I’ve been finding myself falling in love with the lesser celebrated tunes of the Lennon/McCartney catalog. The leap from the first 2 albums to A Hard Day’s Night is astounding. From the first note of the title track they sound utterly assured. This is the first album they recorded as international super stars before it became a drag for them. It’s also the first album they recorded with 4-track capability. There are no cover songs, all Lennon/McCartney tracks, not even a Harrison penned tune and no Ringo either! Try to not like, “I Should Have Known Better”, just try. It’s not humanly possible. One of the best parts of the album is Harrison’s characteristic jangle from his newly acquired 12 string guitar predicting the “folk rock” sound adored by the Byrds by at least a year.
These remasters have me picking out sounds and subtle nuances I never heard before. I might be slow on the train here, but there are BONGOS on the song “A Hard Day’s Night”?!? I’m hearing vocal fuck ups, people coming in too late/too soon, chatter that got picked up on the mic by accident, etc. But those vocals sound heavenly. You can hear their echo on the Please, Please Me and With The Beatles albums. It’s really something to behold. McCartney’s bass playing is more audible than ever before.
In a nutshell, go get the remasters. The further I get into their later albums, I know they will only sound better. It’s a good chance to fall back in love with the best band of all time and some of the most celebrated songs of the 20th century.
I’ve made play lists for each of these albums and included A-Side singles and B-sides (taken from the Past Masters double cd) recorded during those sessions but left off the albums (this was a business practice implored by the Beatles) to give myself a fuller sense of the sound being made during those albums. For those of you interested the break down is as follows:
Please, Please Me
- Love Me Do (Original Single Version)
- From Me To You
- Thank You Girl
With The Beatles
- She Loves You
- I’ll Get You
- I Want To Hold Your Hand
- This Boy
A Hard Day’s Night
- I Call Your Name
*I left off, “Long Tall Sally”, “Slow Down” and “Matchbox” (which were all originally included with “I Call Your Name” on an EP) since they were cover songs and this was an all originals album. “I Call Your Name” is the only one of the four songs that fits within the tone/mood of the A Hard Day’s Night album.
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“Wow!” is the quote I must use at this hour. Flintheart, you have a level of devotion to the beatles that I almost thought impossible in this day & age. I must say I am impressed with the level of dedication you show as well as the attention to fine detail. I didn’t notice the bongos on “A Hard Days Night” (the song)until you mentioned them in your write up despite the fact that I have listened to “A Hard Days Night” (the album remasters on both stereo and mono) numerous times since the re-release. I would like to add that Rubber Soul and Seargent Peppers sound the most different through the remaster. Any Beatles fan needs these albums.