The Sum Times
February 13, 1964

Meet the Beatles
The Beatles
Capitol Records

So much ballyhoo has preceded this new British group it may be hard for reviewers such as myself to separate the hype from the music.  This is the first stateside album by the four young men from Liverpool, England who call themselves The Beatles, presumably misspelling the word with an 'a' to make a play on words, as in "beat" music.  (I have heard that there was an earlier release on a smaller label but, as of this writing, I cannot ascertain what that would have been.)

Luckily, the music contained herein, lives up to the hype.  This is fresh, lively "rock and roll," played by very talented musicians, with a joy seldom found on vinyl.  The blending of their young voices is a wonder of harmony and euphony.  And the musicianship is first-rate.  If I had to guess who will be a superstar if this group makes it, my money would be on the sad-eyed drummer, who keeps a beat as solid as red bricks.

The album opens with a slick count-off, "one two three fa!"  and jumps into a giddy love song, "I Want to Hold Your Hand," as fetching a concoction of charm and sound as this reviewer has been pleased to note.  This composition, like many on this freshman effort, is credited to "Lennon and McCartney," the two guitarists in the group.  They are as glib with a lyric as they are professional on their instruments and these pop ditties should test well on the charts.

The second song, "I Saw Her Standing There," has a sharper edge to it and cuts across the turntable as if the passion behind it might just destroy the singer.  The voice here, (Lennon?  Harrison?) is plaintive, sincere, riotous.

They follow this with a cute ditty called "This Boy," sung as if by a precocious schoolboy.  Then right back to smooth rocking with "It Won't be Long."  Among the many other standouts on this LP is "All My Loving," two minutes of total charisma and love, that may make you feel (like this reviewer is happy to report he is) as if you are in love for the first time.

Harrison's "Don't Bother Me," opens side two, a downbeat beginning, quickly followed by the frenzied "Little Child."  Side two doesn't quite have the kick of side one and it's understandable that it would be hard to flesh out two long LP sides with great material for so young a group of talents.

But these attractive boys (the picture on the rear shows them all in matching suits, smiling like Presley want-to-bes, obviously happy to be with each other and make this remarkable music) are a bright new force in rock and roll and, I predict, may be around for a while, spinning their creative magic.  Buy it for your paramour (as I did) for Valentine's Day.

Reviewed by Creole Myers

The Sum Times
April 15, 1964

The Beatles Second Album
The Beatles
Capitol Records

Well, a lot has happened for this fab foursome in the short few months since I last had the pleasure of reviewing their first album.  They have literally taken the world by storm.  This generically titled sophomore effort has already spawned an enormous couple of hits, "Can't Buy me Love," and "She Loves You."   (Actually this is the third album released by The Beatles.  This reviewer was able to ferret out an earlier LP put out by tiny Vee-Jay records, entitled "Introducing the Beatles, England's No. 1 Vocal Group," which contained some overlapping material from Meet the Beatles.)

On this second album the frenetic Beatles have recorded more cover versions than on their first effort and one imagines the rigors of being made world-wide pop stars overnight has cut into their song-writing time.  They open with "Roll Over Beethoven," Chuck Berry's anthem, and they show they can take American rock and roll and make it their own.  Their version jumps with vigorous playing and enthusiastic singing.  It as good as announces The Beatles' intentions to take over music, and this reviewer would not stand in their way.

They also do ripping covers of "Devil in her Heart" and "Long Tall Sally."  Their voices, for ones so young, carry a certain authority and they are not shy about taking American race records and belting them out as if they wrote them.

The album closes with the aforementioned "She Loves You," and a more catchy pop song would be hard to imagine.  The tag phrase, "yeah yeah yeah," has already caught on and on every corner of every American city you can find teenagers emulating the moptops, shaking their emerging hair and drawling out choruses of yeahs.  When my girlfriend first heard this single she ran out and bought it for me and wrote on its label "she really does love you xxoo."  We have played this little record a couple hundred times and are not tired of its infectious exhilaration yet.

