Funerals aren't so special for the tailies.

In this series of features, we’ll take a look at six episodes of LOST – one episode from each season. These are not recaps or reviews to the episodes. Instead we will be mostly be discussing the formal construction and storytelling modes of each episode and what that form reveals about a particular season or the series as a whole. Needless to say I will be freely discussing SPOILERS; if you haven’t seen the show yet…what are you waiting for? This week, we continue with episode 2.07, “The Other 48 Days.”

The first season of LOST was a full-bore phenomenon thanks to its engrossing mysteries and rich storytelling. Ending with a particularly pointed cliffhanger (WHAT’S INSIDE THE HATCH?!), the Season Two premiere would answer the question in characteristic fashion, simultaneously blunt and head-scratching. The reveal of Desmond and the computer in the hatch exemplify the widening parameters of the narrative in Season Two.

Season One was all about the shared search for redemption by the castaways and the physical struggle for survival. Now, the threat of nature is displaced by the threat of foreign invaders – literally a mysterious group called The Others. There’s the threat of shifting truth and things that can’t be known – who were the Dharma Initiative? Are these strangers really other survivors of Flight 815? What happens if we don’t press the button?

By this point, the producers and writers had internalized the structure and clearly felt more comfortable giving major running time to the flashback scenes; this had the added benefit of slowing down the progress of the island story at a time when the overall length of the series arc was very open-ended. A typical flashback might not leave viewers agape, but it could still be a well-written standalone story and an escape from the increasingly dense Island story.

Just as Season Two begins the process of really expanding the scope of the show, however incrementally, it also marks the point when the flashback formula is comfortable enough that the writers can begin to toy with it and eventually abandon it. “The Other 48 Days,” while a major departure from LOST, is actually a pretty straightforward narrative. It is the first continuous flashback; that is, rather than the typical back and forth of island-flashback-island-flashback and so on, the flashback story is portrayed in one long uninterrupted diegesis. Most of the episodes done this way bookend the flashback with a scene from the continuing Island narrative to start and end the episode; “The Other 48 Days” is the only episode of the series that is strictly chronological.

Despite its linear narrative structure, “The Other 48 Days” is still bold for network TV. There are hardly any of the show’s regular cast members, and certainly none of the sexy leads such as Matthew Fox or Evangeline Lilly, nor the breakout fan favorites like Terry O’Quinn. It’s hard to imagine an episode of, say, The Big Bang Theory that focuses solely on events outside of the show’s familiar settings or is missing Penny and Sheldon. Or an hour of Mad Men with no Don Draper. This episode is a particularly vigorous example of the confidence with which LOST employs its large cast – confident enough to hold off on its biggest, most popular characters, sometimes for weeks at a time.

Traditionally, TV bases its diegetic world – and its business model – on bringing back viewers every week with a stable of six to eight main characters and several less frequent recurring characters. The way TV salaries used to be structured, a main cast member was paid regardless of screen time, so if they are not in an episode (an absence that could potentially alienate finicky viewers), the studio is essentially paying for the actor’s week off. LOST seems to leave these tricky business considerations in the dust in service of telling its sprawling story. Later in Season Two, “SOS” focuses on the recurring characters Rose and Bernard, while the season finale spends over half an hour in the flashbacks of Desmond, a character barely seen in his previous episodes. “Across the Sea,” the controversial antepenultimate episode of the whole series, has none of the main cast, save for a bit of archive footage.

By jettisoning the regular stars and setting aside the flashback formula, “The Other 48 Days” essentially plays like a clip show of an alternate version of LOST – a grittier, less TV-friendly version in which there is no chiseled doctor to save the injured, no natural shelter or cargo to salvage, and especially no benign supernatural guardian guiding the characters to a redemptive destiny. Knowing now the forces at work on the island, it’s tempting to read the different circumstances as The Island’s and Jacob’s ickily efficient way of winnowing down the candidates – the final candidates are hail from the original Season One castaways. Or perhaps it’s the mechanism of fate – all of the tailies eventually were killed, except Bernard, who should have been sitting in the same row as Rose and Jack. The smart presentation of the episode – lots of shaky, handheld camera work, jagged editing, and many short, stark scenes – never allow the viewer an escape from the growing tension.

The episode touches on Season Two’s key themes and recurring motifs. The events of the tailies are driven by ever-increasing paranoia about The Others, a group whose moniker conveys how a lack of understanding can lead to fear and hostility. We’ve already seen how the tailies and castaways have gotten so paranoid they initially label each other as Others. We get background on the key tailies, emphasizing Libby’s warmth and Eko’s steadfast nature. Most importantly, the episode provides a glimpse into the psychology of the hard-edged Ana Lucia. Initially, her aggressively glum attitude irritated viewers – she made the tightly wound Jack look easy-going by comparison. But seeing the ordeal she and her people went through softens the character and makes her more sympathetic. We also see The Other’s main M.O. at work again, as Goodwin infiltrates the group by impersonating a crash survivor, like Ethan at the beach camp in Season One (and meeting the same fate as well).

