The Cavern
Rock & Words
BEATLES FOR SALE (The Beatles, 1964)
Artist: The Beatles (A)
Recording Dates: Ago – Oct 1964
Release Date: December 04, 1964. UK
Record Label: EMI / Parlophone
Producer: George Martin
Rating: 6
Era: Rock & Roll II, Early Sixties (1960-1966)
Subgenre: British Invasion
Best Song: Eight Days A Week
Tracklist: 1) No Reply; 2) I'm A Loser; 3) Baby's In Black; 4) Rock And Roll Music; 5) I'll Follow The Sun; 6) Mr Moonlight; 7) Kansas City/Hey Hey Hey Hey; 8) Eight Days A Week; 9) Words Of Love; 10) Honey Don't; 11) Every Little Thing; 12) I Don't Want To Spoil The Party; 13) What You're Doing; 14) Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby
WHAT-HAPPENED TO-THE-BEATLES???? o.0
Well, they were sold with a Christmas bow. Hence the title. Hahaha. Well, not exactly... Seriously though, the thing is, this album caught them during the most suffocating period of Beatlemania, when all the fame, the constant running around, and the screaming teenage girls stopped being fun and became an unbearable burden. On the other hand, they had just released an absolutely brilliant album, with all original compositions, and had spent weeks filming the movie of the same name, "A Hard Day's Night," followed by a world tour that had left them exhausted. Almost without a break, without enough original songs, they went into the studio to record this material, since they had to do it contractually and the record company wanted to take advantage of the situation to release a Christmas album. Thus, the creative block, the physical and mental exhaustion, and the pressure from the record company, which was only thinking about money while what they desperately needed was a vacation after four years of nonstop work, resulted in the worst and most forced album in the entire Beatles discography. And it has to be said like this, with all its i's, even though the Liverpool quartet is my favorite band: This is the worst Beatles album.
Many consider it underrated. Many say Yellow Submarine is the weakest. Without going into too much detail, because we'll analyze it later, Yellow Submarine is an adorable soundtrack, though not a masterpiece. Side A features two songs that are old favorites, already established in film history. Of the remaining material from the quartet, two are among the most underrated songs in the entire universe, capable of outshining the best tracks on For Sale: "It's All Too Much" and "Hey Bulldog," which could easily be among my top 20 favorite Beatles songs. Of the remaining tracks, "All Together Now" is a harmless, almost childlike, almost innocent song—a joke by Paul that's at least amusing—while "Only A Northern Song" is the only filler. Side B showcases George Martin's compositional skills, with orchestral arrangements for the film. And while he's no Beethoven, he demonstrates his talent and delivers a soundtrack that evokes the key moments of the hallucinatory film through sheer music. Therefore, I consider Yellow Submarine superior to this rushed Beatles For Sale, and I listen to it much more often.
But we're not analyzing Yellow Submarine, but For Sale. McCartney himself has acknowledged that, although they started some recording sessions right after the A Hard Day's Night sessions in the middle of the year, time got away from them due to their tight schedule, and by the end of the year, much material was still missing. So John and Paul asked for a week off, during which they went to the gardens of John's mansion in Weybridge and dedicated every afternoon to composing one of the eight original songs on this album. Which is the worst way to compose, forcing the muses. But it must be pointed out that, although the album is dominated by John's compositions, and he is the "majority" author, so to speak, Paul also had an active role in these songs, as in "No Reply," where he wrote the middle section, harking back to those days of collaboration. Of these eight original tracks, at least four have an unusually dark and pessimistic atmosphere for a pop album: the three opening tracks and "I Don't Want To Spoil The Party," making the album, besides feeling rushed, quite somber. Even so, they didn't manage to include enough original material and had to choose covers they had mastered since their days in La Caverna or Hamburgo. Six is the same magic number of covers they had already used on their first two albums, but here it feels like a step backward, since A Hard Day's Night, which preceded it, was characterized by being entirely original and of enormous quality.
So, being a contractually obligated, soulless album, with a kind of creative stagnation and without enough time to leave out the covers, it's a step backward in the Beatles' discography. The guys sound jaded, not putting in any effort. Furthermore, John's lyrics have a dark and depressing atmosphere, and the cover art, where they appear not only serious but frowning, bundled up in winter suits, as if telling the cameraman to get lost, is a testament to that. Frankly, it's one of the least friendly album covers I've ever seen, and it makes me feel somewhat uneasy when listening to the album. The photo and the album cover are, in reality, the best complaint ever recorded, but a complaint nonetheless.
