The Beatles Abbey Road U.S SO-383 Pressing Vinyl Rip Flac With Bonus
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Abbey Road
Studio album by The Beatles
Released 26 September 1969
Recorded 22 February–20 August 1969, at EMI, Olympic and Trident studios, London
Genre Rock
Length 47:23
Label Apple
Producer George Martin
Singles from Abbey Road
1. "Come Together"/"Something"
Released: 31 October 1969
Abbey Road is the eleventh studio album by English rock band The Beatles. Though work on Abbey Road began in April 1969, making it the final album recorded by the band, Let It Be was the last album released before the Beatles' dissolution in 1970. Abbey Road was released on 26 September 1969 in the United Kingdom, and 1 October 1969 in the United States. It was produced and orchestrated by George Martin for Apple Records. Geoff Emerick was engineer, Alan Parsons was assistant engineer, and Tony Banks was tape operator.
Abbey Road is regarded as one of The Beatles' most tightly constructed albums, although the band was barely operating as a functioning unit at the time.[1][2] Rolling Stone magazine named it the 14th greatest album of all time.[3]
Contents
Genesis
After the stress-filled sessions for the proposed Get Back album (later retitled Let It Be) Paul McCartney suggested to Martin the group get together and make an album "the way we used to"[4] free of the conflict that began with the sessions for The White Album. Martin agreed, stipulating that he must be allowed to do the album his way. In their interviews for the Beatles Anthology series the surviving band members stated they knew at the time this would very likely be the final Beatles product and therefore agreed to set aside their differences and 'go out on a high note'.
With the Let It Be album partly finished, the sessions for Abbey Road began in April, as "The Ballad of John and Yoko"/"Old Brown Shoe" single was completed. In fact recording sessions of John Lennon's "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" had started already in February 1969 in Trident studios with Billy Preston at organ—only three weeks after the Get Back sessions. Photos from these sessions are included in the book Get Back which came along with the Let It Be album but not in the Let It Be movie. Paul is shaved and John has started to let his beard grow.
Most of the album was recorded between 2 July and 1 August 1969. After the album was finished and released, the Get Back / Let It Be project was re-examined. More work was done on the album, including the recording of additional music (see Let It Be). Thus, though the bulk of Let It Be was recorded prior to Abbey Road, the latter was released first, and Abbey Road was the last album properly started by The Beatles before they disbanded. In September 1969, just shortly before the release of the album, Lennon was on hiatus from the group with the Plastic Ono Band, effectively being the first official sign of dissolution.
The two album sides are different in character. Side one is a collection of single tracks, while side two consists of a series of largely incomplete compositions, many of them being relatively short and segued together. The main impetus behind the production of side two was to incorporate the various short and incomplete Lennon and McCartney compositions the group had available into an effective part of the album.
Reception
Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
Allmusic 5/5 stars link
Pitchfork Media (10.0/10.0) 2009
PopMatters 5/5 stars link
Rolling Stone (favourable review from John Mendelsohn, unfavourable review from Ed Ward in same issue) 1969
Rolling Stone 5/5 stars 2004
Abbey Road became one of the most successful Beatles albums ever. In the UK the album debuted straight at number 1. Abbey Road spent its first 11 weeks in the UK charts at number 1, before being displaced to number 2 for one week by the Rolling Stones debuting at the top with Let It Bleed. However, the following week—which was the week of Christmas—Abbey Road returned to the top for another 6 weeks, completing 17 weeks at the top. In all it spent 92 weeks inside the UK Top 75, and 16 years later on 31 October 1987, when it was released for the first time on CD, it reached number 30. In the UK Abbey Road was the best-selling album of 1969 and the fourth best-selling of the entire 1960s, and the eighth best-selling album of 1970.
Reaction in the US was similar. The album debuted at number 178, then moved to number 4 and in its third week to number 1, spending 11 non-consecutive weeks at the top, but was not the best-selling album during the Christmas week. Abbey Road spent a total of 129 weeks in the Billboard 200, re-entering the chart at number 69 on 14 November 1987 when it was released for the first time on CD. It was the 4th best-selling album of 1970 in the US and is now certified 12x platinum by the RIAA.
When the Beatles disbanded, Abbey Road had sold over 7 million copies worldwide. According to EMI, its worldwide sales reached 7.6 million copies in October 1972. This was also the first Beatles' album to reach the 10-million mark in worldwide sales, in 1980.
