Dave Amitri on With The Beatles
As we approach the 60th anniversary of the release of With The Beatles just eight months after Please Please Me I’ve been listening to not only the album for the first time but also some of the music that came before. Trying to get myself in the mind of a music fan in 1963 which requires me to dismiss everything released in my lifetime and more. As luck would have it our dear friends at Nothing Is Real have a two part podcast looking back, just at November 1963 in Beatles world and it has provided the kind of history lesson I could only dreamed of having at school. It has also helped me understand the unique madness of the original and biggest pop mania. So before I get to the album let me try and set the scene as I see it with absolute acknowledgment that these gems are Steven’s and Jason’s as they microscopically followed a month in the life of The Beatles where they were touring the country in front of 120000 fans, an ever voracious press desperate for any snippet of information and increasing interest from the US.
How can I understand something that was going on two years before I was born? Reference points are what I need. Mine is Cliff and The Drifters / Shadows. How does that help? Well something that has really stuck with me from the podcast was a long term employee from one of the local theatres, Southampton or Plymouth being quoted as saying he’d seen Johnny Ray, Bill Haley and Cliff playing at his theatre, but this was something completely different. Just eight months after the release of their first album and before the release of their second. This was new, before their second album they were already causing more fuss than Cliff. What about TV? I know TV and I know about Royal Command Performances. They are huge especially in an era of two channels and bugger all else to do. The Beatles appeared in November 1963 and 20 million people saw them do their thing which was an edgier Cliff and The Shadows turned up to 11, bundles of cheeky Scouse charisma, more risque and all the ooohs, wooohs and yeahs any self-respecting young music fan of 1963 would demand of their idols. Forget your Starman, Virginia Plain or Do you Really Want To Hurt me this must have been the talk everywhere the following day not just the playground. In my imaginary 1963 living room watching this clip with no other way of hearing or seeing them until the next TV appearance or if I could manage to get my hands on a record I would be in. Hook, line and sinker. This clip with John’s killer line delivered like a naughty schoolboy just puts the lid on it. Right here is where The Beatles go beyond the music and into celebrity on the way to phenomenon.
As an observation which I know will upset some but it is just how I see and hear it. While they are obviously a foursome and the dynamics may well change the further I go through the rest of the albums this is John’s band. He is the front man. The voice that is unique as far as I can tell, the attitude, he’s the one, right now he’s the one I’m buying in to.
Other events in November 1963 included Brian Epstein being in New York organising the Ed Sullivan appearances and the band signing a deal to make a movie (even The Beatles thought it wouldn’t last and that was the route to take, not just Cliff). On November 22nd the day the album was released on this tsunami of activity JFK was shot in Dallas. I don’t know what that means but it feels important, significant. All of this to me in 2023 is much more fascinating than the music but that is probably down to Nothing Is Real. I’m in now and want to find out more even before I get to The Beatles own “Summer Holiday”, “A Hard Day’s Night” next July (winky emoji).
Right, I still can’t move on to the music until I’ve mentioned the cover. It’s so striking. Wikipedia tells me it was a photo by Robert Freeman. To fully understand how brilliant it is it’s worth checking out the awful cover on the Australian release. Still four headshots on a black background but couldn’t be more different. These things matter.
Now we get to the music. Six cover versions, seven Lennon and McCartney tunes and one George Harrison song. It’s interesting to me how the vocals are shared as it slightly contradicts my ‘John’s band’ theory. Yes, John does most of the heavy lifting but Paul and George get a more than fair share.
Out of the blocks with three Lennon and McCartney songs. It Won’t Be long is classic early Beatles. John giving it plenty, nice guitar parts, lots of yeahs in a song about falling in love. All I’ve Got To Do is more of the same just slowed down. I love the ahh backing and John’s vocal is yearning enough to set young hearts racing. Paul’s up next with a hit. The brilliant All My Loving. It’s simple again but that is the where the genius lies. More kudos for what I assume is George’s guitar here. It is however sticking to The Shadows formula and you can imagine Hank doing the guitar breaks.
