What they’re saying:
Critical
opinion on The Beatles aka the ‘White
Album’ in 1968 varies, the record being seen as something of a comedown
after the exhilaration of the group’s somewhat over-rated predecessor, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. In addition,
conventional wisdom holds that The Beatles marks the
beginning of the end of the Lennon/McCartney partnership. This book however,
exists to argue that The Beatles is not
only the finest achievement of the Beatles group but can also be considered one
of the greatest LP recordings of all time.
The Beatles
were famous as a tight unit with extremely high standards of composition,
musicianship and production and it is the ‘messiness’ of The Beatles LP that is considered problematic (most
famously by producer George Martin who wanted to edit the songs into a single
LP). Unlike the relatively consistent style the previous LPs had offered, The Beatles revels in confusion. Is the LP rock’n’roll?
Folk? Avant-garde? Rock?
Looking back
at the LP 50 years later, The Beatles can be
seen as a true representation of the spirit of the ‘Fab Four’ and the
individual talents that combined to form the greatest group of all time.
This book is
not to be read as a scholarly study of The Beatles
LP but rather as an experience like listening to the actual record itself:
uneven, disorientating, difficult and fun.
Edited by
Mark Goodall.
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