But it wasn't all bad. As we mentioned, this is one of the times when the Lennon-McCartney songwriting partnership worked best in real life, not just on paper. On the other hand, Ringo's fascination with experimenting with the bass drum began here, while his excessive use of cymbals decreased, which was a welcome change. George also experimented with his guitar sounds, from the fade-in used for the first time on a recording with "Eight Days a Week," to the sweet tones he used in "Words of Love," and the feedback he used for "I Feel Fine," which was recorded during these sessions but released as a single instead of the LP (a mistake, as it could have boosted the album). Other new tricks on this LP included the false ending in "What You're Doing," the wall of sound in songs like "Rock & Roll Music," full of echo in the vocals, frenetic pianos, and an atmosphere more incendiary than Berry's. Even the watery organ sound in “Mr. Moonlight” is a novelty, though it doesn't quite work in the song.
However, the band's biggest and most notable advance lies in their lyrics. While mostly pessimistic and dark, plaintive, this is a complete novelty for the time. Lennon begins to draw influence from Dylan, and here he writes the first of many introspective songs to come. Still at an amateur level, “I'm A Loser” is the first glimpse of John's sharp pen. On Help!, they'll have a more pronounced folk influence, both in the acoustic sounds and the lyrical work, but this song is considered Lennon's turning point as a lyricist, leaving behind the traditional banal teenage themes and speaking with a depth unusual for the time, even if it sounds somewhat “innocent” today.
Even so, the harmonies of the original tracks sound weak, underdeveloped, and sometimes even forced. Occasionally, they're salvaged by the lyrics, a catchy hook, or the technical innovations I mentioned earlier, but that doesn't change the fact that most of the material sounds lackluster, placing the sound more in the early 1963s than the late 1964s. So much so, that only one song from this album became a classic, "Eight Days a Week," and even that's a minor classic, dismissed even by Lennon himself. As for the six covers, it's understandable that they were in a hurry to finish the album and resorted to other material, but apart from the two rock 'n' roll tracks, which sound powerful and improved compared to the originals, the rest strike me as rushed and very weak selections that detract even more from the album's overall brilliance instead of contributing to it, and which only add to that depressing atmosphere.
The album opens with “No Reply”, one of the most rhythmic and worthwhile songs, featuring good vocal harmonies, catchy bridges and choruses, and overall, one of the tracks that maintains the high standard of “A Hard Day’s Night,” except for the lyrics, which are among Lennon’s most pessimistic. However, the lyrics take a slight turn, offering a very precise, almost literary, portrayal of the scene: seeing his girlfriend silhouetted in her window while being told she’s not home. The theme of infidelity or heartbreak might not have been original at the time, but the way he addresses it certainly was. On the other hand, the melodies are good from beginning to end, with catchy verses that culminate in choruses with a double desperate cry (I saw the LIGHT!, I saw the LIGHT!). Around the one-minute mark, the section composed by Paul ("If I were you…") comes in, which brings freshness to the song, with greater musical intensity and at the same time a greater burden of bitterness in the lyrics.
Next up is “I’m A Loser”, whose merit, as we’ve already mentioned, lies in the introspective power of its lyrics. Personally, the vocal harmony doesn’t impress me much, and there are even parts where John sounds too strained in the low notes, barely reaching them. In the choruses, they create a vocal hook with John’s double or triple voice, and the song sounds more upbeat, contrasting with the crushing and somber lyrical message: “I’m a loser and I’m not what I appear to be…”. The contrasts of light and shadow throughout the song only serve to highlight the album’s depressive and gray aura. Although lyrically it’s an improvement for Lennon, who begins a new phase here as a more serious songwriter, I don’t like the depressive message of the lyrics, though John’s apparent honesty can’t be faulted. On the other hand, the harmonica solo (which is repeated towards the end) is one of the most distinctive in Beatles songs, not necessarily following the vocal harmony or the guitar riff. This time, each solo is followed by a short guitar riff. It's not a bad song, but I think it's slightly overrated.