Just like the castaways, the tailies find their own mysterious door to apparent shelter filled with mysteries to ponder. When the Arrow station’s usefulness is exhausted, the tailies move on – unlike the castaways, who ultimately battle over cracking the secrets of The Hatch. If the end of the series truly vindicates John Locke, and he is correct in his goal of unification with The Island (and all the ineffable forces in our lives), then the tailies should ultimately be rebuked. Mere survival isn’t good enough – what’s the point of surviving without understanding?

I wasn’t trying to be a snob. It was just a bandwagon I had missed – and from what I could tell, a particularly geeky, cultish bandwagon. Who needed that sort of addicting entanglement, with a full class schedule and a part-time job? But my roommate finally wore me down and we began to watch Season One.

I admired the cinematic style of “Pilot” and “Tabula Rasa,” and I could see that the writers would be addressing weighty social and philosophical issues in the compressed setting of the castaways’ beach. As much as I admired it, I was still holding it at arm’s length, making snide observations or joking at some of the more absurd or formulaic aspects – it was still, after all, a network TV drama.

I continued this not very respectful viewing approach as we started the fourth episode of Season One, “Walkabout.” By the end, boy, did I shut up. For many LOST fans, including my original enabler, “Walkabout” holds primacy of place. It’s the turning point that convinces you to tag along for the rest of the ride, the moment that promises the show will be going to some thrilling and possibly transcendent places.

“Walkabout” is the earliest refinement of LOST in its classical form, defined by the now iconic flashbacks. The flashbacks were borne out of a practical problem when the series was in development: how to make a true series out of a show about a plane crash? First, slow the island story down completely (more on that later). Next, fill out the running time with flashbacks showing the lives of characters before the crash.

A typical LOST flashback would be considered an external analepsis, a scene that takes place before the narrative started. In the first season, the analepses almost exclusively follow certain structural limitations. First, excepting the bookending premiere and finales, each episode’s flashback is limited to the narrative point-of-view of one of the castaways, or the POV of a natural pair such as Sun and Jin who shared a life story to that point. Second, these stories are contained chronologically before the crash (the start of the ongoing narrative of the series). “Walkabout” is the only episode of Season 1, and the first of the series, to feature an internal analepsis, a scene which takes place earlier within the narrative; in the case of LOST we can define this narrative starting point as Jack waking up in the jungle after the plane crash.

The first on-island flashback, which begins “Walkabout,” shows John Locke waking up on the beach in the aftermath of the crash. Taking a moment to focus on his feet (which have lost their shoes in typical plane crash style), he slowly stands up and starts helping the other survivors. The cold open instantly signals to the viewer that the episode will focus on Locke. From this scene, we cut back to the Island A- and B-story, the search for food and the preparation to burn the crash victims’ bodies. This early in the series run, the elemental survival aspects are prominent.

Locke announces a plan to hunt the wild boar on the Island. As one of the castaways, speaking for the audience, asks who this self-styled knife hunter is, we cut to a close-up of Locke answering a phone in an office setting. Addressed as “Colonel Locke,” he appears to be military personnel, until he is summarily interrupted by his “douche” boss and revealed to be a miserable clerical worker. (Adding to the indignities, Locke reveals in a later episode that his employer was actually a box company, which we know from The Simpsons, is the most boring thing ever.)

As Locke, Kate and Michael start their hunt, they quickly encounter a boar, which knocks Locke down. Locke seems particularly stricken as he lies on the ground, glancing at the boots on his feet. This triggers the next flashback, revealing the “rendezvous” set up during the phone call to be a military strategy board game. The boss Randy mocks Locke’s hobby before bringing up the titular walkabout. Locke is planning a trip to Australia to participate in the famous “journey of spiritual discovery” in the Outback; Randy openly tells John that he won’t be able to do it. Locke cites the story of a blind man who climbed Everest and delivers his signature line: “Don’t tell me what I can’t do.”

As Michael and Kate split off to act out the C-story, Locke marches on alone. The story flashes to Locke, sitting upright in bed and phoning a woman he calls Helen. He sheepishly invites her on the walkabout; it becomes clear that she is a phone sex worker. So far the flashbacks effectively portray Locke as a pathetic poser, a man with aspirations to greatness and adventure but lacking the courage or ability to do it. From the phone call, we return to the jungle where Locke encounters the Monster face-to-face.

Locke returns to camp with the fresh kill. At the funeral pyre that evening (the first of many, many funerals), Michael asks Locke about the Monster, triggering the last sequence of flashbacks. At the guide’s office, Locke forcefully argues for his ability and his right to join the walkabout. The guide refers to Locke misrepresenting his “condition” and refuses; as he stands up to leave, the camera goes wide to reveal Locke is in a wheelchair. Locke desperately explains that he’s lived this way for four years and pleads, angrily yelling his new catchphrase. Then we cut back to the opening flashback scene of Locke waking up on the beach and looking at his feet. What seemed like an artful but inconsequential moment before is now recontextualized by the new information about Locke’s handicap, and the reveal is fully driven home: Locke was paralyzed, but on the Island he can walk. The tantrum at the office probably seems silly now, as Locke realizes he is now on the ultimate walkabout. The editing effectively links John’s spiritual and physical renewal to the Island and the presence of the Monster, foreshadowing the journey Locke will take and his…unique relationship with the Monster.

