John, Paul, George & Ringo's Greatest *

After the recent McCartney v Lennon thread i was lying in bed thinking of my self made compilation cd/playlist that i play after The Beatles singles:

Instant Karma/My Sweet Lord/It Don't Come Easy/Uncle Albert.../Working Class Hero/Bangledesh/My Love/Live & Let Die/Give Me Love/Photograph/Jealous Guy/Band On The Run/Your Sixteen/I'm The Greatest/Whatever Gets You Thru The Night/Listen To What The Man Said/Mull Of Kintyre/Silly Love Songs/With A Little Luck/Coming Up/Starting Over/Woman/Ebony & Ivory/Imagine/All Those Years Ago/Pipes Of Peace/Got My Mind Set On You/Once Upon A Long Ago/When We Was Fab/Free As A Bird/Real Love

This sort of thing would be a big seller i'm sure (No 1 part 2?) would The Beatles ever agree? would different Record companies agree?

You wouldn't need to called it The Beatles but just have their individual names/groups?

What do you all think???

 

Interesting. Give me a few hours to make my own list!

 

Fascinating idea, although proportioning out the tracks would likely be a sticky issue. If you truly make it solo chart hits, then the whittling down takes care of itself... but for cohesiveness, some of the more Beatlesque non-chart hits might help stitch it together more... I dunno. One of the big things I was wondering about is sequencing... It largely seemed chronological, except that 'Imagine' is tucked after 'Ebony and Ivory'. Oversight, or deliberate?

 

Deliberate! it is the the anthem of Lennon's Death (which reach No 1 in that year!) and so it is interesting to tie in with All Thoses Years and Pipes Of Peace and if it wasn't their Lennon would not be represented at that point in the compilation, and it is so important to illustrate the loss of Lennon!

Regarding more Beatlesque i had to include I'm The Greatest, i don't think any others ie Cooking In The Kitchen would work because they are not well known enough, also Traveling Wilburys hits does not work either IMO!

 

I absolutely agree, and figured that might've been what you were getting at... If that's the case, why not throw in Paul's 'Here Today' for John, and maybe displace Ringo's 'Photograph' toward the end of the disc (I love the resonance it took on at the Concert for George, and I think it would function equally well as a meta-comment here).

Agreed on the Wilburys' material, and even on 'Cooking in the Kitchen'... But I was thinking particularly about Paul's Beautiful Night, with the George Martin arrangement and Ringo on drums... or the version of 'Grow Old With Me' from the John Lennon Anthology, which between having been under consideration for the third song in the Beatles Anthology sessions (along with a few others), and George Martin's string arrangement... gorgeous. Even one of the Beatlesque recent Ringo tracks (Oh My Lord or Choose Love, or particularly 'Never Without You').

...but then of course, we change the rules rather heavily, as it gets into individual preference rather than simply confining it to what the charts define for us.

 

I would love to have 'never without you' and maybe the live version of 'photograph' would be good because then Ringo would be more represented later in the compilation, but then Harrison would not be on it! perhaps it needs to fit later nearer the end!

I think it is important to stick with the hits and popular songs although Here Today would be great i can not believe i overlooked that one.

Surely The Beatles, Apple and Record companies MUST of considered this sort of thing for example like Purple Rainbows??

 

Thinking more about Photograph i think it should stay where it is because after all that was how Ringo may have been feeling at the time, missing being in the Beatles (who knows?) i think if this song is moved to nearer the end or indeed it would be the end if it goes chronological and it becomes TOO nostalgic, it is nice to end with Real Love! Grow Old With Me i considered before Pipes Of, but lets face it, it would have been a great song, very piognant, but terrible sound quality of this demo version breaks the flow of the compilation too much! it needs to be slick like 'Beatles One'

 

'Weight Of The World' would demand inclusion as 'late(-ish) period' Ringo !!

 

I have done this a few times over the years. I always break it up from 1970-1975 then 1975 to 1980 because in 75 the 4 Beatles started to leave for different labels plus that was John's last active year until the short comeback in 80.

