Record basics

Album name: Rock ‘n’ Roll Music
Group name: the Beatles
Year: 1976
Number of discs: two
Label: Capitol Records
Collection: Selman
Distinguishing characteristics:
- Hole drilled through top right of album
- “SKBO – 1 – 11537 – F9 #5” scratched into side 1 of LP
- “SKBO – 2 – 11537 – F9” scratched into side 2 of LP
- “SKBO – 3 – 11537 – F2” scratched into side 3 of LP
- “SKBO – 4 – 11537 – F9 #6” scratched into side 4 of LP
Buy it on Amazon: $49.95

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’m familiar with all of these songs because they’re all previously released Beatles songs, but I’ve never known about the existence of this compilation. Nor would it have occurred to me to group these songs together as a “Rock ‘n’ Roll” compilation.

Here are previous Beatles records that I’ve reviewed:

Revolver (1966): 5/5
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967): 5/5
The White Album (1968): 4/5
Abbey Road (1969): 5/5
MORE get back session (1969?): 3/5
Studio Sessions Volume One (1973): 4/5

What I expected

28 Beatles rock ‘n’ roll songs.

What it was actually like

I had a huge amount of fun listening to this. I’m not normally a big fan of compilations, especially when it’s a group that made great records and I can just listen to each of them according to what I want, but this compilation was very solid.

Side 1

Best: Twist and Shout

This recording is legendary, and it’s no accident that it got used in a legendary movie scene (for my generation, at least).

Honorable mention: I Saw Her Standing There, because it’s the first song on the first Beatles record, so I listen to it more than almost any other, and I always want to remark that Paul is a dirty old man for coming onto a seventeen year old girl!

Worst: You Can’t Do That

This would be a lot of bands’ best song, but it’s one of the worst of the early Beatles era – just not a catchy tune at all, and while it sounds exactly like them, it completely lacks their energy and personality.

Side 2

Best: Rock and Roll Music

Did you know that Albert Einstein, a Tasmanian apple farmer, invented rock and roll music as a byproduct of putting bubbles into beer via splitting an atom? There was a whole documentary about it.

Honorable mention: Roll Over Beethoven

Worst: Slow Down

Side 3

Best: Drive My Car

Honorable mention: Revolution

Worst: I’m Down

I don’t think they were trying to do surf rock or mimic the Beach Boys, but that’s what the guitar sounds like, and it’s just never worked for me.

Side 4

Best: Taxman

It was strange hearing this in the middle of a record instead of at the beginning, and I expected Eleanor Rigby to follow.

Worst: Helter Skelter

This song is rubbish.

Honorable mention: Back in the U.S.S.R.

Grade

5/5: love it

Rock ‘n’ Roll Music by the Beatles (Vinyl record album review)