Reviewed by Creole Myers

The Sum Times
June 30, 1964

A Hard Day's Night
The Beatles
United Artists

This new album by the sensational British group (their third release in six months) is actually the soundtrack to their fab new movie of the same name.  Some of the songs herein are new, the best of which is the title song, a compelling rocker about life as a pop star, and who better to pen it than these rightfully celebrated celebrities.  John shouts this number as if he was hoarse from months of performing live (which may very well be the truth) and the harmonies are rich and unforgettable.  You'll carry this tune around in your head after only one listening.

Much of this release is fleshed out with incidental film music (instrumental versions of some of the lads' best songs) and there's really not enough meat here to warrant another album but it won't matter to their legions of fans.  I believe at this point The Beatles could release an LP of their singing in the shower and it would top the charts, such is their irresistible hold on the public's imagination.  Will it last?  It's hard to say.  Just get on the bandwagon and hold on.

And if you haven't seen the movie, A Hard Day's Night, this reviewer recommends you run out today and catch it.  Hope (my amour) and I have seen it a half dozen times and it is indeed a dazzling piece of work.  These are four very charming boys and their music is the soundtrack to love (or so it seems to this reviewer and his soulmate).

Reviewed by Creole Myers

The Sum Times
July 25, 1964

Something New
The Beatles
Capitol Records

How much more creativity do we need evidence of to proclaim The Beatles kings of the pop world?  Four albums in a little over six months (see this reviewer's take on A Hard Day's Night, reviewed in these pages just a little over a month ago) and a movie and worldwide adulation.  The entire planet is joining hands and chanting, "yeah, yeah, yeah."  Or, at least, the entire planet of young people, while parents only wring their hands and question the sanity of anyone who would follow such shaggy misfits.

Something New is indeed something new.  Eleven brand new tracks (well, one actually is a German version of "I Want to Hold Your Hand"), most from the prolific and resplendent pens of Lennon and McCartney.  Even the covers here (a wonderful take on Carl Perkins' "Matchbox," with, I think, George Harrison taking over lead vocals, and a relatively obscure Larry Williams number, "Slow Down," which the boys pitch at a frenzy which denies the title's counsel) seem like brand new material.  It's a lot of music--almost twenty-five minutes worth--and should satisfy their countless fans.

The highlights here are the opener, "I'll Cry Instead," which manages to make a gloomy proclamation into a ringing declaration of love, and "Tell Me Why," a delicious bit of confection with again overpowering harmonies.  And "And I Love Her," which I immediately dedicated to Hope (my readers will already be familiar with my references to my grand passion) and sang to her early in the morning as she opened her dewy eyes, still groggy from our night together, in our bed cast upon the sea of Eros.  It's that kind of song.

It seems incredible that just a year ago The Beatles were unknowns.  In retrospect the world seems emptier then than now.  The Beatles have brought a vitality and enchantment to the known universe and given many of us songs to sing to our soulmates.  Is it too much to say that they have given us the musical equivalent to love, that they have, indeed, given us permission to open up our hearts and let them flow with amity and good will and emotion?  This reviewer thinks not.

Reviewed by Creole Myers

The Sum Times
December 20, 1964

Beatles '65
The Beatles
Capitol Records

Beatlemania!

That's what they're calling it.  The year 1964 will surely be remembered as the year the Beatles conquered the world, took the world by storm, re-invented music, transformed a young generation from self-interested loblollies into globally conscious and powerful consumering hedonists.  Who cannot name them?  JohnPaulGeorgeRingo, as if it were one word.  Who has not seen them, on television, in large auditoriums, playing dumbshow music in front of maniacal throngs, whose own woven, small, previously insignificant voices create an aural tapestry through which no sound emerges, a hysteria which feeds on itself, as if the four puppets on stage were secondary.  But, I diverge.

The point is that actual criticism of the music presented by these four young gentlemen has become something ancillary to the "mania," to the movement their transcendent sound has created.  But, we soldier on, we scribblers, we reviewers.

Luckily, for us, for all of us, this music is special.  Is indeed something remarkable.  Beatles 65, like its predecessors, mixes in a few covers with some fine pop crafting by Lennon and McCartney, and the usual honorary contribution by George Harrison.  Covers here include a rollicking version of Chuck Berry's "Rock and Roll Music," sung by John Lennon as if he alone understood its anarchic potential, and a rather tepid, "Mr. Moonlight."

