Rank the White Album

although bends i didn't mean to dismiss your interpretation! it might even help me enjoy the song a little mroe

Abbey Road's too respectable

What does this mean?

It's my favourite, by the way.

Can someone who likes Happiness Is a Warm Gun explain why people seem to like Happiness Is a Warm Gun so much?

I like the last part, the doowop pastiche.

Honey Pie is crap, but Martha's v. good McCartney. Besides being a much better song, the simplicity of the production helps its stature (whereas the high-corn claptrap they saddled Honey Pie with kneecaps it even more). I like bends's analysis.

Happiness is notable for its incredible lyrical creepiness, unparallelled even for Lennon, and the dreamlike way it shifts between sections remains surprising for many listens. It's also an ace performance by the band (love Lennon's tuneful screaming in the final section!). I wouldn't put it tops in my list if I were to make one, and it's lost a bunch of its charm for me in the many intervening years since I first encountered it (as has most of the Beatles' output), but it's a singular performance. I'm not challposing when I say I think Revolution 9 is a catchy little number; it's one of the only tracks I think I'd feel the need to seek out & listen to again on this record, but of course that says more about my current tastes (which are leaning much more toward Tim Hecker than whatever's going on in power pop right now) than it does about the intrinsic worth of the track.

Does anyone know, did Rutherford Chang ever press that collage of hundreds of copies into a double LP like he threatened to do? I can't imagine he'd have succeeded in getting licensing for a commercial release, but I'd damn sure buy it if he did.

"Respectable" in this particular context I would say is referring to the 2nd side, how it's a suite? And there's other stuff as well but hey, AR is totally excellent imo and it's just my own twisted taste in music and misuse of the english tongue.

I normally hate music hall McCartney (as well as actual music hall) but I love 'Martha My Dear', bends otm about the sadness of it aand also the melody is just really good.

I started trying to do my own ranking and nearly all my favourites are Lennon songs, he was on fire around this time.

lol bends, my thanks were sincere. Every once in a while I do something for the internet that takes like 8 hours so I try to acknowledge the effort!

Beenlistening to this recently - it's pretty good!

http://i.imgur.com/CKxQ2rb.jpg

I LIEK IT LIEK THAT!
OOOOOOHHHHHHH HA!
I LIEK THIS KINDA HOT KINDA MUUUUUUSIC! HOT KINDA MUUUUUUSIC!
PLAY IT TO MEEEEEE! PLAY IT TO ME HOLLYWOOD BLUUUUUUES!

^ I remember hearing this part of 'Honey Pie' upon listening to this album for the first time, and, I won't lie: I cringed. I don't mind the song otherwise, it's just this particular bit that I find a touch embarrassing. 'You Gave Me The Answer' from Wings' Venus and Mars does this style much better and in a far less cringey way than 'Honey Pie' or 'When I'm Sixty-Four' ever did.

i love this album start to finish, incl honey pie. the combo of helter skelter paul and music hall paul suggests a kind of derangement that i cant resist

i love this album start to finish, incl honey pie. the combo of helter skelter paul and music hall paul suggests a kind of derangement that i cant resist
--shiny trippy people holding bandz (m bison)

^^^ my new best friend, this guy gets it

I always find 'Birthday' hilarious for reasons I can't quite put into words, I guess because it's so incongruosly amped up and twitchy.

Yeah, extended drum/tambourine break adorned with off-mike whoops and hollers are so weirdly awkward....It's as if they were imagining playing for audiences again, only with more 1968-style stretching out, and that drum break was earmarked as their "come on Cleveland, clap your hands!" moment.

afaic this record is lennon at his best and mccartney at his worst, generally i'm cool with both but paul was really stinking up the joint

'Yeah, extended drum/tambourine break adorned with off-mike whoops and hollers are so weirdly awkward.'

It's fantastic though, especially the bit where McCartney screams 'DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANCE!' I think it captures this particular type of jittery, giddy excitement really well.

Long, Long, Long

Dear Prudence
Helter Skelter
Blackbird
Cry Baby Cry
Sexy Sadie
I Will
Don't Pass Me By
I'm So Tired
Obla-di Obla-da
Why My Guitar Gently Weeps
Julia
Martha My Dear
Happiness is a Warm Gun
ROCKY RACOON
Revolution 9
Revolution 1
Birthday
The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill
Mother Nature's Son
Yer Blues
Savoy Truffle
Glass Onion
Back in the U.S.S.R.
Honey Pie
Wild Honey Pie
Good Night
Everybody's Got Something to Hide...
Why Don't We Do it in the Road

Piggies

I am with you on the superiority of long long long

However I think you need to reevaluate me and my monkey. It's probably not a top 3 white album track or anything, but definitely one of the better ones

just finished re-listening to it. it's better than i remember, much like most of these songs. i like how the noisy cowbell-thing that plays intermittently through the song.

*i like how the noisy cowbell-thing

I always find 'Birthday' hilarious for reasons I can't quite put into words, I guess because it's so incongruosly amped up and twitchy.

― this is how a punch sounds, like ditch, like quitch (soref), Sunday, October 20, 2013 7:11 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha totally

"Birthday" has the nervous energy of early 80d New Wave power pop. The Cars? Talking Heads? Feel like "I would like you to dance!" is almost on some proto-Devo tip.

