Saturday, March 29, 2008

Beatles Instrumentals


The Beatles, in my opinion, are among the greatest composers of the 20th Century.

Much has been written about their catalogue of songs but there are two rare songs that I thought I'd showcase here on Wheeeeeeeere's Luke?. There's nothing particularly earth shattering about either but they are catchy and rare, in that they are both instrumental (I think the only two instrumentals that they released).

First up is Cry for a Shadow. A very early song, recorded in 1961 in Hamburg, Germany. George Harrison wrote this song with John Lennon as a parody of The Shadows - a British Band at the time. It is the only song in The Beatles' repertoire to be credited to Lennon and Harrison alone. It's a catchy little tune, check it out:



The second, Flying, is off of their 1967 LP - Magical Mystery Tour. The footage of this, included in the movie, Magical Mystery Tour, is from Stanley Kubrick's movie 2001: A Space Odyssey (featuring trippy images of Iceland). Also of note is that it's the only song that is credited to Lennon/McCartney/Harrison/Starkey except for Dig It, off of the Let It Be album.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Did George Harrison ever do an all-sitar instrumental?

That Magical Mystery Tour album is trippy. There are a bunch of good songs on it, though critics don't seem to like it when you read reviews.

You're not counting "Revolution 9" from the White Album as an instrumental? I don't know what I would call it. Number 9... Number 9... Number 9...