But the originals here are sterling at least and revolutionary at their genius best.  "No Reply" opens the album and its polished rock surface belies the anguish in Lennon's manly delivery, as in "I'm a Loser," which follows it.  On this second song Lennon seems to be stretching the confines of pop song writing, penning a more personal plea, heartfelt feelings of distress and unworthiness, amid the cacophony of stardom.  In this he reminds me of the American folk singer, Bob Dylan, whose music strains categorization and whose songwriting skills are on a par with some of the best contemporary poetry.

The Beatles' output during this incredible year has included six albums (including one entitled "The Beatles Story" which consisted of interviews and commentary and such throwaway fan fodder as "Sneaky Haircuts and More About Paul") and a dizzying array of chart-topping singles.  What will 1965 bring us?  This year-ending effort wants to hint at the future and this reviewer senses something totally new under the infectious surface of these remarkable men's music.  Some new depth of writing, some new revelatory message.

My fiancée, Hope, (yes, we're engaged, fans, in these holy days, with no little credit given to The Beatles for their color-and-light backdrop, to our rapturous affair) says she feels they are becoming poets for a new generation, voices of the people, much in the way F.Scott Fitzgerald was for the twenties.  This reviewer agrees.  Hail Britannia!  Write on, Beatles!

Reviewed by Creole Myers

The Sum Times
December 15, 1965

Rubber Soul
The Beatles
Capitol

Beatle fans, this reviewer is back from his honeymoon (I’m married, people, eternally wed!) just in time for this new disc which, from the first cursory listenings, cuts deeper than anything the boys have thus far produced.  Their lyrics are becoming more intimate, more poetic, bright like the fountains of sleep.  Dylan’s influence can be felt here, but Lennon and McCartney, and to a lesser extent, Harrison, have carved out their own territory, romantic, brutal yet beautiful.

Listen to the cosmic rhythms of "Norwegian Wood," with its arcane references to chairless rooms and sleeping in the bath.  Pick up on Lennon’s barely disguised anxiety.  Listen to the punctured heart attack of "You Won’t See Me," the piano pounding like a tortured love muscle.  Or George’s "Think for Yourself" with its fuzz-bass perfectly echoing the singer’s demands of his paramour.  And this critic’s favorite song from this masterful LP, "The Word."  Say the word and you’ll be free, indeed.  Having just said the words, "I do," this piece particularly effected me.  Hope and I sat and cried, playing it over and over until its meaning was lost to its sound, until it had permanently altered out DNA.

The Beatles have taken a quantum leap with Rubber Soul (just as I have in my personal life) and what comes next is anyone’s guess.  We are witnessing this era’s most important musical artists at the height of their creativity.  "Michelle" is sweet, like "Yesterday," but Lennon’s "Girl" is breathtaking, all puns intended.

Just between you and me:  "I’d rather see you dead little girl than to be with another man," was written by a man who has experienced it.  Love is hard.  Love is all.

Reviewed by Creole Myers

The Sum Times
August 15, 1966

Revolver
The Beatles
Capitol Records

The Beatles have now entered the realm of the indispensable.  They are artists of the first rank, the W. B. Yeatses, the James Joyces, the Picassos of rock and roll.  Revolver is like a whisper from the heavens, an intonation, a hint of things to come.  It is the first shot fired in a revolution.  Were it just music we would not be following.

Harrison’s sharp "Taxman" and McCartney’s brilliant "Eleanor Rigby" with its honed-ax strings, are standouts.  "Good Day Sunshine" and "Got to Get You Into my Life" are simultaneously ingenious pop ditties and declarations of veridical human emotion.

"But if I seem to act unkind, it’s only me and not my mind."  I say this to Hope.  There are dips and turns to the roller coaster of love and as the four lads from Liverpool have matured they have understood, their vision has darkened with truth.  In a marriage of minds like the Beatles, as in a marriage between man and wife, there are shadows and corners.  Some need exploring and true artists are not afraid to go there.

