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Post by Eva Yojimbo on Dec 5, 2019 19:18:16 GMT
I never said or suggested that, but nice try with the lying! I included you because you implied the same thing regarding writing poetry. Nope, that's just your poor reading comprehension. Since when does knowing something about an art-form equate to being a legend in that art-form?
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Post by heeeeey on Dec 5, 2019 19:21:19 GMT
I included you because you implied the same thing regarding writing poetry. Nope, that's just your poor reading comprehension. Since when does knowing something about an art-form equate to being a legend in that art-form? You said that I didn't know anything about poetry or 'depth' because I hadn't studied poetry in textbooks, etc. What you told me easily applies to Paul McCartney too. Do you think he ever read a textbook or studied poetry?
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Post by Eva Yojimbo on Dec 5, 2019 19:29:53 GMT
Nope, that's just your poor reading comprehension. Since when does knowing something about an art-form equate to being a legend in that art-form? You said that I didn't know anything about poetry or 'depth' because I hadn't studied poetry in textbooks, etc. What you told me easily applies to Paul McCartney too. Do you think he ever read a textbook or studied poetry? You're conflating what's necessary to be a critic--knowing something about the art-form you're criticizing--and what it takes to be a musician/poet. I criticized your attempt at criticism of poetry/lyrics because you know nothing about either; I never said you had to be a great poet or musician to criticize poetry or music and, in fact, I feel that's completely irrelevant.
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Post by lowtacks86 on Dec 5, 2019 20:45:27 GMT
You do realize that a small, selective sample from an artist with a very large body of work doesn't really help prove your point, right? That's like calling Francis Ford Copolla a hack just because he made "Jack".
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Post by millar70 on Dec 5, 2019 21:23:35 GMT
You do realize that a small, selective sample from an artist with a very large body of work doesn't really help prove your point, right? That's like calling Francis Ford Copolla a hack just because he made "Jack". Whoa..... Are you saying you're a better filmmaker than Francis Ford Coppola? Huh, is that what you're saying? Because once I filmed my 2nd cousin's wedding, so I happen to know a little something about that.....
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Post by heeeeey on Dec 5, 2019 21:28:14 GMT
You do realize that a small, selective sample from an artist with a very large body of work doesn't really help prove your point, right? That's like calling Francis Ford Copolla a hack just because he made "Jack". You and millar70 DO realize that everybody is free to like or dislike ANY celebrity they want, regardless of their "body of work", don't you?
I don't like a thing Frank Zappa ever recorded, and he has a large body of work too. Same with Billy Joel. And no degrees in music or past hit songs are necessary to form opinions.
See, we the audience can have varying tastes in music. That fact seems to be lost on some of you.
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Post by lowtacks86 on Dec 5, 2019 21:36:17 GMT
You do realize that a small, selective sample from an artist with a very large body of work doesn't really help prove your point, right? That's like calling Francis Ford Copolla a hack just because he made "Jack". You and millar70 DO realize that everybody is free to like or dislike ANY celebrity they want, regardless of their "body of work", don't you?
I don't like a thing Frank Zappa ever recorded, and he has a large body of work too. Same with Billy Joel. And no degrees in music or past hit songs are necessary to form opinions.
See, we the audience can have varying tastes in music. That fact seems to be lost on some of you.
I don't think you actually understood my post
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Post by millar70 on Dec 5, 2019 21:39:22 GMT
You do realize that a small, selective sample from an artist with a very large body of work doesn't really help prove your point, right? That's like calling Francis Ford Copolla a hack just because he made "Jack". You and millar70 DO realize that everybody is free to like or dislike ANY celebrity they want, regardless of their "body of work", don't you?
I don't like a thing Frank Zappa ever recorded, and he has a large body of work too. Same with Billy Joel. And no degrees in music or past hit songs are necessary to form opinions.
See, we the audience can have varying tastes in music. That fact seems to be lost on some of you.
So who's music do you like? Obviously, you're not a fan of Paul McCartney, Frank Zappa, or Billy Joel. What kind of music are you into?
