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Beatles: Sgt Pepper vs Abbey Road
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Jeffro View Drop Down
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Which is "best?" Whatever "best" means? I suppose Sgt Pepper's for the creativity but my favorite is Abbey Road. My parents had a copy of that album and it's among my earliest musical memories as a very small child. It's forever imprinted on my brain. 
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Hi,

The major tough side of this poll is that there are several years in between these albums, and when Sgt Peppers came out, it was, by very far, a very important album, though many would say that Frank Zappa and a few others had been doing psychedelia as well.

Abbey Road, by comparison, did not burn the FM radio band as much, as the Sgt Pepper's album did a few years back, when no one had heard anything of the kind much, and it made the album important, specially when it sold by the bushel, which almost no other band had done, and they were not the only "psychedelic" album out there.

AR, is probably the better of the two albums in that the "songs" had matured and were very strong, where the Sgt Pepper's stuff, while meaningful, stood up as a fun album instead. And maybe that is the biggest difference between these albums. AR, lyrically, is much more with it and serious, and the side 2 of the LP will blow out Sgt Peppers any day of the week.
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Originally posted by moshkito moshkito wrote:

Hi,

The major tough side of this poll is that there are several years in between these albums, and when Sgt Peppers came out, it was, by very far, a very important album, though many would say that Frank Zappa and a few others had been doing psychedelia as well.

Abbey Road, by comparison, did not burn the FM radio band as much, as the Sgt Pepper's album did a few years back, when no one had heard anything of the kind much, and it made the album important, specially when it sold by the bushel, which almost no other band had done, and they were not the only "psychedelic" album out there.

AR, is probably the better of the two albums in that the "songs" had matured and were very strong, where the Sgt Pepper's stuff, while meaningful, stood up as a fun album instead. And maybe that is the biggest difference between these albums. AR, lyrically, is much more with it and serious, and the side 2 of the LP will blow out Sgt Peppers any day of the week.

Exactly.
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Originally posted by TCat TCat wrote:

I like both of them, but Sgt. Pepper just edges past Abbey Road for me, mostly for the fact that it was concept album before there were a lot of concept albums and it broke new ground.  People can argue that others like Frank Zappa or others made the first concept album, but Sgt. Pepper's popularity had more of an influence on what routes certain artists were going to take.  I also hear your arguments for Abbey Road, and it is a close one for me too. 

Oh there have been other concept albums in rock music before Sgt. Peppers. However, they certainly altered the form because it has characteristics of a concept album without really being one. So in essence they arguably created a new way in presenting a rock album. 
 
Sgt. Peppers structurally is built like a concept album based on the introduction and the  segue of  the reprisal of the title track with a grand finale at the end of album. However, it really doesn't have a story line other than its a fictional band or an alter ego creating an album.  

I am on the fence with Frank Zappa and his music is certainly different. However, I don't understand the comparisons to The Beatles and Zappa musically. The Beatles were extremely talented songwriters with high melodic content, strong production values and enough novelty in the music that attracted them to seemingly everyone including musicians. They basically had all the markets covered.

Zappa had the musical novelty but didn't have the other traits The Beatles had for me to want to listen to him on a repeated basis. 
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Originally posted by NYSPORTSFAN NYSPORTSFAN wrote:

Originally posted by TCat TCat wrote:

I like both of them, but Sgt. Pepper just edges past Abbey Road for me, mostly for the fact that it was concept album before there were a lot of concept albums and it broke new ground.  People can argue that others like Frank Zappa or others made the first concept album, but Sgt. Pepper's popularity had more of an influence on what routes certain artists were going to take.  I also hear your arguments for Abbey Road, and it is a close one for me too. 

Oh there have been other concept albums in rock music before Sgt. Peppers. However, they certainly altered the form because it has characteristics of a concept album without really being one. So in essence they arguably created a new way in presenting a rock album. 
 
Sgt. Peppers structurally is built like a concept album based on the introduction and the  segue of  the reprisal of the title track with a grand finale at the end of album. However, it really doesn't have a story line other than its a fictional band or an alter ego creating an album.  

 


I found A Day In The Life not so much as a grande finale but the alter ego to the rest of the album. It's a bleak lyric, a reality after the colourful garden of psychedelic pop rock bookended by the theme. Placed outside it gives an aspect to an album I don't think anyone has done since. The album isn't themed driectly; a variety of contemporary songs penned in the boundaries but outside reality waits and it's not well...
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Originally posted by NYSPORTSFAN NYSPORTSFAN wrote:

Sgt. Peppers structurally is built like a concept album based on the introduction and the  segue of  the reprisal of the title track with a grand finale at the end of album. However, it really doesn't have a story line other than its a fictional band or an alter ego creating an album.  
 
