What would you do if faced with the prospect of following up one of the most culturally important albums ever? Good question. If you are The Beatles, you do the following. A) Bugger off on a long holiday somewhere hot like ooh…India. B) Write a whole load of acoustic guitar based songs whilst convening with the likes of Donovan etc C) Come home and release the whole lot on a huge sprawling double album despite people telling you that a judicious pruning would produce a much better single album. D) Watch it become, little by little, one of your best loved albums.
Yes, I’ve rediscovered the White Album after at least 20 years of its being discarded in a cupboard with a load of other ‘Oh, God did I buy that’ albums. So what do I think of it now? Yes, it could’ve been edited a bit and yes, it’s got some real clunkers on it but without them, it just wouldn’t be the same and thereby lies the appeal. Funny how it has crept up those ‘best of’ charts that appear from time to time so that it is close to being the best regarded fabs album.
From my viewpoint, I like it because it is such a mixed bag. You’d be hard pushed to find another double album that has so much musical variety, real quality rubbing shoulders with utter rubbish and a listen-to-once-only avant-garde musical collage. The only other double LP that comes anywhere close that I can think of immediately is Elton John’s ‘Goodbye Yellow Brick Road’ and that, perhaps advisedly, left off the collage.
But the one factor that has struck me after reacquainting myself with the ‘White Album’ is how playful it is. It is a million miles from the critical earnestness of ‘Sgt Pepper’ and seems to display a band who are unaffected by the pressure of success and have actually transcended the need to succeed. In other words they are free to experiment and have a good time doing it. Either that or they have lost the plot entirely under the influence of certain substances – you choose. It’s the little things that make me laugh. It’s John’s raucous ‘Eh-up!’ just before plunging into George’s ‘While my Guitar Gently Weeps’ and the snatch of intricate classical guitar that prefaces the jaunty singalong of ‘The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill’ which still make me smile.
But it’s not all whimsy. There are some real gems on this album, like McCartney’s ‘Martha My Dear’ and ‘Blackbird’ and Lennon’s ‘Revolution’, ‘Happiness is a Warm Gun’ and the immaculate ‘Sexy Sadie’. Without them the album would fall into the trap of being too irreverent and mediocre but being the Beatles, there is always enough real invention to keep you listening. How did they do it?
Yes, I’ve rediscovered the White Album after at least 20 years of its being discarded in a cupboard with a load of other ‘Oh, God did I buy that’ albums. So what do I think of it now? Yes, it could’ve been edited a bit and yes, it’s got some real clunkers on it but without them, it just wouldn’t be the same and thereby lies the appeal. Funny how it has crept up those ‘best of’ charts that appear from time to time so that it is close to being the best regarded fabs album.
From my viewpoint, I like it because it is such a mixed bag. You’d be hard pushed to find another double album that has so much musical variety, real quality rubbing shoulders with utter rubbish and a listen-to-once-only avant-garde musical collage. The only other double LP that comes anywhere close that I can think of immediately is Elton John’s ‘Goodbye Yellow Brick Road’ and that, perhaps advisedly, left off the collage.
But the one factor that has struck me after reacquainting myself with the ‘White Album’ is how playful it is. It is a million miles from the critical earnestness of ‘Sgt Pepper’ and seems to display a band who are unaffected by the pressure of success and have actually transcended the need to succeed. In other words they are free to experiment and have a good time doing it. Either that or they have lost the plot entirely under the influence of certain substances – you choose. It’s the little things that make me laugh. It’s John’s raucous ‘Eh-up!’ just before plunging into George’s ‘While my Guitar Gently Weeps’ and the snatch of intricate classical guitar that prefaces the jaunty singalong of ‘The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill’ which still make me smile.
But it’s not all whimsy. There are some real gems on this album, like McCartney’s ‘Martha My Dear’ and ‘Blackbird’ and Lennon’s ‘Revolution’, ‘Happiness is a Warm Gun’ and the immaculate ‘Sexy Sadie’. Without them the album would fall into the trap of being too irreverent and mediocre but being the Beatles, there is always enough real invention to keep you listening. How did they do it?
