I have had it up to here waiting for the Beatles catalogue to be remastered

nik cohn's 1968 review in the other thread is too generous

and he went gunning for Patty & Mildred Hill.

those miserable spinsters

Surely Rocky Raccoon is the most insufferable track here

― Rhine Jive Click Bait (Hadrian VIII), Thursday, 15 November 2018 21:02 (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Actually, I just got why I don't much like this one.

It's because nothing much happens. Rocky goes to shoot his rival, but get shot first. He gets patched up by the doctor, and that's it. A bit of reflection, a look at a bible, the end.

Story songs need a story, y'all.

THERE'S MORE PLOT IN "PODGY THE BEAR (AND JASPER)" !!

Well, I don't think anyone should expect anything really interesting from Macca songs'lyrics...
Sometimes it's good (or even great) but most of the times it's obviously not the point (even for him !).
I like "Rocky Raccoon" it's a fun little song. The saloon piano is cool. And it's easy to play on the guitar !

Well, who was it who said "they can't all be Eleanor Rigby" ? Oh wait...

Would definitely be prepared to give Rocky Raccoon another chance if an outtake turned up in which no one turns up to Rocky's funeral and Father McKenzie buries him along with his name.

the one time I saw Phish they did a really nice spacey version of dear prudence
though it was a double edged sword because it was so much better than all of phish's songs

― The Poppy Bush AutoZone (upper mississippi sh@kedown)

sure but most songs are much better than all of phish's songs, seriously there's nothing on the white album even half as bad as "tweezer", and like most people here there are songs on the white album i absolutely despise

(i hate "birthday" due to its association with wacky morning radio djs, and i hate "piggies" but not due to its association with charles manson, because i like "helter skelter" just fine)

maybe the best version of "dear prudence" is the five stairsteps version, which is just as good as the b-side of that single. and the b-side was "ooh child".

its role as an aesthetic keystone for nearly all the rock-and-roll recordings that have followed

this is Abbey Road, not the White Album

from this: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-accidental-perfection-of-the-beatles-white-album?fbclid=IwAR2bhkfT7rMSV4CEVkCSq3NW4LRLQ3ySyLx8f5DTOL4-KcmWe94xHkrGEB8

For sure; Abbey Road is arguably the first ’70s rock record.

I like Paul’s singing and tunecraft enough to enjoy even his trifles on this album. The ones I reliably skip are Bungalow Bill and the plodding & precious While My Guitar etc.

Birthday... it sounds like the Beatles are all headbanging.

I haven't heard the new remix of The Beatles yet, but I'm curious about it if only to see how it stacks up against the original stereo (and the original mono, although this is the first Beatles album where the stereo is considered to be the primary mix) ... It's never been my favourite Beatles album but it's interesting to see press about the remix debunking long running myths that this was a "tense"/"scary" album.

It's because nothing much happens. Rocky goes to shoot his rival, but get shot first. He gets patched up by the doctor, and that's it. A bit of reflection, a look at a bible, the end.

Story songs need a story, y'all.

― Mark G, Friday, November 16, 2018 6:11 AM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Surely this is the joke, though? Not only is Rocky not heroic enough to win back his woman, he's not even tragic enough to die in the effort.

Rocky Raccoon is a major shithead

It's an anti-ballad. xp

There is no amount of remixing that would get me to willingly hear these songs again

"it's interesting to see press about the remix debunking long running myths that this was a "tense"/"scary" album."

wrong, it still is

Based only on Spotify, it does sound a bit like some songs like "Helter Skelter" and "Savoy Truffle" have a different feel when the murk gets cleared up. I don't think that remixing an album 50 years later can 'debunk' the mood that someone gets from an album, though (certainly no more than the C90 I listened to in high school could 'prove' it).

wrong, it still is

― akm, Saturday, November 17, 2018 5:28 PM (thirteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It really isn't! We've been through this before, but if people really find the likes of 'Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da', 'Don't Pass Me By' and 'The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill' "creepy", then...

I mean, there's a few seconds of 'Long, Long, Long' that lean towards the sinister sounding, but we're talking about a few seconds of a double LP.

I just really hate the #9 baby.

The sinister vibe comes mostly from John, who sounds haunted throughout the album, but it bleeds into the other songs the way gruesome moments in a David Lynch movie make the banal stuff seem tainted and horrifying.

why are we engaging with turrican's trolling on this exact topic again? he's made it very clear he has no interest in how anybody else hears or relates to this album. he just summarized the takes of several posters in this thread who as a "long running myth." what's the point of conversing with someone who approaches conversation like that?