Then there's "Baby's In Black" to close out this dark Lennon trilogy that opens the album. What could be more depressing than a girl who never answers, or a song that screams "I'm a loser" to the world? A: A funeral song. The track has a rather lethargic waltz rhythm, and only the vocal interplay between John and Paul, in the style of "If I Fell," serves as a hook to disguise the poor and repetitive harmonies. George also puts in some effort with the guitar solos and arrangements, but that guitar work and rhythm that doesn't change for a single second make it sound very flat and… err… boring.
Fortunately, the first and best of the covers follows. It's Chuck Berry's "Rock & Roll Music", one of the quartet's idols. Presumably, it was one of the songs they mastered back in their Hamburg days, and they certainly give it a great treatment. John sings it almost furiously, only slightly less so than on "Twist & Shout," while George Martin does a superb job on the piano, wild and very much in the style of Jerry Lee Lewis, making the instrument the star of the song, along with John's impassioned vocals. I would have liked to see Harrison really get into it on the guitar, and a bit more restraint from Ringo on the cymbals, but the song, while not one of my favorite covers, isn't bad.
We quickly return to the more languid themes with “I’ll Follow The Sun”. It’s a kind of deceptive ballad because, despite being soft and light, it has a very strange rhythm, which Ringo had to arrange very subtly. The song is one of Paul’s earliest compositions, written when he was just 16 and had only recently met John. And it shows. At least, despite sounding immature and corny, it offers a ray of light to the darkness that John radiated at the beginning of the album. It also lasts less than two minutes.
Next up is “Mr. Moonlight”, a cover of the Roy Lee Johnson original. The only justification I can find for this song is that it's one of the ones they played back in Germany and knew very well. Otherwise, the Beatles had 40,000 other songs to choose from, a thousand times better than this one. There's an almost universal consensus that (not counting Revolution #9, which is NOT music) this is the worst song the Beatles ever recorded. And you know I don't like to follow almost universal consensus, but this time I have to agree. A boring, flat, unhooking song, boring, with a terrible melody, with an organ that doesn't fit the Beatles sound at all, boring, with John unnecessarily straining his voice, boring. Furthermore, with this song, John returns to soporific rhythms and an atmosphere that's more gray than nocturnal. What were they thinking? Wouldn't it have been better to record a two-minute Christmas message with four voices? Or any Bo Diddley song if what they wanted was for Ringo to do a drum solo? Or the drummer boy, to also take advantage of the Christmas atmosphere? Or, failing that, a mother-insult, which would have at least been more fun?
After the bitter aftertaste left by that dreadful song, a medley of a couple of slow rock and roll numbers follows, which aren't hard to imagine being sung in Germany or Liverpool. "Kansas City" by Leiber & Stoller and "Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey" by Rick Pennyman. Paul himself would say 20 years later that it took a lot of guts to start screaming like an idiot. The truth is, it's a fresh little rock and roll number that works well with the song change after the solo, at 1:10. So much so, that Sir Paul usually still performs it live with quite good results, getting the whole stadium screaming like mad. It's also very upbeat, and it pulls us back from the precipice we feel like jumping off after hearing John's state of mind. It's not the eighth wonder of the world, but it's fun, and with all due respect, it's Paul's equivalent of Lennon's "Twist & Shout."
Next up is “Eight Days A Week”, another of the album's not only worthwhile but truly excellent songs. John displays a brighter, almost naive side, with innocent lyrics... and it's a welcome change! The song begins with a fade-in, which was apparently the first time it was used on a recording, as they usually faded out at the end. The clapping in the verses adds a playful and fun touch, the vocal harmonies and hooks return, and the instrumental break midway through the chorus, followed by Ringo's rapid bass drum solo that closes the song, is irresistible. George's guitar scale that opens and closes the track is also a formidable hook, and I'm sure it's a defining feature of this song, everywhere. At least they've regained their form, delivering one of the best songs from this early period.
The ninth track is “Words of Love”, originally by Buddy Holly. To my surprise, it's not sung by Paul, who I think is better suited to these kinds of songs, but by John. The song is an ode to saccharine sweetness, but it's cute despite being cloying, and the sweet tone George uses on his guitar would never be heard again. It's not offensive. It's not my favorite either, and when I'm feeling sentimental, I even enjoy it, like everything else by Buddy.
