The Beatles - Revolver POLL

Love how Paul and the band would play the title below after Dave did a Top 10 OJ list.

http://i.imgur.com/UZ7vUPx.jpg

The thing is it's such a badass recording that all is forgiven... but yeah, wd have been just as killer as a B-side and wow... ''Rain'' as album opener... hard to get used to but could be awesome. Meanwhile the single starts to look a bit wacky, one side mocks hack writersand the other complains about taxes.... ''we're taking barbershop into strange, new places.''

I wonder if some of this album's rep is BECAUSE it has few familiar names for the non-fan. I remember it getting totally brushed over in the Anthology shows, and then when I bought it, my mom struggling to recognize song titles besides YS and GTGYIML. It's like this vault of cool album tracks that becomes greater than the sum of its parts. And the playing and mixing is hot as shit, IMO they never sounded better as a band. They could have done three more albums in the style of Paperback Writer/Taxman and I'd be thrilled, even if it was just, like, re-recordings of their past records or covers of contemporary hits. Instead it's just a couple of cuts on Pepper's as they otherwise ditch the four-piece band format more than ever before. I guess they'd done as much as they could with it, and were in the process of being outflanked on the things beyond their capabilities (that is, Daytripper isn't quite Satisfaction, Ringo is never hoing to be Keith Moon etc.).

I totally agree with the idea that the album as a whole is much more famous than its components (although you forget E. Rigby). But thinking about it, it's the case of Rubber Soul too (besides Michelle and maybe Drive my car).

As for Rain as the opener and Tomorrow as the final... now we're talking !

Yeah "Revolver" is such an awesome record it's easy to see why it's the favorite of many people. There are still lots of experimental/Beatley songs ("Eleanor Rigby", "Love You To", "Yellow Sub", "For No One") but much of it is distorted psych guitar rock that still has the energy of the early years that would be missing in something like "The White Album". If there were a few more "Revolvers" out there it would be insane.

As for why a revolutionary album would start w a song bout taxes, there is some slight historical irony in there, given America's start as an English colony with the protesting of taxes being a big factor in deciding to break off.

Er... I find Rain quite boring, great drumming and bassline aside. Taxman, OTOH, is a prefect album opener. Direct, upbeat, catchy, but still brimming with enough experimentation to hint an what's coming. I share people's distaste with the subject matter.

(xp) What irony?

Rain boring !? It's one of my favourite songs from them and the production, sounds and playing are amazing.
Actually I think it's the most and best song with the Revolver "spirit" (psychedelic, badass guitars, crazy and huge bass, drugged harmonies...). Lennon's voice and delivery is fantastic. The lyrics are bit light... but it's a better message than Taxman's !
Together with Tomorrow they are, by far, the most outthere songs imo (with I'm only sleeping behind).

Irony being the original Tea Party and Stamp Act and "No Taxation Without Representation" unfair taxes being a big factor in the split between the colonies and England. Then in the 60's we had "The British Invasion" named so as a sort of cheeky reference to the Revolutionary War.

I find the melody draggy and Lennon's vox too nasal and sneery on Rain (I know that was increasingly his thing, but it doesn't always work for me). I appreciate its innovations, I just don't particularly dig it.

Also, and I realise this is cock-eyed in all kinds of ways and I may well get shouted at for it, it reminds me of Oasis and I've always hated Oasis.

(xxxp) OK right I hadn't thought about the historical significance of the phrase "British Invasion".

xp
Well it's a very simple song at its core so I can totally understand not being impressed by the songwriting aspect.

Er... I find Rain quite boring, great drumming and bassline aside.

I find the melody draggy and Lennon's vox too nasal and sneery on Rain (I know that was increasingly his thing, but it doesn't always work for me). I appreciate its innovations, I just don't particularly dig it.

Also, and I realise this is cock-eyed in all kinds of ways and I may well get shouted at for it, it reminds me of Oasis and I've always hated Oasis.

Agree with every Chap word here.

If you haven't read Geoff Emerick's book, "Here, There and Everywhere", you should check it out. There's a section where he describes his very first day as an official engineer on Revolver which turned out to be the first Tomorrow Never Knows session. He was only 19 years old and still living with his parents. I can only imagine.

I listened to the audio book a few years ago, it's incredible. My favorite bit is how on one of his first days of work he figures out the best way to record bass guitar is by using giant speakers as microphones.

I always felt "I Want to Tell You" was a mutant psych version of Motown, it has that swing to it.

Er... I find Rain quite boring, great drumming and bassline aside.

I find the melody draggy and Lennon's vox too nasal and sneery on Rain (I know that was increasingly his thing, but it doesn't always work for me). I appreciate its innovations, I just don't particularly dig it.

Also, and I realise this is cock-eyed in all kinds of ways and I may well get shouted at for it, it reminds me of Oasis and I've always hated Oasis.

Agree with every Chap word here.

same. i have been walking around listening to past masters vol 2 a lot recently, and have come to think it's maybe the most overrated beatles song (at least among fans who know about it in the first place). listening to it right now, it's hard to pinpoint why. the bass is amazing, ringo's doing his thing, the production is interesting. maybe it's the vocal? lennon's voice itself sounds good, but the melody is just boring as hell. if you get Rain stuck in your head, you just get this terrible one-note "RAAAAAAAAAAAAIN" moaning thing to deal with. whereas the melodies going on in And Your Bird Can Sing dance circles around the hungover Rain.