At the end of Revolver when Lennon sings, "Turn off your mind, relax and float downstream, it is not dying," he speaks directly to me.  I get too worldly.  I listen closer.  "Love is all, love is everyone."  Yes, I say.  If Hope needs to explore perhaps so do we all.  Revolver is a love story etched with blood, written in stone.

[Portions of this review have been excised against the author’s wishes.  –ed.]

Reviewed by Creole Myers

The Sum Times
June 15, 1997

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
The Beatles
Capitol Records

This is music from the gods, music made in space.  "Turn on," Mr. Leary has enjoined us and the Beatles have provided the background music, the aural landscape of Delphic, psychedelic ambiguity.  I can’t talk about it.  Words are worthless in the face of such beauty.

When the final chord of this masterpiece hangs in the air—forever--it is beckoning us to the void.  I have looked over the edge and seen the face of my wife and her lover.  Art saves us.  Sometimes.  Sometimes.

[Portions of this review have been excised against the author’s wishes.—ed.]

Reviewed by Creole Myers

The Sum Times
December 1, 1968

The White Album
The Beatles
Apple Records

Helter Skelter.  Makes you want to scream.  My soul is rubber.

I have slid down that slide, you say.  It leads to the end.  The end is murder, bloodshed, infidelity.  Love is gone.

Rubberbands, my mind is tricked up with rubberbands.  Listen to Revolution #9.  What is Lennon doing?  He is inventing chaos.  He is inside chaos.  I am alone.

Backwards, it is the voice of the everlasting lares and penates.

There is no hope.

We have gone from "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" to "Why Don’t we Do it in the Road?"

WHY?

In space I scream Helter Skelter.  Have you heard the sans-culotte calling?

Have you heard the end?

Hope.  NO HOPE.

I am my room.  I am my speakers.  Love dies.  I regret everything I’ve never regretted.

The Beatles are gods.  Take me to your leader.

Hopeless---

"When I get to the bottom. . . ."

I AM THE WALRUS.  YELLOW MATTER CUSTARD!

If there is no heaven, there is no earth.

I am overwhelmed by indifference.  I am a lizard on a windowpane.

A tangled mess, a whirlwind, and then the mind of God.  A state of deathlike release. . .  COME AND GET IT!  $%^#@* ؇¤¥Ðµ‹›

Dissolution. . . .

Despair. . . .

The modern day composer refuses to die.

Rock is dead.  Paul is dead.

My marriage is dead.

"I need a fix cuz. . . ."

[Much of this review has been excised against the author’s wishes.  –ed.]

Reviewed by Creole Myers

Creole Myers Gazette
Free handout, Mimeographed, 1969

Let It Be
The Beatles
Apple Records

I have gone down and come back.  The end is just a little harder when brought about by friends.  Is this the last Beatles album?  Is the ride really over?  Have we come this far only to hear Phil Spector strings and a song about the long and winding road?

I’ve been down that road.  It goes nowhere.  It’s a road to nowhere.  Is it Abbey Road?  You decide.

I missed Abbey Road.  I couldn’t listen to it where I was.  Now I am frightened to go back to it.  If I listen to it I may die.  I know that sounds irrational but there it is.  Someone told me George Harrison’s best song is on that album.  Someone told me McCartney wrote a symphony.  My friend, Colin, sang me a snatch of a song, "And in the end the love you give. . . ."  and I cut him off like a gibbet.  I don’t know.  I will never know.  I cannot go back.

I am loveless, unlovable.

Let it be.

When you find yourself in times of trouble.

Let it Be.

Good enough advice for the end of this fulgurating, florid, dying decade.  This impossible decade when everything was possible and nothing hurt.

And in the end. . . .

I don’t know.  God help me, I don’t know.

Author Bio

Corey Mesler is the owner of Burke’s Book Store, in Memphis, Tennessee, one of the country’s oldest (1875) and best independent bookstores.  He has worked in the book business all his adult life, if he has had an adult life, and he is also a book reviewer for The Memphis Commercial Appeal, The Memphis Flyer, Brightleaf and BookPage.  He’s been a pirate, a pauper, a puppet, a poet, a pawn and a king.