Would ABBEY ROAD be more revered if it was by another band?

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"What was Martin's best production work besides the Beatles?"

Don't Let The Sun Catch You Crying!

― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 15 September 2006 12:44 (nineteen years ago)

"What was Martin's best production work besides the Beatles?"

Ferry Across The Mersey!

― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 15 September 2006 12:45 (nineteen years ago)

"What was Martin's best production work besides the Beatles?"

Goldfinger!

― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 15 September 2006 12:46 (nineteen years ago)

"What was Martin's best production work besides the Beatles?"

Sister Golden Hair!

― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 15 September 2006 12:47 (nineteen years ago)

"Tug Of War"

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Friday, 15 September 2006 12:48 (nineteen years ago)

"What was Martin's best production work besides the Beatles?"

Balham - Gateway To The South!

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Friday, 15 September 2006 13:40 (nineteen years ago)

Well, "Goodnight Tonight" too, but obviously they wouldn't have filled entire album with funk experiments like that one. ELO proved the disco beat was perfectly compatible with a more typical Beatles sound too.

A whole record's worth of "Goodnight Tonight"s would have made me feel like a kid on Xmas who got a new bicycle.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Friday, 15 September 2006 13:45 (nineteen years ago)

If it was released today, doubtful anyone would even get past the "Oh! Darling" / "Octopus's Garden" section of the album

au contraire, if it was released today critics would love the bold, uncredited rip of "mr. whirly."

― fact checking cuz (fcc), Friday, 15 September 2006 13:56 (nineteen years ago)

Haha! And "Party Girl" too.

― Run Ruud Run (Ken L), Friday, 15 September 2006 14:07 (nineteen years ago)

The only way Abbey Road would win critical acclaim today would be if they'd shot a new cover depicting the Beatles swanning around in detective trenchcoats and big sunglasses and generally play-acting thirties classiness.

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Friday, 15 September 2006 14:09 (nineteen years ago)

Am I the only one who mistook Steve Cropper for Lemmy in that photo upthread?

― Run Ruud Run (Ken L), Friday, 15 September 2006 14:12 (nineteen years ago)

Altho I've heard worse Beatles' albums and this has some good things on it, this album has some truly awful crap on it, I HATE that song "Because", what a truly mawkish twat Lennon could be

― Oh No It's Dadaismus! (Dada), Friday, 15 September 2006 14:26 (nineteen years ago)

1. FWIW, the late Nicholas Schnaffner claimed that vocalwise, "Abbey Road" had the hightest proportion of 3-part harmonies of any Beatles record. For what it's worth.

2.I really think that George's pair are the best two songs on the album and maybe his best contributions ever. And "Something" has one of those "perfect" guitar solos.

3.The much-loathed "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" is actually a wonderful bit of comedy that would probably get the praise it deserves if it were written by Syd Barrett, or nearly anybody besides Paulie. "Late nights all alone with her test tubes" - come on, that's inspired! Nice non-obnoxious Moog accents and counterpoints, too.

That's all i have for now.

― M. Agony Von Bontee (M. Agony Von Bontee), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:16 (nineteen years ago)

"Because" is one of the extremely few good songs John Lennon wrote between 1968 and 1970.

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:26 (nineteen years ago)

You're a dipshit.

― Squirrel_Police (Squirrel_Police), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:28 (nineteen years ago)

Classic, if only for the "shh-dum" intro to "Come Together."

― Run Ruud Run (Ken L), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:32 (nineteen years ago)

"Come Together" is one of the things that really drag this album down, along with "I Want You". John Lennon was the reason why The Beatles went downhill at the time, and he went on to release an absolutely awful and unlistenable solo debut with "Plastic Ono Band".

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:35 (nineteen years ago)

I'm afraid you are a bit off the mark just this one time, broren min.

― Run Ruud Run (Ken L), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:38 (nineteen years ago)

"he went on to release an absolutely awful and unlistenable post on ILM with FRIGHTENING CONSISTENCY"

― Squirrel_Police (Squirrel_Police), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:39 (nineteen years ago)

'I Want You' and 'You Never Give Me Your Money' are easily the two best tracks on the album IMO. Both employ reasonably progressive structures (even if the former alternates between just two 'sections') and show what The Beatles could have become given a few more years and perhaps just as many heavy acid trips.

