Each song on the sprawling double album
The Beatles
is an entity to itself, as the band touches on anything and everything it can. This makes for a frustratingly scattershot record or a singularly gripping musical experience, depending on your view, but what makes the so-called
White Album
interesting is its mess. Never before had a
rock
record been so self-reflective, or so ironic;
the Beach Boys
send-up
"Back in the U.S.S.R."
and the British blooze parody
"Yer Blues"
are delivered straight-faced, so it's never clear if these are affectionate tributes or wicked satires.
Lennon
turns in two of his best
ballads
with
"Dear Prudence"
and
"Julia"
; scours the
Abbey Road
vaults for the
musique concrete
collage
"Revolution 9"
; pours on the schmaltz for
Ringo
's closing number,
"Good Night"
; celebrates the
Beatles
cult with
"Glass Onion"
; and, with
"Cry Baby Cry,"
rivals
Syd Barrett
.
McCartney
doesn't reach quite as far, yet his songs are stunning -- the
music hall
romp
"Honey Pie,"
the mock
country
of
"Rocky Raccoon,"
the
ska
-inflected
"Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,"
and the proto-
metal
roar of
"Helter Skelter."
Clearly,
the Beatles
' two main songwriting forces were no longer on the same page, but neither were
George
Harrison
still had just two songs per LP, but it's clear from
"While My Guitar Gently Weeps,"
the canned
soul
"Savoy Truffle,"
the haunting
"Long, Long, Long,"
and even the silly
"Piggies"
that he had developed into a songwriter who deserved wider exposure. And
turns in a delight with his first original, the lumbering
-carnival stomp
"Don't Pass Me By."
None of it sounds like it was meant to share album space together, but somehow
creates its own style and sound through its mess. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine