Login
"Abbey Road" is the 11th studio album released by the Beatles. It is their last recorded album, although Let It Be was the last album released before the band's dissolution in 1970. Work on Abbey Road began in April 1969, and the album was released on 26 September 1969 in the United Kingdom, and 1 October 1969 in the United States.
The album was released amid tensions within the band. It has been viewed by many critics as the Beatles' greatest work and is ranked by several publications as one of the greatest albums of all time. Abbey Road remains their best-selling album.
After the near-disastrous sessions for the proposed Get Back album (later released as Let It Be), Paul McCartney suggested to music producer George Martin that the group get together and make an album "the way we used to", free of the conflict that began following the death of Brian Epstein and carrying over to the sessions for the "White Album". Martin agreed, stipulating that he must be allowed to do the album his way. This would be the last time the band would record with Martin.
With the Let It Be album partly finished, the sessions for Abbey Road began in April, as the single "The Ballad of John and Yoko" / "Old Brown Shoe" was completed. In fact, recording sessions of John Lennon's "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" had already started in February 1969 in Trident Studios, with Billy Preston on the organ—only three weeks after the Get Back sessions. Photos from these sessions are included in the book Get Back, which came along with the Let It Be album but not in the Let It Be film. McCartney is clean-shaven and Lennon has started to let his beard grow.
Most of the album was recorded between 2 July and 1 August 1969. After the album was finished and released, the Get Back / Let It Be project was re-examined. More work was done on the album, including the recording of additional music. Thus, though the bulk of Let It Be was recorded prior to Abbey Road, the latter was released first, and Abbey Road was the last album properly started by the Beatles before they disbanded. Lennon was on hiatus from the group and working with the Plastic Ono Band during the September 1969 lead-up to Abbey Road's release, which was effectively the first official sign of the Beatles' impending dissolution.
From the opening bassline of "Come Together" to "The love you take is equal to the love you make," almost 44 years later Abbey Road remains one of the greatest masterpieces not only in the Beatles' history, but also in rock history. Thankfully, because of the new Beatles remasters, we're hearing Abbey Road again like it's the first time. With a Side A stocked with tracks like "Come Together," "Something" and "Oh! Darling," our readers recently voted Abbey Road as the Fab Four's greatest album, no small achievement.
And then there's that Side B. As John Mendelsohn wrote in his 1969 Rolling Stone review of Abbey Road, "That the Beatles can unify seemingly countless musical fragments and lyrical doodlings into a uniformly wonderful suite, as they've done on side two, seems potent testimony that no, they've far from lost it, and no, they haven't stopped trying. No, on the contrary, they've achieved here the closest thing yet to Beatles freeform, fusing more diverse intriguing musical and lyrical ideas into a piece that amounts to far more than the sum of those ideas." (Mendelsohn also said "Simply, side two does more for me than the whole of Sgt. Pepper," which might be a slight overstatement).
(www.rollingstone.com)
The front cover design, a photograph of the group traversing a zebra crossing, was based on sketched ideas by McCartney, and taken on 8 August 1969 outside EMI Studios on Abbey Road. At around 11.30 that morning, photographer Iain Macmillan was given only ten minutes to take the photo whilst he stood on a step-ladder and a policeman held up the traffic.
In the scene, the group walk across the street in single file from left to right, with Lennon leading, followed by Starr, McCartney, and Harrison. McCartney is barefoot. With the exception of Harrison, the group are wearing suits designed by Tommy Nutter.
The image of the Beatles on the crossing has become one of the most famous and imitated in recording history. The crossing is a popular destination for Beatles fans and there is a live webcam featuring it. In December 2010, the crossing was given grade II listed status for its "cultural and historical importance"; the Abbey Road studios themselves had been given similar status earlier in the year.
The album was released amid tensions within the band. It has been viewed by many critics as the Beatles' greatest work and is ranked by several publications as one of the greatest albums of all time. Abbey Road remains their best-selling album.
After the near-disastrous sessions for the proposed Get Back album (later released as Let It Be), Paul McCartney suggested to music producer George Martin that the group get together and make an album "the way we used to", free of the conflict that began following the death of Brian Epstein and carrying over to the sessions for the "White Album". Martin agreed, stipulating that he must be allowed to do the album his way. This would be the last time the band would record with Martin.
With the Let It Be album partly finished, the sessions for Abbey Road began in April, as the single "The Ballad of John and Yoko" / "Old Brown Shoe" was completed. In fact, recording sessions of John Lennon's "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" had already started in February 1969 in Trident Studios, with Billy Preston on the organ—only three weeks after the Get Back sessions. Photos from these sessions are included in the book Get Back, which came along with the Let It Be album but not in the Let It Be film. McCartney is clean-shaven and Lennon has started to let his beard grow.
Most of the album was recorded between 2 July and 1 August 1969. After the album was finished and released, the Get Back / Let It Be project was re-examined. More work was done on the album, including the recording of additional music. Thus, though the bulk of Let It Be was recorded prior to Abbey Road, the latter was released first, and Abbey Road was the last album properly started by the Beatles before they disbanded. Lennon was on hiatus from the group and working with the Plastic Ono Band during the September 1969 lead-up to Abbey Road's release, which was effectively the first official sign of the Beatles' impending dissolution.
From the opening bassline of "Come Together" to "The love you take is equal to the love you make," almost 44 years later Abbey Road remains one of the greatest masterpieces not only in the Beatles' history, but also in rock history. Thankfully, because of the new Beatles remasters, we're hearing Abbey Road again like it's the first time. With a Side A stocked with tracks like "Come Together," "Something" and "Oh! Darling," our readers recently voted Abbey Road as the Fab Four's greatest album, no small achievement.
And then there's that Side B. As John Mendelsohn wrote in his 1969 Rolling Stone review of Abbey Road, "That the Beatles can unify seemingly countless musical fragments and lyrical doodlings into a uniformly wonderful suite, as they've done on side two, seems potent testimony that no, they've far from lost it, and no, they haven't stopped trying. No, on the contrary, they've achieved here the closest thing yet to Beatles freeform, fusing more diverse intriguing musical and lyrical ideas into a piece that amounts to far more than the sum of those ideas." (Mendelsohn also said "Simply, side two does more for me than the whole of Sgt. Pepper," which might be a slight overstatement).
(www.rollingstone.com)
The front cover design, a photograph of the group traversing a zebra crossing, was based on sketched ideas by McCartney, and taken on 8 August 1969 outside EMI Studios on Abbey Road. At around 11.30 that morning, photographer Iain Macmillan was given only ten minutes to take the photo whilst he stood on a step-ladder and a policeman held up the traffic.
In the scene, the group walk across the street in single file from left to right, with Lennon leading, followed by Starr, McCartney, and Harrison. McCartney is barefoot. With the exception of Harrison, the group are wearing suits designed by Tommy Nutter.
The image of the Beatles on the crossing has become one of the most famous and imitated in recording history. The crossing is a popular destination for Beatles fans and there is a live webcam featuring it. In December 2010, the crossing was given grade II listed status for its "cultural and historical importance"; the Abbey Road studios themselves had been given similar status earlier in the year.