MOJO Beatlemania Volume 1

 (2 customer reviews)

The covers on this collection are, like may Beatles covers, sometimes hard to appreciate. For whatver reason, while I really enjoy practically any Dylan song covered by practically any artist, many Beatles songs suffer at the hands of other artists.

That's not to say these are bad, but it does speak to the relative strengths, and differences of both the Beatles and Dylan. Both Lennon/McCartney and Dylan are master songsmiths, and both are masters at the delivery of the songs in their respective catalogs, but the Beatles, of course, were top notch performers in a more popular format, and naturally occupy a larger public space in the hearts and minds of the music-loving masses. The chances a lot of folks even realize they're listening to a Dylan song being performed by someone else is certainly nowhere near the chances of someone realizing, 'hey, that's a Beatles song!' And that makes all the difference in the world.

For completists only. They're all for the most part - pleasant, professional and polite remakes.

The only one track most people would want is the José Feliciano interpretation of IN MY LIFE - solid acoustic sparse stripped down version - he does the song & Beatles justice. The 11-minute Issac Hayes is an interesting stylistic copying of the Velvet Underground - it starts as a Easy Listening-Sunshiny Pop version with white bread 60's girl vocals - then segues into a Motown soul version - Issac then joins in for some more soul and it all finishes in a blast of dissonant guitars - reminiscent of VU's "Heroin" - and yes, it's all part of the same 11-minute song. Ultimately, it's not really a great version but completists might want to hear it. The Dillards version sound almost exactly like the Beach Boys.

So, basically, you have one excellent re-interpretation and two intersting tracks for rock 'n roll/Beatle completists ... the rest - all pleasant, all...Read more