The Beatles Albums – With The Beatles

With Please Please Me still making waves, the follow-up album With the Beatles was recorded only four months later. Stylistically the sound was close to the bone of their first studio album. The musical development of the band was yet to really take hold as it did in later albums. With the Beatles seemed to be a simple continuation of the Lennon McCartney songwriting practice. This was also the period when they were branching out to write for other artists; most notably The Rolling Stones, Billy J Kramer and The Dakotas.  

The fab 4 were still reeling from the shock of overnight success, I guess it was a dangerous time in their early career to be taking chances and as Please Please Me had in fact pleased the world over – it seemed less risky to stick to a winning formula.


There was still that mix of Chuck Berry and Smokey Robinson covers thrown in to keep the party going, alongside those luscious harmonious buildups that would make any modern-day boy band blush with embarrassment. Yet despite following a protocol there are a few marginal differences that raise With the Beatles to perch on its own pedestal. This was the first time McCartney had written lyrics before composing the music with ‘All my Loving’ and boy did he hit the golden note with this stand out success. This was also the first time we were treated to a slice of George Harrison’s lyrical abilities with ‘Don’t Bother Me’. Some more cynical critics would deem the sound of Harrison’s first contribution as slightly dreary, yet nothing about Harrison is dreary! ‘Don’t Bother Me’ may be bristling with its minor key and melancholy but it stands alone in comparison to the rest of the tracks as being uncharacteristically bold in both tone and style.
  
 Sure, With the Beatles may have been a record built upon quick turnaround and cash money but that doesn’t take away from its integrity. There’s still that rough n tumble energy leftover from the late city nights in Hamburg, there’s still the unabashed naïve personality of four youths having a good time and there’s still a love of making noise.
   
Yet again the fans were utterly satiated with this latest Beatles offering and the record shot to top spot selling a million copies and sitting at number one in the charts for a consecutive 21 weeks.