In 1997, Abbey Road was named the 12th greatest album of all time in a 'Music of the Millennium' poll conducted by HMV, Channel 4, The Guardian and Classic FM; it received the same ranking in a 1998 poll of Q magazine readers. In 2000, Q placed it at number 17 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever.[5] In 2001, the TV network VH1 named it the 8th greatest album ever,[6] and, in December 2003, it was named the 14th best album by Rolling Stone.[3] In 2006, the album was chosen by Time Magazine as one of the 100 best albums of all time.[7] In 2006, Abbey Road was rated as Australia's fourth favourite album on My Favourite Album, a television special done by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation aired on 3 December 2006 (it was the highest position for a Beatles Album on that list).[8]
Track listing
Side one
"Come Together"
The album opener "Come Together" was a Lennon contribution. The chorus was inspired by a song Lennon originally wrote for Timothy Leary's campaign for governor of California titled "Let's Get It Together". A rough version of this can be heard in outtakes from Lennon's second bed-in event in Canada. It has been speculated that the verses, described by Lennon as intentionally obscure, refer cryptically to each of the Beatles (e.g. "he's one holy roller" allegedly refers to the spiritually inclined George Harrison); however, it has also been suggested that the song has only a single "pariah-like protagonist" and Lennon was "painting another sardonic self-portrait".[9] The song was later the subject of a lawsuit brought against Lennon by Morris Levy because the opening line in "Come Together"—"Here come old flat-top"—was admittedly lifted from a line in Chuck Berry's "You Can't Catch Me". "Come Together" was later released as a double A side single with "Something".[10] In the liner notes to the Love album Martin described the track as a personal favourite.
The second track on the album later became Harrison's first A-side single. Basing the first line of the song on "Something in the Way She Moves" from James Taylor's 1968 Apple Records album James Taylor, Harrison wrote "Something" during the The Beatles sessions.[11] After the lyrics were refined during the "Let It Be" sessions (tapes reveal Lennon giving Harrison some songwriting advice during its composition), the song was initially given to Joe Cocker, but was subsequently recorded for Abbey Road. "Something" was Lennon's favourite song on the album, and McCartney considered it the best song Harrison had written. Frank Sinatra once commented that "Something" was his favourite Lennon/McCartney song[12] (sic) and "the greatest love song ever written".[13] The song was released as a double A-side single with "Come Together".
Harrison was rapidly growing as a songwriter, and with Abbey Road, he made his most significant contributions to a Beatles album. "Something" became the first Beatles number one single that was not a Lennon/McCartney composition—it was also the first single with songs from an already released album; "Here Comes the Sun" has received significant radio airplay despite never having been released as a single. At the Concert for George on the first anniversary of Harrison's death, "Something" was sung by McCartney, who performed the first part of the song solo while playing ukulele. After the first chorus, the song shifted to its traditional arrangement, with other musicians joining in, and Eric Clapton sharing vocals with McCartney.
"Maxwell's Silver Hammer"
"Maxwell's Silver Hammer", McCartney's first song on the album, was first performed by the Beatles during the Let It Be sessions (as can be seen in the Let It Be documentary).
According to Geoff Emerick's book, Here, There and Everywhere, Lennon said the song was "more of Paul's granny music", and refused to participate in the recording of the song.[14]
"Oh! Darling"
When recording "Oh! Darling", McCartney attempted recording only once a day. He said, "When we were recording 'Oh! Darling' I came into the studios early every day for a week to sing it by myself because at first my voice was too clear. I wanted it to sound as though I'd been performing it on stage all week."[15] Lennon was of the opinion that it was the type of song that he would've sung the lead on, remarking that it was more his style. On the Anthology 3 album, Lennon can be heard singing the lead on an ad-libbed verse regarding the news that Yoko Ono's divorce from her previous husband had just come through.
"Octopus's Garden"
Ringo Starr wrote and sang one song for the album, "Octopus's Garden", his second (and last) composition released on a Beatles album. It was inspired by a trip to Sardinia that occurred when Starr left the band for two weeks with his family during the sessions for The Beatles. While there, he composed the song, which is arguably his most successful writing effort. While Starr had the lyrics nearly pinned down, the song's melodic structure was partly written in the studio by Harrison (as can be seen in the Let It Be film), although Harrison gave full songwriting credit to Starr. (Harrison and Starr would later collaborate on Starr's solo singles "It Don't Come Easy" and "Photograph".)