Don’t Bother Me is my favourite on the album by some distance. It has a different feel to the rest, it is a George song after all. I’ve been trying to work out what it is. George’s vocal is great but he still sounds like a Beatle. Lyrically it’s another boy / girl song but Geroge is more angsty about things in general than the soppier Lennon and McCartney songs. It’s edgy. It does different things melodically too which someone with more musical knowledge can probably explain to me. It feels out of another time while being an obviously Beatles song. I’ve been listening to The Coral a lot lately and they wear their Liverpool hearts on their sleeves. Don’t Bother Me would fit very nicely on any Coral album. As great as All My Loving is, it wouldn’t. Glad I’ve cleared that up. It’s a hell of a song either way.
With its harmonica and Buddy Holly vocal styling Little Child is a step back in time into the 50’s and none the worse for that. I wish people still made one minute 46 second songs.
Side one finishes with two covers and they are chalk and cheese with Paul providing the cheese. They did Till There Was You at The Royal Command Performance and followed it with Twist and Shout. Paul there for the mums while the girls wanted John and the boys wanted to be John. It’s a pleasant enough song that Paul sings beautifully but he’s 21 here. It’s all very Gary Barlow or dare I say it Cliff. John meanwhile rips into a definitive version of Please Mr Postman to end side one on a massive high. Overall 1963 Dave clinging to his copy would be thrilled with what he’d heard and been desperate to get side two on. 2023 Dave is starting to fall for the bands charm while not yet fully convinced that Macca won’t surface throughout like a whiff of Yardley among the Brut and Old Spice. On to side two………
George excels again here with a fantastically dry performance of the Chuck Berry rock n roll classic Roll Over Beethoven. I love the way George sings in Scouse. Great start.
Hold Me Tight is a low point. Nothing wrong with it per se it’s just a bit of unnecessary fluff.
You Really Got A Hold On Me is George and John doing their best Everly brothers on a Smokey Robinson song. It’s ok and I’m sure 1963 Dave would have made a valiant attempt to sing along into his bedroom mirror just wishing he could be as cool as John and as George as George. In 2023 it doesn’t have a lot to grip me. This is probably my problem.
Ringo gets a vocal credit on I Wanna Be Your Man. But I think I can safely say this is another for team George. His guitar throughout is inventive and drives on this fantastic foot stomping romp of a song.
I recently came across a couple of Shadows songs on which they actually sing. Devil In Her Heart puts me in mind of this
That’s The Way It Goes.
Nothing wrong with that at all, it’s good to hear George sing again.
Another great Lennon vocal lifts another potentially weak song in Not A Second Time with a piano break that I can imagine Hank Marvin doing behind his fixed grin on the infamous red Fender.
The closing track is an absolute highlight. It’s a down and dirty version of Money that’s all about John. The backing from the rest of the band is interesting because it’s The Beatles stepping out of their natural habitat. There’s some piano and all sorts going on a million miles from Hold Me Tight.
14 songs with nods to the future, leaning heavily on the past but absolutely in the present. The Beatles were rewriting how musical bands behaved, were spoken about and how they interacted with their fans. With The Beatles immediately replaced Please Please Me at the top of the UK album charts and stayed there for 21 weeks. (Please Please Me had held it for 30 weeks). None of this is normal, how can I truly appreciate its magnitude 60 years on? I will say that I wish I was there to feel it, experience it, live it. A black and white world lived in colour? I wish. Without a time machine that can’t happen. So I ask again. For those of you that were there please share how it felt and did you realise what was happening in front of your eyes?
Remarkably I’ve discovered that I Want To Hold Your Hand was recorded at the same time and not included on the album but released just a week after. One of my heroes Paul Weller often left some his best work for singles not on albums and maybe this was another of his many nods to the band. I could get lost in this stuff and never finish this review but the madness is summed up by this extract from Wikipedia
With advance orders exceeding one million copies in the United Kingdom, “I Want to Hold Your Hand” would have gone straight to the top of the British record charts on its day of release (29 November 1963) had it not been blocked by the group’s first million-seller She Loves You, their previous UK single, which was having a resurgence of popularity following intense media coverage of the group. Taking two weeks to dislodge its predecessor, “I Want to Hold Your Hand” stayed at number one for five weeks and remained in the UK top 50 for 21 weeks in total.