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Post by millar70 on Dec 5, 2019 21:40:50 GMT
You and millar70 DO realize that everybody is free to like or dislike ANY celebrity they want, regardless of their "body of work", don't you?
I don't like a thing Frank Zappa ever recorded, and he has a large body of work too. Same with Billy Joel. And no degrees in music or past hit songs are necessary to form opinions.
See, we the audience can have varying tastes in music. That fact seems to be lost on some of you.
I don't think you actually understood my post Join the club, we're at 12 pages now in this thread.
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Post by lowtacks86 on Dec 5, 2019 21:41:12 GMT
You do realize that a small, selective sample from an artist with a very large body of work doesn't really help prove your point, right? That's like calling Francis Ford Copolla a hack just because he made "Jack". You and millar70 DO realize that everybody is free to like or dislike ANY celebrity they want, regardless of their "body of work", don't you?
I don't like a thing Frank Zappa ever recorded, and he has a large body of work too. Same with Billy Joel. And no degrees in music or past hit songs are necessary to form opinions.
See, we the audience can have varying tastes in music. That fact seems to be lost on some of you.
"Same with Billy Joel." Come on, not even this catchy gem?
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Post by Eva Yojimbo on Dec 5, 2019 21:58:13 GMT
You and millar70 DO realize that everybody is free to like or dislike ANY celebrity they want, regardless of their "body of work", don't you?
I don't like a thing Frank Zappa ever recorded, and he has a large body of work too. Same with Billy Joel. And no degrees in music or past hit songs are necessary to form opinions.
See, we the audience can have varying tastes in music. That fact seems to be lost on some of you.
I don't think you actually understood my post This could be c/p'ed and accurately used as a reply to at least 50% of Heeeeey's responses.
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Post by Eva Yojimbo on Dec 6, 2019 14:06:08 GMT
Just to be clear, there's a difference between opinions and criticism (even though opinions can often be a part of criticism, they aren't the same thing). What Jill said about McCartney/The Beatles is how you express an opinion. She said she found them boring and didn't like the guitar sound. Those statements are both merely how she feels about them. Everyone's entitled to their feelings, as that's generally what opinions are, and such things are entirely subjective. However, to say that the lyrics are bad, or that Paul's a bad bassist/songwriter, implies you have some standard that the music/artist doesn't measure up to. This points to something objective about the music/lyrics (even if the standard itself might be subjective). This is when it becomes criticism, and this is when it's necessary to know something about the art-form you're criticizing in order to articulate why it's bad or shallow or whatever when measured by those standards. Just because you play an instrument, or write poetry/lyrics, etc. doesn't automatically give you any great insight into the art-form, so such experience is of little (if any) relevance.
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Post by mrellaguru on Dec 6, 2019 16:22:37 GMT
You do realize that a small, selective sample from an artist with a very large body of work doesn't really help prove your point, right? That's like calling Francis Ford Copolla a hack just because he made "Jack".
Those weren't even bad songs that were cited by the OP. Some of the lyrics sound silly when read but songs are more than just words.
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Post by heeeeey on Dec 6, 2019 16:38:11 GMT
Just to be clear, there's a difference between opinions and criticism (even though opinions can often be a part of criticism, they aren't the same thing). What Jill said about McCartney/The Beatles is how you express an opinion. She said she found them boring and didn't like the guitar sound. Those statements are both merely how she feels about them. Everyone's entitled to their feelings, as that's generally what opinions are, and such things are entirely subjective. However, to say that the lyrics are bad, or that Paul's a bad bassist/songwriter, implies you have some standard that the music/artist doesn't measure up to. This points to something objective about the music/lyrics (even if the standard itself might be subjective). This is when it becomes criticism, and this is when it's necessary to know something about the art-form you're criticizing in order to articulate why it's bad or shallow or whatever when measured by those standards. Just because you play an instrument, or write poetry/lyrics, etc. doesn't automatically give you any great insight into the art-form, so such experience is of little (if any) relevance. So movie critics and Broadway performance critics who get paid for their critiques shouldn't have grounds to critique anything because usually they have never performed onstage or acted before? What you say may be true if said critique hasn't been verified by a professional like mine was. Just read my signature. You are the one who said song lyrics have no depth are unimportant to a song, so what do you or anyone else care if I point out the borderline retardedness of Paul's lyrics in some of his songs?
