Chapter 9 - The BEATLES

Chapter 9

Number 9...number 9... number 9... There it is, my dingy copy of the end of The Beatles, The BEATLES. Technically i'm supposed to take the "amazing mental kaleidoscope" hallway and talk about their TM retreat with everybody and their girlfriend's dog, and how everybody took a turn quitting during these final sessions before McCartney finally announced it. Meh. At heart it's a self-titled "we were The Beatles." 

It is a kaleidoscope, i'll give you that. It's 4 dudes going back to being 4 separate dudes doing their own thing. Glass Onion pretty much sums up how they feel about that first half of their lives. As an album i hate it. It smells like cabbage farts in my brain. But, there's a light at the end of the tunnel that i'm positive isn't a freight train coming our way. You know what's good about it? It's a ridiculous behemoth double album and half the songs don't even contain a majority of The Beatles playing on them. There's more studio improvisation than Pop-Rock. You know what this album really says? Don't get mad at me, but it literally says "we were The Beatles, jesus christ we sucked. We're just 4 space cadets who happen to be great musicians and worked hard to write silly songs and make a lot of money for other people." 

You might think i'm crazy, but in that context this is a phenomenal achievement of recorded music. Look, i'm serious, this was 1968. Two months after this was released it was 1969 and we all know Bryan Adams found the only part of that year that wasn't 2020 to fondly remember. 

The first time around i called it bad random crap. I think i'm wrong. I was looking at it from the wrong direction, let's try taking it literal. "We're the biggest band in the world, and we're pointless [jazz hands]." It's true. That's why it's a double album of random crap. It's good random crap. 

Everybody points to the fact that all they had was 1 acoustic guitar in India, and that's why many of the songs feel stripped back and they plundered the studio sound effects library. Kay, sure, but let's really think about this. I've made albums that sound better than this. Not that my albums or my playing are better, i just mean i have better sound production with my cheap gear and computer than all of the equipment in Abbey Road Studios put together. This album sounds great for 1968, but i have actual bedroom recorded albums of equal/better audio quality for about 1/10,000th the price. Meanwhile, George no Rs Martin is saying "Paul, this raccoon song sucks, can we please record anything else?" 

So much sloppy and out of tune playing, so many fragments stitched into abstract nothingness. Why don't we do it in the road? You're telling me that's better than McCartney? Yeah, now i love this album. It's inconsistent and trivial on purpose. I certainly like that context a whole lot better. It's giving it too much credit, but i like it. I like it a lot. 4 people picked to live as an internationally renowned pop phenomenon, go crazy and get mad at each other, then go 4 different directions afterward. 

It's so weird, i truly love The Beatles. What i don't like is that this self-titled monstrosity feels like a retrospective mix-tape from 3 different better projects. This sounds like they broke up halfway through the process and just handed a box of random mixes to The Compiler for final consolidation to fulfill contractual obligations. Listening to The BEATLES is exactly like listening to EL&P's Love Beach. I have to want it to be a trainwreck. 

Crazily enough, that feels good. That's the context in which this album is fantastic. No before, no after, this is all The Beatles that exists; a brilliant bedroom collage album with no larger context than the fact that it now exists. Plus it ends with Good Night, so i don't have to. I do have to finish this little exposé (not that it's particularly scandalous) with some sort of conclusion, but that is definitely tomorrow's problem. Cheers.

Chapter 10