Musically I’m starting to get it but have they hit their creative heights yet? Of course not. I’ll have to wait until July for the next one and the net stage in their development. The Beatles are definitely under my skin but more for the hullaballoo around them than the actual noise they create. 2023 Dave is more keen to hear the next Nothing Is Real podcast than the next Beatles album. 1963 Dave has stopped cutting his hair, saving up for a suit and is spending hours practicing smiling and shaking his head at the same time.
That Royal Command Performance
Oooh! Innee bold?
Excellent stuff! An album I have a soft spot for as it was one of the first 3 or 4 that I ever heard.
John is indeed fairly dominant in the early years, the next (brilliant) album could almost be a solo album.
Can’t agree totally about George, easily the weakest voice of the main three and while Don’t Bother Me is a passable first attempt at writing a song, he is some way behind the other two. He does (almost) catch up later though.
Love It Won’t Be Long also and All I’ve Got to Do is a relatively unknown gem. Lennon’s voice is incredible at this stage (pretty much any stage), B side of I wanna hold your hand is miraculous, This Boy
Thanks Dai. I just found George’s parts interesting among the more traditional accepted Beatles sound. Lennons voice was clearly a gift.
In 1974 I was 15 years old and was on holiday in Magaluf. Towards the end of the evening in the hotel, the DJ would play ‘With The Beatles’. This was the first time I had heard it and I thought it was fantastic. There was a record shop close by and I bought the Yellow Submarine EP, which included ‘I’m Only Sleeping’, ‘Taxman’ and ‘She Said, She Said’ and an Argentinian Beatles import album titled ‘Por Siempre’ which included ‘I Call Your Name’, ‘The Inner Light’ and ‘Yes It Is’. This was the start of my love of all things Beatles. I can only imagine what it must have been like to be 15 in 1963 and hearing ‘With The Beatles’ for the first time. For a 15 year old in 1974 it was quite something.
I was 13 and had become a Beatlemaniac during 1963…pictures on the wall and everything. I even made a collarless jacket out of an old one. For Christmas I was given my first record player and my first record – I Want To Hold Your Hand – and with the record tokens garnered from relatives I went and bought With The Beatles the day after Boxing Day. I still have it.
It is hard to describe their impact that year as it was seismic. I had been listening to the radio for years, but their arrival was indescribable- they were so different to anything that had come before. They were actually on the telly and radio quite a lot – they would appear on Ready Steady Go!, variety shows, childrens shows, and the radio appearances are well documented – then there were magazines and so on…they were everywhere!
This LP has been downgraded in recent years whilst PPM has risen in stature for some reason – I always preferred WTB, although it was made very much in the same template…a Paul soppy oldie, finish with a John rocker, covers of US classics (notable also that this was probably the first time I had heard those songs, so they were ‘Beatle songs’ to me as much as the originals), but no singles on here of course – it wasn’t a huge leap forward…that would happen in 1964. It was Beatlemania in 14 tracks.
Which was the name of the album in Canada
1963, for this eight year old, was a magic year of unfolding marvels. The boys from Liverpool were into their stellar run of early single releases, each seemingly mind-bogglingly individual and thrilling, and then my first exposure to science-fiction and electronic music blew my little mind via the idiot box, which we needed to switch on a good five minutes ahead of either Doctor Who or Juke Box Jury, to be sure that it had warmed up by the time the opening credits rolled. I have never recovered, thankfully, and nor would I wish to. Life affirming music and mind expanding drama, I couldn’t have wished for more at such tender years.
Me too, and I am amazed we are still interested in both after 60 years!
Brilliant work, Dave. You always cast new light on albums I love. And thanks for reminding me about Nothing Is Real, which I haven’t listened to for a while. I was five and With The Beatles was the first LP I heard. I knew every note and every word by heart. It has had a profound effect on me the whole of my life. I prepared a Feature to mark its 60th anniversary. I’ll post it here, if that’s ok, Dave. Apologies for the length but it was meant for a Feature.
