What was the worst album by the Beatles?

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It has more original songs than Beatles for Sale (as if that should be some measurement of quality — it isn’t), but the two stellar Lennon singles, “Yesterday” and “I’ve Just Seen a Face" aside, most of the songs are second rate. “You’re Gonna Lose that Girl” is good fun, but “You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away” is candy-floss Dylan that is saved only by the beautiful vocal in my opinion; the mid-tempo McCartney rockers are dull and the George Harrison songs are awful. “Tell Me What You See” is supremely annoying. All of these songs have interesting bits: the Beatles certainly always tried their hardest to make songs work.
“Act Naturally” I kind of like but “Dizzy Miss Lizzy”—compared to the Beatles other Larry Williams covers, especially — is a sloppy mess.
I think it would have been improved by taking off the Harrison songs, and the covers and adding the two B-sides, the pleasant enough “Yes It is” and the really rockin’ “I’m Down” which kicks “Dizzy Miss Lizzy”’s sloppily double-tracked ass all over the room.
It’s still not a bad album. The heights are very high indeed and the lows are listenable and well-crafted. But I think the strain was telling on them and I think it’s their worst album: yes, worse than Let It Be, which I think is ridiculously underrated, even though I admit that it’s a bit of a mess — which is what makes it such an honest document.

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