No time for blogging tonight. I have to listen to my new BEATLES album! It's one of life's rare pleasures, the chance to listen to a new release by the best rock band ever on the same day that it's sold to the general public.
In case you don't know, "LOVE" is the soundtrack to a show that's been put on in Las Vegas since earlier this year. It's kind of an officially-sanctioned mash-up, mainly based on Beatles music that's long been familiar, but remixed with all kinds of interpolations from different songs woven in. The Beatles website offers a lot more information than I'll take the time to spell out here. But what I heard on my way home from work tonight was delightful - the sound quality is excellent and the new textures are refreshing. This isn't the Beatles via turn-tablism - not a radical splice-job juxtaposition striving for maximum wierdness or anything like that. It's just a new way of hearing the Beatles canon woven together for a new time and sensibility. A wonderful concept and of course, just what the world needs now... "Love," sweet Love!
3 comments:
Dave, how do you like it after giving it a thorough listening? I am thinking of getting this for my Beatles-loving dh for christmas. Do you recommend it?
Yeah, I recommend it. I can imagine some Beatles purists not liking it - the members of Oasis called it "rubbish" but I think they were just trying to inhibit sales since Oasis had a greatest hits collection released the same day as "Love" (and the same day as the U218 singles collection - talk about some heavyweight competition!)
There are basically two things that make this album a worthy addition to the Beatles canon. 1) the sound is phenomenally good, clear, full and rich. I don't have a great stereo system in my house but this definitely has improved quality over the standard CD releases. And it's fun to hear some of the background musical elements brought to the surface on some of the Beatles classics that weren't really tampered with all that much (like "Something", "Get Back", "Hey Jude" and a few others that basically stayed intact for the most part.)
2) The remixes and "surprises" are fun the first couple times through, kind of like playing a little guessing game which we used to do way back when on the original Beatles albums, dissecting little sound snippets, etc. There is a very cool "psychedelic centerpiece" section of the album that runs through Tomorrow Never Knows, Within You Without You, Strawberry Fields, Lucy in the Sky and other bits of the Beatles' trippy period that I really enjoy quite a bit and stands on its own as a strong piece of music, albeit a montage.
The fact that its been done with the band's blessing makes this as much of a must-have as the "Anthology" CDs, and it's intriguing to realize that quite a few bits from the Anthology tapes have found their way into "Love." I personally don't own the "One" collection or the "Yellow Submarine Songtrack" but I think "Love" is more essential than either of those.
Someday we'll get the original albums with decent liner notes, mono and stereo versions and a 21st century remastering. But "Love" is a good update of a venerable catalog.
Awesome, thanks Dave. On christmas morning, my dh will be the beneficiary of your review :-). I doubt that he is a purist, just an appreciator.
Post a Comment