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Post by Eva Yojimbo on Dec 6, 2019 17:25:10 GMT
Just to be clear, there's a difference between opinions and criticism (even though opinions can often be a part of criticism, they aren't the same thing). What Jill said about McCartney/The Beatles is how you express an opinion. She said she found them boring and didn't like the guitar sound. Those statements are both merely how she feels about them. Everyone's entitled to their feelings, as that's generally what opinions are, and such things are entirely subjective. However, to say that the lyrics are bad, or that Paul's a bad bassist/songwriter, implies you have some standard that the music/artist doesn't measure up to. This points to something objective about the music/lyrics (even if the standard itself might be subjective). This is when it becomes criticism, and this is when it's necessary to know something about the art-form you're criticizing in order to articulate why it's bad or shallow or whatever when measured by those standards. Just because you play an instrument, or write poetry/lyrics, etc. doesn't automatically give you any great insight into the art-form, so such experience is of little (if any) relevance. So movie critics and Broadway performance critics who get paid for their critiques shouldn't have grounds to critique anything because usually they have never performed onstage or acted before? No, that's literally the opposite of what I said. You can know about something without doing that something. You can study music without playing/making music, you can study film without making films, you can study literature without writing novels/plays/poems, etc. Knowing something about an art-form is what gives criticism weight. Just because you make/play music, films, or write doesn't mean you know all that much about those art-forms. Essentially, doing something =/= knowing about that something. The latter is necessary for good criticism, the former is not. What you say may be true if said critique hasn't been verified by a professional like mine was. Just read my signature. You are the one who said song lyrics have no depth are unimportant to a song, so what do you or anyone else care if I point out the borderline retardedness of Paul's lyrics in some of his songs? The problem is that "professionals" regularly disagree because they all have different standards, opinions, and preferences. So saying one professional said something doesn't mean much. Besides, such opinions can't be right or wrong in any objective sense anyway. Actually what I said is that song lyrics rarely have the depth of great poetry. I later explained why that is, and why it's not a problem (because songwriting is a hybrid art-form; the lyrics aren't supposed to stand on their own, much like movie music). The issue is that you had no clue how to measure lyrical or poetic depth in the first place because you know nothing about poetry as an art-form.
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Post by heeeeey on Dec 6, 2019 17:27:36 GMT
You and millar70 DO realize that everybody is free to like or dislike ANY celebrity they want, regardless of their "body of work", don't you?
I don't like a thing Frank Zappa ever recorded, and he has a large body of work too. Same with Billy Joel. And no degrees in music or past hit songs are necessary to form opinions.
See, we the audience can have varying tastes in music. That fact seems to be lost on some of you.
So who's music do you like? Obviously, you're not a fan of Paul McCartney, Frank Zappa, or Billy Joel. What kind of music are you into? Too many to list. I am a big fan of George Harrison. I think he wrote the best songs both as a Beatle and solo artist. 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps' is a favorite song of mine. And I think he wrote one of the most romantic love songs ever written -- 'Something'.