I'm so glad to see that someone else has realised that Sgt Pepper is not a concept album.
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Originally posted by chopper chopper wrote:

Originally posted by NYSPORTSFAN NYSPORTSFAN wrote:

Sgt. Peppers structurally is built like a concept album based on the introduction and the  segue of  the reprisal of the title track with a grand finale at the end of album. However, it really doesn't have a story line other than its a fictional band or an alter ego creating an album.  
 
I'm so glad to see that someone else has realised that Sgt Pepper is not a concept album.

Thanks ... it's never been a concept album, and the last piece pretty much dismantles the rest of it all ... although a clever writer (and John and Paul were!) could easily say that after all that stuff we're tired and need to go to bed, which they made it sound better in another album.

For that matter, even Magical Mystery Tour is not a concept album either ... in fact, I am not sure that any of the BEATLES' albums are a "concept" album, even though THE WHITE ALBUM is probably closer to a concept album than any of them. 

I think that AR is an album where the BEATLES wanted to do something that the record companies did not want ... and it was to get away from the "song format" and do something else ... which they did on Side 2 of the AR album. A certain amount of freedom that really showed that these guys were very good musicians and could do stuff that was superb.

Sadly, comparatively speaking, none of the 4 came close to the brilliant last 2 or 3 albums on their own, which to me was a disappointment ... it made me think that the real talent was not those 4 guys but someone else that was steering the music into something else, bigger than just a hit song ... 
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Originally posted by moshkito moshkito wrote:

Originally posted by chopper chopper wrote:

Originally posted by NYSPORTSFAN NYSPORTSFAN wrote:

Sgt. Peppers structurally is built like a concept album based on the introduction and the  segue of  the reprisal of the title track with a grand finale at the end of album. However, it really doesn't have a story line other than its a fictional band or an alter ego creating an album.  
 
I'm so glad to see that someone else has realised that Sgt Pepper is not a concept album.

Thanks ... it's never been a concept album, and the last piece pretty much dismantles the rest of it all ... although a clever writer (and John and Paul were!) could easily say that after all that stuff we're tired and need to go to bed, which they made it sound better in another album.

For that matter, even Magical Mystery Tour is not a concept album either ... in fact, I am not sure that any of the BEATLES' albums are a "concept" album, even though THE WHITE ALBUM is probably closer to a concept album than any of them. 

I think that AR is an album where the BEATLES wanted to do something that the record companies did not want ... and it was to get away from the "song format" and do something else ... which they did on Side 2 of the AR album. A certain amount of freedom that really showed that these guys were very good musicians and could do stuff that was superb.

Sadly, comparatively speaking, none of the 4 came close to the brilliant last 2 or 3 albums on their own, which to me was a disappointment ... it made me think that the real talent was not those 4 guys but someone else that was steering the music into something else, bigger than just a hit song ... 
MMT isn't even a proper Beatles album, it's a compilation of the MMT EP and some singles. MMT (the original EP) is a soundtrack to the film (or the Beatle songs from the film, not even all the music), not really a concept.
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Originally posted by chopper chopper wrote:

...
MMT isn't even a proper Beatles album, it's a compilation of the MMT EP and some singles. MMT (the original EP) is a soundtrack to the film (or the Beatle songs from the film, not even all the music), not really a concept.

There are tell tale signs of many things that had been written, if not completely, at least in various parts, when you listen to the original bootleg of the Beatles in Hamburg, which if I am not mistaken, was something like 3 LP's. Some of those bits ended up as far as LET IT BE, and WHITE ALBUM, if my memory serves me right. Nothing major, but you can see that they had riffs and bits and pieces that they kept and then found a place for them, or a song would develop.

I imagine that this is normal within a group that stays together a reasonable amount of time.

BTW, if you have not heard/seen, PETER JACKSON has been given ALL THE MATERIAL that is related to LET IT BE, and they are planning a huge film and release it all. According to Paul, he feels that LET IT BE, the film as is right now, is a bit sad, and mostly shows the tensions in the band, which I have always disagreed with ... the bootlegs around it, which likely showed a good hour plus of other stuff, including fun stuff, showed that they also had some fun, be it singing MARY JANE, or BESAME MUCHO ... and all kinds of other nutsy stuff, and Paul says that the whole recording of that album was actually a much more fun time than folks imagine.

I always thought, that's not a sad/bummer film, even in my reviews of the film, I would not trash it, since I, personally, felt that this was about REAL PEOPLE, doing their thing together ... and when that happens there are agreements and disagreements, but only one of them kinda bothered me, and it was George Harrison getting upset and saying he will play it if he wants him to, or he will leave if he wants him to (Paul) ... and John intervenes and starts a different song. This moodyness on George's part is clear on Patti's book about the whole thing.

