so they had to sync with the UK discography during 1966 (which they did).

 

I don't know what relevance that has in the UK/US traclist issue. From 1987, the US audience had the UK tracklist. The Word is still The Word, be it in mono, UK original stereo, US stereo or remixed stereo.

 

Because the original 'track listing' and the original 'album' are not the same thing. The mix is a big part of an album.

The 'The Word' actually sounds very different in the US Stereo mix from all the other mixes of the song.

 

Maybe, maybe not.

 

Yes, that may have also been a factor (their EMI contract had actually expired by the time Revolver came out).

 

We know that but I doubt most listeners care. I think even Schnitz's beloved 'US version' is a playlist of 1987 remixes (?)

 

I know, but it's still the same song.

If we start considering that a mix is more "legitimate" or original than others, we would have to say that only the mono Rubber Soul represents The Beatles' original intent, since they didn't take part in the stereo mixes (which according to George Martin, he did with the mono compatibility in mind).

 

They should. It's history. We don't want Giles' remixes becoming the canon version, do we?

 

Parlophone and the Beatles wanted the UK tracklist. Can we agree on that? Capitol shortened/changed their albums as a money grab and they felt compelled to add the current singles. Enjoy your preferred tracklist. I'm out.

 

Once first generation American fans are gone, the UK Rubber Soul will be the only version that is listened to. It is part of the official canon.

Take that for what you will.

 

There's no single on the US Rubber Soul.

 

In 1966 Revolver and Yesterday & Today weren't like their UK counterparts.

In 1967 Magical Mystery Tour wasn't like its UK EP counterpart, it was markely superior, almost a concept album follow-up to Sgt. Pepper all by itself.

In 1970 the Hey Jude album wasn't like anything in the UK either.

Capitol still took smart liberties to do the right thing by their consumers. Parlophone did not.

 

The UK "butchering" took place at the time the sessions were over, and the head chef and knife sharpener were Martin & Epstein. They should have put the singles on the albums. They should have told Ringo "no" to vocals. They should have said "no" to weak dance tracks. They should have constrained George further.

 

The album they originally created was the mono anyway. From the 70s, people grew up with the 1963-67 stereo mixes, which The Beatles didn't take part in.

The most important thing is, it was the correct tracklist. No IJSAF, Drive My Car opens the album as it should. And the fundamental Nowhere Man in, etc.

 

No.

 

So you keep contradicting yourself. Your "vastly superior US MMT" has the silly "Hello, Goodbye", which comprises all the things you hate and the Beatles' career didn't sink beacause of this track release.

 

I consider your constant references to 'butchering', 'comedy producer', 'shopkeeper', etc very disrespectful and insulting to people who helped blaze a trail which DOZENS of UK and US groups then followed. As with all 'pioneers', they weren't perfect and made a lot of it up as they went along. You dismiss the role of the Beatles themselves in what you refer to as 'butchering'. Their plan in the early days was to release strong singles several times a year plus a couple of LPs which would showcase their other recorded songs, usually without the need for the public to pay again for the singles they'd already bought (obviously PPM was an exception to this, as were the film LPs for obvious reasons). I also find your dismissal of all things George and Ringo very tiresome. That's just your opinion but you present your opinions as 'facts'. I, along with many others, like many (not all) of George's early songs and one or two of Ringo's. That's my opinion and I respect the fact that many will disagree with that opinion. As many have said, you're retrofitting your opinions to actual events in an attempt to ascribe motives and shortcomings that maybe didn't exist. As with some of the US posters here, we lived through these events, we experienced them, we marvelled at them, we were grateful for each new LP as it was released (whether UK or US). I'm very familiar with the US Rubber Soul and fully respect that people who grew up listening to it, prefer it over the UK version which I grew up listening to and which I obviously prefer. The Beatles would probably have continued on their trajectory in the rest of the world without breaking the US market - they'd have been poorer financially but it would have been America's loss.

 

Very productive PM this has been. Let me try this again.

The US Rubber Soul was essential, pivotal, and in many ways a ground zero, for US and Canadian artists who made the next generation of music that we are still obsessing over now.

From Canada: Joni, Neil, Leonard, Gordon, Ian and Sylvia, Anne Murray etc.

From the US it's not even possible to make a list. The appeal was that the tunes were communicating with themselves. Thanks for adding the word to the dialogue here, but the UK RS would be a more cartoonish presentation, being more scattershot and exploitative of "over-produced" material, stuck in the sequence regardless of tone.

 

If they would have met and mutually influence Bob Dylan, or met a certifiable Yogi, they might have been okay without having US success.

It's not just about preference, though. It's about cause and effect and history. What people may not fully realize is that the US Rubber Soul album was as influential in the US/Canada as Sgt. Pepper later would be, in its own way. Its influence on Brian Wilson to produce Pet Sounds is really just the tip of the iceberg. And whereas Sgt. Pepper had a more global effect (being the same album everywhere), the Capitol Rubber Soul was more of a local phenomenon - its cozy track listing germane to North America (and Venezuela) - localized to US/Canadian ears for the most part, and more intimately known as-was in that respect.

 

You're telling me that all of those people are too stupid to recognize the quantum leaps forward in songwriting made by Dylan and the Fabs in 1965 if those songs are on albums that lead off with electric guitars?

 

What does that mean? How is Run For Your Life communicating with In My Life?

There is no regard of tone in the US album either, there are multiple tones.

I'm not sure what you mean with "over-produced material" sentence.

 

-We can't be sure about the version that inspired Brian Wilson. There appears to be differing reports about it.

-Nobody denies the effect of the US Rubber Soul in the American musical scene. But the mistake is to attribute that to the specific tracklist differences, given that the original album had the same effect in the rest of the world (and the effect it has on the new US fans that discovered it from 1987). The US version just followed the original more than previous Capitol albums, so that some of its power remanied intact.
I still think the original would have been even more well-received, with fundamental tracks like Nowhere Man, but we will never know.

 

Hello Goodbye is a cool psychedelic track, there is nothing silly about it. It was also a #1 in the US and UK and most other countries. Where's the love?