The Beatles - Help!

The title track was a joke to everyone but the man who wrote it. John Lennon later admitted that "Help!" was a real cry from someone overwhelmed by fame, dressed up as a bright pop single. That tension between surface shine and something deeper runs through the whole of this 1965 album.

Side one collects the songs from the band's second feature film, including the chiming "Ticket to Ride," with its heavy, droning beat, and Lennon's Dylan-influenced "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away." Side two is where the future arrives. Paul McCartney's "Yesterday," performed with only a string quartet behind him, became one of the most recorded songs in history, while "I've Just Seen a Face" hints at the folk-rock direction the group would soon chase. George Harrison contributes two songs, and Ringo takes the mic for a cheerful cover of Buck Owens' "Act Naturally."

Help! sits right at the hinge of the Beatles' career, the last album before Rubber Soul turned them fully inward, and it catches the band at its most confidently melodic.

Pressed on 180-gram vinyl from the 2009 stereo remasters, in a replica of the original Parlophone sleeve. Essential Beatles.