Upon repeat viewings, with the knowledge of Locke’s paralysis, it’s shocking how little the producers try to hide it. Mostly they just play into the viewer’s assumptions: we saw Locke walking around the Island, so there was no reason to suspect that he had been unable to before. As astute viewers, we are always searching for some thematic or narrative unity, and with crucial information missing, the sad sack nature of Locke’s character seemed like the only unifying aspect of the flashbacks. The only deceptive technique the filmmakers use is a lack of any wide shots showing Locke in his wheelchair.

The daring twist of “Walkabout” serves as a template for many of the most memorable moments and aspects of the series going forward. What they all seem to have in common is taking the avid and astute nature of LOST viewership and turning it on its head. That is, rather than a Usual Suspects-style twist that crudely and unnecessarily deceives before yanking out the rug from underneath, LOST lets natural audience assumptions of form and structure do the leg work, before adding a vital piece of information that upends those assumptions.

These flashback scenes comprise less than nine minutes of the 42-minute running time. The episode is still mostly concerned with island business such as the boar hunt, Jack grappling with being the hero, and Hurley fishing. It’s a testament to the cumulative effect of the flashbacks that they so thoroughly dominate any fan’s memory of “Walkabout.” After establishing the hooky premise of LOST in the first three hours, “Walkabout” starts broadening the scope of the show in an unanticipated new direction – if paralyzed men can suddenly walk around, is there something special about the plane crash or the Island? And what other amazing secrets might the other survivors hold?

It’s easy to see how Depp’s portrayal in the original film, Curse of the Black Pearl became instantly iconic. Captain Jack was a delightful enigma; you could never quite tell if his insouciance was a put-on, and it allowed him to stay three steps ahead of the every other character (and the audience). That giddy offhandedness is what I recall most from that first film: how thrilling was it that this craven commercial calculation – a movie based on a theme park ride, for God’s sake – could surprise me at every turn? The series yielded diminishing returns in the second film, Dead Man’s Chest. By the time of the tortuous At World’s End, the mythology had crawled so far up its own rear that it was tough to even piece together the plot twists, harder still to care about the characters. I’m not sure I even made it to the ending of the third installment.

On Stranger Tides wisely simplifies the story, often outright lifting the structure from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, a greater film that also follows the search for a life-giving relic. The story absolutely drags in the first hour of expository set-up, until the arrival of a new entity for the Pirates series – mermaids. Though not nearly as uncanny as Bill Nighy’s Davy Jones, these beautiful and predatory creatures feel organic to the sea-chantey mythos of the original film, as they ensnare helpless young men with their supermodel looks and hypnotic singing. The mermaid hunting scene brings a dollop of creepy suspense, and after this high point the movie rides a reliably satisfying groove to the climax and coda, which predictably sets up the inevitable fifth film.

But Jack Sparrow is now the fatal flaw in the newly extended franchise: nothing he does now has the ability to surprise, and that is an impossible problem to work around when your action figure hero relies on seeming unpredictable at every moment. Like many franchises that started with a great or greatly entertaining movie, the Pirates films have nothing left to offer – the magic is gone. By driving the elements that worked into the ground, the summer movie-as-brand style threatens even our fondly cherished memories – how can I still separate the novelty and panache of the first film from the formula that was embedded all along?

1965 stands out now as the pivotal year in The Beatles’ evolution. As composers, The Beatles were drawing from increasingly diverse fonts of inspiration; as performers they were pushing past the limits of what the guitar-bass-drum tandem could contain. Even at the legendary Shea Stadium show, it was already clear that the four-piece live setting provided diminishing returns, and soon the nonstop roar of Beatlemania would force the group into the studio full-time. So its a fairly idiosyncratic year for The Beatles, and occasionally filled with awkward growing pains; but it’s quite rewarding.

We might as well start with the ugly redheaded stepchild of The Beatles’ catalogue, the cover of Larry Williams’ “Bad Boy”. This song never surfaced in the U.K. until the CD issue of the essential non-album track compilation Past Masters; before then it was just a stopgap track the group gave to Capitol Records to fill out one of the illegitimate retooled American albums. I’ve listened to it maybe three times ever, and I don’t plan to ever again.

In April of 1965, The Beatles released a new single, Ticket to Ride b/w Yes It Is. It’s a dramatic choice, with neither side an obvious candidate for a chart-topping pop hit. The A-side has a resigned John lyric about his girl leaving, but what stands out most of all is the arrangement. The droning bass and guitar anticipate the creeping influence of Eastern sounds on The Beatles’ music (especially on George); the thumping off-kilter drum pattern has been cited by Lennon as the first example of “heavy metal.” Maybe a stretch too far, but the overall effect must have been noteworthy and still sounds as melancholy and disoriented as ever. Historically this is also the first Beatles record featuring the increasingly virtuosic McCartney on lead guitar – you can already hear his signature “bend every string as hard as possible” playing style.

