Editing The Beatles (album) (section)

==Cultural responses==
The release coincided with public condemnation of Lennon's treatment of Cynthia, and of his and Ono's joint projects, particularly ''Two Virgins''.{{sfn|Schaffner|1978|pp=106–07}}{{sfn|Doggett|2011|pp=52, 55}} The British authorities similarly displayed a less tolerant attitude towards the Beatles,{{sfn|Schaffner|1978|p=107}} when London Drug Squad officers arrested Lennon and Ono in October 1968 for marijuana possession, a charge that he claimed was false.{{sfn|Doggett|2011|p=55}}

===Lyrical misinterpretations===
The album's lyrics progressed from being vague to open-ended and prone to misinterpretation of authorial intention, such as "Glass Onion" (e.g., "the walrus was Paul"){{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=275}} and "Piggies" ("what they need's a damn good whacking").{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=278}} In the case of "Back in the U.S.S.R.", the words were interpreted by Christian evangelist [[David Noebel]] as further proof of the Beatles' compliance in a [[Communist]] plot to [[Brainwashing|brainwash]] American youth.{{sfn|Schaffner|1978|pp=53, 113}} According to MacDonald, the [[counterculture of the 1960s]] analysed ''The Beatles'' above and beyond all of the band's previous releases.{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=273}}{{Clarify|date=July 2024|reason=did they analyse it more often/intensely than others, it did they consider it AS being greater than others? }} Lennon's lyrics on "Revolution 1" were misinterpreted with messages he did not intend. In the album version, he advises those who "talk about destruction" to "count me out". Lennon then follows the sung word "out" with the spoken word "in". At the time of the album's release – which followed, chronologically, the up-tempo single version of the song, "Revolution" – that single word "in" was taken by the [[Political radicalism|radical]] [[political left]] as Lennon's endorsement of politically motivated violence, which followed the [[May 1968 events in France|May 1968 Paris riots]].{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|pp=248–49}} However, the album version was recorded first.{{efn|Recording on "Revolution 1" began on 30 May,{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=245}} "Revolution" on 9 July.{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=259}}}}

[[Charles Manson]] first heard the album not long after it was released. Manson may have found hidden meanings in songs from earlier Beatles albums,{{sfn|Nielsen|2005|p=90}} but, according to [[Vincent Bugliosi]] in ''The Beatles'', Manson allegedly interpreted prophetic significance in several of the songs, including "Blackbird", "Piggies" (particularly the line "what they need's a damn good whacking"), "Helter Skelter", "Revolution 1" and "Revolution 9",{{sfn|Guinn|2013|p=194}} and interpreted the lyrics as a sign of imminent violence or war.{{sfn|Sheffield|2004|p=54}} He and other members and associates of the [[Manson family]] repeatedly listened to it, and he allegedly told them that it was an [[Apocalypse|apocalyptic]] message predicting an [[Ethnic conflict|uprising of oppressed races]],{{sfn|Guinn|2013|p=196}} drawing parallels with chapter 9 of the [[Book of Revelation]].{{sfn|Nielsen|2005|p=92}} Paul McCartney said, "Charles Manson interpreted that Helter Skelter was something to do with the four horsemen of the Apocalypse."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Polcaro |first=Rafael |date=2019-09-05 |title=What the Beatles said about Charles Manson inspiration on “Helter Skelter” |url=https://rockandrollgarage.com/what-the-beatles-said-about-charles-manson-inspiration-on-helter-skelter/ |access-date=2025-02-25 |website=Rock and Roll Garage |language=en-US}}</ref>

===New Left criticism===
Further to the betrayal they had felt at Lennon's non-activist stance in "Revolution", [[New Left]] commentators condemned ''The Beatles'' for its failure to offer a political agenda.{{sfn|Roessner|2006|p=149}} The Beatles themselves were accused of using eclecticism and pastiche as a means of avoiding important issues in the [[Protests of 1968|turbulent political and social climate]].{{sfn|Roessner|2006|p=149}} [[Jon Landau]], writing for the [[Liberation News Service]], argued that, particularly in "Piggies" and "Rocky Raccoon", the band had adopted parody because they were "afraid of confronting reality" and "the urgencies of the moment".{{sfn|Wiener|1991|p=65}} Like Landau, many writers among the New Left considered the album outdated and irrelevant; instead, they heralded the Rolling Stones' concurrent release, ''[[Beggars Banquet]]'', as what Lennon biographer [[Jon Wiener]] terms "the 'strong solution,' a musical turning outward, toward the political and social battles of the day".{{sfn|Wiener|1991|pp=65–66}}