I think Rain is groovy and weird and druggy and maybe a huger departure from where they'd come from than "Paperback Writer," and the drum fills rule, but I agree that I've never quite been converted to it being this crucial milestone Beatles song. If anything I'd bring it in to replace "I'm Only Sleeping" and make "She Said She Said" the album opener. But what do I know?

was it written/recorded before tomorrow never knows? i always think of TNK as the link between different eras of the beatles, so if Rain was first then i understand giving it props for that.

recorded after first take of TNK (the "Mark I" version) but maybe not the final one? I'm not sure. Anyway it was released first, so that's something.

If anything I'd bring it in to replace "I'm Only Sleeping"

IOS is fucking fantastic, don't touch it.

for a 50 year old piece of rock n roll, TNK still sounds totally astonishing.

If anything I'd bring it in to replace "I'm Only Sleeping"

IOS is fucking fantastic, don't touch it.

― the joke should be over once the kid is eaten. (chap), Thursday, April 30, 2015 2:39 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

for a 50 year old piece of rock n roll, TNK still sounds totally astonishing.

― tylerw, Thursday, April 30, 2015 2:40 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ios and tnk are the only tunes on this album that never really get stale for me

Well again I can understand not being impressed by the basic songwriting of Rain and yes the melody is minimalist... But TNK is even more simple in that case !

One chord !

when my band covered it for that (great) ILX beatles comp we played it w/ two chords, but yeah...
https://soundcloud.com/ilx-beatles-comp/forces-at-work-tomorrow-never

And as a simple song with great production and performance, they're both better than Taxman !

I'm Only Sleeping is on some Chillwave vibe. Love how those guitars are somehow right inbetween acoustic and electric, it's hard to tell.

I can't believe there isn't a Revolver Sessions box I can buy on iTunes I want to hear every attempt at TNK.

Can't imagine how these guys must've felt trudging around on tour in 1966, knowing they had something epochal in the can, but not being able to play any of it live.

They should have gone on tour w Yoko doing tape loops.

Maybe Cynthia could have provided the tape loops.

Well again I can understand not being impressed by the basic songwriting of Rain and yes the melody is minimalist... But TNK is even more simple in that case !

Yep, though I really like the melody on TNK! It's just a personal taste thing I think. Some people don't like coriander.

Yeah the guitars on Only sleeping are great. There's something so sad and dark in that song. Lennon was on fire at that time... (and then he made Strawberry fields, A day in the life and Walrus !)

Rain... hmmm, never a standout for me although I think it improves in today's context. It's kind of proto-shoegaze, isn't it?

Thought I'd finally look in to see why Revolver's in the news. Doctor Casino's Blood, Sweat & Tears thing earlier is great. I think I've met my doppelganger.

Rain-love utterly baffles me too, always has.

https://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/6576012/unknown-george-harrison-letter-surfaces-reveals-why-the-beatles-canceled-stax

Did you hear that we nearly recorded in Memphis with Jim Stuart [sic]. We would all like it a lot, but too many people get insane with money ideas at the mention of the word 'Beatles,' and so it fell through!

aw man, how cool would that have been

so much of the Revolver material is decidedly un-American (Eleanor Rigby, Tomorrow Never Knows, For No One etc.), it's funny to think what would have crept into the material or how the record would be different

"Got To Get You Into My Life"?

is very American R&B

altho it scans more as Motown than Stax to me

They might have just done some messing around...or they might have asked to re-recorded "Day Tripper" with Otis Redding!

There's also this, recorded on the Rubber Soul sessions; they conceivably could've come out with an instrumental EP or something along these lines:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ghnj5Tr64Bk

eh that's not exactly stunning material

Is the idea that they would have recorded Revolver there, or some unspecified next project? I probably used to know this, but was the longish gap between Revolver and SPLHCB (with John filming How I Won The War and whatever else) planned out in advance?

I'm very happily imagining some alternate timeline where this deal didn't fall through and they trundled determinedly into Memphis in late 1966 to bang out a potboiling album (mostly covers or vault-clearing bits and pieces, one assumes, since I don't think most of the Pepper material had actually been written) with the M.G.'s, Sam & Dave, Otis Redding. "When I'm Sixty-Four" gets a boost with the first recorded vocals by talented young songwriter Isaac Hayes. "The One After 909" with the heat turned up, "Cry For A Shadow" turned inside out, "That Means A Lot" finding its final form... pretty cool fuckin record I think.

ha it's fun to fantasize but... would they really have gone in that much for collaboration, swapping vocals etc.? seems kinda unlikely. I can see them using some sidemen on stuff - the horns, a Cropper lick here or there

I wonder what that Tune In dude thinks of this?

would they really have gone in that much for collaboration, swapping vocals etc.?

yeah i admit it's maybe a reach, but these guys did adore American R&B, and it might just be that since they didn't have a ton of new originals they were eager to record, and that they probably had a short term stay booked (Rubber Soul and Revolver having both been knocked out in under a month) it might be more of a jam-session kind of deal, them discovering in the course of rehearsal a body of covers that everybody's kind of in the mood to play, and just going with it. Like if there was any moment in their career when some kind of collaboration with a stable of outside musicians (setting aside string sections and so on) was plausible I think this could have been it.

Following the fantasy a chapter forward, you can even imagine the experience shifting their priorities slightly going into the next records, coming out of Pepper going "well that was cool, but it wasn't really as fun as that Stax record, let's play together as a band more," who knows. Fanfic, I know, but ehhh, it's Beatles fandom.