Build­ing a Shorter (bet­ter?) Bea­t­les White Album

The new issue of the British music mag­a­zine Mojo cel­e­brates the 40th anniver­sary of the Bea­t­les’ White Album (a.k.a. “The Bea­t­les”), and it includes a great Beatles-geek exer­cise: Sequence a single-disc ver­sion of the album, in keep­ing with pro­ducer George Martin’s famous com­plaint that it should not have been stretched to two records. Mojo offers sev­eral such sug­gested versions.

Of course, Paul McCartney’s equally famous defense of the dou­ble album, as heard in “The Bea­t­les Anthol­ogy,” was “It’s the bloody Bea­t­les White Album. Shut up!” Cer­tainly one of the charms of the White Album is how sprawl­ing it is, though there are cer­tain songs I never again need to hear. Still, whit­tling the White Album down to 15 tracks, as instructed, is pretty tough. Here’s my best stab at the single-album ver­sion of the White Album, with Side 1 and Side 2 des­ig­nated because this was a clas­sic record long before CDs came along:

Tough­est dele­tions: “Cry Baby Cry,” “Yer Blues,” “Savoy Truf­fle,” “I’m So Tired”

Next tier: “Martha My Dear,” “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” “The Con­tin­u­ing Story of Bun­ga­low Bill,” “Rev­o­lu­tion 1,” “Wild Honey Pie,” “Why Don’t We Do It in the Road”

Eas­i­est dele­tions: “Honey Pie,” “Rocky Rac­coon,” “Rev­o­lu­tion 9,” “Good Night,” “Don’t Pass Me By” (sorry, Ringo)

This exer­cise con­firms that my two favorite sides of the orig­i­nal album are Side 1 (which I always liked) and Side 3 (which grew on me as an adult). Paul’s cutesy mate­r­ial doesn’t hold up nearly as well as John’s harder-edged songs, though the tough­est rocker remains Paul’s (“Hel­ter Skel­ter”).

I’m tempted to sub­sti­tute “Yer Blues” for “Birth­day”—or to put “Sexy Sadie” in that spot on Side 1 and add “Cry Baby Cry” or “I’m So Tired” to Side 2—but the “Birth­day” riff and drum­ming just can’t be denied, even if the song is slight.

I also almost dropped “I Will” but just couldn’t; it’s an espe­cially sweet song to sing to your kids. Then again, so are “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” and “Good Night,” and those didn’t make my cut.

Paul was right: A sin­gle album just loses too much essen­tial material.

Here’s the real solu­tion: The Bea­t­les should have added “Hey Jude” and the harder-rocking sin­gle ver­sion of “Rev­o­lu­tion”—both of which were recorded dur­ing the White Album ses­sions but released sep­a­rately as a single—and removed “Honey Pie,” “Rocky Rac­coon” and the pok­ier “Rev­o­lu­tion 1.” You’d still have the divi­sive 8-minute sound col­lage that is “Rev­o­lu­tion 9,” but, hey, it’s the bloody Bea­t­les White Album. Shut up!

What’s your 15-song White Album?

By Mark Caro | The Chicago Tri­bune
19 August 2008