I have always felt that the last two albums (WHITE and AR) were about ... the Beatles ... 4 people ... and not something else, and LET IT BE, gave us that, but a lot was taken out to make the stars look better, and come off as master musicians doing their work ... and in the end, they were telling us, that there is no master musician ... just some grand fun, and the desire to put together great music. And play it!


Edited by moshkito - February 06 2019 at 06:54
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Abbey Road, by far.

What In a Silent Way did for jazz, Abbey Road did for rock and pop: foreshadow what everybody else would do over the next 10 years. Abbey Road is truly one of the most influential albums ever released by anybody. It's no accident that McCartney closed out his most recent live shows with most of "Side 2".

Which is not to take anything away from Sgt. Pepper, which was a far more experimental album. Sgt. Pepper was very much a product of its time, and it shows. It was certainly influential for all the psychedelic bands/albums that rose up in its wake, most famously Their Satanic Majesties Request. Abbey Road is a much more UNIVERSAL, and TIMELESS album.
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Ranking The Beatles' Albums

02. 4 stars 1968: The Beatles - The Beatles (The White Album) - http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLycVTiaj8OI80AsTGjYJAPi7-i8kTH-Bq
04. 4 stars 1967: The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band - http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3PhWT10BW3VDM5IcVodrdUpVIhU8f7Z-
06. 4 stars 1967: The Beatles - Magical Mystery Tour - http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLycVTiaj8OI8F5vZlwv4NnvGwc84ITnW2
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For me it's Sgt. Peppers by just a tiny, tiny bit. The golden slumbers medley is probably the best thing they have ever done (imo) but I find Sgt. Peppers more fun to listen to plus I really don't care for "oh Darling" and "Maxwell's silver hammer" is almost as annoying. 
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Originally posted by chopper chopper wrote:

Originally posted by NYSPORTSFAN NYSPORTSFAN wrote:

Sgt. Peppers structurally is built like a concept album based on the introduction and the  segue of  the reprisal of the title track with a grand finale at the end of album. However, it really doesn't have a story line other than its a fictional band or an alter ego creating an album.  
 
I'm so glad to see that someone else has realised that Sgt Pepper is not a concept album.


Opinions vary on that. Apparently the concept is the Beatles playing music as this other band (their alter egos and the cover sort of reflects that). I don't think it's a very strong concept but I can see how it might qualify. 


Edited by AFlowerKingCrimson - May 17 2024 at 13:59
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Sgt Pepper was undoubtedly their masterpiece, but Abbey Road the most polished album (and for me the most satisfying listen).
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It's a draw. Smile
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I like both
Voted for Abbey Road
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Abbey Road, their best album.
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Originally posted by chopper chopper wrote:

...
MMT isn't even a proper Beatles album, it's a compilation of the MMT EP and some singles. MMT (the original EP) is a soundtrack to the film (or the Beatle songs from the film, not even all the music), not really a concept.

HI,

One of the things that pissed me off was the "silent" band in the club ... The Bonzo Dog Band ... and they didn't have to be silent, but I bet they would have upstaged the Beatles within one minute. My guess is that it did happen, and they changed it to silent so the Beatles were the stars ... and no one knew who the Bonzo's were ... yes they did ... all of the Beatles had heard the Goons (quietly copied them in the Christmas Shows ... and then copied them again on the first 2 films doing visually what the Goons were doing with sound effects!!!!!), and they had connections to Monty Python ... and later several others ... to the point that they even allowed one of them to create the album that satirized the Beatles (The Rutles) ... 

I'm not sure it mattered a lot ... the Bonzo's went on to even quote the play Marat/Sade, a portion of which was in a bootleg, and it showed the band had guts and quality ... while the Beatles went on to do more pop/crap songs, though many of us will argue that the stuff got better ....but later ... too much of it was just trivial stuff until the White Album ... when the "meaning" took a very serious turn! Let It Be, gave us the first hint of this, and AR put the finishing on it with colorful paint.

I think MMT could have been a "concept" album, however, the Beatles were the stars and there was no way that it was not going to be an image of what MTV ended up doing ... kissing the stars and ignore all the rest. With a better director and writers, it would have been way more interesting ... but no one cared about anything but making sure the stars were lit up! ... with a heavy "period" on that. The same goes for Sgt Pepper's ... which did not get much of a film/video treatment, but a year later or two, things changed and the visuals on TV were the big thing, and this WAS what made Monty Python ... by the mid 60's the radio comedy stuff suffered as TV tried to bring everyone over. But they were never able to improve, or do better with the sound effects!


Edited by moshkito - June 25 2024 at 13:17
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These two albums are both classic masterpieces. If I had to choose it would be Sgt. Pepper. A lot of joy from that LP when I was young.
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My two favourite Beatles albums, but I listen to Abbey Road more.
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