Beatlemania took hold of the UK throughout 1963, propelled by increasingly successful singles, Please Please Me, From Me To You and She Loves You, a debut album that stayed at the top of the charts for thirty weeks, no less than four nationwide tours and numerous radio and TV appearances. The music papers were full of stories about the Beatles and magazines for teenage girls regularly contained interviews with the band members, colour posters, and other Beatle-related articles. Brian Epstein’s masterplan worked like a dream. The Beatles were a gang, a band of four brothers, each with their own character and each with equally important roles to play, the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. Young girls were the main driver of pop record sales. They had a selection of boy for them to swoon over, the “smart” one, the “cute” one, the “quiet” one and the “funny” one, all of whom wore bespoke suits, cuban heels and sported a risqué haircut. They were a media dream, happily flirting and joking with the press and anyone who thrust a microphone towards them. The songs addressed their audience in the first person and were packed with devices designed to induce a frenzy, such as a high pitched “Ooo” accompanied by a shake of the Beatlecut and, of course, the “Yeah, yeah, yeah!” Even the stage silhouette was carefully considered, Ringo on his riser, John, alone to his left and the left-hand, right-hand bass and guitar players, necks pointing away from each other, sharing a mike to his right. The Daily Mirror brought “Beatlemania” into the mainstream when it used the term to describe fan behaviour at the first night of their first headline tour in Cheltenham, 1st November 1963. Three nights later, they performed four songs, From Me To You, She Loves You, ‘Til There Was You and Twist & Shout, at The Royal Variety Performance for the Queen Mother. The show was broadcast on ITV the following week to 21.2 million people, almost everyone who had access to a TV back then, and John’s unapologetically scouse suggestion that “those in the cheap seats should clap their hands; whilst the rest could just rattle their jewellery!” passed into legend. It was a moment when the whole of the UK stopped. The Beatles had a universal appeal, defying age, class and gender.
In the middle of all the hysteria and mayhem, squeezed into their crazily busy schedule, they returned to the studio to record their second album, With The Beatles, on the evening of the 18th July 1963. Please Please Me had been at number one since May. In between albums, they’d used up some of their best songs on singles, She Loves You and its B side having been taped just over two weeks earlier. For this album, they started with the covers. They recorded three and made progress on a fourth in a three and half hour session with George Martin supplementing the band on piano for the first couple, both contrasting Tamla Motown classics.
Smokey Robinson and The Miracles had a top ten hit in the US in 1962 with You’ve Really Got A Hold On Me, a song inspired by Sam Cooke’s Bring It On Home To Me. It was originally a B side for Happy Landing before radio DJs ‘flipped’ it and The Beatles obtained it by import later that year. There is so much to love and so much to emulate in the record, notably Marv Tarplin’s descending guitar lines, the gentle stop-start roll of Benny Benjamin’s drums, the harmonised backing vocals and, most of all, Smokey’s beautifully expressive lead. John most likely enjoyed the bitter sweet sentiment in the lyric. It is easily the most musically complex song The Beatles had attempted up to that point and they managed it in just seven takes, a handful of months after the original had been released. There is a confidence in the tight backing vocals and in Ringo’s double-handed fills. John attacks the lead vocal, riding roughshod over any delicacy, with George, rather than Paul, adding grit in the harmony. The arrangement of the electric guitars cleverly replaces the sax on the original and the instrumental break out-Motowns Motown. It is a great version of a great, great record.
If You Really Got A Hold Of Me is a measure of The Beatles’ ambition, Money (That’s What I Want) must have seemed ripe for a takeover. Written by Berry Gordy with Janie Bradford, it was the first hit on Gordy’s own label as performed by Barrett Strong. The Blues is at the heart of the melody, an idiom The Beatles normally approached with care, plus, its lust for something other than a teenage girl defied their strategy of speaking directly to their audience. Nevertheless, it had been in their act since 1960 and featured in their Decca audition. It is a tremendous performance that trounces the original and is arguably the best on the album. The key is that the two best voices in the band and, therefore, in Rock/Pop ever, are at the top of their game. This isn’t simply a showcase for a John gutsy lead. Paul is raving in a higher octave. Closing With The Beatles by rocking up an R&B track, and concluded after seven takes rather than just one, condemned Money to perpetual, mostly adverse, comparison with Twist & Shout. However, for a song whose style was outside of The Beatles comfort zone, Money is triumphant. The Rolling Stones were listening.
Devil In Her Heart is another girl-group song, written by Richard Drapkin and originally recorded by The Donays. It was an obscurity and used as a George showcase. His lead vocal is much, much better than Do You Want To Know A Secret. However, it’s a track that illustrates what a complete band The Beatles were because it’s John’s insistent, nagging backing vocal that makes the track, a trick they repeated with Taxman for Revolver. The band interplay is of its now usual high standard and it lays the platform for the expression in the vocal. John pushes George to his best vocal yet. A performance that would be a highlight by any other band is now routine for The Beatles, all done in three takes.
