The White Album

The Beatles White Album was a double album released in 1968. The ideas behind this collection of songs beneath the simplistic white cover were largely conceived by the band members on a trip to India.

The songs covered a plethora of themes from rock, happiness, tiredness, about a Desmond who is a 'she', sex, pigs, birthdays, rage, chaos, romance, love and eventually culminates with a most appropriate and gentle closing track in 'Goodnight.' Fragmented but sounding cohesive at the same time. A fan once wrote saying that even after 40 years since its release, to the Beatles fan, much is still being discovered with each hearing of the songs. This album was made amid a period of turmoil and tensions in the band. The members were going through the death of their band manager, experiencing relationship breakups, drugs, arguments and in-fighting among themselves. Instead of caving in to all these circumstances, the musical geniuses of the fab four shone through to produce this epic album.

I remembered vividly how the white album was played repeatedly on my CD player while i was sitting through the night in a hospital accompanying my brother who just underwent a surgery sometime in 1995. I also reminisced the time from the mid to late 90s when CD bootlegs were widely available in music shops then, some of which were 'under table' purchases but it was just such a fun time scurrying through the wide range of Beatles bootlegs which i bought and amass quite a huge collection. I am still very proud of my Beatles CD bootleg collection till today.

As i grow older, my penchant for Beatles music tends to focus on their later releases from the album 'Revolver' and 'Sgt Pepper' onwards where the music tends to talk about more adult and worldly themes rather than the teeny lovey pop tunes in their earlier years. There is just so much to write about the Beatles, that i will perhaps blog more about their music in time to come.

The latest September issue of Mojo Magazine (a british music magazine) celebrates the White Album with a quite interesting CD of cover versions of the songs in the album. I am waiting with anticipation for the second cover CD which will come with the next issue. i wonder how 'Revolution #9' will sound like really.

Hearing the white album at this period of time reflects my current state of mind - chaos and confusion. I just hope that amid this difficult period, something can eventually string my thoughts back together again, just like how the last track 'Goodnight' always managed to lull me gently to sleep each time without fail.

Here are some selections from the White Album...Enjoy.

'I Will'

'Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da'

'Blackbird'

'Birthday'

'Helter Skelter'

'Goodnight'












'Blackbird singing in the dead of the night, take these broken wings and learn to fly' - Blackbird