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Post by heeeeey on Dec 6, 2019 17:30:22 GMT
So movie critics and Broadway performance critics who get paid for their critiques shouldn't have grounds to critique anything because usually they have never performed onstage or acted before? No, that's literally the opposite of what I said. You can know about something without doing that something. You can study music without playing/making music, you can study film without making films, you can study literature without writing novels/plays/poems, etc. Knowing something about an art-form is what gives criticism weight. Just because you make/play music, films, or write doesn't mean you know all that much about those art-forms. Essentially, doing something =/= knowing about that something. The latter is necessary for good criticism, the former is not. What you say may be true if said critique hasn't been verified by a professional like mine was. Just read my signature. You are the one who said song lyrics have no depth are unimportant to a song, so what do you or anyone else care if I point out the borderline retardedness of Paul's lyrics in some of his songs? The problem is that "professionals" regularly disagree because they all have different standards, opinions, and preferences. So saying one professional said something doesn't mean much. Besides, such opinions can't be right or wrong in any objective sense anyway. Actually what I said is that song lyrics rarely have the depth of great poetry. I later explained why that is, and why it's not a problem (because songwriting is a hybrid art-form; the lyrics aren't supposed to stand on their own, much like movie music). The issue is that you had no clue how to measure lyrical or poetic depth in the first place because you know nothing about poetry as an art-form. Well, I don't know why you're comparing 'great poetry' to pop song lyrics anyway. I never claimed as much. Although there are plenty of times someone will like a song because the lyrics affect them also.
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Post by petrolino on Dec 6, 2019 18:12:29 GMT
So who's music do you like? Obviously, you're not a fan of Paul McCartney, Frank Zappa, or Billy Joel. What kind of music are you into? Too many to list. I am a big fan of George Harrison. I think he wrote the best songs both as a Beatle and solo artist. 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps' is a favorite song of mine. And I think he wrote one of the most romantic love songs ever written -- 'Something'.
I think 'Something' has one of the most beautiful and evocative basslines ever recorded. The way in which Paul McCartney subtly weaves his bass around the guitar line and the melody, taking care not to intrude upon the work of his bandmates, can creep up on you and spread throughout a damaged system like electrical wildfire. The Beatles were a wonderful band.
"I know so many people who work so hard and do all their homework and pay all their dues, but they just don’t have an original tune coming out of their head. They can be great guitarists, really talented and gifted, and think, ‘Oh, I should write a song,’ and then, ‘Well actually, this summer I’m going to write a song’ and then, ‘Well, I’m a bit busy this summer, but I’m going to write a song next summer,’ and that’s not a composer. That’s a great musician with a great gift on their instrument. There’s ten different gifts involved with that, too, but when you have a river of music going, I can’t wait until the summer. I would have written three songs by the summer because I can’t help it. That’s when you’re a composer, that’s a separate gift and lots of composers don’t have the gift of dexterity and can’t even play an instrument. In fact, most film composers I know can kind of play a bit of keyboard but the reason they became composers is because that other guy in class could eat them alive every time playing Mozart. But the composer guy who doesn’t have the physical chops with his fingers is coming with tunes and doesn’t have to play Mozart; he’s got his own stuff. So, it’s a separate gift and just because you have that gift, doesn’t mean that it’s good. Just because I’ve got this river of music going through my head that I don’t deserve to have doesn’t mean it’s good music or that anyone else will like it; it’s just there. And if you’re lucky and you have that music going through your head and it’s music that everyone else likes too, your name is Paul McCartney. If you’re at the other end of the scale, you’ve got all this stuff going through your head but you’re Frank Zappa; Frank Zappa was close enough to the mainstream that he could earn a living but he was never going to be the zeitgeist of the era the way John Lennon or Paul McCartney or Elton John or Sting were. These people have instincts that take them right to the sweet spot. You can analyze the sweet spot and navigate to that scientifically, but you can’t tell the difference between a hit and a non-hit. Both have a verse/chorus, they both have technically the same characteristics, but one strikes it, the other doesn’t. One was probably written through true instinct, the other probably written on a chart. So, you have to follow your instincts, and in my case, I don’t know where I sit but I’m certainly not in the sweet spot, but I’m close enough that I can earn a living. Enough people feel what I feel, or get something out of the music that I produce from my instincts that I can earn a living, and that’s good enough."