“Yes It Is” is superficially very similar to “This Boy” – a waltzy ballad with three-part harmony. It’s not quite as thrillingly effective as the older B-side, but the added nuances in the arrangement make it stand apart nonetheless. George utilizes a new piece of equipment for his guitar work, an effect pedal that fades his volume in and out. And the harmonies, while still exquisite, are deliberately dissonant and even ugly, fully expressing the psyche of the singer who has been traumatized by a break-up. I wouldn’t make the case for “Yes It Is” as one of the all-time greats, but I admire The Beatles for giving this much care and delicacy to a B-side.

In July, the next single arrived, Help b/w I’m Down. I mentioned in my thoughts about 1964 that the other Beatles, by all accounts, did not recognize any of Lennon’s darker compositions as cries for help. Somehow, their ignorance even extended when Lennon literally titled a song, “Help!“, in which John admits a staggering degree of vulnerability to a loved one and manages to pack a fair amount of complexity into what seems like a simple confessional. This is one of the Beatles’ most sturdily constructed and dramatically arranged songs; note especially the intro and chorus, in which the descending chords are are countered by the rising vocals of Paul and George. McCartney’s “I’m Down” complements the A-side well, channeling romantic and sexual frustration into a snarling Little Richard knock-off.

In August, the film Help! and its accompanying soundtrack album were released. The film was ultimately a letdown; even as a historical document of mid-60s Beatleness it pales in comparison to the esoteric Magical Mystery Tour. But the album is loaded with gems. It doesn’t have the unified wholeness or headlong rush of A Hard Day’s Night, but where it lacks in energy it bursts with nuance and curiosity. Side one is all the new songs from the film. Besides the two singles, the standout must be John’s “You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away,” which gets by on John’s tortured lyric (supposedly directed at manager Brian Epstein who was totally gay-bones for Lennon); otherwise it masks its Dylan influence just enough to not become utter homage. John’s superficially more upbeat offering “You’re Going to Lose That Girl” can still be heard often on oldies stations, but ultimately it sounds even more nasty in its treatment of women as objects to be used for settling manly scores. The bouncy bongos and backing vocals tie it sonically to Lennon’s earlier misogynist classic “You Can’t Do That;” and the lyrics make it a compelling companion piece as well.

Paul’s contributions, “The Night Before” and “Another Girl” are sophisticated melodic confections, signifying little if anything. I prefer “The Night Before” for its labyrinthine key changes and distressed vocal performance; “Another Girl” features solid lead guitar work by McCartney (bend those strings, dammit!) but has the same icky way-too-upbeat-for-a-breakup vibe as “I’ll Follow the Sun.” George’s sole composition from the film is “I Need You,” a prototypical mid-tempo Harrison lament. The lyric is a little clunky but the arrangement smartly uses the volume pedal to imbue a sense of anxiety and disorientation.

Side two is where things start to get really interesting. Things kick off with the best Ringo song yet, a cover of Buck Owens’ “Act Naturally,” and the album ends with a spirited reading of “Dizzy Miss Lizzy;” in between are the five songs that mark the beginning of The Beatles’ next career phase. “It’s Only Love” is almost too much melodrama coming from Lennon, but the arrangement is so delicate and continental-sounding, it’s hard to understand that these are the same guys who slammed out “Twist and Shout” just two years earlier. George matches Paul’s gift for melody on “You Like Me Too Much,” Paul and John reveal disarming sensitivity on “Tell Me What You See;” and both songs hinge on vintage-60′s electric piano. The latter is particularly striking in its portrayal of a blossoming relationship and the hesitation that comes with opening yourself completely to a new person.

And then there’s McCartney’s jawdropping acoustic pairing of “I’ve Just Seen a Face” and “Yesterday.” The prime placement of “Face” on the U.S. version of Rubber Soul has always led to a far greater estimation of the song over here than in Britain. It playfully opens with a feint, a spindly guitar duet that sounds like a great classical composition; then abruptly the band does a complete 180 into straight-up American country for the remainder of the song. I could extrapolate about how it sonically expresses the feeling of falling in love or some such nonsense, but regardless its my favorite part of the song and album. There remains little to be said about “Yesterday;” it’s been considered a standard since about five minutes after its release.

Day Tripper/We Can Work It Out is The Beatles first double-sided single – that is, it is the first single of theirs to make no distinction between an A-side and B-side. It’s a signal that band members and their handlers thought so highly of both tracks that it would be unfair to impugn the quality of one or the other by relegated it to the flip side. “Day Tripper” is defined by its George Harrison riff (ably doubled by McCartney’s bass). It’s one of the most instantly recognizable pieces of lead guitar in rock history (and a requisite for the beginning guitar player). The lyrics are straightforward blues, repeating three lines that paint a picture of a teasing woman who didn’t live up to the singer’s expectations. It could have been another exercise in barely controlled Lennon anger. But the riff and the vocal performances lend the tale an air of insouciant cool – blues for aloof Sixties hipsters.