Although Paul would often perform show-type tunes throughout his career, the only song The Beatles covered that actually came from Broadway was ‘Til There Was You. Paul was introduced to Peggy Lee’s version by his cousin Bett. It quickly became part of their repertoire and was showcased in the Decca audition. Paul’s vocal is nicely poised and John and George’s twin acoustic guitars are delicate and subtle. In fact, the interacting ‘Spanish’ guitars are responsible for the relatively high total number of takes, eight, to get a cover right. Ringo provides tasteful bossa nova bongos. There isn’t a single moment of it that jars. It’s the obverse of Rock & Roll, bringing a moment of serene calm after the first five self-composed songs on side one. Meredith Wilson, the writer, received more royalties for this one song, because of The Beatles cover, than for the entire Music Man show from which it came. ‘Til There Was You was an important song for The Beatles. They performed it at key moments when reaching out to a wider audience such as at The Royal Variety Performance and the Ed Sullivan show in America.
On the 30th July, they completed ‘Til There Was You and moved on to two more covers before starting on the original songs. Please Mr Postman is another girl-group song and a third Motown record for the same album, a 1961 number one for The Marvelettes. It is perfect for John, a song longing for a love that isn’t quite there. It had dropped out of their live setlist, so they had to refamiliarise themselves with its charms over nine takes. Whereas Gladys Horton was playful, almost teasing, a double-tracked John is assertive, bordering on annoyed. The beat is applied relentlessly. Only the backing voices show any kind of tenderness. In the hands of The Beatles, the song is more danceable if somewhat darker in mood.
Roll Over Beethoven was their first attempt at a genuine Rock & Roll song. Chuck Berry’s arrogance and quicksilver guitar playing didn’t naturally suit the quiet Beatle, but it’s George given the task of delivering both. At this point in their career, The Beatles were enjoying huge success in the UK but were yet to properly introduce themselves to the world. Roll Over Beethoven is a calling card, an announcement that The Beatles are the new thing. Chuck Berry’s Roll Over Beethoven was originally released in 1956, ironically the oldest song The Beatles had covered so far. However, they play it in later, 1960s style Chuck Berry, slowed down with the spritely rhythm converted to boogie-woogie. It worked. Those energetic handclaps are right to be excited. George’s self belief must have been sky-high, boosted by a second triumphant lead vocal.
In the pressure cooker of Beatlemania expectation, they wrote seven new songs and carried one over from Please Please Me. It Won’t Be Long is a firecracker, opening the album with raucous energy and exuberance, a dynamic Pop song, exploding from the speakers. The debut began with “One, two, three, fuh!” This begins with a double-tracked John singing the title before the instruments kick in. There is a lot packed into two minutes. The chord changes are unusual and harmonically sophisticated throughout, particularly in the middle eight descending chord sequence. It’s so strong, it was considered for a single, echoing the ‘yeah, yeah, yeah’ in She Loves You.
All I Got To Do, Lennon’s attempt to write like Smokey, is utterly captivating. In McCartney’s biography Many Years From Now, Barry Miles claims that Lennon demonstrated the song to the others moments before they started the tapes rolling. Ringo’s drum pattern beautifully confounds his critics, his bass peddle squeaking distinctively, gently leaning on the rhythm guitar. Paul strums his electric bass chords, a first in Rock and Roll according to Dennis Alstrand. Lennon’s lead vocal wonderfully captures a yearning romanticism but also has an unsettled edginess. They finished it in the studio within fifteen takes plus a vocal overdub and never played it live. A mini masterpiece all done and dusted in a single day and never revisited.
And immediately into another masterpiece. Paul’s pure pop perfection, All My Loving, is a song and performance that lifts hearts, a two minute package of aural sunshine. The guitar work is spectacular. The melodic descending bassline is Paul’s best to date. John plays the chords as triplets, giving the song real momentum. George’s solo is a peach. Much of the vocal is Paul double-tracked, the backing singers making their entrance after the bridge. Those ‘ooh’s are delicious. It quickly caught the ear of DJs and became well-loved despite being an album track and not a single. It was so popular with fans, The Beatles selected it to open their appearance on the Ed Sullivan show that properly introduced them to America.
