The Beatles' White Album (originally posted 7/9/09)

Many Beatles fans echo the thoughts of Beatles producer Sir George Martin in believing that a great single-disc album would have resulted from culling the best tracks from the two-disc "White Album" and eliminating the weaker tunes. Says Martin, "I thought we should probably have made a very, very good single album rather than a double. But they insisted. I think it could have been made fantastically good if it had been compressed a bit and condensed." What songs to keep and which ones to cut ("I was underwhelmed because some of (the songs) weren't great" - Martin) was a question a friend of mine, Ed "Terminator" Thrane, and I grappled with almost a decade ago. Ed's list was heavy on the Lennon, for he was a huge Beatle John mark. Ed preferred my list, based not so much on my selections as in the order I listed the songs. Both lists have been lost to posterity; here, I try to recreate my list.


SIDE ONE


1. Back in the USSR: Just as on the White Album, I feel this Paul McCartney homage to the Beach Boys makes an ideal opening track. For the record, Paul was the drummer on this track.


2. Yer Blues: Song placement on a Beatles album was always premeditated, as opposed to tracks just being haphazardly organized onto two sides of an LP. One great thing about listening to a Beatles album was after hearing, say, an endearing children's song (Yellow Submarine), you immediately get socked with the psychedelic, LSD-influenced She Said, She Said. Their albums just flowed eclecticaly but naturally from track-to-track, especially on their greatest works, which would be A Hard Day's Night, Rubber Soul, Revolver (the greatest album of all-time), and Abbey Road.
Here, following the light-hearted opening track, I follow it with John's blues parody, and it was this roller-coaster of emotions from track-to-track that my friend Ed responded so favorably towards.


3. Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da: Not the favorite track of, say, John or George Harrison, and I include this upbeat, whimsical (and I am being charitable here) song because it is one of the most well-known tracks on the album and to avoid making my single disc too loaded with Lennon tracks.


4. Julia: Certain lines in John's pensive ballad to his deceased mother have always touched me.


5. Birthday: Another of the more renowned songs on the album. Placing a party song right after a maudlin ballad has a certain hilarity about it. And, Paul's song also rocks!


6. I'm So Tired: One of John's greatest songs as a Beatle.


7. Why Don't We Do it In the Road?: From their first release, Please Please Me, up through Revolver, each Beatles British LP had exactly fourteen tracks, seven on each side. Here, I take artistic license by adding an eighth song to my Side One, and this brief song is the extra track. I love the ominous organ and Paul's gritty vocals. (The history of how Beatles British LPs became corrupted with different tracks and/or different album titles when released in America is well-known, and I see no point in recounting it here.)


8. While My Guitar Gently Weeps: Early Beatles albums contained either Lennon-McCartney songs or covers, save for George Harrison's Don't Bother Me on the second LP With the Beatles. This pattern started to change on the Help! LP, which featured two slight Harrison tracks (I Need You, You Like Me Too Much). Harrison's contributions to Rubber Soul and to Revolver showed his blossoming songwriting skills. On the last song of my Side One, George (with Eric Clapton on guitar) gives us a future Classic Rock standard.


SIDE TWO


1. Martha My Dear: Paul's ode to his dog, a theme he would return to later in life with equally good results (Jet-1973).


2. Glass Onion: Lennon's witty song addressed to the Beatles fans who read too much into his songs. I like the version of Glass Onion on Beatles Anthology 3 even better, with the shattered glass special effects. The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill would also fit nicely in this slot.


3. Mother Nature's Son: This song of Paul's has some beautiful parts to it, and is better than Paul's Blackbird, also on the album.


4. Savoy Truffle: George stated that this song was inspired by a toothache of Eric Clapton's. Without this song and Cry, Baby, Cry, side four of the White Album would barely exist.


5. Good Night: On each Beatles album, from the Shirelles cover Boys on the first album Please, Please Me through Abbey Road (excluding A Hard Day's Night) drummer Ringo Starr would sing lead on one song. Here, I bypass the first song he ever wrote alone for a Beatles album, Don't Pass Me By (on Side Two of the White Album) for the Side Four album closer written by John and Paul and sung by Ringo. Everyone loves Ringo, but Don't Pass Me By is really, really bad. If I break the Ringo Rule, then The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill would be here.


6. Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except for Me and My Monkey: Another great rocker from John, and he gets really esoteric with the lyrics here.


7. Cry, Baby, Cry: A beautiful song from John, this would make a perfect closing track because of the snippet of an unfinished Paul song added to the end with the poignant lyric "Can you take me back/Where I Came From/Can You Take Me Back..."

Obviously, there were some tough cuts, but some could be excluded immediately. Revolution 1 and Revolution 9, Don't Pass Me By, Honey Pie, Wild Honey Pie are the most obvious cuts. What about the other songs?


The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill: In case you could not tell from the notes above, this was the hardest song to leave out. In fact, the song probably should replace Good Night.


Helter Skelter: The most notorious song on the album, which supposedly influenced Charles Manson during the Tate-LaBianca murders. This song of Paul's, a rocking tune about an English fairground, "still sucks anyway" according to the 4th edition of the New Rolling Stone Album Guide, a book with many execrable opinions and "facts" (Relax, I'll get to my scathing review of this book a few blogs from now.) The song does not suck.


Sexy Sadie: I feel this thinly-veiled Lennon reference to the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi is the most overrated song on the album, and it is because I just do not dig the lyrics.


Happiness is a Warm Gun: The first minute or so of this Lennon song is one of my favorite moments of the album, but I am just not a huge fan of the chorus.


Dear Prudence: There are many fans of this Lennon song imploring Mia Farrow's sister to come out from her chalet (Ed, the aforementioned Rolling Stone book), but it is not a favorite of mine.


Blackbird: Another favorite of the Rolling Stone book, I still like Mother Nature's Son more, despite some very sensitive lyrics from Paul.


I Will: A little too endearing and syrupy a serving of Paul for me, this song inexplicably made Ed's list.


Long, Long, Long: I felt this song, loved by many (Pete Shotton- John's friend from his Liverpool days, the Rolling Stone book), is the most overrated Harrison song in the Beatles' oeuvre.


Piggies: Another notorious song from the album because of its link to the Manson storyline, this Harrison song has always been charming for me. A worthy song that could easily make the cut on other Beatles albums.


Rocky Raccoon: An utterly ridiculous song of Paul's, delievered with moxie by the cute Beatle. I have never seen or heard this opinion anywhere before, but I wonder, given Paul's excellent performance of this asinine song, how he would do singing bad songs from an Elvis soundtrack? Probably much better than Elvis, since, unlike Paul, Elvis had an internal B.S. detector that recognized the crap just wasn't worth the effort. Paul, as judging by his work on Red Rose Speedway and Wild Life, plus his duet with Michael Jackson on The Girl is Mine, had no such subconscious roadblocks and would have probably delivered tour-de-force performances on The Song of the Shrimp, Yoga Is As Yoga Does, Poison Ivy League, Barefoot Ballad, Do the Clam, and so forth.