You make it easy for yourself by going with 'Yesterday', which is indeed, like 'Blackbird' a simple song with simple production values.nuffink wrote:I'm sorry, I just disagree. Yesterday isn't the most covered song of all time because of GM's production. It would have been if I'd have produced it and I'm shite.
History doesn't record who stretched Picasso's canvasses for him. George, through assiduous self promotion has made sure of his place.
'A Day in the Life' on the other hand, would have been something else entirely without George Martin. John may have 'come up' with the 'Orchestra going out of control' idea, but GM wrote the music for it, orchestrated it, recorded it, and mixed it with everything else using old fashioned tape splicing.
Perhaps you think that would be easy to do with the technology they, or rather, he had at their (his) disposal.
But whether or no, 'merely stretching the canvas' is a pretty unrealistic representation of George Martins role.
I dig all those bands, And yet The Beatles still stand out. Avant Garde is ground breaking music, and yet I get lost inside the noodlings to quickly. I can listen to jazz for hours and still grove to an old beatles tune. It's apples and Oranges. I need Zappa as much as I need the Beatles,Pink Floyd. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus , Miles Davis et all. And I make no distinction with good music. If it catches my ear and it touches my soul, It's good music 
Ol GM might have acted to smooth over the fab four's experimental urges but that's history. I love it for what it is/was/and forever will be. It was Pop, melodic,catchy,cutting edge,new,different, and most of all good music. Great craft. and just plain beatles.