"I Want You (She's So Heavy)"
"I Want You (She's So Heavy)" is a combination of two somewhat different recording attempts. The first attempt occurred almost immediately after the "Get Back/Let It Be" sessions in February 1969 and featuring Billy Preston on keyboards. This was subsequently combined with a second version made during the "Abbey Road" sessions proper, and when edited together ran nearly 8 minutes long, making it The Beatles' second-longest released song ("Revolution 9" being the longest). Perhaps more than any other Beatles song, "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" reveals a pronounced progressive rock influence, with its unusual length and structure, repeating guitar riff, and "white noise" effects; the "I Want You" section has a straightforward blues structure. It also features one of the earliest uses of a Moog synthesizer to create the white-noise or "wind" effect heard near the end of the track. During the final edit, as the guitar riff and white noise effect continues on and on, Lennon told engineer Emerick to "cut it right there" at the 7:44 mark, creating a sudden, jarring silence which concluded side one of Abbey Road. The final overdub session for "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" would be the last time all four Beatles worked in the studio together.
Side two
"Here Comes the Sun"
"Here Comes the Sun" is Harrison's second song on the album and one of his best-known; it was written in Eric Clapton's garden while Harrison was absent from an Apple board meeting. "Here Comes The Sun" was influenced by the Cream song "Badge", which was co-written by Clapton and Harrison. While not released as a single, the song has received frequent radio airplay since its release.
"Because"
"Because" features a Moog synthesizer, played by Harrison. The chords in the song were inspired by Ludwig van Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata", in a roundabout way: Lennon said he "was lying on the sofa in our house, listening to Yoko play Beethoven's 'Moonlight Sonata' on the piano. Suddenly, I said, 'Can you play those chords backward?' She did, and I wrote 'Because' around them."[16] "Because" features three-part harmonies by Lennon, McCartney, and Harrison, which were then triple-tracked to sound like nine singers. The results of this have been compared in sound to the Beach Boys.
The medley
The remainder of the album is the 16-minute medley consisting of several short songs, both finished and unfinished, blended into a continuous group by McCartney and Martin. Most of these songs were written (and originally recorded in demo form) during sessions for The Beatles and the "Get Back"/Let It Be sessions.
"You Never Give Me Your Money" is the first song of the Abbey Road medley. It was written by McCartney and based loosely on The Beatles' financial problems with Apple. (Paul had refused signing Allen Klein as their new manager.) It slowly and quietly follows into "Sun King" (which, like "Because", showcases Lennon's, McCartney's, and Harrison's overdubbed harmonies), "Mean Mr. Mustard" (written during The Beatles' trip to India), and "Polythene Pam" (contributed by Lennon). These in turn are followed by four McCartney songs, "She Came in Through the Bathroom Window" (written after a fan came into McCartney's residence literally through the bathroom window[17]), "Golden Slumbers" (based on lyrics but not the music of Thomas Dekker's 17th-century song of the same name), "Carry That Weight" (featuring chorus vocals from all four Beatles), and the climax, "The End".
"The End" is notable for featuring Starr's only drum solo in The Beatles catalogue (the drums are mixed across two tracks in "true stereo"—in a similar way to the studio single version of Get Back). Normally, even though mixes were in stereo, the drums were mixed in mono, locked together with other instruments and often panned hard left or right in the stereo "picture", or even double-tracked to give the illusion of true stereo.) 54 seconds into the song, immediately prior to "And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make" line played over piano chords, are 18 bars (or measures) of guitar solo: the first two bars are played by McCartney, the second two by Harrison, and the third two by Lennon, then the sequence repeats.[18] Each has a distinctive style which McCartney felt reflected their personalities: McCartney's playing included string bends similar to his lead guitar work on "Another Girl" from the Help! album; Harrison's was melodic with slides yet technically advanced and Lennon's was rhythmic, stinging and had the heaviest distortion. Immediately after Lennon's third solo, the piano chords of the final line "And in the end...." begins.
An alternative version with Harrison's lead guitar solo played against McCartney's (with Starr's drum solo heard slightly in the background) appears on the Anthology 3 album. The song ends with the memorable final line, "And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make".