After three very different but equally brilliant Lennon-McCartney songs, With The Beatles introduces George the composer. Don’t Bother Me is a complete change in tone, George sending a dour message from his sick bed in a minor key. A lot of words are cleverly packed into the rich melody and the haunting guitar line is lovely, especially the five note intro. George is left alone to sing, no harmonies, no backing vocals, so he is double-tracked, capturing the mood perfectly. The other Beatles help make the song work. They all contribute some nice Latin percussion, Paul’s bass in the middle eight is great and John’s guitar is excellent. Don’t Bother Me stands shoulder to shoulder with the previous three songs because of its differences and yet it is as accomplished in its particular way. Positioned as it is, the track enhances the album as a whole. It’s an example of how many elements The Beatles had at their disposal to maximise their appeal.
At first glance, Little Child can be mistaken for album filler. It’s a simple song meant for Ringo, the first Beatles song to be piano-led. There are no guitars apart from George playing the bass notes while Paul pounds the keys and John goes feral on harmonica. After Ringo decided it wasn’t for him, John and Paul do the singing, bringing a sardonic flavour to “I’m so sad and lonely”. It’s wild and raw, a real pleasure to listen to. It doesn’t overstay its welcome either. Its energy would be exhausting to dance to if it lasted any longer.
Hold Me Tight demonstrates how far The Beatles had come in such a brief period. At one point, Paul fancied it might be a single. Its construct resembles the girl group songs that they were so fond of. Imagine The Chiffons singing it at a slightly gentler pace. They tried it out for Please Please Me but were dissatisfied with the result. Listening to it on With The Beatles, you can hear multiple flaws in the singing and the playing, almost as though they gave up after a while and decided that would do. The bass is a great riff, amplified by the guitars above it. The handclaps add some much-needed vim and the rough edges give it a garage feel. On With The Beatles it is eclipsed by its surroundings but placed on Please Please Me it would give that album a boost.
Their generosity to The Rolling Stones seems less altruistic when you consider that they deemed I Wanna Be Your Man worthy of only a Ringo vocal. A throwaway for The Beatles was an important single for The Stones. Ringo’s knuckles scrape the floor less than Jagger’s and Brian Jones proves he is a great musician but I Wanna Be Your Man firmly stamps The Beatles authority in the Pop/Rock heirachy. Of course, The Beatles are better organised, neater and cleaner, yet George Martin’s Hammond organ and John and Paul’s vocal screams, squeals and yelps express the lust in the song more convincingly than The Stones.
Not A Second Time drew the attention of The Times’ Classical Music Critic, William Mann: “Harmonic interest is typical of their quicker songs, too, and one gets the impression that they think simultaneously of harmony and melody, so firmly are the major tonic sevenths and ninths built into their tunes, and the flat submediant key switches, so natural is the Aeolian cadence at the end of ‘Not A Second Time’ (the chord progression which ends Mahler’s Song of the Earth).” John was flattered but dismissive. He felt he was just trying to write another Smokey song. The melody is sweet but the lyric explores the shadows Smokey usually avoids. His vocal is brittle and tormented, the backing sparse and intense. George Martin plays a downbeat, ruminative piano dominated by the left hand and Ringo puts in his best performance of the album with some finely judged fills. In 1963, there were few groups in Pop attempting to tackle such emotional complexities.
Every Beatles album cover is iconic but the coollest by far is With The Beatles. The Beatles themselves became involved in the design. They wanted to emulate the black and white photographs Astrid Kirchherr took in Hamburg, unsmiling in half-light. Robert Freeman’s cover photographs for John Coltrane had impressed and Brian Epstein persuaded him to take on the task with triple the usual fee. He met them in a corridor of The Palace Court Hotel, Bournemouth and one hour, two rolls of film later the job was done. EMI didn’t approve. George Martin had to intervene personally but the group had to compromise by including a border and a clear display of the album title and record label on the front. Tony Barrow, the band’s PR, wrote the informative notes on the back, making one error in crediting John with playing the Hammond organ on I Wanna Be Your Man. He conjures up quite an image of John standing at a microphone working his harmonica while Paul pounds on the piano while recording Little Child. This is an album cover poured over repeatedly by millions of fans, absorbing every detail.