“We Can Work It Out” is a stand-out collaboration between Lennon and McCartney, dominated by McCartney’s earnest optimism. Looking to resolve an argument, McCartney’s verses call for empathy and patience and acknowledge the possibility of being wrong; Lennon’s bridge ominously warns that life is too short and precious to waste on conflict. In the broadest sense, this plea for peace and understanding is an early paean to the zeitgeist that would define the late 1960’s. A pump harmonium adds warm texture to a simple arrangement, with a recognizable tempo shift in the bridge emphasizing John’s distaste for “fussing and fighting, my friend.” All in all, this isn’t one of my favorites, despite it’s status as an apparent A-side and its perpetual popularity on oldies radio.

Released in December 1965, Rubber Soul marks the beginning of a trio of albums generally regarded as The Beatles’ finest and most groundbreaking. Rubber Soul tends to be the most underrated of the three, and its innovations are definitely the subtlest. It’s the first album since A Hard Day’s Night to be all original material by the group – no covers – and the first to feature songwriting credits from all four members of the group. In many ways, this is the end of the line on the band that The Beatles started as, the album that pushes the rock combo arrangement of guitar + bass + drums to its full creative capacity. The dominant instruments of the era are stretched like the image on the album cover, used to create as many textures and moods as possible, before turning to orchestras and sound effects and albums as conceptual art.

Paul McCartney said in Anthology that the real brilliance of The Beatles was not so much any movement they created, but instead that they were absorbing and popularizing the trends that fascinated them. The mid-Sixties saw a boom in folk music as Bob Dylan epitomized the conscientious troubadour before turning to rock and spawning the ponderous folk-rock movement in his wake. More importantly, he introduced The Beatles to marijuana and inspired a new, often wincing honesty in John Lennon’s songwriting. Many songs on the album feature the genre’s artlessly strummed acoustic guitars, but it would be reductive to simply call Rubber Soul “the folk-rock album.” At most, three, maybe four, songs on the record can be grouped with that genre in mood or style.

The one that that instantly leaps out is Lennon’s “Norwegian Wood (This Bird has Flown);” but the addition of warbly sitar already takes it beyond a simply Dylanism, and the loaded story in the lyrics is more broadly goofy, befitting The Beatles. George’s “If I Needed Someone” apes the chiming 12-string sound of The Byrds (which was already aped from Harrison in A Hard Day’s Night). The variety on the rest of the album belies the “folk rock” reputation, though. George’s other songwriting contribution, “Think for Yourself,” is a funky rebuke to conformity (or is it just a girl?) complete with melodic fuzz bass. Ringo also finally gets a songwriting credit on the forlorn country number, “What Goes On.”

McCartney’s songs are virtuosic in their breadth, if not as deeply felt as Lennon’s contributions. “You Won’t See Me” and “I’m Looking Through You” are surprisingly bitter, for all their tunefulness. “Drive My Car” is the sort of upbeat R&B that McCartney excelled at, and Lennon apparently had input in the saucy pick-up narrative. “Michelle” stands apart from the rest, one of the two best songs on the album. Possibly recorded entirely by McCartney, what started as a joke song making fun of Left Bank culture morphed into a breathtaking expression of unrequited (and untranslated) love. And all still with guitars, bass, and drums.

Lennon clearly towers over his peers in the writing department, essentially writing half of the album on his own (though “Wait” should probably count as a full Lennon-McCartney collabo). The musically and spiritually groovy “The Word” is another precursor to the imminent explosion of hippie culture. “http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IO2o99_K5Pw” is a nice dark companion piece to “Michelle” – Lennon sounds like a fly who’s trapped in a spiderweb and kind of enjoying it. “Run for Your Life” sends the album out on a genuinely chilling note, perhaps the only bum note he hits here.

“Nowhere Man” and “In My Life” seem like the last gasp of greatness for John, before he decides to check out for the next few years. The empathy and earnestness exhibited in the writing are quite moving, but it wouldn’t be the same without the stunning arrangements. The former makes great use of the Byrds folk-rock style, especially in the ringing guitar solo. “In My Life” is an even greater achievement, creating texture unimaginable even two years earlier for a rock combo, but which would be impossible for an orchestra or acoustic instruments to duplicate. The fake harpsichord solo is almost always a guaranteed tear-jerker.

And so 1965 ends much the way it started: with John Lennon in a murderous rage. But the progress The Beatles had made musically and personally meant that they had crossed the point of no return.

