Showing posts with label Here Comes the Sun. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Here Comes the Sun. Show all posts

Thursday, August 08, 2019

CPT Flashback - August 8, 1969 - 50 years ago today the Beatles, greatest rock group in history, released their final album, Abbey Road

Enjoy a trip down memory lane as you check out the history, back story, and results of the last album recorded by the Beatles.  It was the end of the long and winding road of the Fab Four from Liverpool.




Here Comes the Sun – George Harrison
Subtitulada en Españo










Why The Beatles’ ‘Abbey Road’ Album Was Streets Ahead Of Its Time

With some of the most magisterial songs The Beatles ever wrote, ‘Abbey Road’ was the final album they recorded, and now stands as many people’s favourite.

Published August 8, 2019
by Richard Havers


Prior to 26 September 1969, most people in the world were blissfully unaware that Abbey Road was the location of EMI’s London recording studios. Some keen fans may have spotted the name in news reports of The Beatles’ activities, but this was a time when it was of little importance to most fans where something was recorded. Ironically, given the album’s title, not all of Abbey Road was recorded at Abbey Road, and, in truth, the title is as much about the street and the zebra crossing outside as it is about the studio itself.

But when all is said and done, the album is for many, including this writer, the absolute pinnacle of the band’s achievements. All this, despite having been recorded as the band was breaking up amid internal strife and bitterness.

“A natural born gas”
Abbey Road was The Beatles’ 11th studio album and the very last to be recorded (their 12th – and last-released – studio album, Let It Be, was mostly recorded prior to this record). Rolling Stone magazine called it “complicated instead of complex”, while Nik Cohn, writing in The New York Times, suggested that “individually” the songs are “nothing special”, The Guardian called the album “a slight matter”, and the Detroit Free Press suggested, “We expected inventiveness. We got a good LP.”

However, Chris Welch, writing in Melody Maker, felt just the opposite: “The truth is, their latest LP is just a natural born gas, entirely free of pretension, deep meanings or symbolism.” Similarly enthusiastic, The Record Mirror said that Abbey Road was “every bit as good as the last three” albums by the group. History, too, has been much kinder, with many now citing this as their favourite Beatles album.


What makes Abbey Road a masterpiece?
What is it that makes Abbey Road a masterpiece? Well, the breadth of the musical vision, the sheer scale of the band’s collective musical imagination, and the audacity of it all, at a time when The Beatles were coming to the end of their time together.

And then there are the two George Harrison masterpieces, ‘Here Comes the Sun’ and ‘Something’; both rank alongside the best songs the band ever recorded. Of the former, uDiscover’s Martin Chilton, writing in the Daily Telegraph, says “it’s almost impossible not to sing along to” – and he’s right.

‘Something’ is sublime, the perfect love song and John Lennon’s favourite track on the album. Often prior to performing it in concert, Frank Sinatra would describe it as “the greatest love song ever written” (while also erroneously saying it was his favourite “Lennon and McCartney composition”).


Something to luxuriate in
Side Two’s 15-minute “medley” begins with ‘You Never Give Me Your Money’, a Paul McCartney song. It transitions beautifully into ‘Sun King’, which was written by John and features John, Paul, and George’s impeccable harmonies. From there the medley runs into two more Lennon songs, ‘Mean Mr Mustard’ and ‘Polythene Pam’ (both written in India). Then it’s a quadruple shot from McCartney: ‘She Came In Through The Bathroom Window’, the beautiful ‘Golden Slumbers’ and ‘Carry That Weight’ (which includes elements from ‘You Never Give Me Your Money’), before the medley closes with ‘The End’.

Opinion is divided among some fans and critics about some of the remaining tracks. However, there is no disputing the power, no denying the magnificence, of two of John Lennon’s compositions. ‘Come Together’ is one of the great opening tracks on any album. Likewise, ‘I Want You (She’s So Heavy)’ just takes the band to a place they had never been before… towering.

The songs not entirely recorded at Abbey Road were ‘Something’, which features some overdubs recorded at Olympic Studios in Barnes, West London. For ‘I Want You (She’s So Heavy)’ the band recorded the rhythm track in February 1969, at Trident Studios in Soho’s Wardour Street, where a composite of the song was then assembled. Work continued on the song until August (including a session on 8 August, when the album’s cover shoot also took place), as recordings were added to the original Trident tape; the finished song, completed at Abbey Road, was another composite made from two versions of the song. Meanwhile, ‘You Never Give Me Your Money’ was started at Olympic in May 1969, and then finished at Abbey Road over a number of sessions in July and August.

Abbey Road is far greater than the sum of its parts, a record that, more than any other Beatles album, stands the test of time when played as a whole. It is not an album to cherry-pick tracks on random play – this is one to put on, to luxuriate in ‘Come Together’, and to finish with a smile on your face as Paul sings about Her Majesty being “a pretty nice girl” on the closing, “hidden” track.

The 5th Beatle Sir George Martin

TRACK LISTING

·         Come Together
·         Something
·         Maxwell's Silver Hammer
·         Oh! Darling
·         Octopus's Garden
·         I Want You (She's So Heavy)
·         Here Comes the Sun
·         Because
·         You Never Give Me Your Money
·         Sun King
·         Mean Mr. Mustard
·         Polythene Pam
·         She Came in Through the Bathroom Window
·         Golden Slumbers
·         Carry That Weight
·         The End
·         Her Majesty


   Album Selections

Beatles Come Together
(Double click for full screen)



Beatles Something



Beatles Maxwell's Silver Hammer



Beatles Oh! Darling



Beatles Octopus's Garden



Beatles Because



Beatles Golden Slumbers



Beatles Carry That Weight



Beatles The End



Beatles Her Majesty






Here Comes the Sun Background Story