Absolutely the Beatles’ worst song
mainThe critic Bill Wyman has ranked all 213 Beatles tracks from worst to best.
You might be slightly surprised by his choice of the best.
And even more surprised that the worst is not by Ringo.
Read here.
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Critic? Surely best known for being in the Rolling Stones…
https://www.sfgate.com/politics/joegarofoli/article/Can-Bill-Wyman-be-Bill-Wyman-No-says-Bill-Wyman-2715728.php
Now we need a critic named Paul McCartney to rank all the Stones songs.
Interesting, and thanks for explaining. I had been wondering whether it was possible that Norman had actually not heard of the Rolling Stones!
This guy has waaaaay too much time on his hands.
this article was first published by NY Mag two years ago:
https://www.bunkhistory.org/resources/462?related=224&relationship_name=FAST-FORWARD
Actually, it was Vulture on June 7, 2017
But what’s more important is that it is published here not as “all Beatles songs ranked” but with the title “Absolutely the Beatles’ worst song” in ALL CAPS to be sure that we understand that the worst is most important.
Octopus’s Garden is one of their most memorable songs. Lennon and McCartney, considering how many songs they produced, are one of the least successful songwriting teams in entertainment. They have about a dozen first-rate songs, like Yesterday, Eleanor Rigby, The Fool On the Hill, I Will, In My Life, When I’m 64 and not much more. Out of the hundreds they wrote, that’s a very small percentage compared to Gershwin, Porter, Arlen, any of the great songwriters in the Great American Songbook. They don’t even do as well as Tony Power and the other perky 60s songwriters in Britain. They got drug-addled, tasteless, witless and just plain lousy, and they started out pretty lousy, too.
From Wiki: “The Beatles are the best-selling band in history, with estimated sales of over 800 million records worldwide. They are the best-selling music artists in the United States, with 178 million certified units. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988, and all four main members were inducted individually from 1994 to 2015. They have also had more number-one albums on the British charts and sold more singles in the UK than any other act. In 2008, the group topped Billboard magazine’s list of the all-time most successful artists; as of 2017, they hold the record for most number-one hits on the Hot 100 chart with twenty.”
Yeah, you’re absolutely right. Easily one of the least successful songwriting teams in entertainment.
What a nerve you’ve got – posting actual facts to support your statement. That’s not how things are done here. You must be new here, amirite?
Ive been a beatles fan all my live am 63 years old and i still play beatles lp & cd. All the time and solo jonh paul george and ringo lp & cd and there dvd
Complete waste of time. Everyone (who likes the Beatles) is going to have their own favourite tracks. This is just one opinion out of millions .. so more or less meaningless
I found and read the article, which seems to have been written by a person with fairly deep knowledge of the Beatles’ music and that of their contemporaries. It is not simply a list, but an annotated list with a paragraph for each song, with rationale for its placement. I found it interesting. You are correct that it is opinion, but informed opinion can be … informative. I assume you don’t read any music reviews, which are, after all, opinion.
The surprise is that “Hold Me Tight” wasn’t last. McCartney’s vocal is so bad, you wonder why George Martin committed it to vinyl.
Just my two pence:
1. I disagree with the poor ranking of “She’s Leaving Home” (#204); that one was really good, a slow break from the rousing beat of so many of the songs on “Sgt Pepper’s LHCB”.
2. “I’m Happy Just to Dance with You” (#196) is a fantastic early horny-teen song. Unjustified poor rank.
3. I don’t agree with the strong ranking of “You’ve Got to Hide your Love Away” (#46); that one always annoyed me.
4. Same with “The Long and Winding Road” (#45) — bo-o-o-o-oring!
5. And “In my Life” (#42), in the top 25%? Get serious. It’s pretentious and dull and badly sung.
6. “While my Guitar Gently Weeps” (#32) — My pick for number one, or close. Maybe second to “Nowhere Man”, or third after “Nowhere Man” and “Eleanor Rigby”.
7. “Norwegian Wood” is nice, but not nice enough to be number 8.
This is ridiculous! Any idiot knows that Julia is the best song and Maxwell’s Silver Hammer is the worst. Wyman should spend less time watching cricket and more time listening.
This is as ridiculous as any rating of works of art.
To put “Good Day Sunshine” last and “Nowhere Man” within the top 20ies only shows that the”critic” has no clue of musical language and grammar – it is pure “ressentiment” stated in this list, like in most ratings. Come on you Anglo-Saxons stop this non-sense!!
I quite like “Good Day Sunshine” and it is musically well written. Which can’t be said of all their other stuff.
Wow, you guys in the comments section got pretty butthurt by one guy’s opinion that he wrote in some article. Lol.
That said, I don’t see how ranking 200+ songs was a good idea. I enjoy all the songs the Beatles wrote pretty evenly, but two songs that have always stood out to me are Revolution 1 (the slow version on the White album) and Strawberry Fields Forever.
What a dumb list
I also have been playing The Beatles songs since my teen years. As to the list, at No. 3 “Penny Lane” is one of my favourites. Yet I wonder why it was omitted from the long list of songs performed at Cirque du Soleil’s superb Beatles tribute show “Love” at the Las Vegas Mirage? That had the music specially digitised by George Martin’s son and approved by the remaining Beatles.
By today’s standards: “Good Day Sunshine” would be considered exceptional. Although, below par Beatle songs are about as rear as a hen’s tooth, this song proves -The Beatles were indeed, mere mortals. (-: ((ºJº))