Beatles, The (The White Album) - Beatles (The)

Dizzy_Lizzy 20.09.2004
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Review of Beatles, The (The White Album) - Beatles (The)

When first released, 'The Beatles', generally known to posterity as the 'White Album' after its stark white packaging, seemed simply baffling. Apart from Bob Dylan's 'Blonde on Blonde', it was the first rock double album, and there was something pretty daunting about the sprawling collection of 30 tracks to digest at once. Numerous other acts have done the same since, but in 1968 it was not the norm. However, maybe that's one of the most fascinating ...
...recorded, more like a scrapbook in which they sandwiched the real goodies with a collection of shorter tracks which might be seen as demos or unfinished ideas by one or two members of the group (like McCartney's 53-seconds-long 'Wild Honey Pie'), and a few highly dispensable items which suggest that quality control was giving way to self-indulgence. Some three and a half decades later, its legendary status is assured. Diehard Beatles fans think it's ...

JOHNV 16.09.2004 · Read full review
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Review of Beatles, The (The White Album) - Beatles (The)

At least 50% of the population like The BEATLES. Maybe 25% of the population are very fond of them. The 25% that love The Beatles will buy up almost everything that ever gets released. I sadly fall into the 'slavish devotion' catagory and must have certain songs by the Beatles in at least 5 or 6 different formats (Records, Tapes, CD's and MP3). With this in mind I think I can say with a degree of knowledge that this is the Beatles most 'Must Have' ...
...their most polished or competant... Just that all-in-all it's the best. I originally had this on tape (missed out on vinyl but couldn't quite afford CD's). I bought it at the local market, took it home, stuck it in the alba, and, after a couple of hours listening completed reassessed my opinion of The Beatles. Years later a girl I was seeing at the time bought me the album on CD for Christmas. For this one small, quite insignificant gesture (in ...

mongo_bongocat 27.05.2006 · Read full review
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Review of Beatles, The (The White Album) - Beatles (The)

To all intents and purposes, The Beatles’ last real album as a band was Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and even then that album was more about George Martin and the studio working magic with a few hammy songs while the band members were spending their time growing facial hair and dressing up. Pepper had been the rock music event of 1967, but it had seen the band behind the music start to move apart. Thus when the revolutionary air of ...
...by the world’s biggest band, what actually happened was that three gifted individuals got together in the studio, accompanied by everybody’s favourite loser, Ringo Starr, with their collection of here’s one I prepared earlier stuffed under their arms and shared the experience with us. In such unpromising circumstances with John and Paul becoming more and more distant and estranged as Lennon’s real soul mate emerged in the shape of Yoko Ono, and George ...

dave27 01.03.2003 · Read full review
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Review of Beatles, The (The White Album) - Beatles (The)

When the “loveable moptops” released this album in 1968, they had become considerably less loveable in the public eye. Their interests in drugs, Indian mysticism and religion, along with the disastrous “Magical Mystery Tour” flick of 1967, had tarnished their reputation. And to top it all, they had grown huge beards! Certainly, no-one was expecting this sprawling masterpiece, which changed the direction of rock music, and ...
...band of all time – which they undoubtedly are. In this review, I’ve decided to take each side of the album and go through it in detail. So here goes… Opener “Back in the USSR” is a great attention grabber, and when it merges into “Dear Prudence”, it’s a double whammy of sheer class. Then comes “Glass Onion”. This Lennon mini-epic contains great lyrics which refer back to other Beatles ...

thegrinder2k 18.03.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Beatles, The (The White Album) - Beatles (The)

I do think it's a shame they didn't make it as a single album - it would have been absolutely brilliant. Let's see, if they'd missed off Revolution #9, Bungalow Bill, Ob-La-Di (leave that one for Marmalade) and Rocky Raccoon. OK, they might have had to dump a couple of other songs too, to fit it all on. And that might have been difficult, as the rest of the White album is made up of good (some excellent) songs. It's worth buying for "While My Guitar ...
...I know it's not popular to say that about a George Harrison composition. It's Eric Clapton on guitar, and the solos are breathtaking. When George sings "Look at you all…" he manages to convey utter despair, and at the same time detachment. It's almost like he's abandoned the real lyrics to sing this line, too. Is he talking about the state of the world, or the state of the Beatles… The album was recorded at a time when the Beatles' breakup was becoming ...

rsmith 18.10.2000 · Read full review
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Review of Beatles, The (The White Album) - Beatles (The)