Lennon is the most prolific contributor. Typically some of his songs, such as "Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey" and "Glass Onion," walk a fine line between insipid and inspiring. Everyone will have their own opinions on this. However a song like "Julia" (his mother's name), a beautiful ballad, clearly illustrates a very emotional and talented musician.
McCartney's offerings are much more straightforward. "Back in the USSR" is reminiscent of the Beach Boys. A lot of his songs are rather quaint - "Martha My Dear," "Blackbird" and "Honey Pie" being obvious examples - while other efforts - such as "Helter Skelter" and "Why Don't We Do It in the Road" illustrate a more hard core rock 'n' roll approach.
Harrison, unfortunately (mainly because of band politics), is only allowed four songs. Two of these - "Piggies" and "Savoy Truffle" - walk that Lennon tightrope between clever and stupid. The other two, "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" and "Long, Long, Long" show the emergence of a songwriting talent to match the intimidating standards of Lennon-McCartney. The first of these is a stirring guitar piece with Cream's Eric Clapton on lead, while the second cleverly alternates between soft ballad and a louder approach.
Finally come the low points of The White Album. "Don't Pass Me By," written and performed by drummer Ringo, is lame. "Good Night," the final track, is a lullaby written by Lennon and given to Starr. Both songs show that as a singer, Ringo makes a pretty good drummer. Even worse is the unnecessary "Wild Honey Pie" and the unspeakably long and boring "Revolution 9."
This is certainly a collection of good songs, not to mention some outstanding ones. Still it's hard to shake the impression that this is a showcase of four individual musicians, rather than the greatest band in the history of rock 'n' roll. Even if some of the attempts at
Go To Page: 1 2