"Savoy Truffle" sounds rad. Anyone feeling sour on a perceived generic-ness to "Birthday" should be able to kick out the jams to that one.

'Savoy Truffle' and 'Birthday' are two of my favourite things on the record, I particularly love how the band attack the "yes we're going to a party, party" section - it's full of energy and life, totally upbeat and not at all creepy.

I particularly love how the band attack the "yes we're going to a party, party" section

Me too

Guitars sound so good there

Re: my posts upthread about how Ringo probably didn’t play a double-bass-drum kit on “Good Morning, Good Morning” — and being corrected on said assertion — there’s photos in the book/box of Ringo playing a double-bass setup (and one of Paul doing the same). Only, I can’t hear any instances of it on the white album.

Piano sound on Birthday is fantastic

The fifties rock and roll coda on "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" is so excellent.

i've started dipping into this remix and it's.... idk it's pretty weird. for whatever reason the really bright, clear "da da da da da da da da" backing vocals on Helter Skelter are what stands out most to me. it sounds like a Wings song. which is not a minus in my book but it definitely doesn't feel as much of its period or of what this album sounds like to me. "cry baby cry" also feels strange all cleaned up and each track clearly enunciated. the bass part on that frankly sounds kinda bad, like maybe the old mix was hiding places where what paul's doing is a little dissonant or cluttered over top of lennon's keyboard parts. the super clean punchiness works okay for "monkey," i'll admit.

Yeah, I wasn't saying it wasn't weird tbc but it is interesting and some of it does work. I do appreciate more clarity with the picking in "Blackbird".

Bass playing is great on "Cry Baby Cry!" I assume you're talking about the glissandi at the beginning?

Holy hell, “(You’re So Square) Baby I Don’t Care” sounds like Hüsker Dü.

Okay, just started poking around in this and found the the melody of “Jealous Guy” in something called “Child of Nature,” which I am sure somebody posted about way upthread but sorry, tl;dr.

Okay, did find mention of the song on this thread and mention of the similarity of the melody on various other threads now that I looked but it has um, passed me by, until now.

yeah it's an early version

jealous guy is an improvement

The "I'm one of nature's children" line is so awkward

Yeah. Still having to choose between « Mother nature’s child » and « Child of nature » to keep on an album is a tough choice !

Okay, started listening at the beginning and, while for the most part I don’t mind or actively like the new mixes so far, “I Will” was really bugging me with its overcooked jug band high jinks.

Are the backing vocals on “Helter Skelter” boosted? Almost sounds like the Edwin Hawkins Singers on “Lay Down (Candles in the Rain).”

Holy hell, “(You’re So Square) Baby I Don’t Care” sounds like Hüsker Dü.

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Sunday, November 18, 2018 2:39 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I thought the same thing, but didn't want to play to type here.

xpost
yeah and there's one specific "da da da da" that is very loud : I wonder why (maybe it's also louder in the original mix ?) but it's kinda fun in the ott aspect of the song.

I'm liking most of this but the extreme foregrounding of the bass on some of these songs is terrible. Why it seemed like a good idea to do that at the expense of the sharp edges and sheer weirdness of Happiness is a Warm Gun e.g. is ???. It sounds like a YouTube bass tutorial.

For all his self consciousness it's like Paul still doesn't get that burnishing his legacy = dialing it down in general. Large swaths of this mix only put me in mind of the guy pleading with his band to dress up like candy shop soldiers on the record before it.

I don't really hear a massive bass boost; in some instances (like "Glass Onion"), the bass is quieter than on the original mix. And where it is loud, it doesn't overwhelm (unlike the "Dear Prudence" drums, which are needlessly loud).

The one serious disappointment to me is that Ringo's scream in "Helter Skelter," and the subsequent guitar clang, is much lower than on the original mix. Of all the elements on that album to tone down, why that?

I think on HIAWG and some other tracks it's just loud enough to have a newly distinct profile that isn't necessarily in service to the song. Felt this way abt a lot of the new Pepper tracks, too...sometimes there is something good in the smearing of sounds!

I felt Happiness Is A Warm Gun missed the smeariness too. It felt like a band performing a weird song rather than a crazy collage.

Hey, is the 4LP reissue limited at all? am jonesing for it but not sure when I'll be able to afford it in the near-ish future

DANG, the remix of "A Day in the Life" is good.