When the Beatles released “Rubber Soul,” their second album of 1965, some of their most loyal teenybopper fans were put off. “You look as if you’d all been dead for weeks,” complained fan Annabel Lee in a poetic letter in the February 1966 issue of the Beatles Book Monthly. She was referring to the photo on the album jacket, which featured the group in the woods, clad in black turtlenecks and tan suede jackets, looking off to the side or, in the case of John, coolly down his nose.
In retrospect, Robert Freeman’s autumnal, artfully distorted photograph was an entirely apt image for a worldlier, darker, more grown-up Beatles record.
The Beatles’ “Rubber Soul” has gotten the special deluxe treatment, with a bevy of new editions on CD, vinyl and Blu-ray and a museum show’s worth of expertly curated material released Friday. As usual, there are punchy new mixes by Giles Martin along with never officially released session recordings and demos, including audio of a hitherto unknown song of John’s, and an up-to-date account of the writing, recording and legacy of the album.
Whatever Annabel Lee may have thought, this was the period just before the Beatles got truly weird; the fantastic sonic explorations of “Revolver” would come next. There was a lowering of tempos, a concerted exploration of new guitar sounds and a new depth of introspection, reflecting a multitude of diverse musical inspirations: Bob Dylan and Ravi Shankar (“Norwegian Wood”), the chiming guitars of the Byrds (“If I Needed Someone”), Otis Redding (“Drive My Car”), Smokey Robinson and J.S. Bach (the recurring guitar motif of “In My Life” and George Martin’s pseudo-harpsichord solo), even Paul’s holiday in Greece (the twanging bouzouki-style guitar of “Girl”).
Speaking with London Life magazine around the time of the album’s release, Paul summed up the impulse to keep trying new things: “I saw someone on TV asked what he wanted out of life, and he said ‘a cosy rut.’ To be in a cosy rut is about the sickest thing ever, I think. You can enjoy it, but what’s the point of living in a cosy rut?” Indeed, from “Rubber Soul” on, every Beatles album would feel like a radical departure from the sound of the previous record.
Lyrically, “Rubber Soul” revealed a new level of sophistication and wit in the group’s writing. John, especially, after the publication of his second book of nonsense verse and stories, had finally cottoned onto the idea of putting some of his literary impulses to good use in song, resulting in some of his most haunting Beatles-era tracks. Paul, meanwhile, was in a period of uncharacteristic autobiographical directness in his lyric-writing, documenting his grievances with his actor girlfriend Jane Asher while residing in her family’s London home. It was as if the two songwriters were turning inward in reaction to putting on the biggest stadium tour in history to that point.
Putting it bluntly, the “Rubber Soul” sessions also capture the Beatles at their most prurient: the would-be affair of “Norwegian Wood” (the details of which, it has been pointed out, align with Joan Baez’s account of her encounter with Lennon the previous year), the sensual intake of breath on “Girl,” the beep-beeping euphemism of “Drive My Car,” Paul cooing velvety French in “Michelle.” Unsurprisingly, the original opening line of “Day Tripper” — “She’s a prick teaser” — is not to be heard in any of the newly released recordings. (In the related episode of the Saturday morning Beatles cartoon, the “teaser” in question is an extraterrestrial babe who whisks the group to the planet Glom.)
“Rubber Soul” is the Beatles album that made musos as diverse as Grace Slick and Elvis Costello sit up and take notice — it’s also Harry Styles’ favorite. The U.S. release ended up with an altered track listing that highlighted the group’s folkier leanings; Joni Mitchell wore the grooves out on her copy and slipped “Norwegian Wood” into her coffeehouse sets in Detroit. (That version of “Rubber Soul” is included in the special super deluxe new editions.) Perhaps most importantly, “Rubber Soul” marked an escalation in the musical arms race between the Beatles and Brian Wilson that would culminate in “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.”
While there are no world-altering revelations here, there are some charming curios, including audio of an early version of “Day Tripper,” before the song became a thinly disguised delivery system for one of the most essential guitar riffs of all time, and several minutes of the group larking around between takes of “Think for Yourself.” As for the newly unearthed song snippet of John’s, “Little Girl” will intrigue only the most dedicated appreciators of Beatles flotsam. More interesting than its simple, undulating melody is its use of the British slang abbreviation for an unprintable expression: “If you’d have asked me yesterday / Then I’d have told you sweet F.A.”
In Beatles scholar Kevin Howlett’s detailed account of the making of the album, presented here in a tastefully illustrated 88-page hardback book, one of the unsung heroes of the record is Hazel Yarwood. A cutting specialist at EMI more used to bringing out the complex dynamics of classical recordings, she was instructed to boost the low end of “Rubber Soul” to match the sound of the American records the Beatles loved. Her efforts are in ample evidence in the exciting opening moments of “Drive My Car,” with a rhythm section that sounds, appropriately enough, like a motor thrumming to life.
For 10 years now — actually, since around the time streaming decisively overtook people’s listening habits — these Beatles releases have made a pretty compelling case for the collectible physical object. This may be the handsomest yet, and a very fine excuse to wander into the deep, dark woods of “Rubber Soul” yet again.
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