John Lennon

Lennon covers old teen favorites on an LP that is more infamous for its surrounding legal troubles than for its actual music. It's an easy album to like and Lennon acknowledges the inspiration for "Come Together" with Chuck Berry's "You Can't Catch Me," while "Stand By Me" is one of the few cuts where Lennon puts enough of his heart and soul into it to make it his own.

As a performing group, the Beatles began by playing old rock favorites, for dancing, to
tough audiences in Liverpool and Hamburg. When they began writing seriously, they
discovered that they couldn't compose in the early American rock tradition. So when they
needed something crude, harsh and joyfully loud to round out an album, they borrowed
songs originally done by Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Carl Perkins, Larry Williams... More >

No doubt mysteries of emotional and rhythmic commitment (soul and groove) determine why this runs out of gas after "Be-Bop-a-Lula" and "Stand by Me." But it's also true that covering Gene Vincent and Ben E. King is considerably less perilous than covering Chuck Berry, Little Richard, and Fats Domino, whose songs follow. Which may be why "Ya Ya" (Lee Dorsey) and "Just Because" (Lloyd Price) work. Too bad he didn't go for more esoterica--this could have been another Moondog Matinee. (Grade - B-)