The Beatles - Meet The Beatles

So the jacket says this is "The First Album by England's Phenomenal Pop Combo" but wikipedia says it's the second US release. We all know record companies lie like anything and wikipedia at least tries not to so I'm going with wikipedia. I'm getting good and tired of the Beatles but all I have left is the white album and then I've played all of it. I did not expect there to be much on this one that I'd like. Their early stuff doesn't always do it for me, and I listened to my double of Sgt. Pepper right before this, and decided it was probably my favorite Beatles album. Then I looked at this and... eh. Didn't expect much.

It didn't get off to a great start either. The jacket is in terrible shape. It's split on two sides so it's more like a portfolio than a sleeve now, and my mom's cat's used it as a scratching post. They did that to all her records (fuck cats, am I right? fuck those fluffy destructive little shits) but they really did a number on this one. Big huge gouges. It was dirty, mildewed. AND there was a hiss so bad through the first minute of the first track that I almost called it a loss and didn't play it through.

Glad I did though. Heard some good old tunes I forgot about: This Boy, All My Loving. I also heard one I never herd before that I really liked: Don't Bother Me. So it plays alright, for the most part, even though it's all fucked up. There's a valuable lesson there. That's a powerful metaphor. Um. Or something. I'm just glad all I have left is the white album and then I can start digging through the Stones.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Something New

This one was really dirty. I cleaned it up and after it played it was all covered with dust that got kicked up by the needle and the needle had a big dust bunny on it. Other than that, cleaned, plays, basic early Beatles. Got a neat German version of I Wanna Hold Your Hand.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Beatles '65

Got my mom's name on it. I don't know. I Feel Fine is probably my favorite track on this one. Basic early Beatles before they went and got really freaky. Cleaned. Plays. Very minor skip on side two. Not enough to even notice unless you're looking for it.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Hey Jude

The original title of Hey Jude was The Beatles Again, which pretty much sums up the way I feel about this album. I can't believe how many Beatles records there are in this stack. I'm played so many and I still have like, four or five left. Most of them are early, but I do have the White Album still to go. I think I'm leaving that one for last.

This cleaned up. Played just fine. No major scratches. Jacket's a wreck. Don't really care about the jackets though so whatever.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Introducing The Beatles

Me: This is their first album.
Amy: Is it called Their First Album?
Me: No.
Amy: Good. Because that would be stupid.

So this is their first US release. I'm not terribly impressed. It's even more fiftieser. That is so a word. Um. Dirty. Cleaned up nice. Plays okay. It's got I Saw Her Standing There, Love Me Do, Do You Want to Know a Secret, and Twist and Shout which are four of their most famous songs and also the only four songs on here worth a tinker's damn. So. Yeah. It's the Beatles. Yay.

By the way, check out those haircuts. Nice, right?

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - The Beatles' Second Album

Me: This is the Beatles' second album.
Amy: Cool.
Me: The title is The Beatles' Second Album.
Amy: Very creative.
Me: Well, they WERE creative geniuses.

Plays good. Had some weird crud on it but cleaned up nice. Couple minor skips.

The cool thing about this one is, you can really see where they were coming from. This is basically 1950's sock-hop rock-and-roll. Came out in 1964, but still. It's got like, Roy Orbison style guitars. It kind of puts Sgt. Pepper in perspective you know? This was... it might as well have been Rock Around the Clock. But just four years later they'd be some seriously psychedelic motherfuckers. It's a thing.

I mean... fuck 'em. They're the Beatles. Old people music. Whatever. Right?

But in four years they went from sharkskin suits and Beatle boots to Apple Bonkers and Blue Meanies. It's a thing. It's... a... big deal.

Words fail me. Go read a book about the Beatles. Maybe you've heard of them. They were something of a big deal at one time.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Let It Be

Let It Be. The last album they made. They hated each other by the end. Aw, man. I thought these silly happy hippy fucks would cheer me up but listening to this album, thinking about their silly horseshit, it bums me out. All you need is love. They loved each other. Wasn't enough, was it? Were they ever not full of shit? I dunno man. On to the next one. Only got... half a fucking dozen left. How many albums did these assholes make? God damn. Nothing if not prolific, these well-intentioned hypocrites.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Yellow Submarine

I remember watching this movie with my younger brother Steve when we were both kids. I remember both of us liking it. He's a kind of a punk rock guy now. And I'm a kind of a curmudgeonly ex-punk rock guy now. But don't let either of us fool you. We both listened to this silly all-you-need-is-love bullshit back in the day. This album plays pretty well. Looks scratched as fuck. Plays just fine.

Steve took me to a couple awesome bars in Williamsburg last week. Skinny Dennis which we both like and frequent pretty often, and Extra Fancy which is the best seafood I've had in Brooklyn. Wish we were all there now, me and Steve and Amy and Maureen. Hanging at Extra Fancy, slinging back beers and raw clams. It'd be a good time. I guess the nautical theme makes that little reminiscence appropriate. Maybe not. Either way. It would be a good time.

Bum-ba-bum, Sail the ship, Bum-ba-bum, chop the tree...

Side two of this is the incidental music from the movie and its really badly scratched. It doesn't skip too much but it's barely listenable.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Revolver

So like I started saying in the last post, other than the fact that I really want to work my way through all this Beatles and get to something else, the real reason I'm playing the Beatles, other than the fact that I'd like to get them all done, is that they're some cheerful motherfuckers and I'm kind of bummed about the way CUNY has been treating me. But fuck those guys anyway.

The Beatles - Beatles VI

Ok so the real reason I'm playing the Beatles and drinking is because I'm kind of bummed out about... what the fuck?

This is a thing that happens? What the shit? Okay, so... first track on either side won't play. That is... well established.