The key to "Happiness" is definitely in that last section, with those gorgeous backing harmonies and Lennon doing some classic rock breakdown.

i love this album start to finish, incl honey pie. the combo of helter skelter paul and music hall paul suggests a kind of derangement that i cant resist

― shiny trippy people holding bandz (m bison), Sunday, October 20, 2013 11:00 AM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

OTM.

It's impossible for me to hate on anything here, though, since I first heard it when I was three. I was scared of side 3, though (because of Ringo's blisters), and didn't hear those songs again until I was in high school.

For whatever reason, I had the idea when I was a kid that self titled albums were greatest hits albums,so when I got the White Album (age 14) I took it as a chronological collection of hit singles. Of course, many of the songs were, but I recall thinking "man, the top 40 was really weird back in the 60s." Love this crazy bitch top to bottom, including the Esher demos.

It's funny, I got this record for a birthday present as a kid, and there happened to be a little bubble in the vinyl that made playing martha my dear impossible... and as a result i ended up not hearing that song until 20+ years later when I was in a thrift store and it came on over the radio station they had playing inside. I was like "gee this is great, which paul mc record is this from?" and then i realized it was martha.

anyways i agree w a lot of what's been said about the album as a whole itt. the sequencing and segues are sooo good. and even though there are a few clunkers, plus some otherwise-good songs that have been kinda spoilt due to overexposure, the entire thing is really surprisingly listenable and also just sounds really good to me at this late date. kudos beatles.

from my perspective as a kid it made for such a cool visual package, too. the poster with the lyrics (I remember poring over them and finding all these references that were completely unfamiliar and mysterious to me -- montelimar, sir walter raleigh, chairman mao) the pictures of them looking all scruffed out and druggy, the collage that was more downtown avant-garde art scene than the bright psychedelia of their previous stuff...

surprised by the high ranking for Julia, that was the one track that made me go "woah.." listening to the Mono remasters through the first time. Anthology version of Cry Baby Cry is better than the album IMO.

I'm trying to do a ranking right now and I'm surprised at how low I'm putting Julia. I used to really like that one but now it sounds a lil too twee for me

Also think I might be the only one who really likes Revolution 1.

i used to love it but now it seems smug and condescending.

I was trying to think of what Long, Long, Long, reminded me of, and then i realized it's basically a blueprint for Third/Sister Lovers

xpost I just really like the weird arrangement. I'm sure the lyrics would be annoying if I thought about them enough

Mother Nature's Son
Martha My Dear
Blackbird
Cry Baby Cry
Long, Long, Long
Sexy Sadie
Revolution 1
Dear Prudence
Happiness Is a Warm Gun
Wild Honey Pie
Honey Pie
Helter Skelter
Julia
Rocky Raccoon
Back in the U.S.S.R.
I'm So Tired
Don't Pass Me By
Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey
While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Glass Onion
Piggies
Savoy Truffle
I Will
Yer Blues
Good Night
Birthday
Why Don't We Do It in the Road?
The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill
Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da
Revolution 9

yeah as a song it's pretty good. i think there are interesting things with the tempo and time signature but i no longer have the vocabulary to describe these things. the politics of that song are shit though. misguided as movements like the weather underground and the black panthers were, they were responding to crises and acting out of a sense of urgency. it doesn't make sense to tell these people to "free their mind" because "everything is going to be alright." xp

aw revolution 9 isn't that bad

heh I know, I probably rated it that low b/c I was listening to it on cruddy laptop speakers and the panning stereo effects were annoying. said setup also might explain some of my other choices, oops

other ppl on here could probably explain what was going on in lennon's head when he wrote that song -- i'm sure he must have discussed a bunch in interviews... but w/o researching it, my hunch is that a large part of it was his awareness of the influence he had over ppl at the time, and his uneasiness at them throwing themselves into violent situations, etc.

did anyone genuinely sit down and listen to Revolution 9 again when the remasters came out? have to say i couldn't face it in mono or stereo. i've still no idea what's going on at the start either.

i just listened to it (unremastered stereo mp3) on $10 sony earbuds and it was cool. i mean, it's a sound collage that feels influenced by horror movies. i suspect it would suck in mono.

Revolution #9 is ace. Would be in the top half of my list if I made one.

i actually think the politics of 'revolution' the single are pretty good -- it's the "you can count me out...IN" on the white album version that annoys me. during his embarrassing 'radical' phase a few years later lennon apparently said he regretted writing the line ridiculing maoists, which may be the single most disappointing thing i've ever heard about him.

Well they did the laid-back album version first, and then later went and did the fast punk version. At any rate what's really the difference, Mick Jagger singing Street Fighting Man while living in a mansion, etc.

Laid-back version is dull as ditchwater, single version is great

these days I'd rather listen to "Long Long Long" and "Savoy Truffle" over the two other Harrisongs.

'long long long' is probably in my top 10 beatles tracks. 'savoy' is nice too. much prefer the anthology version of 'guitar' to the sludgy album version.

i just listened to it (unremastered stereo mp3) on $10 sony earbuds and it was cool. i mean, it's a sound collage that feels influenced by horror movies. i suspect it would suck in mono.

― (emphasis Treeship's) (Treeship), Wednesday, October 23, 2013 2:11 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Just listened to it in mono this morning, and come to find out it's actually a fold-down mix; the collage was assembled in the studio in stereo. It's not bad in mono, but it loses a lot without the panning. I completely love it, though; can't think of a more perfect climax to this record.

ppl never seem to like 'good night' but i can't imagine any other way to end the album. plus it's kind of the perfect comedown after 'revolution 9' (which i love).