- Stewart Copeland, Please Kill Me : The Uncensored Oral History Of Punk
"It is one of the best bass lines ever recorded, by anyone. You just don’t hear bass lines like this very often. It is almost like a bass solo through the whole song, weaving in and out of chords. It is very active, but still manages to stay out of the way of the vocal melody (one of the nicest melodies in the Beatles catalog). During the Abbey Road sessions, McCartney played his Rickenbacker 4001S along with a Fender Jazz Bass he had acquired during the sessions for The White Album the previous year. Several different recording engineers worked on Abbey Road, and they each favored a different method of recording the bass. Some songs on the album were recorded by placing a microphone in front of the bass cabinet, some were recorded with a DI, and some used a combination of the two. The bass on “Something” was recorded DI as an overdub, and is most likely the Jazz Bass. This recording also features a keyboard bass that occasionally doubles the electric bass in octaves or in unison. The bass line is pretty busy during the verses. It has an orchestral quality to it—almost like a timpani part—very percussive and dramatic. In the verses, there are usually crescendos through the 16th notes on beat 2 of the C and C7 chords. Paul also plays a slight, but very natural, crescendo on the ascending line over the G chord (measures 7, 16, 34, and 43). During the verses, McCartney isn’t sticking to a regular pattern or even a consistent rhythmic feel. He is mixing dotted quarters, quarters, eighths, and sixteenths. The sixteenths usually fall on beats 1 and 2; McCartney tends to leave a little more space on beats 3 and 4. Still, it’s not just a straight quarter note or eighth note groove—it is fairly irregular. But the other instruments are leaving plenty of space for the bass to be active. Ringo plays the sparsest backbeat imaginable with hardly any fills (a total of three fills through the first two verses!). In the first verse, there is a rhythm guitar strumming the chords and an organ that comes in midway through to play staccato chords on the Am. The strings enter at the end of the first verse, but just as sustaining chords. So in the first two verses, the only moving parts are the vocal melody and the bass. Thus, the bass functions as harmonic foundation, countermelody, and percussive drive. As Ringo’s part becomes substantially more active during the bridge, McCartney falls into a straight eighth note pattern. It is his turn to be supportive, but he still plays an interesting descending line, moving down the A major scale, but with an E pedal at the top (see measures 21-22). Harmonically, this song emphasizes descending voice leading. In the bridge, the bass line goes R-7-6-5-4 (with an E pedal throughout). The opening chord progression in the verse (measures 2-5) is a familiar one: I – I(maj7) – I(b7) – IV. The typical thing to do is to start on the root and descend chromatically: R-7-b7-6. This, however, is what the vocal melody is doing: C-B-Bb-A. So McCartney, rather than just having the bass mimic the vocal melody, implies a I-V-I-IV progression by playing C in measure 2, G in measure 3, C again in measure 4, and F in measure 5. Had he doubled the already prominent line, the song would have felt much more “square”; however, McCartney makes a nice choice that brings added dimension to the song. At the end of the verse, the chord progression does the same motion but in the relative minor, A minor. This time it is twice as fast, each chord lasting two beats rather than four. So the progression is Am – Am(maj7) – Am7 – D9. McCartney applies the same concept in the minor progression as he did in the major progression. He begins on A, plays E (and then embellishes) on the first beat of the Am(maj7) chord, goes back to A on the Am7 (in the first two verses he lands on a G), and ends the progression on the root of the D9 chord. In measure 3, Paul plays an upper neighbor tone figure (G-A-G on the “and” of beat 2) which becomes a recurring motive, appearing again in measures 5, 12, 30, and 39. It usually occurs over the Cmaj7 chord in the verses. Since the vocal melody is at rest and the bass line is the only moving part, it attracts the listener’s attention, and makes it an easily recognizable motive. In measure 39, the motive appears for the last time. McCartney emphasizes its importance by playing it three times. The third repeat is slightly different rhythmically, being more of a grace note before an eighth (on the “and” of beat 3). But when we hear it, we still recognize it as the upper neighbor tone motive. This motive may seem fairly insignificant, but it actually serves to support the overall harmonic structure. Let’s look at exactly how this figure functions in relation to the whole song. “Something” is in the key of C major. The