They still had plenty of covers to fill out the running time, but the Lennon-McCartney writing team was gathering steam and beginning to knock out pop classics as if they were pulling them out of thin air. “All My Loving” and “I Wanna Be your Man” come from this record, issued hurriedly to capitalize on English Beatlemania. But even when they were laying into some classic Chuck Berry, by this time the Beatles had acquired a unique sound in the blend of John’s and Paul’s voices, whi [Read More...]
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This is the album that launched Beatlemania in the U.S. Well, sort of. The cover is the same, but this is the U.K. version of the Beatles’ second album, which was released only eight months after their debut in March of 1963. The U.S. version (entitled Meet the Beatles) included only nine of these songs and added “I Want To Hold Your Hand” and its b-side “I Saw Her Standing There” along with “This Boy.”
But even though this is not the version that millions of baby boomers (like myself) grew up with, it’s still an essential album in the Beatles’ catalog. Among the originals is their best song never released as a single, “All My Loving.” Also Ringo gets a vocal on the song originally given to the Rolling Stones, “I Wanna Be Your Man.” And George Harrison gets his first songwriting credit with “Don’t Bother Me.”
The Beatles raid the Motown vaults for many of the covers. “Please Mr. Postman,” “You’ve Really Got a Hold on Me” and “Money” are highlights. The latter features one of Lennon’s best vocals. [It wouldn't be until their next album when they released a collection of all original material.]
All told, this album catches the Beatles while they are still not too far removed from their Cavern Club and Hamburg days. As such, you hear an urgency and energy in their performance that sets their music apart from the rest of the British Invasion that followed. ESSENTIAL
As mentioned already by previous reviewers, this is the British version of Meet The Beatles-which combined a few tunes off their 2nd album with this, their 1st(in the US). I was just a wee lass when these guys arrived on our shores & as soon as I saw them on their very first appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show, I knew life was never gonna be the same. No matter what age you were if you were around 40 yrs. ago, you realized this was history in the making, the start of something new & exciting in the world of rock & roll music. From the opening cut to the very last, the music sounds just as fresh even now. NY’s oldies & classic rock stations will be playing most(if not all)of The Beatles catalog during the month of February. Today’s so-called ‘boy bands’ cannot hold a candle to these guys & all the other great rock/pop bands of the British Invasion of the 1960s. No Beatle album collection is complete without this. Extremely enjoyable & worth 10 Stars.