Um. God damn. Track two on side one is a classic. God damn. Side two is scratched to all fuck. Gonna go ahead and blame the condition of this record on my crazy ex-stepfather because: fuck that guy anyway.

Uh. Yeah. I'll probably never play this again. It's fucked. "Eight Days A Week" plays great. But look at this. Shit.

Holy crap, this one has "Dizzy Miss Lizzy!"

My ex-wife and her dad were really into the Beatles. She considered this her theme song. It didn't work out with me and her. Me calling her my ex and all, you probably figured that out.

Crazy. Yeah, man, I don't know.

The way music works on my memory, sometimes it's really good. Sometimes, not so much. I'm so much happier and healthier than I was when she and I were together.

It's still a bummer that it didn't work out, a bummer that we even tried, that we wasted all that time trying so hard. Looking back, it's easy to say the relationship was bad for both of us. Looking forward, from the beginning, who could have predicted? Other than everyone, I mean.


Anyway, I'm in a better place now. I hope she is too.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - A Hard Day's Night

Okay, so, I'm playing through all the Beatles stuff I haven't played today. I have a stack of the Beatles, and a stack of the Stones and another stack of Bob Dylan that I'd like to complete before I start digging through all the other weird shit. I'm doing the Beatles first because I like to save the best for last. HA! Suck it BEATLES! Ah whatever. Most of it's good.

There are some really weird like, lounge or bossa nova versions of some Beatles tunes on this. Man... just weird.

I live in Brooklyn, weed capitol of NYC and I don't have a connection. How sad is that? Listening to this I wish I was hanging with my sister, smoking a doob, listening to this silly shit. Ah well. Next time I see her, I guess.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Rubber Soul

Last week when I was googling Dylan lyrics to send to my friend Larra as a joke that only I thought was funny, I found this article about a song Dylan wrote about John Lennon. It was an interesting read and it mentioned Norwegian Wood which is on this album. I love that song and I haven't heard it for a long time so I pulled this out of the stack and gave it a listen.

It's a good album. It's scratched all to hell. I mean, just awful. Oddly, it plays just fine. So anyway it's a decent album and if I ever find myself in the mood to listen to Norwegian Wood I'll play it again. The rest of the songs on it are okay. None of them are my favorites. It's got In My Life on it which makes my mom cry every time she hears it. But that's not much of a distinction. Lots of things make her cry. Car commercials make her cry.

Anyway: good album, scratched so badly it looks like it was used as a cat toy, plays just fine anyway.

Incidentally, there's probably gonna be a ton of Beatles and Stones on the blog coming up, partially because I want to see which I have more of, and partially because they're all stacked up together and I want to get through them and move on to other stuff.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Yesterday and Today

Yay, more Beatles. If you're starting to get tired of entries about the Beatles, you're starting to get the picture of what my childhood was like. I know I just wrote this long nostalgic post about Abbey Road. I also said they weren't my favorite band, just that they were always around. This one cleaned up okay. It had a really ugly scratch right in the middle of "We Can Work It Out" which I thought would not only cause it to skip, but might knock the needle all the fuck over the record. I hovered over the turntable ready to lift the needle the second that happened. But it didn't. It played right through it. Very minor skip once every 1.8 seconds through the second half of the song. That was it. The rest of the album played pretty good.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - Magical Mystery Tour

This one's in rough shape but it still plays. It looks pretty scratched up but despite that it only skips a few times. It does have some pops though, and there's hissing or static or something through a good part of it. The hiss sound is pretty minor though. You don't hear it unless you listen for it. I think it just comes from the record being old and worn. While playing this one I thought that there might be some problem with the speakers on my crappy stereo. But then I realized that the Beatles were doing something "innovative" with the stereo mixing on the record. It just sounds weird, especially when you're standing near the stereo. Just gets louder and quieter in alternating speakers, and certain instruments only come out of one speaker. But there's nothing wrong with my stereo. There was just something wrong with the Beatles. Be that as it may, this is a great album with some really good songs on it. That's all I got for now. I gotta go to bed because I gotta get up at 5 fucking AM to go to a class I hate because I'm a glutton for fucking punishment. Who the fuck thought it was a good idea to sign up for an 8 the fuck AM class? Not the Walrus, that's who. Not the Eggman either. Goo goo ga joob.

I have two copies of this!

The Beatles - Abbey Road

Ah, man. Well, Abbey Road is just the holy grail, isn't it?

The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

I just saw my two-year-old spontaneously get up and start dancing to "With a Little Help From My Friends." It was the best thing I ever saw.

[wikipedia]

The Beatles - HELP!

So what I had been doing was posting the pics and the descriptions and my thoughts and what not in the order that I unpacked them and took their pictures, roughly, more or less. But I got a turntable the other day and I finally got it hooked up. I can't clean them and play them in the order I unpacked them because they don't all have inner sleeves. I don't want to clean them and play them until I can put them away properly and I can't do that without an inner sleeve which they don't all have. I ordered some online but they haven't come yet. What all this needless detail that probably no one is ever going to read amounts to is, now I'm going through them basically at random, pulling albums that look interesting, making sure they're in relatively decent shape, have sleeves, cleaning them, and playing them. So. None of this matters and I should probably delete it but I'm not going to.

Anyway, the first album I cleaned up and played was HELP! by the Beatles which would make my mom proud. I probably ought to tell her. I guess I will eventually. Anyway, it had some minor scratches but it played just fine. The cover had some mildew on it that I cleaned up. I cleaned the album, got it to play. My little boy James loved it. He was going around in circles playing with his trucks humming a little tune while I sat and watched him and listened to the music my parents played when I was his age doing the same thing. I'm all verklempt.

[wikipedia]