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Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Remastered)

The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Remastered) Audio CD

A fair review of the The Beatles "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Remastered)" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all The Beatles reviews here, or go back to the The Beatles tabs.

Band: The Beatles
Title: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Remastered)
Rating:

Release Date: 2009-09-09
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band 2: With A Little Help From My Friends 3: Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds 4: Getting Better 5: Fixing A Hole 6: She's Leaving Home 7: Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite 8: Within You Without You 9: When I'm Sixty Four 10: Lovely Rita 11: Good Morning Good Morning 12: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) 13: A Day In The Life 14: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band Documentary

Beatles: "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" remastered
1, fogetaboutit. If you are expecting this to sound like the Beatles have (in some cases risen from the grave) reunited, and re-recorded this album in Dolby Digital 7. . . but if you have a good system, a keen ear and are a Beatles fan, you will appreciate the magic that was performed on this 43 year old recording. .

Sgt. Pepper's!
It is an amazing CD, and I've been listening to it non-stop since I bought it! .

Classic
Ten years reviewing, and finally, I try to tackle the motherload, the crowned king. It comes to this. What is there to say? Why is it important?

Why is it important may be the entry point for discussing Sgt Pepper. So much time has passed since 1967 and so very much has developed in music, hearing this today may make one ask, what is the fuss? It's not easy in retrospect to understand if you were not there. I was not and it took me awhile.

Others who are my age or younger come up with counter-arugments, from the plausable (Freak Out, First Velvet Underground Album) to the insane (More of the Monkees) So, alright, let's get to it.

It is not so much the songs on Sgt. Pepper that make this album so important. The Beatles could do anything as writters, and anyone who belittles their ability in this area is just not facing reality. And if you think of it, all Pepper is on the most basic level is a great collection of really, really, great songs. Even Paul McCartney discribes the Beatles to this day as "a great little band. :

But if you listen to how the title track segues into "With A Little Help From My Frinds," this was new. No one thought an album could have links. "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" may have made a fantastic panio ballad, but the electronic keybords create a dreamy texture, and this texture is a blueprint for anyone who does space rock or ambient. Rock did not have to be about Bobby Vinton's puppy love. It could be about your sons painting, your first trip, your fever dream. This just had not been tried before.

"Getting Better" is only a rock song, but may be the first song where Paul said "you know, John, if I take my finger and slide down my bass neck instead of lifting my hand, I get the coolest sound. " Maybe John said "try and match it with the vocacls, and not the drums, that may work. '

Little discoveries by a young man trying the untested becomes standard practice by the next year--only he does it ten times as good as anyone else.

And he does it while singing "I used to be cruel to my women/I beat her and kept her apart from the things she loved/man I was mean but I'm chagning my scene and I'm doing the best that I can. " Rock songs did not talk about stuff like this in 1967--Vinton still had cupid songs on the charts--but here was Paul doing it, and man did it rock. Maybe he was getting better because he was fixing the hole where the rain got in--Two different songs, but the connection is iron clad.

For the first time you could speak the silent. It really was alright. Things were now, suddenly, different.

Such were the times, and the Beatles nailed it. Seeing the mop tops with sideburns, mustaches and neon garb let you know that no, you were not imagining that strange "shift" that you may have detected in 1967; it was tangable. Things WERE different. Pepper talks about it without talking about it. With little Beatle crib notes.

Listen to the heavy breathing that ends "Lovely Rita. " Did Rita give it up for Paul? Is he puffing grass behind her back? Is he marching at a demonstation while she arrests him? The Beatles may not have said the words recreational sex, LSD, Vietnam, civil rights, but this was all in the subtext. It was almost in everyone's drinking water.

Either way, the breath made the musical dynamics of "Lovely Rita" just SIZZLE.

Need more: Hear how Paul snaps the words "had a smoke" on Day In The Life. He went into a dream, with all those holes John talks about. Artistically, the synergy is incredible, but this was really going on in the real world. The Beatles were just implying what was out there, but no one was talking about, on records.

I could spin countless more examples, but hopefully I have made my point. It is the little details, the little comments the words make, the buried noises that were not part of rock before Pepper that make it so important. The problem is that all these moves are now such standard practice that we forget that Sgt Pepper is where all these rules came from. Think you know all the rules, go back and hear Pepper again. Then again. Found something else? me too. Let's play it again. Wait. . I heard something. Let's play it again

Forty two years on, we are still doing this. We will never stop doing this. .

Sgt Pepper: Alive & Well
Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Remastered) I had a social studies teacher in seventh grade who played this album over and over. Sgt. He commented on the various aspects of the lyrics, music, the overall crafting of the album, in a way in which I came to appreciate the genius behind the album. It's been fun to listen after many decades and discover that it is as good today as I remember it.

Awesome CD
Every song is enjoyable, and I find myself just keeping it on repeat. Unsure of what to expect (having never really listened to the Beatle's besides '1'), this CD is fantastic. It's the only Beatle's CD I have, and makes me want to get more! Don't hesitate on this one.

You can see a complete list of all The Beatles discography, or go back to the The Beatles tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.