The Beatles 1962 - 1966, 1967 - 1970

50 years down the line, that is the rather confronting number of years staring me in the face. 50 Years since "the red" and "the blue" album were released, giving an overview of The Beatles' career. In 2023 the album get their first major re-release, polished up with the most modern digital tricks and expanded to three albums each. On top of it all there is a new single, and lets face it a fantastic new single, that closes it all, 61 years after the release of that first single, 'Love Me Do', the b-side of the, ridiculously priced, 7" single.

I am reviewing the new version of the albums. I do not have them and may never have. What I'm wondering is whether it really adds to the experience I've had a long time ago. What I'll do here, is try to explain what the two double albums mean to me.

In 1973 I got the red album with St. Nicolas and one month later the blue for my birthday. The two albums opened and deepened the band's music to me. I've written this before. For my age I was early where 1960s music is concerned. Thanks to two then teenage girls, Tineke and Yvonne, I heard all the singles they had as a very young boy. Although I knew there was something called an LP, I had no patience for them and did not know that songs, only the singles. Not long after, I discovered the pirate radio station Radio Veronica and got to know more and more songs and still well under 10 years of age. My first self-bought single was 'Hey Jude' in October 1968, still my favourite Beatles song.

'Abbey Road' was released not long before my parents moved, with me in protest. I remember that the elder brother of my friend downstairs announced that he would have the new Beatles album on a Friday. We younger kids all sat ready to listen to it when he would get home. I always see the album sleeve in my mind, but thinking about writing this post, I wonder if he played it from a tape recorder, a big one. 'Come Together' I knew from the radio, a song I remember not liking a lot at the time. That changed over time, in fact, I'm playing it myself with my band Sweetwood for years already. After 'Come Together' there were all songs we did not know and lost interest very soon and started playing.

We moved, The Beatles called it quits and fast forward to 1973. The albums were released and were something I really, really wanted to have. First came 1962-1966. For the first time I heard the first three singles and some early album tracks like 'All My Loving'. Then all the biggest hits that I, nearly, all did know from the singles. But then there were album tracks, which I all did not know. And this is what really was mindblowing when I listened to 1967 - 1970. A whole world opened there with songs like 'Back In The USSR' and 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps'.

The red one always sold better than the blue. My take is that this one was bought by the girls, now ten years older, girls that had dropped away when the band became more experimental. The second category are the parents who liked a lot of the early songs anyway. The blue is the album for the boys and men. The first Beatles albums I bought myself when I started to have my own money were 'Abbey Road', 'Sgt. Peppers' and 'The Beatles'. The rest I all bought second hand a bit later. With the first one mentioned here as my absolute favourite.

The blue one expanded my musical universe. The red catered my little boy brain. In 2023 I like them both because the music is absolutely fantastic. To imagine these four young men from Liverpool created this huge body of music in just seven years, is something that can't be comprehended anymore.

I played the blue one last week. It took some polishing with a wet cloth but the sound was certainly good. Of course the blue, I'd might add. Again, I noticed how incredibly good the music is. Starting with one of the best double a-side singles ever released, 'Penny Lane' - 'Strawberry Fields Forever', the 'Sgt. Peppers' tracks and the great singles that follow it, not on an album, singles. A song that has become one of my absolute favourites, 'Magical Mystery Tour', an incredible song and on and on until it stops with 'The Long and Winding Road', not my favourite, but I can certainly listen to it now.

The blue album is a musical trip, not down memory lane. It's a lane containing the best pop music ever made by a combination of four men who called it quits before their 30th birthdays, to start more or less successful solo careers. Two are still alive and still playing. Paul to huge stadiums and Ringo at a lower level but still incredibly active.

Out of the blue there was 'Now And Then' two weeks ago. I've already written about it in the singles section. I have bought the cd version this week and have played it many times over the stereo. Yes, it is more a John Lennon song than a The Beatles song, I cede that. Yet, it is so beautiful and it works so well. The sound is The Beatles in a mix of then and now. There's a rhythm guitar part that did not exist in the 1960s, the strings did and the George style solo that Paul plays is phenomenally Beatles. Now And Then is a cherry on the cake. A cake that is more cherries than cake, yet is allowed to top it. It tells all, doesn't it?

It was 50 years ago today. Man, time flies when you're having fun. And this music certainly is a part of that fun!

Wout de Natris