"Her Majesty"
"Her Majesty", tacked on the end, was originally part of the side two medley, appearing between "Mean Mr. Mustard" and "Polythene Pam". McCartney disliked the way the medley sounded when it included "Her Majesty", so he had the medley re-edited to remove it. However, second engineer John Kurlander had been instructed never to throw out anything, so after the group left the recording studio that day, he picked it up off the floor, spliced 14 seconds of red leader tape onto the final mix reel, and then spliced in "Her Majesty" immediately after the leader tape. The box of the album's master reel bore an instruction to leave "Her Majesty" off the final product, but the next day when Malcolm Davies at Apple received the tape, he (also trained not to throw anything away) cut a playback lacquer of the whole sequence, including "Her Majesty". The Beatles liked this effect and left it on the album. Original US pressings of Abbey Road do not list "Her Majesty" on the album's cover nor on the record label, making it a hidden track.
"Her Majesty" opens with the final, crashing chord of "Mean Mr. Mustard", while the final note of "Her Majesty" remained buried in the mix of "Polythene Pam". This was the result of "Her Majesty" being snipped off the reel during a rough mix of the medley. The cut in the medley was subsequently disguised with further mixing although "Her Majesty" was not touched again and still appears in its rough mix.
Production notes
Abbey Road, The Beatles (partially) and the Let It Be sessions were the only Beatles albums to be recorded on 8-track tape machines, rather than the 4-track machines that were used for prior Beatles albums starting with the single "I Want to Hold Your Hand" in 1963 and the album A Hard Day's Night in 1964. EMI's management had not approved the use of their then-new 3M 8-track deck until shortly after the sessions for their 1968 single "Hey Jude". Also, the Moog synthesizer is prominently featured, not merely as a background effect, but sometimes playing a central role, as in "Because" where it is used for the middle 8. It is also prominent on "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" (played using a ribbon strip) and "Here Comes the Sun". The instrument was introduced to the band by Harrison after a stay in Los Angeles where he was introduced to the instrument. (The first landmark pop song to employ the Moog was "Daily Nightly" by The Monkees). Earlier in 1969, Harrison had released Electronic Sound, which featured dissonant sounds entirely made from a Moog, on Apple's short-lived experimental label Zapple.
Abbey Road was also the first and only Beatles album to be entirely recorded through a solid state transistor mixing desk as opposed to thermionic valve.
One of the assistant engineers working on the album was a then-unknown Alan Parsons. He went on to engineer Pink Floyd's landmark album The Dark Side of the Moon and produce many popular albums himself with The Alan Parsons Project. John Kurlander also assisted on many of the sessions, and went on to become a successful engineer and producer, most noteworthy for his success on the scores for The Lord of the Rings film trilogy.
Album cover photograph
An image of the zebra crossing in Abbey Road, where The Beatles crossed during the 1969 photo shoot for the cover of their Abbey Road album.
"At some point, the album was going to be titled Everest after the brand of cigarettes I used to smoke," recalls Geoff Emerick. The idea included a cover photo in the Himalayas but by the time the group was to take the photo they decided to call it Abbey Road and take the photo outside the studio on 8 August 1969. The cover designer was Apple Records creative director Kosh. The cover photograph was taken by photographer Iain Macmillan. Macmillan was given only ten minutes around 11:30 that morning to take the photo on a zebra crossing on Abbey Road. That cover photograph has since become one of the most famous and most imitated album covers in recording history. In the photograph, the Beatles walk across the street single file from left to right, with Lennon leading, followed by Starr, McCartney, and Harrison. McCartney is bare-footed and out of step with the other three. The photograph also played a prominent part in the "Paul is dead" urban legend in late 1969. With the exception of Harrison the group are wearing suits designed by Tommy Nutter.[19] The man standing on the pavement in the background is Paul Cole (c. 1911 – 13 February 2008[20]), an American tourist unaware he had been photographed until he saw the album cover months later.[20] The zebra crossing today remains a popular destination for Beatles fans. There is even a webcam featuring it.
The Abbey Road cover is the only Beatles album cover of their original UK albums to have neither the group's name or an album title visible (in America, Hey Jude also has a cover like that).[citation needed]
The Beetle
The Volkswagen Beetle with the number plate LMW 281F parked next to the zebra crossing belonged to one of the people living in the block of flats across from the recording studio. After the album came out, the number plate was stolen repeatedly from the car. In 1986, the car was sold at auction for £2,530[21] and is currently on display at the Autostadt museum in Wolfsburg, Germany.[22]
Cover versions
The songs on Abbey Road have been covered many times (see the song articles for more details) and the album itself has been covered in its entirety.
One month after Abbey Road's release, George Benson recorded a cover version of the album called The Other Side of Abbey Road. In 1970 Booker T. & the M.G.'s recorded McLemore Avenue (the location of Stax Records) which covered the Abbey Road songs and had a similar cover photo.