― Space Gourmand (Haberdager), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:42 (nineteen years ago)

(i.e. a really good non-wanky melodic prog group)

― Space Gourmand (Haberdager), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:45 (nineteen years ago)

You really think so? It never occured to me that the Beatles could have continued at the same level. Never has a group broken up at such a perfect time. Whatever you think of their music, they have the strongest career arc of any band ever.

― Mark (MarkR), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:46 (nineteen years ago)

I really don't see ANY evidence that the Beatles would have evolved into prog. Although clearly 99% of proggers are Beatle nuts.

― Squirrel_Police (Squirrel_Police), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:51 (nineteen years ago)

"What was Martin's best production work besides the Beatles?"

Sgt Pepper's Lonely Heart Club Band - the movie soundtrack

― everything (everything), Friday, 15 September 2006 18:54 (nineteen years ago)

I agree that Lennon contributed significantly to the general decline in the Beatles. You gotta wonder how long it would have taken him to record a solo album if his natural competitiveness against McCartney hadn't kicked in after "McCartney" came out. Also, "Come Together" is my least favourite on Abbey Road. It's a lazy rip-off blues jam of the sort that Lennon obviously enjoyed playing (since such jams keep cropping up in his work over the next 5 years) with "borrowed" words that his ass was rightly sued for. The naughty double meaning in the title (that is the reason that it's so celebrated on Classic Rock stations) is the corniest old blues gimmick around.

Still at least he wasn't shy about owning up to his own laziness.

― everything (everything), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:02 (nineteen years ago)

The premise of this thread is really weird for me. I admittedly haven't given the album a lot of time as an album but it's never clicked for me. However, everyone's always telling me it's their best work and that it's "every fan's favourite." I was totally under the impression that it was overrated.

― Sundar (sundar), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:06 (nineteen years ago)

Mark, your last sentence is pretty much correct, although by that logic I care far, far more for their later-period material and so consider that they had more left in the tank for the arc to be truly fulfilled. My point is that a strong completed career arc does not necessarily preclude an inability to write excellent music, and if they had continues I think their work would have not only stayed at the high level they'd worked up towards but exceeded even that. Although there's no evidence that they would have grown more progressive, prog in itself was barely around at the time the Beatles split, and its heyday was certainly yet to come. Had the Beatles continued, I think they might well have been swept up a little into the movement (although their music would still have been entirely different from, say, King Crimson, with a continuing emphasis on songcraft over musical dexterity). They were certainly not content to hang around in one place, and I think we'd have seen great things from them.

― Space Gourmand (Haberdager), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:07 (nineteen years ago)

The strength of Harrison's material on Abbey Road, and the weakness of Lennon's might have led them to a different, more Harrison-sympathetic dynamic that could have easily pumped out a couple more great albums.

― everything (everything), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:11 (nineteen years ago)

The problem with speculating about it is that it's hard to imagine a post-1970 Beatles with John Lennon.

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:18 (nineteen years ago)

more harrison-sympathetic = more guitar solos = more prog

― Space Gourmand (Haberdager), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:23 (nineteen years ago)

Plus, the early-70's solo careers of all four is probably more interesting than two or three more Beatles albums would have been.

I don't think I'd trade in the solo albums 69-74 for three more Beatles albums anyway.

― everything (everything), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:24 (nineteen years ago)

"more harrison-sympathetic = more guitar solos = more prog"

Anyone who's actually heard the album want to comment?

― everything (everything), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:25 (nineteen years ago)

Heard what album? I was talking about an album that was never made. Unless this is your point.

― Space Gourmand (Haberdager), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:26 (nineteen years ago)

my comment wasn't serious anyway.

― Space Gourmand (Haberdager), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:27 (nineteen years ago)

Another best beatles thread ever.

― Run Ruud Run (Ken L), Friday, 15 September 2006 19:34 (nineteen years ago)

Regarding the prog comments. The problem is that the suite on side 2 wasn't meant to be a suite. It was just a bunch of unfinished parts of songs put together to be able to fill the rest of the album And, admittedly, it worked out quite well, but prog? Nope!

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Friday, 15 September 2006 21:03 (nineteen years ago)

who cares what it was meant to be? it IS a suite, just like, say, uncle albert/admiral halsey, and just like, say, genesis.

