Trippin' Down Abbey Road

Released almost 40 years ago, the Beatles' Abbey Road still does not disappoint. On the contrary, like most Beatles' music/poetry, their artistry reveals subtle textures and nuances which reverberate through time and space. While each song is a masterpiece individually, the album expresses itself most eloquently as a sumptuous feast offering many distinct but complementary flavors, one path with surprising twists and turns.

Opening with Lennon & McCartney's Come Together (one thing I can tell you is you've got to be free), softened and mellowed by Something (in the way she moves...) we are led on a playful romp through Maxwell's Silver Hammer (naughty boy), Oh! Darling (pure schmaltz) and Octopus's Garden (happy and safe). The mood palpably shifts with I Want You / She's So Heavy - an intimation of a deeper dimension to come - this segment takes us beyond our comfort zone into impatience and expectation; finally with Here Comes The Sun we can relax and let go (it's all right...); a wormhole opens with Because:

because the world is round it turns me on
because the wind is high it blows my mind
because the sky is blue it makes me cry

Then it starts to get really interesting...

Weaving sensuously through You Never Give Me Your Money (oh that magic feeling, nowhere to go) and (here comes the) Sun King (quando paramucho mi amore...), awareness like a guitar string vibrates in perfect harmony with ~~

Abruptly Mean Mr. Mustard (such a dirty old man) shatters that reverie - the energy shifts, expanding through a completely seamless transition as Polythene Pam rockets us higher and higher, reaching the album's exquisite crescendo, its perfect wave - cascading into She Came In Through The Bathroom Window (didn't anybody tell her...), riding the awesome power of that wave all the way to the shore...

Golden Slumbers is a gentle denouement, a tender lullabye (once there was a way to get back home), and that mood continues into Carry That Weight, but surprise! - another flawless segue into an incredible guitar/drum piece (oh yeah! all right!) and we peak again, with a joyous freefall to The End:

and in the end the love you take
is equal to the love you make

Her Majesty arrives after a silence that seems a bit too long, incongruous but somehow perfect - it pops the bubble and we're back.

What a trip.
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