Just have him watch Yellow Submarine. He’ll either be hooked or bored.
If he’s bored, then he’ll never like the Beatles.
The starting point should be Lovely Rita, which neatly encapsulates the tension between music hall and psychedelia that runs through so much of the Beatles’ music.
No-one’s mentioned Here, There and Everywhere, which is one of my favourites.
Revolver is the most brilliant collection of songs.
Sgt Pepper is the greatest expression of their partnership.
I don’t have any truck with repackages when it comes to the Beatles. They are better than that. But maybe that’s what a kid needs. Who knows. The butcher album might be the one.
Some great suggestions here.
My favorite is Blackbird, followed by the Golden Slumbers medley.
2 of these were faves of mine as a child: Don’t Pass me By and Her Majesty. You need to get worse…
Blackbird is a great song, and not that difficult to learn on guitar with a bit of practice. It shows off the songwriting and guitar genius of McCartney. It was played on a Martin D28, by the way.
I agree. I was going to recommend both Revolver & Rubber Soul as well. Those are, the transition LP’s. When the Beatles changed from simply pop, catchy songs to deeper, multi-demenisonal songs. Kind of the best of both worlds.
She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah…
And add the screaming/fainting girls to that…
Two Virgins
Agree with everybody who recommended middle period Beatles (Help, Rubber Soul, Revolver). This is timeless pop music and still the blueprint for pop songs that are produced today, so I think a 15 year old can relate. Hell, I’m not even able to comprehend how anybody couldn’t relate to THAT music.
Also, the Red and Blue Albums. This is how I was socialized with Beatles music. I was born in 1968 and thus knew T. Rex and Suzi Quatro before them, but learned about them from my older cousins. Got my first Beatles album And Now: The Beatles in 1978 for a Christmas present because it was the only Beatles album available from my mother’s book club; it was a compilation of ca. 63/64 album cuts, great songs (my favorite from it was and still is Money), but just an appetizer for the wealth I came to explore. Weeks later, I got me the Red and Blue Albums with my own money. They became my Pop Bible, I listened to them extensively for several years after, and I don’t think that I have a stronger or maybe more nostalgic feel for any other album I ever owned, and I got me quite some since then. Still have the worn out copies in my LP stash. I loved (and still do) every single song on those albums and discovered new things and aspects even at the umpteenth listen. So what worked for a 10 year old in 1978 might work for a 15 year old with an open mind for music in 2016.
Today of course I know and have every single Beatles song, and there’s so much more in their catalog that’s equally good as the songs on the Red and Blue, but I still find that they are one of the best career spanning compilations for a group or artist ever.
Yep.
I discovered The Beatles when I was about 14 years old, in the mid-70s. I started with my older brother’s copy of Abbey Road. Of course I knew of The Beatles before hand, but never really listened to them. Abbey Road was simply wonderful: “this is The Beatles?” I remember thinking to myself.
This was before real FM music radio stations, and AM stations only played top 40, so I had to either borrow or purchase my own albums to further my knowledge.
One of my friends had an aunt who was a Beatles fan and we started listening to her old records when we could. These were the early versions with a lot of covers, and I think they were the UK releases so I don’t even recall exactly which albums they were.
I’ve mentioned this before, but I got the red album for Christmas that year and was absolutely amazed that all of these songs with which I was familiar were actually original Beatles’ songs.
So, my recommendation is to start with the magnificent Abbey Road and work backwards. The style difference in a mere, what 8 years?, is astounding.
Paperback Writer.
For some reason I want to say Abbey Road. It sounds the most modern and works as a complete album. My first Beatles album was Sgt. Peppers, which is a classic, but it’s weighed down by psychedelia trappings and sounds “of its time”.
1 or Past Masters are good for overviews, however.
Just listening to all of Revolver would give him a good feel for their stylistic range, creativity, and fun. It’s at the midpont of their career, so it has elements of “mop top” early sound as well as “mature” later sound. It has some famous songs and some less well known ones. It’s also good for showcasing the differences among John, Paul, and George’s composing styles.
If he isn’t impressed by, say, the glorious drum-heavy rock of “She Said She Said” (John), maybe he’ll like the melodious and wistful gem “For No One” (Paul). Or whatever.
ETA: I didn’t read any replies in this thread before I write mine – I’m happy to see others agree.
And, after he digests Revolver, it’s time for the Red and Blue albums (as others have noted). Plus “I Saw Her Standing There” (as someone mentioned).
JKellyMap, work with me: so, as I have IMHO’d for years on this board, Revolver is their best, and therefore best ever, and also my favorite album. We agree, right?
So: gotta keep it in your back pocket. Notice I start with Paperback Writer, one of the Revolver-prep singles, but I also go with Help and Rubber Soul. Sophisticated Pop, no psychedelia - fun on their own merits, while still modern sounding. From there, go Red for broader listening, Sgt Pepper if they want to focus on the artistic view. Wow them with the flash and Art of it. ETA: including Strawberry Fields and Penny Lane!!!
Then, after those, hit them with Revolver and show how it fits in. The trip from Taxman to Tomorrow Never Knows jumps out like the most casually profound thing ever.
It is much more fun and interesting, to me, to hear The Beatles consciously measure out and cross the line - introducing psychedelia; studio effects, etc. - as they did on Revolver, than being fully on the other side as with Pepper. Bringing that out in the listening is a cool thing.
As I step back, this is pretty much what I did with my kids. It was fun, on trips or weekend mornings. I think I learned to talk the way I do about music here on the SDMB through my conversations with them, now that I think about it. And yeah, each of them would say The Beatles is their favorite band, but each owns the music in completely different ways.
(They are meh about Jeff Beck, but know to shut up when I come across the umpteenth showing of Live at Ronnie Scott’s on cable.)
Just noticed this. Yep - D-28. Left-handed of course. Had gotten it recently, and was using it, even though he still loved (and still loves today) his Epiphone Texan.