For the longest time this was (despite not containing my favourite song by them) my favourite Beatles' album, and in fact it may still be. The two pre-Sgt Peppers albums (Revolver/Rubber Soul) have come up to compete for my affections, but I just love what a complete artistic statement this one is.
To me it feels like if the white album was the sketch book; this is the painting. They had matured past their mod/beat stage, they'd matured past their psychedelic stage and had fully developed the mix of bluesy rock and intelligent baroque pop music that could still take unexpected twists and turns and explore interesting territory as and when the band liked.
'Come Together' is an original funky groove with brilliantly obscure Lennon lyrics; 'Something' shows George staking his claim as potential equal to Lennon and McCartney, and the others are happy to do great work on it with some interesting drum parts from Ringo and Paul almost playing lead lines on the bass. 'Maxwell's Silver Hammer' is more of Paul's twee pop, but in all fairness I enjoyed singing it at school and that sound did go on to inspire a lot of other pop acts in the future. Then Paul digs deep in his guts for the searing 'Oh Darling'. The sudden switch from John's blues monster "I Want You (She's so Heavy)" to George's gentle folky 'Here Comes the Sun' is brilliant sequencing.
Apparently a lot of fans don't love the medley on side-B, but I've always thought it was brilliant. A series of songs that could potentially have been great in their own right, but as short, sharp, 'not overstaying their welcome' doses of music they work even better. Of course, then you come to 'the End', possibly the perfect close to an album with everyone getting a moment to shine. The brilliant last line "and in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make" just sums them up nicely. I don't resent them tacking 'her majesty' on the end as a P.S., it's a nice little precursor to the 'hidden track' trend of albums in the 90s and showed that the Beatles still didn't take themselves too seriously, even at the end.
I think that for all the crap that some of them may have talked later, the fact that Paul and John had already launched solo careers and George was heading that way, it speaks to their love of the band (and maybe their competitive spirit) that they all still bring such great songs to the table for the last 'hoorah' even Ringo does pretty well with 'Octopus's Garden'.
This is a 10/10 album for me
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