Year One was all about The Beatles’ raw charisma and rush towards Beatlemania at home and abroad. Year Two, then, finds John Lennon and Paul McCartney coming into their own as songwriters and the band as a whole trying to avoid fatigue. Just weeks after arriving home from their triumphant visit to America, The Beatles were occupied with filming their own feature, A Hard Day’s Night, as well as writing songs and recording songs to perform in the film. Yet they still managed to release a single that March, Can’t Buy Me Love b/w You Can’t Do That, which perfectly conjures the effortless energy the band could create at this stage of their career. “Can’t Buy Me Love” is something of a standard now, a song everyone knows and likes, even if they don’t really. It seems like typical McCartney that just at the moment The Beatles would become 22-year-old millionaires, he would downplay money’s value vis-a-vis love; but I can’t really tell if the titular sentiment is one of blissful revelation or pleading desperation. I dig the driving acoustic guitar, regardless.

“You Can’t Do That” shows the care with which The Beatles compiled their releases, and especially the way the paired their singles. The A-side is bouncy McCartney optimism; the B-side is unadulterated Lennon rage. Some stereotypes persist for a reason. The lyrics are basically an admonition to the singer’s girl not to mess around on him; when Paul and George add their aggressive backing vocals, it sounds uncomfortably like a guy and his bros ganging up on a girl. The highlight is John’s stuttering guitar solo, in which he sounds like he’s trying to strangle his Rickenbacker out of jealousy. Not gonna lie, the whole thing sounds super misogynistic now, especially since the whole tirade is triggered by the girl just talking to a guy. But I love the way the music and lyrics match perfectly. Historically, this is also the first Beatles release with George’s 12-string Rickenbacker.

In June comes the Long Tall Sally EP, a fairly minor release that’s still pretty enjoyable. “Long Tall Sally” is fun even if it is just McCartney showing off at this point. “I Call Your Name” is a funky number in the vein of the material that would soon appear on A Hard Day’s Night. It’s an early example of the painfully vulnerable confessional Lennon would ultimately specialize in; in the song, he basically he misses his ex-girlfriend and admits fault for the break-up. But he still feels the need to assert his toughness:

Oh I can’t sleep at night
But just the same
I never weep at night
I call your name

“Slow Down” is a throwaway cover, but on the remaster you can more clearly hear George Martin rocking the piano, Jerry Lee Lewis-style. I don’t even want to talk about Ringo’s take on “Matchbox.”

In July, The Beatles simultaneously dropped the full-length album A Hard Day’s Night and the single A Hard Day’s Night b/w Things We Said Today. The most notable aspect of the album is the songwriting credit – 13 songs, all Lennon-McCartney originals. This is the first Beatles album with a distinctly acoustic sound. Perhaps they realized they could lay off the electric guitars and mix things up without losing their momentum. The first seven songs are all featured in the accompanying film and they’re all either essential Beatles or just catchy as shit. “A Hard Day’s Night” feels like the inauguration of The Sixties; musicologists and mathematicians are still trying to decipher the complex chord that starts the song. It boggles the mind that John and Paul basically wrote this in 20 minutes at the eleventh hour because they needed another movie song. “And I Love Her” shows restraint and became the model for McCartney tenderness at its best. George gets to sing the throwaway “I’m Happy Just to Dance With You,” which may actually be the most hummable song in the film. My personal highlight is “If I Fell,” in which Lennon makes a nice call back to their own big hit by discovering that “love [is] more than just holding hands.” The lyrics are another expression of Lennon’s trademark vulnerability, a plea for some marker of trust with his new lover before he breaks off his current relationship. Honestly, it’s kind of funny that the title is “If I Fell,” because between the breathtaking harmonies and delicate arrangement the dude already seems very unhypothetically invested. “Tell My Why” is more upbeat self-flagellation from John.

The B-side material is just as strong. “Any Time at All” is a rewrite of “It Won’t Be Long” (not a bad thing). “I’ll Cry Instead” finds John in top self-loathing form and has first of many Beatles lyrics about shoulders. (Okay, there aren’t really that many.) I didn’t realize until this listen how thoroughly Lennon dominates the album. “Things We Said Today” is actually the only McCartney composition on Side Two, a wistful expression of the idea that our present will be rosy nostalgia someday. “When I Get Home” isn’t a great song, but it certainly intriguing in the narrative of cheating and regret it suggests. Unlike the previous albums which ended with smashing rave-ups, A Hard Day’s Night fades out with the resigned “I’ll Be Back,” perhaps the group’s most mature effort to date.

Four months later, The Beatles released their next single I Feel Fine b/w She’s a Woman. John’s lyrics for “I Feel Fine” seem like a retort to McCartney’s hit “Can’t Buy Me Love”:

Well her baby buys her things, you know,
He buys her diamond rings, you know
She said so
She’s in love with me and I feel fine

See, Paul? John treats his “baby” right by throwing money at her, and he feels fine. More than anything, I think the song is pretty much about how awesome it was to be a Beatle, despite the soul-sucking Beatlemania and relentless touring schedule that supposedly sapped their energy around this period. The Ray Charles cymbal work by Ringo has always stuck out to me (and its a bitch to play in Rock Band). I also like the story of the accidental feedback and how they incorporated that. “She’s a Woman” is a crappy Little Richard knock-off by Paul, not worth sitting through for the brief explosion in the chorus.