Additionally, several artists have covered some or all of the side B medley, including Phil Collins (for the Martin/Beatles tribute album In My Life), Dream Theater, The String Cheese Incident, Transatlantic, The Punkles, Tenacious D and 70 Volt Parade.
On May 10, 2010, The Waybacks (with friends including Elvis Costello) performed the entire Abbey Road album at the 2010 Merlefest in Wilkesboro, North Carolina.
Track listing
All songs written and composed by Lennon/McCartney, except where noted.
Side one
1. "Come Together" Lennon 4:20
2. "Something" (George Harrison) Harrison 3:03
3. "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" McCartney 3:27
4. "Oh! Darling" McCartney 3:26
5. "Octopus's Garden" (Richard Starkey) Starr 2:51
6. "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" Lennon 7:47
Side two
1. "Here Comes the Sun" (Harrison) Harrison 3:05
2. "Because" Lennon, McCartney and Harrison 2:45
3. "You Never Give Me Your Money" McCartney 4:02
4. "Sun King" Lennon, with McCartney and Harrison 2:26
5. "Mean Mr. Mustard" Lennon 1:06
6. "Polythene Pam" Lennon 1:12
7. "She Came in Through the Bathroom Window" McCartney 1:57
8. "Golden Slumbers" McCartney 1:31
9. "Carry That Weight" McCartney with Lennon, Harrison and Starr 1:36
10. "The End" McCartney 2:05
11. "Her Majesty" McCartney 0:23
47:23
Notes
* "Her Majesty" appears as a hidden track. Between "The End" and "Her Majesty" is 14 seconds of silence. Later releases of the album included the song on the track listing.
* One cassette tape version in the US had "Come Together" and "Here Comes The Sun" swapped so that Harrison's composition opens the album. All subsequent versions (including the CD) have restored the track listing to its original order.
* Tracks 9 through 13 are sometimes noted as one song (medley) called "The Abbey Road Medley".
* Tracks 14 through 16 are sometimes noted as one song called "The Golden Slumbers Medley".
Personnel
According to Mark Lewisohn[23] and Alan W. Pollack.[24]
The Beatles
* George Harrison – lead, rhythm, acoustic and bass guitars; lead, harmony and background vocals (sometimes multitracked); Hammond organ, harmonium and Moog synthesizer; handclaps and assorted percussion.
* John Lennon – lead and rhythm guitars; six- and 12-string acoustic guitars; lead, harmony and background vocals (sometimes multitracked); electric and acoustic pianos; Hammond organ and Moog synthesizer; white noise generator and sound effects; tambourine and maracas.
* Paul McCartney – lead, rhythm, acoustic and bass guitars; fuzz bass; lead, harmony and background vocals (sometimes multitracked); electric and acoustic pianos; Hammond organ and Moog synthesizer (ribbon strip); handclaps and assorted percussion and sound effects.
* Ringo Starr – drums, percussion, piano, timpani, anvil and hand claps; lead and background vocals.
Additional musicians
* George Martin – piano; electric harpsichord, harmonium and percussion.
* Billy Preston – Hammond organ on "Something" and "I Want You (She's So Heavy)"
Production
* "Something" and "Here Comes the Sun" orchestrated and conducted by George Martin (with George Harrison)
* "Golden Slumbers", "Carry That Weight" and "The End" orchestrated and conducted by George Martin (with Paul McCartney).
* Produced by George Martin (with The Beatles).
* Recorded by Geoff Emerick and Phil McDonald.
* Mixed by Geoff Emerick, Phil McDonald and George Martin (with The Beatles).
* Moog programming by Mike Vickers.
Release history
Country Date Label Format Catalog
United Kingdom 26 September 1969 Apple (Parlophone) LP PCS 7088
United States 1 October 1969 Apple, Capitol LP SO 383
Japan 21 May 1983 Toshiba-EMI Compact Disc CP35-3016
Worldwide reissue 10 October 1987 Apple, Parlophone, EMI CD CDP 7 46446 2
Japan 11 March 1998 Toshiba-EMI CD TOCP 51122
Japan 21 January 2004 Toshiba-EMI Remastered LP TOJP 60142
Worldwide reissue 9 September 2009 Apple Remastered CD 0946 3 82468 24
Also Included "The Ballad Of John And Yoko" And "Old Brown Shoe"
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