It was the chemistry between John and Paul that made The Beatles great. Without both of them working together, we would never have heard of any of them.
(Well, I suspect Paul might have been moderately successful as a writer of cheap catchy or schmaltzy pop songs. He does have an amazing gift for melody. But he would not have come close even to the quality of Wings if not for John’s influence.)
The only other one who mattered was George Martin. George Harrison and Ringo could have been virtually any other reasonably competent guitarist and drummer.
Billy Preston, asshole. You credit the nerds behind the desk, and don’t give propers to Sir Billy?
Abstain is my vote (from procreating, monobrow!), but, if pressed, George Harrison, maybe leading by a nose over Ringo. Just regular musicians doing good and even great work and experiencing things no one could possibly imagine (not drugs, Beatlemania, dumbass! that was a one-time deal!).
Not sure exactly who this anger is directed towards, but if it’s directed towards me, please note that in post #10 of this thread, I have already aologised once for leaving out Billy Preston from this poll.
I heard a very good interview with Paul last year on CBC’s ‘Q’. The summary at that link is all right, but if you can get the audio to work (I can’t tell if it’s just my computer, which is 4 years old and therefore at the point where the computer games they give away for free inside a box of cereal require a more recent flash/newer browser/more up to date OS than the computer will handle OR whether the actual audio link has expired.), Paul came across as an open, friendly, down to earth guy.
I think for all four of the main Beatles, their lives were so public that the least assholishness on any one of their parts got blown up way out of proportion and beyond the scope of taking it back.
I do apologize – it was meant to be a good-natured comment, not a literal insult. After all, we’re just talking about music, at its best, a pleasurable expression, not some heavy political thing.
The Beatles as a group were far more than the sum of their parts, which is why I don’t have a favorite. The Lennon/McCartney partnership was the indispensable core of the group, but they needed each other’s strengths to counterbalance each of their weaknesses, as the group’s breakup demonstrates. John without Paul was too didactic, and Paul without John was barely above bubblegum. Together they were magic.