A week later, The Beatles released their fourth full-length album, Beatles for Sale. Surely they must have felt more like a traded and held commodity than respected human beings, and that sort of isolation dejection comes through on the new compositions. But the album also is a return to the 8 originals + 6 covers formula of the first two, and so it feels like a retreat, especially since the covers collectively aren’t worthwhile.

Beatles for Sale starts strong with three more dark dark Lennon songs, two of them the best of the album. “No Reply” has John, in voyeuristic fashion, stalking his girlfriend (who has clearly moved on to another guy) to the point where she is hiding in her house and not answering her phone (hence the title). The music is good, dramatic, minor-key stuff, but the narrator sounds completely unhinged. “I’m a Loser” at least hides its misery in upbeat country trappings. “Baby’s in Black” gets really morbid; under the harmonies the singer seems pissed that his object of affection is still mourning her dead lover, even to the point where he laments her “mistake”. Later on, “I Don’t Want to Spoil the Party” is a great piece of drunken passive-aggression – he clearly does want to spoil the party.

McCartney’s material is similarly downbeat, but nicer and prettier! “I’ll Follow the Sun” always struck me as kind of callous for a break-up song, but it’s rightly considered a classic. “What You’re Doing” is a tense “are you breaking up with me” confrontation. Even the giddy chorus of “Every Little Thing” is matched with the contemplation of the verses. Indeed, the only purely happy song here is “Eight Days a Week,” which remains as infectious as a monkey in a Danny Boyle zombie movie.

Of the covers, Chuck Berry’s “Rock and Roll Music” recaptures the swagger of 1963; and it’s pretty funny hearing George (the shy one) sing Carl Perkins’ braggadocio lyrics in “Everybody’s Trying to Be My Baby“. The rest are inessential at best; “Mr. Moonlight” may literally be the worst thing The Beatles put to tape.

And so 1964 ends. And what have we learned? Paul and John grew as songwriters by leaps and bounds. George created folk-rock. Endless touring/recording/existing as the most famous people on earth sucks. The other Beatles clearly did not understand John’s songwriting as a constant cry for help. And even when The Beatles took a step backward, they were still relentlessly moving forward.

My good buddy Stillman once hit on a profound truth: the story of The Beatles represents the ultimate coming-of-age tale, a bildungsroman that would be the Platonic ideal of the form – except that it actually did happen less than fifty years ago. The story is obviously enhanced by the lasting music, but there’s symbiosis in that the story itself makes the music more lasting, more associative with similar touchstones in our own lives.

And so we start at the beginning, when the tight-knit group of guitarists John Lennon, Paul McCartney (converted to bass), and George Harrison are joined by drummer Ringo Starr to begin their recording career. Given the towering legacy of the group, one wonders what the fuss was all about when they issued their first single, Love Me Do b/w P.S. I Love You. The melody and lyrics of the A-side give new definition to the term “simplistic.” Paul’s solo vocal is wooden and shaky, which would never be a problem again. Indeed, the most distinctive thing about it is John’s bluesy harmonica. The contemporary music press was apparently fixated on the harmonica as the defining characteristic of The Beatles, the thing that made them stand out from other “beat groups;” John’s harp seems almost an afterthought now. The B-side is better, a diverting McCartney trifle that makes explicit the notion of these pop songs as love letters to the group’s female fans. The admittedly moderate success of the single was more likely a display of local loyalty than an indication of quality.

Just three months later, the chaps had already stepped up their game with Please Please Me b/w Ask Me Why. Their first chart-topper, “Please Please Me” was Lennon’s attempt to ape the melodramatic style of Roy Orbison. The band sped up the arrangement at the behest of producer George Martin, and with the throbbing energy of the rhythm section the tension and release are even more sharply felt than they would have been, especially in the buildup to the chorus. The perfunctory “John sings low, Paul sings high” harmonizing on the first record is replaced with a more dynamic integration where you can’t imagine one vocal part without the other. It all adds up to the greatest song of all time about fellatio. “Ask Me Why” is a pretty enough mid-tempo ballad with some unusual chord changes; it also has a nice Orbison flavor to it. I remember this being a favorite of mine when I was young and my dad was introducing me to the early Beatles stuff. Now it just seems fine for what it is, a perfectly competent B-side.

The first full-length album Please Please Me is a bit of an uneven listen now. The Beatles supposedly prided themselves on not offering an album with any filler; but this one has the four songs from the previously-issued singles and six covers of other artists’ material. That leaves four new Lennon-McCartney compositions: “I Saw Her Standing There,” “Misery,” “Do You Want to Know a Secret” and “There’s a Place“. None of them are strictly bad, but let’s just say “Misery” never really turns up on the oldies stations these days. “Do You Want to Know a Secret” remains endearing (listen to those “doo-dah-doo” harmonies and try not to smile).