Next up is Carl Perkins' "Honey Don't". I haven't bothered to listen to the original, but I think this is one of Ringo's best vocal performances with the quartet. He handles country well, even though I'm not a big fan, and the solos at 2:15 and 2:20 are just okay. Of course, they could have chosen a better cover, but at least I appreciate Ringo's effort; he sounds very confident and convincing.
Then there's "Every Little Thing", another John song, but one where Paul's contribution is quite noticeable. It's very rhythmic, with good tones, vocal harmonies that don't veer towards the point of exhaustion, and above all, more cheerful lyrics, highlighting all the virtues of the lovestruck woman. Again, Ringo does a great job with the bass drum during the choruses: that "Every little thing she does…" PO-POOOM "She does for meeee, yeah" is wonderful. In short, while not the eighth wonder of the world, it's an appealing track that stands out slightly from the average on this album, but perhaps not enough for Yes to cover it on their debut.
Then John arrives to spoil the party, precisely with “I Don't Want To Spoil The Party”. The song has country influences, which suit Ringo better. John sounds really listless; I don't know if it's intentional to match the song or because of his actual state of mind, but he doesn't put any effort into his singing, and the hooks this time are bland and inadequate. The lyrics are again dark, depressing, and a real party pooper—for God's sake, someone give him a Prozac!
Fortunately, "What You're Doing" follows, a luminous song by Paul (I've never been more grateful for McCartney's commercial side). This song is brilliant, full of hooks, from that colossal kick drum intro, the arpeggiated riff, the sublime vocal harmonies, great bridges, abrupt stops, a false ending with a great bass return, a fantastic solo that blends guitar and piano from both Georges, and that simplicity of Paul's that sometimes borders on saccharine, but here works perfectly. I like it quite a lot, and although it's not considered a classic, it's my favorite song on this album. As a side note, I don't know if it's just my nerves, but this song bears a striking resemblance to the Stones' "Satisfaction," almost six months before this generational anthem was released. The guitar riffs are only vaguely similar, but if you listen closely, they're in the same time signature, and you can hum one over the other. Jagger's phrasing is also different, but another striking similarity is the moment when the drums take over, carrying the song for a colossal return. In short, Keith Richards has repeatedly stated that he envisioned "Satisfaction" as a slow blues, and I don't doubt his authorship, but I wouldn't find it suspicious if that final version was inspired by this innocuous yet great song by Paul. Incidentally, it's supposedly dedicated to Jane Asher, Paul's girlfriend, but some also claim it's dedicated to the Byrds, and that the arpeggio-riff is somehow a parody of the American group's sound.
The album closes with Harrison singing Perkins' "Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby". The song is unremarkable; it's a little rock and roll tune, but it sounds as lifeless and lacking in energy as the rest of the album. The vocals are heavy with echo, making them sound fuller than the original, and perhaps the most redeeming feature is the solo at 1:09, which isn't particularly incendiary or memorable either. It's just an okay song, but I still think they could have chosen covers with much better judgment, or at least performed them with more energy. They might have worked for them that way in 1960-62 at the Star and The Cavern, but by the end of 1964, the Stones and the Animals had already redefined this sound.
Taking all this into account, this album is a half-hearted effort, and rather than a work that contributes to the evolution of the Beatles' sound, it's a product made to be tied with a red ribbon on green wrapping paper and given as a Christmas present (incidentally, fitting for the upcoming holidays) to your worst enemies. And to paraphrase my esteemed Mecko, in the non-musical sense, it could serve very well to level the turntable or the legs of the CD player, or even to place outside the office next to a "Do Not Disturb" sign (at least the scowls would be of some use), and listen to only occasionally, say, once for every 30 listens to the rest of their discography, just so we don't forget that the Beatles also made mistakes and released albums "For Sale." Well, maybe it's not that big of a deal, but objectively speaking, this is an average work that could be from any average band, and the Beatles are not average, so I consider it disrespectful to their audience. Fortunately, this mistake would never be repeated as long as they functioned as a quartet.
In short, if the Beatles didn't enjoy making this album, I don't see why I should enjoy listening to it. It's not an ear-splitting insult, but it falls far, far short of the quartet's true standard. That's why the 6, which might seem exaggerated to some, but if I'm not going to hold back my praise for the amazing albums they released after '66—at least three of which are among the best of all time—then I shouldn't sugarcoat my opinion of this one either… a stain on the Beatles' discography, with technical and lyrical advancements, but not musical ones.
By Corvan
Nov/16/2009