I always programed it like a beatles LP meaning Ringo would get one song and george would get 2. A CD would hold a lot more music so Harrison would get 4 and Ringo 2. This made for some real hard thinking when it came to track picks because Harrison and Starr's output and quality went way up.
No cover versions, only orignals.
The 2nd Cd would have less Lennon and more George and Ringo. The last time I made one of these, I ended it with Real Love and Free As A Bird.

 

I wouldnt give them less tracks especially Harrison? IMO ATMP, LITMW, DH + singles were as good as if not better: ATMP? than Lennon-McCartney were producing, just because he didn't have the material in the Beatles shouldn't dictate he has less tracks IMO

 

Like I posted in one of the other threads, this guy went ALL out, and specifically sequenced a "Green Album" (Beatles 1970-1973) companion for the Red and Blue albums:

Disc 1
Side 1
Love (J)
Junk/Singalong Junk (P)
My Sweet Lord (G)
Across the Universe (Beatles)
Maybe I'm Amazed (P)
Isn't It a Pity (version one) (G)
The Long and Winding Road (Beatles)

Side 2
Another Day (P)
Beware of Darkness (G)
Uncle Albert/ Admiral Halsey (P)
It Don't Come Easy (R)
Happy Xmas (War Is Over) (J/Y)
Imagine (J)
All Things Must Pass (G)

Disc 2
Side 3
Angela (J/Y)
Hi Hi Hi (P)
Band on the Run (P)
Jet (P)
You're Sixteen (You're Beautiful and You're Mine) (R)
Live and Let Die (P)
Intuition (J)

Side 4
My Love (P)
Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth) (G)
Little Lamb Dragonfly (P)
You Are Here (J)
Photograph (R)
The Light That Has Lighted The World (G)
Mind Games (J)

 

Little Lamb Dragonfly?? whos that McCartney????

 

Yes, it is. Just updated the whole list with parenthetical notations to who did what.

 

Why has someone else started a similar listing in another McCartney thread???? should we end this one and just post in their, I think they should join us here, this was started first and it needs its own thread, its not just about McCartney V Lennon what do you think????

 

Heh... they're actually not quite the same intent... that other list was put together to fantasize about what a Beatles follow-up to Abbey Road might've looked like, had the band not broken up and the songs from their first wave of solo albums were instead pooled into a "Beatles" recording project.

Yours seems a little more "Let's look at the big picture, and then compile their individual solo greatest hits onto a single volume."

I'd say the current conversation in the other thread saved it from again devolving into a "Paul was my favorite!" "John was my favorite!" tennis match... but it's also kind of off the original topic of that thread. Here, we're talking about what this thread was started to discuss. So I dunno...

 

I like the idea of coming up with funcional compilations that could fit an 80 minute CD.

Beatle Blasphemy 1970 - All Things Must Pass /running time 77+ minutes
-----------------------------------------------------------
01 All Things Must Pass - George Harrison.mp3
02 Maybe I'm Amazed - Paul McCartney.mp3
03 It Don't Come Easy - Ringo Starr.mp3
04 Working class hero - John Lennon.mp3
05 Every Night - Paul McCartney.mp3
06 Mother - John Lennon.mp3
07 Junk - Paul McCartney.mp3
08 Well, well, well - John Lennon.mp3
09 That Would Be Something - Paul McCartney.mp3
10 Look at me - John Lennon.mp3
11 Oo You - Paul McCartney.mp3
12 God - John Lennon.mp3
13 My Sweet Lord - George Harrison.mp3
14 I found out - John Lennon.mp3
15 Teddy Boy - Paul McCartney.mp3
16 Hold on - John Lennon.mp3
17 Wah-Wah - George Harrison.mp3
18 Isolation - John Lennon.mp3
19 Early 1970 - Ringo Starr.mp3
20 Man We Was Lonely - Paul McCartney.mp3
21 Remember - John Lennon.mp3
22 Love - John Lennon.mp3

 

I made a compilation a few years ago I called "John, George, Paul & Ringo - The Apple Years". I floated the idea on a Beatles messgae board a few years ago, stating:

I then asked for suggestions based on chart success in the US and UK. Going mostly chronolgically, here's what a few of us came up with:

