The Beatles Appreciation Thread

[Matt]

This game is going to be a LONG one. We're going to play Beatles Song Survivor, where we'll eventually eliminate all of the Beatles entire repertoire down to ONE song, the best of them all! This could take us months, but what else have we got to do? The board has been pretty quiet, so.... WHY NOT?

The best thing about this game is that you don't have to know ANYTHING about the Beatles, or their music. Each round will have five Beatles song titles, with links to hear each song in its entirety. So, if you don't know the songs, have a listen to each of them and pick TWO to be eliminated. List a THIRD choice, as an alternate in the case of a tie at the end of that round. The surviving three songs from that round will be put "away" until we've gone through all the songs at least once. Then, they'll go head to head with other surviving songs from the other rounds. (Does that make sense to everyone, or just me? )

If you've always wanted to know more about the Beatles, play this game everyday, and you'll get to hear ALL their music!

There is ONE problem that we may run into. I searched all over the internet for free webhosting that allows MP3 or large WAV file uploads, and had to resort to Geocities. Geocities will only allow large files to be downloaded a certain amount of times per hour. Therefore, I've created five different websites so that each song is on a separate site, however, you may still find that if you click on a link, you get an error message to try back again later. If you get that error message, it should work for you within the hour.

I'm going to start the first round with five selections from the "Beatles For Sale" CD of 1964 (since we were discussing this CD in the "Is This Poll a Joke" thread). I thought it would be too hard to eliminate some of the best Harrison and Lennon/McCartney numbers so soon, so I've decided to start easy--with cover songs. 

And so starts BEATLES SONG SURVIVOR - ROUND ONE

1.  "Rock And Roll Music" (Berry); Lead vocal: Lennon
2.  "Everybody's Trying to Be My Baby (Perkins); Lead vocal: Harrison
3.  Medley "Kansas City/Hey Hey Hey Hey" (Lieber/Stoller)/(Penniman); Lead vocal: McCartney
4. "Honey Don't" (Perkins); Lead vocal: Starr
5. "Mr. Moonlight" (Johnson); Lead vocal: Lennon


(When I end a round and start the next, I'll need to take the songs from the previous round down so that the next round's songs will fit on the website. Therefore the links in each round will still show up, but they won't work once that round has ended.)

[Matt]

I'm going to cast the first vote..... off goes Ringo's "Honey Don't".

My 2nd choice is "Mr. Moonlight".

3rd (alternate choice in the case of a tie) is "Kansas City".

(The third choice was tough, because I've always loved George's "Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby". I know "Kansas City" is a bit better, but having a soft spot for "Everybody's Trying..." makes it too hard to vote off in the first round.)

[The Schofield Kid]

How good is this going to be,a game that could take months.I say the longer the better,and we start with the very first Beatles album I bought in 1980.Hopefully we'll get as many if not more playing than we did with the Eastwood survivor thread.
My votes:( which took about 20 minutes to decide,and it's only the 1st round )
1-Mr.Moonlight
2-Honey Don't
3-Kansas City

[Brendan]

Was it by sheer coincidence that the latest "Survivor" premiered the same night Matt decided to start this survivor game?  Hey at least I can build up my Beatles mp3 collection now! Albeit.... doing it the wrong way.... 

[Lin Sunderland]

Brilliant game idea Matt.   I look forward to listening to the Beatles songs whether I know them or not.   What a great reason to listen to the Beatles everyday

My votes
1 Honey Don't
2 Mr Moonlight
3 Kansas City


So far the 'out' choices are unanimous

[Gant]

Well done Matt.. This is gonna be excellent fun and a great chance to catch up on loads of fantastic music..

I think one of the reasons I've shied away from Beatles For Sale is the amount of cover versions. (maybe they were too busy touring at the time) I'm a big carl Perkins fan so am not too keen on these Beatles covers of his songs.. Tho' I'm sure his bank manager appreciated them.

I'm gonna go for.

Honey Don't
Everybodys tryin to be my baby

and Kansas City for my 3rd.

[Matt]

Was it by sheer coincidence that the latest "Survivor" premiered the same night Matt decided to start this survivor game?

Sheer coincidence. I had no idea. I bet our game lasts longer than theirs.

I say the longer the better,and we start with the very first Beatles album I bought in 1980.Hopefully we'll get as many if not more playing than we did with the Eastwood survivor thread.

Okay, I could go chronological. I'll start the second round with songs from their first album.

I'd love to see a lot of people playing, but I have a feeling the participation will be light, since some people who aren't Beatles fans won't want to listen to 20 min. or so of music for each round.

Just a note for anyone who isn't too familiar with the Beatles: If we're going to do this chronological, and you listen to some of the songs in these early rounds and think you don't like the Beatles... stick around and keep playing. As tgy said in another thread, the way their music changed and matured in the span of only 7 years is absolutely amazing. By the time we get to the albums from '66, I can't imagine NOT loving almost every song, no matter what kind of music you usually listen to.

