I’m going to be the outlier and vote 1964. I was around for the Sullivan shows that broke the Beatles in America. Nothing was ever that big again, and I include the release of Sgt. Peppers, which is not their best album. WordMan probably has that right with Rubber Soul and Revolver. (If “Strawberry Fields” and “Penny Lane” were actually on Pepper I might change my mind, but they were a separate single. But Hard Day’s Night might be better yet…)
They changed everything in 1964. They changed record buying. They changed the charts. (All five of the top five on Billboard! Nobody’s ever comes close.) They changed what rock movies could be. The *Hard Day’s Night *album was, in the English version, fourteen songs written by them, each a masterpiece for the day. They started the British invasion and caused the careers of a dozen other major acts because of their breakthrough.
1964 was the 10 on the Richter scale. All the other quakes, however large, were just aftershocks.
Ah, and I was even in that thread, too! Looks like I’m at least somewhat consistent from last year, calling it my #4 or #5 Beatles album, depending on the day you ask me. (Hard Day’s Night being the album that sneaks into the #4 spot for me.)
Yes, you could make that case. In 1964, The Beatles were a tree in a wood of saplings. By 1967, the musical landscape had changed and they were now in a forest of other, albeit smaller, trees. So while their tree may have grown taller, they were not, in relative terms, as pre-eminently conspicuous in the musical forest canopy.
I wound up voting 1967 because of all the furor over Sgt. Pepper.
But for me personally 1964 is almost as important, because the band’s first appearance on Ed Sullivan was a HUGE deal, even for a 9-year-old kid in small-town west Texas (the fact that my older sister was 13 then, and thus a prime candidate for Beatlemania, didn’t hurt either).
I totally get this. Every now and then, I listen to Please Please Me, and it catches me in a "can you imagine what it would be like for this being the first or second song you ever heard from the Beatles, new, when the context was Motown, Brill, and some Surf? I love that stuff, but man, everything about that song is perfect.
Then, when I realize I feel the same way about I Want to Hold Your Hand, She Loves You, and on and on, I mean, it’s just not fair.
I’ve got to go with 1967, although 1966 is close. I agree that Revolver is a great album, But I think Sgt Pepper represents their creative peak, even if the highs of Revolver soar higher. I believe there was more experimentation and innovation on Sgt. Pepper. But it’s really close.
After 1967 there were flashes of greatness, but they were individual flashes. The Beatles as a coherent group working together clearly peaked in 1966/1967.
I voted 1964 but their best album in my opinion was let it be…i think their tours with all their screaming fan"s(mostly teenage girls)is what they are remembered for.
I was always a White Album man myself, but you can’t deny that Sgt. Pepper was the peak for those boys. Lennon was driving around in a psychedelic painted Rolls Royce, McCartney was dropping acid on TeeVee, Harrison taught America what a sitar was and Ringo was still in the band! Peak!
Gonna have to agree with **Exapno **- peak Beatlemania was peak Beatles. But then I’m not a huge fan, so am not going by when they released which album.
For me, their whole career was the peak: Isn’t it unique that one group could have so many artistic and cultural accomplishments that people like us, some 50 years after the events in question, would be engaged in a lively discussion about which of at least six of their nine great years was the greatest? So little time, so much joy.
Semi-related trivia: The album “1” was the best-selling album of the decade (2000-2009) worldwide. So, even 30+ years after whatever “peak” you choose, they were still the toppermost of the poppermost.
Fair enough — but we’re not going for ‘album’, but for ‘year’, right?
So I figure ‘67 is everything on Sgt Pepper’s plus the Double-A-Side of Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields Forever. I figure ‘67 is everything on Sgt Pepper’s plus stuff ranging from Hello, Goodbye to All You Need Is Love.
I figure ‘67 is Sgt Pepper’s plus One Too Many Songs For Me To Handwave Away.
I choose 1967 because that was the year they released Sgt Pepper, an album that revolutionized pop music and separated the Beatles forever from all the other long haired British pop groups that wanted to ride their coattails. Surprising to me, however, is that Abbey Road, released in 1969, was actually their #1 album in sales.
