History YMMV / TheWhiteAlbum

* EnsembleDarkHorse: As with ''Music/{{Revolver|Beatles Album}}'', this is sometimes cited as the Beatles' best album instead of ''[[Music/SgtPeppersLonelyHeartsClubBand Sgt. Pepper's]]''.

* OnceOriginalNowCommon: "Helter Skelter" was one of the heaviest rock songs in The60s, but this quality is less unique nowadays, given the many, many heavy metal bands out there. Ironically, [=McCartney=] created "Helter Skelter" to outdo Music/TheWho's "I Can See For Miles", which The Who claimed was their loudest, harshest song yet.

* FanNickname: The title "The White Album". Also began the informal convention of nicknaming a band's SelfTitledAlbum after the defining feature of its cover art (e.g. the Music/{{Weezer}} self-titled albums, named after the background colors, and Music/PeterGabriel's first three albums, named after the cover photos).

* TrueArtIsIncomprehensible: "Revolution 9" is a dissonant ''musique concrète'' piece made up of found tape fragments.

** As with most long double albums, there's the constant debate over if it would've been better as a single album, and if so which songs are filler and should be cut. It doesn't help that this is probably the album where the differences between John and Paul's writing stand out the most.

* SugarWiki/CrowningMomentOfFunny: Poor Rocky Raccoon and his [[EpicFail "showdown"]] with Dan.
** Also; The line about the ex-girlfriend's name ('Her name was Magill, and she called herself Lil, but everyone knew her as Nancy') which might imply that she was a prostitute... making his reaction to the breakup even more stupid.
** Rocky's line "It's only a scratch" became more amusing after both Music/GeorgeHarrison and Music/RingoStarr befriended the cast of Creator/MontyPython, whose film ''Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail'' featured a more memorable instance of the phrase.
* EnsembleDarkhorse: As with ''Music/{{Revolver|Beatles Album}}'', this is sometimes cited as the Beatles' best album instead of ''[[Music/SgtPeppersLonelyHeartsClubBand Sgt. Pepper's]]''.

* HilariousInHindsight: From "Rocky Raccoon", "Her name was Magill, and she called herself Lil, but everyone knew her as Nancy". In 2011, Paul married Nancy Shevell.

** "Wild Honey Pie" is either a hilarious SoBadItsGood track; or just a plain bad, unlistenable, and completely pointless addition.

* GeniusBonus: "Helter Skelter" takes its name from a type of slide used at carnivals, but it was originally an older English expression meaning "in confused, disorderly haste"--a pretty good description of the song itself.

** Sadly, American cult leader UsefulNotes/CharlesManson still managed to interpret the lyrics of the songs "Piggies", "Revolution 1", "Revolution 9", "I Will", "Honey Pie", "Blackbird" and "Helter Skelter" as convoluted prophecy of an apocalyptic race war, which he then attempted to instigate by forming a cult of serial killers, who then proceeded to commit one of the most notorious series of murders in American history at Manson's direction. For a more elaborate description of his {{Cloudcuckoolander}} interpretations, see [[http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansonbeatles.html this link]]. The mere fact that "Honey Pie", possibly the most innocuous song in the history of English-language popular music, was taken by Manson as a secret message to him and his followers (the key line was "your Hollywood song", which Manson took as a ShoutOut to him in Los Angeles), gives you an idea of how deranged he was.

* "Wild Honey Pie" is either a hilarious SoBadItsGood track or just plain bad, unlistenable, and a completely pointless addition.

* CriticalBacklash: "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da" routinely finds its way onto "worst songs of all time" lists, which confuses fans who both find it to be a silly, but fun little toe-tapper, and wonder why it gets singled out for such a bad reputation of all the songs on the album, given that "Wild Honey Pie" and especially "Revolution 9" are more likely to draw criticism from fans.

* CriticalBacklash: "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da" routinely finds its way onto "worst songs of all time" lists, which confuses fans who both find it to be a silly but fun little toe-tapper, and wonder why it gets singled out for such a bad reputation of all the songs on the album, given that "Wild Honey Pie" and especially "Revolution 9" are more likely to draw criticism from fans.