― fact checking cuz (fcc), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:01 (nineteen years ago)

You're just saying "suite" to make it sound more pompous or pretentious, which it isn't. It's a friggin' MEDLEY, okay?

― everything (everything), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:04 (nineteen years ago)

it's a friggin' sah-uite medley, bro

― oops (Oops), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:06 (nineteen years ago)

what we choose to call it is a lot less important than what it sounds like. but inasmuch as suite means a group of related things that are used together, which it in fact does, i've got no particular problem with it.

― fact checking cuz (fcc), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:09 (nineteen years ago)

You may call it what you will. But, in musical terms a suite is an set instrumental pieces performed at a single session (generally in a single key). A medley is a series of songs strung together.

― everything (everything), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:22 (nineteen years ago)

The 20 minute epics by 70s prog acts were usually called suites.

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:24 (nineteen years ago)

i'd argue that the concept of "single session" is meaningless in the record-production process, as a pop record hasn't been made in a single session since any of us were born. dictionarilty speaking, suites can also consist of parts in related keys, which, if memory serves, most of those beatles things are. not that it matters either way. either it sounds proggy or it doesn't. i think it kinda does.

― fact checking cuz (fcc), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:25 (nineteen years ago)

x-post

Okay, that was the genre's classical pretentions. Those dopes didn't know any better.

― everything (everything), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:27 (nineteen years ago)

>The 20 minute epics by 70s prog acts were usually called suites.

Actually the preferred term was opuses.

― Squirrel_Police (Squirrel_Police), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:33 (nineteen years ago)

Opii?

― everything (everything), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:35 (nineteen years ago)

now we're talking.

1. Carry on wayward son (5:13)
2. The wall (4:47)
3. What's on my mind (3:27)
4. Miracles out of nowhere (6:29)
5. Opus insert (4:26)
6. Questions of my childhood (3:38)
7. Cheyenne anthem (6:50)
8. Magnum opus (8:27)

― fact checking cuz (fcc), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:35 (nineteen years ago)

Abbey Road was easily in my top few Beatles albums when I first got into them as a teenage lad, often claiming the #1 spot. It's gradually fallen off into the category of albums I almost never put on. Not sure why - when I do, it never really fails to entertain, although I'm definitely in the camp that's very ehhh on "Come Together."

One of the reasons why Abbey Road fascinates, I think, is that we know it was made by a nearly-broken-up band with the barest of enthusiasm for what they were doing...and yet it sounds more complete, more joyful, more Beatles than anything put out since Magical Mystery Tour. Some of that can be put down to studio wizardry (especially the completion of the medley) and letting George Martin take the helm (where he was left out of Get Back and apparently not much consulted on the white album), or Paul burning the midnight oil to get it all put together, but still, it's an album that completely doesn't match its storyline. If Lennon was so over the Beatles at this point, why did he give them "Come Together," which, even though we hate it, certainly is a classic rock staple and would have done fine (though sounded shittier) on any of his solo records. To him perhaps they were all bullshit, trifles, contract-fillers. But the same can arguably be said of Harrison - if the established story is that he was always repressed and that he finally got to share all his great songs on All Things Must Pass, why didn't he hang on to his two brilliant tracks here and turn in a reworked version of "For You Blue" or something to round this one out?

Rarely has an album of people fulfilling professional commitments sounded so not like what it is. The story isn't complete; the songs are too good, even the ones that project the Beatles into "70s rock" and worse. Does it not excite me now because it's rotten at the core, a triumph of style over substance? Is Band on the Run in fact the better Paul McCartney production showpiece record???

Oh! HERE's the thread I was looking for! Construct a worthy follow-up to Abbey Road by using solo material from ex-Beatles.

― Doctor Casino (Doctor Casino), Friday, 15 September 2006 22:36 (nineteen years ago)

Objectively, I like just about everything on it but there's just something really dead about the record. It's basically the precursor to the Ringo album, and McCartney, Plastic Ono Band, All Things Must Pass (and maybe even Sentimental Journey) were all a bit of fresh air.

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Friday, 15 September 2006 23:11 (nineteen years ago)

Side B's weak for a Beatles album.

― Squirrel_Police (Squirrel_Police), Friday, 15 September 2006 23:22 (nineteen years ago)

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