bridge modulates to A major, but returns to C before the start of the guitar solo. So the entire song has a large scale C major (verse) – A major (bridge) – C major (verse) motion. But the verses also briefly move through an A tonality, this time A minor, and then return to C. So within those larger C major sections, there is a smaller C major – A minor – C major motion. This C-A-C progression is mirrored again, though not exactly, on a comparatively microscopic level with McCartney’s G-A-G neighbor tone motive. G is the fifth of a C chord, so it is the second strongest note in the chord. With the G-A-G motive, McCartney is essentially hinting at a motion from the I chord (C) to the VI (A) and back to the I (C). It is a short motive in the bass, but it slyly sets the stage for the key changes throughout the song. Of less structural importance to the song, but interesting from the standpoint of bass line construction, Paul consistently includes an upper neighbor tone figure over the Am(maj7) in the verses (see measure 8). The descending sixteenth note run on beats 3 and 4 always starts with the notes E-F-E, or scale degrees 5-6-5 in the key of A minor. The G-A-G motive in the first part of the verses is scale degrees 5-6-5 in C major. As mentioned above, the progression Am – Am(maj7) – Am7 – D9 is the relative minor version of C – Cmaj7 – C7 – F which begins the verses. So McCartney’s 5-6-5 neighbor tone figure occurs in the same place in the minor progression as it does in the major progression: over the maj7 chord. The two versions of the neighbor tone motive, major and minor, are different rhythmically, so their similarity is not immediately apparent upon listening to the song. The connection between the two, however, is unquestionable. It is a subtle way of tying the whole bass line—and in a way, the whole song—together. Now let’s be realistic. McCartney was certainly not thinking about this stuff in the detail I just described. He didn’t sit down and do a harmonic analysis of the song and decide how he wanted to support it. He didn’t map out which parts of the song he had space to play sixteenth note runs and in which parts he should lay back. But he did these things intuitively. The neighbor tone motive was not an accident, nor was it a coincidence each time it occurred. It was the product of a great bass player instinctively constructing a great bass line—arguably one of the best bass lines ever recorded."
- Rob Collier on 'Something', Bass Musician : Face Of Bass Special
'Something'
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Post by heeeeey on Dec 6, 2019 18:21:37 GMT
Too many to list. I am a big fan of George Harrison. I think he wrote the best songs both as a Beatle and solo artist. 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps' is a favorite song of mine. And I think he wrote one of the most romantic love songs ever written -- 'Something'. I think 'Something' has one of the most beautiful basslines ever recorded. The way in which Paul McCartney subtly weaves his bass around the guitar line and the melody, taking care not to intrude upon the work of his bandmates, it creeps up on me and spreads throughout my damaged system like wildfire. The Beatles were a wonderful band. "... McCartney was certainly not thinking about this stuff in the detail I just described. He didn’t sit down and do a harmonic analysis of the song and decide how he wanted to support it. He didn’t map out which parts of the song he had space to play sixteenth note runs and in which parts he should lay back. But he did these things intuitively. The neighbor tone motive was not an accident, nor was it a coincidence each time it occurred. It was the product of a great bass player instinctively constructing a great bass line—arguably one of the best bass lines ever recorded."
- Rob Collier, Bass Musician : Face Of Bass Special
'Something'
It probably wasn't him playing at all. Quincy replaced Ringo in the studio, but I bet Ringo still got credit. Btw, look at Paul and Linda @ 1:00 of the video. The dumbass nearly slugged her.
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Post by heeeeey on Dec 6, 2019 22:02:56 GMT
That's a good place to end it for me. I'm tired of this crap. No. Please deliver the full quote because this would actually confirm what I always thought in my idiotic amateur mind. When you listened to their CDs (as I was forced to by my guitar teacher) they sound off, sort of out of tune. Something is wrong with the guitar. As far as their compositions are concerned, well, you can take it or leave it, I guess. The only album I liked by them was St. Peppar. I don't give fuck about the rest. IMO, Sgt. Pepper was very overrated. Anything in particular you like about it? If I had to recommend something from them, it would be Abbey Road.
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