Only barn-burning opener “I Saw Her Standing There” and epic closer “Twist and Shout” seem essential. In making the case for Paul McCartney as the best bassist ever, “I Saw Her Standing There” is Exhibit A; and at a time when rock music was still very much the dance music of choice the song’s club jailbait narrative is a perfect example of complementary content and form. “Twist and Shout” still sounds wild and out-of-control, mostly from John’s larynx-destroying vocals.

The reason I’m trying to do this chronologically and including single releases is to relate just how quickly this music was made. The frequency of output is unparalleled anymore; just three weeks after the LP, The Beatles released their next number one From Me to You b/w Thank You Girl, two more “love letter” songs of varying quality. I just flat-out love “From Me to You”. The Beatles were a big deal in Britain by now, and in the wider (ie older) culture they were more noted for the androgynous haircuts and falsetto “OOOOO”-ing than for their playing chops or song writing. Here, the Beatles cleverly integrate the falsetto into the lyrics (“if there’s anything I can DOOOOOOOO”); they hit upon a new chord for them in the bridge (G-minor); and they discover the possibilities of changing an arrangement as a song progresses (adding a harmony part to the second bridge). McCartney has acknowledged that “Thank You Girl” was essentially a tossed-off note for the fan club girls, but it still has the typical mix of drive and sweetness.

Another four months until the next game-changer, She Loves You b/w I’ll Get You. John and Paul are already tinkering with the formula, still writing about young romantic concerns but now from a third-person perspective. Trying to listen with fresh ears, the lyrics are engagingly conversational, sung with the enthusiasm of a good friend delivering great news. On the remaster (only the mono version exists) the crashing cymbals really stand out, along with George’s descending chords in the refrain. The group was apparently savaged for the use of the slang word “yeah,” but their boundless energy at the moment could not be contained by the syntax police. “I’ll Get You” is the group’s first first slightly sour composition, in which a suitor’s declaration of persistence begins to come off as stalkerish; but the melody and harmony are so arresting that it’s not too big a deal.

It’s one of those freaky cultural occurances, that on the same day The Beatles dropped their second album, With The Beatles, President Kennedy was assassinated in Texas. Armchair cultural theorists suggest that post-JFK America had a void shot through its previous optimism, and The Beatles soon came to fill that void. At the least, the arty-ponderous cover with the band members in black turtlenecks, faces half-shrouded, seems to foreshadow the winter of mourning America faced.

Sociology aside, With the Beatles feels more like a self-contained whole than the first album. Obviously it helps that it was recorded and compiled as a unit rather than a compilation; but the growth in the group’s own skills combined with their cover choices transform this into an inspired tribute to American R&B. The album opens with a three-shot of soulful Lennon-McCartney compositions: “It Won’t Be Long,” with it’s ebullient call-and-response, “All I’ve Got to Do,” and “All My Loving.” The last one may be the most important song of The Beatles career, the one they chose to open their epoch-making performance on The Ed Sullivan Show. I tend to get a little over-awed by this song, so I won’t try to describe it. Just do me a favor and go listen to it right now. “Don’t Bother Me” is George’s first recorded composition and adds some dark nuance to the bouncy proceedings before giving way to the 106-second throwaway “Little Child.” (Put down the harmonica, John.) The mostly-unplugged “Till There Was You” is admittedly sappy but well-done for what it is.

From “Please Mr. Postman” onward, though, the record is an amazing run of Motown, girl group and amped-up Merseybeat (in one instance at Ramones-speed). It’s really sort of audacious: ostensibly, the lads are just paying homage to their favorite American records – which happen to be the basis of modern American pop music. In the process of interspersing the Berry Gordy and Chuck Berry songs with their own, The Beatles firmly entrench themselves as an equal touchstone.

Only seven days after the album release, The Beatles finish out the year with another single, I Want to Hold Your Hand b/w This Boy. The A-side is the definitive early period single, the one that finally put the band over the top in America. It’s become something of a truism that it was silly for parents to get so upset or threatened by The Beatles’ influence on kids; my dad told me his dad derided The Beatles as “a whole lot of bang-bang-bang,” and it turns out he was correct in an unintended sense – the raw, churning nature of the music totally gives the lie to the innocence of the lyrics. I mean, there’s just NO way grown men would sing that way about holding hands. The tension between the urgent performance and the more peppy touches in the arrangement (those handclaps) feels like the purest expression of adolescent sexuality.

That makes “This Boy” the perfect flip side: a heartfelt and chaste plea for a girl to reconsider which boy she really wants. It’s a great example of how pop music – just music and lyrics – can turn the common and temporary pain of puppy love into a matter of earth-shattering importance. An early appearance of John, Paul, and George’s gorgeous three-part harmony capabilities, with John ardently stepping up his game in the solo bridge, “This Boy” might be the only Beatles song I can think of that penetrates the whole iconic Beatle-culture thing and affects me in the same manner as my favorite current music, which makes it an extra special song for me. Overall, the best and deepest single they had yet produced…and the recording career was barely a year old.