[Matt]

By the way.... aren't Lennon's vocals amazing on his two songs from this round? He's my favorite of any male rock vocalist. "Mr. Moonlight" isn't a good song, but John's performance makes a loser of a song damn good listening.

[The Schofield Kid]

Okay, I could go chronological. I'll start the second round with songs from their first album.

Sorry,I meant to say that it was good to start with the album Beatles For Sale,because that was the first album of theirs that I bought in 1980.

[Gant]

I've got a great live version of Mr Moonlight from the Hamburg days.. I agree, Lennons vocals are great..

[Matt]

I found a website that lists all the Beatles songs in the order they were RECORDED. This would be a pretty cool way to go through all the songs the first time in this game. What do you think of doing it that way? http://ic.net/~erasmus/BEATLES.HTM

Haven't decided yet if I would keep going chronological after 2/5 of the music has been eliminated. I was thinking of combining rounds like: "John's Psychedelic Period" with songs like "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "Tomorrow Never Knows" etc. and an example of another round would be something like "Paul's Story Songs" with songs like "Maxwell's Silver Hammer", "Eleanor Rigby", "Lady Madonna", etc.  Maybe we'll do that after all the first eliminations. There's time to decide how to do it... the first eliminations will probably take a few months.

[little_bill]

geez matt, fair play on all the work, setiing up five different accounts, thats dedication man,
after listening i'll go with

1.Mr Moonlight.
2.Kansas City.
3.Everbodys trying to be my baby.

[[email protected]]

Wow, so hard 

1-Mr.Moonlight
2-Honey Don't
3-Kansas City

[Americanbeauty]

Tough 

1. Mr Moonlight
2. Everybody's Trying
3. Honey Don't

[The Schofield Kid]

By the way.... aren't Lennon's vocals amazing on his two songs from this round? He's my favorite of any male rock vocalist. "Mr. Moonlight" isn't a good song, but John's performance makes a loser of a song damn good listening.

I love that story about when they recorded the Please Please Me album ( all in one day  ) the last song they did was Twist and Shout,and John's voice by this time was really going but he sang it and held nothing back and got it in one or two takes.Awesome.

[Matt]

That's the end of Round One. Say goodbye to "Mr. Moonlight" and "Honey Don't".


Now that we've gotten warmed up with a round of cover songs, it's time to play hardball. I'm picking the songs in each round now by the chronological order in which they were recorded. All the songs in this round were released on their first album, "Please Please Me", released in the U.K. on 3/22/1963.



For those who don't know much about The Beatles, John Lennon and Paul McCartney agreed that all of their songs would be published as "Lennon/McCartney" compositions, no matter which of them wrote the song. In the early years, they wrote together more than they would later on, but you can usually tell which of them was the main (or sole) composer of the song by who the lead vocalist is.


BEATLES SONG SURVIVOR - ROUND TWO

As before, vote off two of the following songs, and list an alternate third choice that will only be used as a tie-breaker if needed. The three surviving songs from this thread will be brought back later in the game to compete with the other rounds' survivors.

1.  "Love Me Do" (Lennon/McCartney); Lead vocal: McCartney, with Lennon
2.  "P.S. I Love You (Lennon/McCartney); Lead vocal: McCartney, with Lennon
3.   "Please Please Me" (Lennon/McCartney); Lead vocal: Lennon, with McCartney and Harrison
4.   "Ask Me Why" (Lennon/McCartney); Lead vocal: Lennon, with McCartney
5.   "There's A Place" (Lennon/McCartney); Lead vocal: Lennon and McCartney


(When I end a round and start the next, I'll need to take the songs from the previous round down so that the next round's songs will fit on the website. Therefore the links in each round will still show up, but they won't work once that round has ended.)

NOTE:  You can join in the game anytime. You don't need to have been voting from the beginning to play.

[Matt]

Well, I know two that will HAVE to survive this round.

My first choice to cut is easy... I've never liked "P.S. I Love You".

Second choice is going to be "Ask Me Why".

Alternate third choice:  "There's A Place".

[The Schofield Kid]

Not as hard this round.

1- Ask Me Why
2- There's a Place
3- P.S. I Love You

[Gant]

Second round, first lp.. and I'm already struggling..

I'll go

1    P.S I Love You
2    Ask Me Why
3    Love Me Do

Amazing to think they knocked this album off in a day. these days you'd be lucky if a band managed to get a couple of drum tracks down. Theres something very fresh and exciting about this album. Always loved it. 
Like the cover as well.. Notice Ringo has yet to recieve his Beatles hair cut. 

[little_bill]

1- Ask Me Why
2- There's a Place
3- P.S. I Love You