===Popular music and postmodernism===
Sociologists Michael Katovich and Wesley Longhofer write that the album's release created "a collective appreciation of it as a 'state-of-the-art' rendition of the current pop, rock, and folk-rock sounds".{{sfn|Katovich|Longhofer|2009|p = 401}} The majority of historians categorise ''The Beatles'' as [[Postmodern music|postmodern]], emphasising aesthetic and stylistic features of the album;{{sfn|Womack|2008|pp=210–11}}{{efn|According to author and music critic [[Kenneth Womack]], the list of critical works referring to the White Album as postmodernist includes Henry W. Sullivan's ''The Beatles with Lacan: Rock 'n' Roll as Requiem for the Modern Age'' (1995), Ed Whitley's "The Postmodern White Album" (2000), [[David Quantick]]'s ''Revolution: The Making of the Beatles' White Album'' (2002), Devin McKinney's ''Magic Circles: The Beatles in Dream and History'' (2003), and Jeffrey Roessner's "We All Want to Change the World: Postmodern Politics and the Beatles' White Album" (2006).{{sfn|Womack|2008|pp=210–11}}}} Inglis, for example, lists [[bricolage]], fragmentation, pastiche, parody, [[Reflexivity (social theory)|reflexivity]], [[Pluralism (political theory)|plurality]], irony, exaggeration, anti-representation and "meta-art", and says that it "has been designated as popular music's first postmodern album".{{sfn|Inglis|2009|pp=120–21}} Authors such as [[Fredric Jameson]], Andrew Goodwin and [[Kenneth Womack]] instead situate all of the Beatles' work within a [[musical modernism|modernist]] stance, based either on their "artificiality"{{sfn|Goodwin|2006|p=442}} or their ideological stance of progress through love and peace.{{sfn|Womack|2008|p=212}} Scapelliti cites ''The Beatles'' as the source of "the freeform nihilism echoed … in the [[punk rock|punk]] and [[Alternative rock|alternative music]] genres".{{sfn|Graff|Durchholz|1999|p=88}} In his introduction to ''Rolling Stone''{{'}}s list of the "100 Greatest Beatles Songs", [[Elvis Costello]] comments on the band's pervasive influence into the 21st century and concludes: "The scope and license of the White Album has permitted everyone from [[OutKast]] to [[Radiohead]] to [[Green Day]] to [[Joanna Newsom]] to roll their picture out on a broader, bolder canvas."<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/100-greatest-beatles-songs-154008/back-in-the-ussr-162967/|author=Rolling Stone staff|title=100 Greatest Beatles Songs|magazine=[[Rolling Stone|rollingstone.com]]|date=19 September 2011|access-date=14 March 2019}}</ref>

In early 2013, the Recess Gallery in New York City's [[SoHo, Manhattan|SoHo]] neighbourhood presented ''We Buy White Albums'', an [[installation art|installation]] by artist [[Rutherford Chang]]. The piece was in the form of a record store in which nothing but original pressings of the LP was on display.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/23/arts/design/artists-obsession-with-beatles-white-album-on-display.html|title=A Plain White Square, and Yet So Fascinating|first=Allan|last=Kozinn|work=The New York Times|date=22 February 2013|access-date=14 July 2014}}</ref> Chang created a recording in which the sounds of one hundred copies of side one of the first LP were overlaid.<ref>{{cite journal|url=http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/11/21/white_album_x_100_listen_to_beatles_project_we_buy_white_albums_by_rutherford.html|title=What It Sounds Like If You Play 100 Vinyl Copies of 'The White Album' at Once|journal=Slate|date=21 November 2013|access-date=14 July 2014|last1=Haglund|first1=David}}</ref>