ANTHOLOGY 1

I must admit to having a strong emotional attachment to this album. One of my earliest music memories is listening to this and "Steve Miller Band Greatest Hits 1974-78" with my dad when my brother and we were still too young to have our own tastes in music. But even with rose coloured glasses, this albums $45 price tag was too much for me to swallow, until for a short period a few years ago, the entire anthology series was on sale for 2/$25 at my local record store. As such, it's difficult to listen to this album and judge the music objectively, but I will do my best.

A lot of the music on this album will not be familiar to the Beatles fan, with song names such as "That'll Be The Day", "In Spite of All The Danger", and "Cry For a Shadow". To me, these songs are just as eternal as the Beatles better known songs, such as "Help!", "Yesterday", and "Hey Jude", but listening to this albums years after my youth, after I had had the chance to sample more of the Beatles career, this album really sounds very different from anything else that they did.

The biggest difference is a bit more of a '50s, rock-and-roll vibe - and of course, this makes sense. The Beatles, at the point where many of this songs come from, were still doing a lot of cover songs and finding their own sound. The pop-writing sensibilities that would make them famous, and the experimental attitude that would get them on this website, are not quite as apparent in this music.

Songs like "You'll be Mine" (track 7 on disc 1) hardly even sound like a Beatles tune. Even the singing doesn't sound like it is sung by a Beatle (although it is actually sung by Paul).

Ever wondered what it would sound like if the Beatles performed with Tony Sheridan in a school? Then check out "My Bonnie". Ever wondered what an early Beatles instrumental would have sounded like? Check out "Cry For a Shadow". There is a lot of stuff in here that could be interesting to a hardcore Beatles fan. But that is the audience - the hardcore Beatles fan. It features more non- album tracks than Anthology 2 and 3 as well, including "Free As a Bird", which was finished from John Lennon's demo tape for the Anthology.

As far as it's appeal to the prog fan goes, this album doesn't have a whole lot. It is definitely aimed at the Beatles fan, and for that reason gets a 2 star rating. This is straight up rock and roll for the most part. (And on some songs, the sound quality is actually quite poor)

That being said, there are some great songs on here - Three Cool Cats, Besame Mucho, Love Me Do, How Do You Do It, This Boy, No Reply, etc. are among my favorites. The album has 60 tracks, including demo and final versions of many songs, interviews and comments by those intimate with the band, etc. If you can find it at a good price, a great purchase.