The Beatles UK singles: A sides v B Sides

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by AFOS, Jul 31, 2013.

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  1. Landis

    Landis Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Boston
    I have never considered "Paperback Writer" a Beach Boys type of song in all honesty especially when The Beatles were doing acapella harmonies at start of their songs for example "Nowhere Man". The boosted bass sound combined with those distorted guitar sounds really IMO points forward or it's concept towards what many hard rock bands would actually do. I can't think of any Beach Boys song prior to "Paperback Writer" that is actually like this track. Another interesting thing on the track is how they fused two different songs in two different languages on "Paperback Writer.

    I actually prefer "Paperback Writer" to "Rain" but there is a lot crammed in "Rain" that I think is very interesting ranging from the unusual bass and drum patterns, to the ringing droning guitar sounds, the backward vocal fade-out effect and how thick sonically the song is actually. Just compare it to anything on The Rolling Stones "Aftermath or The Beach Boys Pet Sounds and you would know what I mean.
     
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  2. Jonno

    Jonno Forum Resident

    Location:
    UK
    Are you speaking for everyone who was there?
     
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  3. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Every person I knew at that time, yes. My music loving friends. Are you personally offended? We were just kids.
     
  4. At the risk of a) threadcrapping, b) dragging this out, and c) generating outrage, I've never thought much of BFS. Rather than a "big leap forward," it strikes me as a step back.

    I've always thought of it as a "contractual obligation album" -- after wearing themselves out with two years of non-stop touring, recording, and even acting, they were called back into the studio because "EMI needs a Christmas season release, don'cha know?" And, the fact is, they didn't have enough new material. So, while, for me, AHDN was the big breakthrough in being entirely an album of originals, BFS went back to the mix of some Lennon/McCartney numbers with a whole bunch of '50s rock'n'roll covers…and, frankly, only "Words Of Love" really fits with the originals on the album. The best of the others ("Rock & Roll Music") sounds like it belongs on WTB instead, and some ("Kansas City/Hey Hey Hey Hey" and "Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby") belong at the bottom of a locked closet; with the latter, in particular, bringing the album to an end with a resounding thud.

    It's also very badly sequenced, in my opinion, opening with three straight depressing songs (and how incongruous must it have seemed, at the close of 1964, to have the most-famous celebrities in the world, rich, young, and adored, sing about how they're rejected schlubs for the first three numbers back-to-back?), then suddenly dropping that and churning out a bunch of '50s covers for the remainder of the side.

    Don't get me wrong -- there is some great material on BFS…just not enough of it. Maybe it would have been better as a two-EP set like MMT, but for me, if I heard the first few Beatles albums for the first time without knowing their chronology, I'd probably assume BFS came between WTB and AHDN, not after the latter.
     
  5. fogalu

    fogalu There is only one Beethoven

    Location:
    Killarney, Ireland
    "Paperback Writer/Rain" - a great single but it has the hard, almost unpleasant sound that I associate with "Revolver".
    I always preferred the PW side but since the Beatles mono set came out, I am beginning to re-appreciate "Rain".
    Not having a working turntable for many years, all that was available on CD was that God-awful stereo mix of "Rain". John's vocal is so far left (for a change) that he's almost in an adjacent studio.
    The mono mix brought back to me how great it sounded as a 45.
     
  6. bumbletort

    bumbletort Senior Member

    Location:
    Baltimore, Md, USA
    Well, this part I can address. Back then we didn't view pop recordings as confessionals, that is, we listened to songs as something apart from the personal lives of the artists. In a very real sense, these songs are character songs--the singer presenting the experience of a 'character', not of themselves. One way or another that is how Art ultimately ends up, standing apart from its creator--it's the Art that is dependent on a narrative supplied by something external to supply resonance (such as the creator's autobiography, for ex.) that Time does not treat so well.
     
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  7. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

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