Rating: 2/5
Review:
A curiosity
This is a genuine
curiosity. It’s a 1965 collection of Beatles covers and it’s a
mixed bag, to say the least. Many of the acts here are largely
forgotten, and frankly, it’s not hard to see why.
To be fair, there
are some genuinely interesting takes on some songs, like The Score’s
strange but compelling version of Please Please Me and an enjoyable
jangly psych take on She’s A Woman by The Northwest Corporation.
There’s also some unobjectionable but rather dull stuff from Del
Shannon, The Beach Boys and others, but there are also some real
turkeys here. Just as examples, there’s a cringingly bland version
of She Loves You and the embarrassing absurdity of The Moving
Sidewalks trying to give a serious heavy rock treatment to an
honest-to-God light pop song like I Want To Hold Your Hand. (I would
also have been interested in Chuck Berry’s views on Roll Over
Beethoven and Rock And Roll Music being included as Beatles covers.)
These are early
Beatles songs which relied for much of their greatness and
individuality on the Beatles’ performance, and it shows here. For
example, The Blue Things’ version of Twist And Shout simply
highlights how great Lennon’s vocals were and how ordinary the song
sounds without them. As an album, it has some historical interest
but not all that much musical interest. One for real collectors and
Beatles fanatics only, I’d say.
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