The Beatles - The Beatles [White Album] (Mp3 Download)

Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine @ allmusic.com

Each song on the sprawling double album The Beatles is an entity to itself, as the band touches on anything and everything it can. This makes for a frustratingly scattershot record or a singularly gripping musical experience, depending on your view, but what makes the so-called White Album and interesting is its mess. Never before had a rock record been so self-reflective, or so ironic; the Beach Boys send-up "Back in the U.S.S.R." and the British blooze parody "Yer Blues" are delivered straight-faced, so it's never clear if these are affectionate tributes or wicked satires. Lennon turns in two of his best ballads with "Dear Prudence" and "Julia"; scours the Abbey Road vaults for the musique concrète collage "Revolution 9"; pours on the schmaltz for Ringo's closing number, "Good Night"; celebrates the Beatles cult with "Glass Onion"; and, with "Cry Baby Cry," rivals Syd Barrett. McCartney doesn't reach quite as far, yet his songs are stunning -- the music hall romp "Honey Pie," the mock country of "Rocky Raccoon," the ska-inflected "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da," and the proto-metal roar of "Helter Skelter." Clearly, the Beatles' two main songwriting forces were no longer on the same page, but neither were GeorgeRingo. Harrison still had just two songs per LP, but it's clear from "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," the canned soul of "Savoy Truffle," the haunting "Long, Long, Long," and even the silly "Piggies" that he had developed into a songwriter who deserved wider exposure. And Ringo turns in a delight with his first original, the lumbering country-carnival stomp "Don't Pass Me By." None of it sounds like it was meant to share album space together, but somehow The Beatles creates its own style and sound through its mess.

Track Lists
CD 1 :
01. Back In The U.S.S.R
02. Dear Prudence
03. Glass Onion
04. Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da
05. Wild Honey Pie
06. The Continuing Story Of Bungalow Bill
07. While My Guitar Gently Weeps
08. Happiness Is A Warm Gun
09. Martha My Dear
10. I'm So Tired
11. Blackbird
12. Piggies
13. Rocky Raccoon
14. Don't Pass Me By
15. Why Don't Do It In The Road
16. I Will
17. Julia

CD 2 :
01. Birthday
02. Yer Blues
03. Mother Nature's Son
04. Everbody's Got Something To Hide Except For Me And My Mom
05. Sexy Sadiev
06. Helter Skelter
07. Long, Long, Long
08. Revolution 01
09. Honey Pie
10. Savoy Truffle
11. Cry Baby Cry
12. Revolution 09
13. Good Night