1. Instant Karma, 2/70: US #3, UK #5
2. My Sweet Lord, 11/70: US #1, UK #1
3. Another Day, 3/71: US #5, UK #2
4. It Don't Come Easy, 5/71: US #4, UK #4
5. What Is Life, 2/71: US #10, UK --
6. Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey, 8/71: US #1, UK --
7. Power to the People, 4/71: US #11, UK#7
8. Back off Boogaloo, 4/72: US #9, UK #2
9. Bangla-Desh, 8/71: US #23, UK #10
10. My Love, 4/73: US #1, UK #9
11. Imagine, 10/71: US #3, UK #6
12. Photograph, 10/73: US #1, UK #8
13. Give Me Love (Give Me Peace One Earth), 5/73: US #1, UK #8
14. Live and Let Die, 7/73: US #2, UK #9
15. You're Sixteen, 12/73: US #1, UK #4
16. Whatever Gets You Thru the Night, 9/74: US #1, UK #36
17. Dark Horse, 11/74: US #15, UK --
18. Oh My My, 3/74: US #3, UK --
19. Band On the Run, 4/74: US #1, UK #3
20. Happy Xmas, 12/71: US #3, UK #4

 

I'm astounded that none of these lists include Gimme Some Truth, one of Lennon's finest songs ever, Beatles or post-Beatles.

 

The Fab Faux's sequencing of the fake 1970 Hot as Sun album include it, for whatever it's worth... I posted about it over here.

 

I think if they are going to go this route and release a compilation album, then it would be much smarter and more lucrative for them to make it an ongoing project with multiple compilations, each representing more or less one year of their post-beatle careers.

At a minimum absolutey great albums could be consructed for 1970, 1971, 1974, and 1980. With the possibility of releasing weaker compilation albums of 1972 and 1973, and the possible release of a posthumous John Lennon material compilation including tracks from John's Milk and Honey, Paul's Pipes of Peace, George's Gone Troppo, and Ringo's Old Wave. I also like the idea of opening this last compilation way up, and include tracks for George's Cloud 9, Paul's Flowers in the Dirt, and Ringo's Time takes Time.

To me none of this seems like a bad thing because a lot of their solo albums are barely selling enough to stay in print, and others are completely unavailable. This concept would have a chance of re-introducing old and new audiences to the fine work the four did on their own! It would also be fun and make a lot of money. The liner notes could include pictures and descriptions from each of the Albums used for the compilations, and hopefully increase sales of their individual catalogs. It's a win, win, win idea.

 

1. Give Peace a Chance (John)
2. My sweet Lord (George)
3. Maybe I'm Amazed (Paul)
4. What is Life (George)
5. Imagine (John)
6. Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey (Paul)
7. My Love (Paul)
8. Photograph (Ringo)
9. Band on the Run (Paul)
10. Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth) (George)
11. Mind Games (John)
12. You're Sixteen (Ringo)
13. Jet (Paul)
14. No No Song (Ringo)
15. #9 Dream (John)
16. Hi Hi Hi (Paul)
17. Stand By Me (John)
18. Junior's Farm (Paul)
19. Listen to What the Man Said (Paul)
20. Crackerbox Palace (George)
21. Let Em In (Paul)
22. Silly Love Songs (Paul)
23. With a Little Luck (Paul)
24. Blow Away (George)
25. Woman (John)
26. (Just Like) Starting Over (John)
27. Coming Up (Paul)
28. Watching The Wheels (John)
29. Nobody Told Me (John)
30. Wrack My Brain (Ringo)
31. Take it Away (Paul)
32. Borrowed Time (John)
33. All Those Years Ago ( George)

for me, these lists can change from day to day....So here's my today list.

 

OK fair enough, im happy for this thread to go across to join the other one if need be, its just with so much McCartney threads it made sense to start a new one, the other thread before we started talking about compilations did make me think about it!

 

Thats a great compilation, would it include The Beatles version of Teddy Boy, i personally prefer that, i love the Lennon dose-doe bit? it should have been on Let It Be, the McCartney solo version is to clinical to me, i guess because i heard the other vesion first! and they definatly would not be MP3!!

 

That is really good maybe mine is a too long timespan, that one is so solid and the nearest we would ever have got to a new Beatles album (or two, the length of albums then!) although i love When we was fab and the threatles songs on mine because they are appropiate to the cause IMO!