With The Beatles is the product of an increasingly confident studio act, whose recordings are more complex emotionally and musically. The band had quickly adapted to their new drummer, were excelling in Abbey Road, then known as EMI Recording Studios, and were developing a productive two-way relationship with George Martin. His piano contributions are as menacing as any of John’s snarling lead vocals. As a result, the resonance and tone of the album are tremendous. It sounds huge with a slight hint of echo. The guitars are loud, played with assurance and panache on the rockers and subtle and intimate on the ballads. There is bounce to the bass and the kick drum. The backing vocals are tight yet expansive. With The Beatles is more of an album than Please Please Me. It flows beautifully, showcasing their versatility, inventiveness and rapidly increasing professionalism. It contains no singles and no B sides. Despite the cream of the self-composed songs being skimmed off for 45s, the quality of the writing is sharper, representing a raising of the bar. There are at least four stone cold Beatle classics, whereas the debut has just one. It’s telling that Hold Me Tight is not a new song. Capitol had enough faith to combine all the original songs plus Til There Was You with I Want To Hold Your Hand, I Saw Her Standing There and This Boy for Meet The Beatles, the album that broke them in the American market. However, it’s the six covers that document The Beatles development much more accurately. Though they are all derived from their live act, they are recorded with more care than those on Please Please Me. They may not reach the level of raw excitement of Twist & Shout, though Money comes very close, but the performances display a richness and depth few of The Beatles contemporaries could hope to achieve.
With The Beatles’ lack of representation on the Red 1962-1966 collection, even the expanded version, has resulted in its fab-ness being routinely overlooked. Including the singles either side, it was a sound that positively leapt from the radio and captured the world, lively and full of charm. It certainly captivated a five year old boy, his fifteen year old aunt, twenty-seven year old mother and, seemingly ancient, forty-eight year old grandmother, leading to a lifelong love affair of music in general and The Beatles in particular. In 1963, young people found their voice, the satire of That Was The That Was targeted the establishment, skirts were getting shorter, UK growth was at a post war high and the white heat of technology arrived. Britain was ready for The Beatles to bring the joy and effectively kick-start the sixties. The whole package of With The Beatles, from the visuals to the needle-drop is definitive of Beatlemania. In the US, JFK was assassinated, a day of danger and dread. Teenage America had to wait a month or so for I Want To Hold Your Hand and Meet The Beatles, but, very soon, a domestic UK sensation became global.
Prefer The Stones version of I Wanna Be Your Man myself, Beatles one is way too polite, Jagger and Jones’ slide make it sound like a threat. Certainly a different take on the song.
Beatles version of Money is far superior though, superb.
The Stones version is wild and ragged and lasts 1:43. The Beatles take lasts 3:01, easily the longest track on With The Beatles. It would be a lot better if they cut a third of its length.
Tigger, this deserves its own post. Your experience of the album is a million miles from mine. Please post your own 🙏
I’m happy for all the With The Beatles appreciation to be on a single thread. As you can see, you and I largely agree, especially on Don’t Bother Me and Money.
👍 😀
Me too – 2 well written write-ups of a Beatles album I mostly skip by and haven’t really played for a long while, but should now go back and check again
OK, I feel like an imposter up against your detailed knowledge and impressive prose. You’re right though we do kind of draw the same conclusions of it even though we listened to it for the first time almost 60 years apart
Excellent stuff! I had seen the Fabs the previous May 31 at the Southend Odeon, in the company of Roy Orbison, Gerry and the Pacemakers, Louise Cordet, David Macbeth, Erkey Grant (whatever happened to him?) and Ian Crawford (ditto?). We were still at the stage where to see your faves you had to put up with a lot of package tour filler.
Unsurprisingly they did nothing from With the Beatles. But if you look at a setlist from around the time WTB was released, apart from All My Loving the only tracks from it they did were four covers – Money, Til There Was You, Roll Over Beethoven and You Really Got a Hold on Me. All things they could play in their sleep, presumably.
Just listened to the first episode of Nothing Is Real on November 1963 and I make the mistake of calling it the Royal Variety Performance instead of Command.