I’m identifying the best three albums by my fifty favorite rock bands of all time. This blog is for #10- The Beatles. As a reminder to everyone including my wonderful wife – this list is my favorite rock bands, not the best rock bands of all time. The Beatles would certainly rank higher on that list.
Criteria for selecting the best three albums
First, Greatest Hits albums are not permitted. I will note The Beatles have several really good ones, especially the number one greatest hits album. The reason I mentioned this record is that the Beatles had several number-one hits that were singles and not included in one of their albums. Second – no live albums. Third, I’m including an honorable mention or two for the top 25 bands.
Beatles albums ranked by ChatGPT
Let’s take a look at what artificial intelligence has to say about this list. According to ChatGPT here are the top five Beatles albums based on sales and critical acclaim.
- Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band – This album frequently tops lists of the greatest albums of all time and was a significant commercial success.
- The Beatles (White Album) – A double album, it sold extremely well and is respected by critics.
- Abbey Road – a commercial success, especially noted for its iconic cover, and the album’s medley on side two.
- Revolver – While it wasn’t their highest-selling album upon initial release, its critical standing has only grown over the years, and it’s now often listed as one of the greatest albums of all time.
- Rubber Soul – This is where The Beatles’ music started becoming more sophisticated, both in terms of lyrics and production.
Wow – this is a good list. There is a bias toward their later music. I’m okay with that. I have a similar bias.
Spotify popular releases for this band
Let’s look at some data from Spotify. According to this streaming music platform below are their five most popular albums. Two notable changes – Help shows up as well as Let It Be. As a reminder Spotify’s algorithm is based on songs more than albums which explains Help because of “Yesterday” and Let It Be because of that title track.
The third-best album by this band is Sgt. Pepper’s
The third-best album by The Beatles is Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. This album has been ranked higher by several critics. I think Rolling Stone listed it as the number-one all-time rock-n-roll album at one point. I own it on original vinyl. It was considered groundbreaking at the time and includes the songs “Help from My Friends”, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”, and “A Day in the Life”.
The second-best album by The Beatles
The second-best album by The Beatles is Abbey Road. It was recorded late in their career. I’m not sure why I put the album title on the slide everybody knows this album by the iconic album cover. I own this one on vinyl. It includes my favorite Beatles song of all time “Come Together”, plus my wife’s favorite “Oh Darling” as well as “Here Comes the Sun” and several other songs everybody knows.
Honorable mention albums for this band
I picked two albums where I felt like the band changed things up. The first is Rubber Soul. They created a different kind of sound for this record. It includes several really good songs “Drive My Car”, “Nowhere Man”, and “Looking Through You”. The other honorable mention is the Beatle’s White Album. It is an ambitious double album with many good songs like “Back in the USSR”, “Blackbird” and “Revolution”. The only reason I did not include it in the top three is that there are some filler songs and strange stuff. If they’d cut that and released this as a single record I think the White Album could have possibly been the best rock and roll album of all time.
The best album by The Beatles
The best album by The Beatles is Revolver. The band had gone through a major transition. They stopped playing live concerts because they couldn’t hear themselves playing and only spent time in the studio. The results are amazing. Revolver is one of those post-live albums. It includes many great songs including “Tax Man”, “Eleanor Rigby”, “Yellow Submarine”, “Good Day Sunshine” and “Got To Get You Into My Life”.
There you have it – the three best Beatles albums. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.
I am Doug Keating and this is my letter to my sons.