The Beatles Band • Page 4

Dunno if this is controversial but I feel like John washessssssssss Paul across the majority of The White Album

 

Never really clicked for me before. Just another slow John rocker. But I like it a lot now

 

Disagree strongly with this. "Martha My Dear", "I Will", "Mother Nature's Son", "Blackbird", "Helter Skelter", "Back in the USSR", "Why Don't We Do It in the Road". Legitimately love every single one of those.

George more or less took an album off outside of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" though

 

I think overall John has the greater volume of songs I love. But then I have to remember that Paul often played a big part in making them what they were.

 

to be fair I'm a boring angry young man whose favorite solo Beatles LP is Plastic Ono Band for the primal screaming

BUT those are all great songs. I think I'm just knocking him too much for "Ob-la-di, Ob-la-da," but if I do that I should probably knock John for Revolution 9.

The John songs on White are some of my all time favorites of his though. "Yer Blues," "Julia," "Happiness is a Warm Gun," and "Dear Prudence" (one of my top 10 favorite Beatles tunes) are all incredible.

Upon second look I think it's closer to even, but I just have a personal taste bias toward those John songs.

Macca wins Sgt. Pepper's and Abbey Road for sure though

 

This. It's been said to death but the balance/interplay between the two is really what made them the greatest

 

I know turning artistry into a horse race/competition is dumb and reductive especially in Beatles conversations but I do find fun in looking back at their LPs and seeing how John and Paul tried to one up each other

 

Oh I forgot "Ob La Di". That song is a jam. I never hold McCartney's songs made for a lark against him if they're fun and tuneful, since that was the intent.

One of the things that I think can both help and hurt John is he had much less of an ear than McCartney, so he could be very dependent on the arrangement and production. So when it means Paul and George Martin got all kinds of creative in adding to his songs, it can take John's songs into the stratosphere. But it can also mean he has some that are crying for some more sonic details.

 

I thought John and Paul were both equally great on White Album in different ways, honestly.

 

Well said. For some time I've held the firm belief that Paul is one of the best melody writers of all time, sometimes I think maybe the best. I remember Dave Grohl being interviewed about recording with Paul and just being blown away at how "easy" it all came to him. Really just one of the best.

 

I think John doesn't get enough credit for his pop chops ("Help!" anyone!?!) and Paul doesn't get enough credit for his experimental side.

 

Help! might be top 5 John for me

One of the first Beatles songs I fell in love with.

There's some real palpable anguish in that performance/those lyrics

 

My dog's name is Marvin and when we first got him, I used to always sing 'Marvin, My Dear' in the tune of Martha, My Dear. I just realized I need to start doing that more.

 

This is a band who's discography I really need to revisit; they were one of the first bands I was into, but that largely happened before I tended to listen to full albums. So I have like two or three of their albums I listen to because they ended up having a bunch of my favorites on them (White and Abbey Road had a ton). Polythene Pam/She came in through the bathroom window was one of the coolest things I'd ever heard when I was younger because I had no idea you could just write two songs and throw them together like that.

 

Have you guys seen this?!

The A/B Road Session Tapes
http://docdro.id/Rl8Ow56

 

Just got a chance to read the song rankings article. That was absolute trash. I know song ranking/album ranking is opinion based so there is no wrong answer, but God that was painful

 

This gave me a headache by page 3. Haha

 

I think I might get a Beatles tattoo for my next one. I've seen some good ideas on Google

 

whoa
Yoko Ono to Receive Songwriting Credit on John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’

 

^cool!

John vs Paul is a funny debate and somehow not nearly as boring as it should be. John wrote more of the best Beatles songs. Paul otherwise is the beatles to me - his bass playing, his voice, the parts of their career where he's clearly the driving force behind it all...he's fascinating imo. In music I'm 99% of the time going to take pure songwriting ability over musical virtuosity, but Lennon v McCartney might be the exception. Even then, the more you think about it it's clear they were each other's perfect complement.

 

Yeah but Paul was almost 100% of Sgt Pepper, any so many other of their top songs, definitely not fair to say John wrote more

 

It's probably the toughest question to answer for me as they are both incredible, obviously. I think Lennon's first two solo albums proper (Plastic Ono and Imagine) are the pinnacle of post Beatles work, but the depth of material Paul has produced along with such an incredible amount of styles he's tackled is just outstanding. Lennon wrote nearly all of the A Hard Days Night LP which is for me the Beatlemania sound perfectly encapsulated but then as stated Paul was the driving force for their latter output and in keeping them together as long as they did to put out Abbey Road etc. Really too tough to answer.

 

Honestly, they're about even for me. And if I prefer John, it's really just by inches.

Ram is a masterpiece, but so is Plastic Ono Band. John wrote more of my favorite Beatles songs, but Paul took a lot of them to the next level in the studio. Paul wrote goofy nursery rhyme shit, but John could be preachy.

The big thing is, both were reduced to mere normalcy by the loss of each other's influence and the filling in of the tremendous blank slate that the '60's pop renaissance uncovered. They had the benefit of the right time, the right cowriter, the right success to justify the resource investment they needed, the right technological advances to recording and production, and a lack of precedence in pop record creation. So the real question is probably: what kind of band would they have been without all that?

 

It's also worth noting that a lot of bigger Paul songs, John added some magic to, and vice versa. They would always play each other their songs, and ask advice. They would both add some of the biggest moments to each other's songs.

 

One of my favorite things to listen to on latter Beatles songs is what Rob Sheffield referred to as John's delightfully shady background vocals. You can listen to stuff like "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" and in the background hear Lennon doing these incredible background vocal parts that are just licking with sarcasm from his opinion of the songs. I love a lot of these Paul songs Lennon did this for but I can't help find that hilarious