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I think Richards was refering to their handling of musical instruments, not song-writing ability.
"Cording" = chords. It is well documented that The Beatles used guitar chords that were more advanced and harmonically rich than what you would find in most popular music styles from the '50s and '60s.
Playing chords on a guitar is "handling a musical instrument."
Listen to McCartney's bass playing. His sense of melody and counterpoint is legendary on that instrument, and has been copies relentlessly for 50 years. So he doesn't play goofy, overly-busy runs like Jaco or Stanley Clark. So what?
"Cording" = chords. It is well documented that The Beatles used guitar chords that were more advanced and harmonically rich than what you would find in most popular music styles from the '50s and '60s.
Playing chords on a guitar is "handling a musical instrument."
Listen to McCartney's bass playing. His sense of melody and counterpoint is legendary on that instrument, and has been copies relentlessly for 50 years. So he doesn't play goofy, overly-busy runs like Jaco or Stanley Clark. So what?
Hey I love the Beatles as well. They were good musicians, good artists and they knew how to put catchy chords togethere. They all sang well, and many of them, particularly McCartney, was able to handle multiple instruments. But Harrison or Lennon was not in the same league of Clapton or Jimmy Page, Ringo was not a Ginger Baker, McCartney was not a John Entwistle. There is just no comparison.
Fortunetly the whole - their adequate skills as musicians, their songwriting skills, their creativity, their studio productions skills, their singing, was greater then the sum of it's parts. It was their synergy of Beatles that mattered, so that in effect they became arguably (and I will argue for) the best rock and roll band in history.
I don't see their guitar chords as particularly advanced, particularly in their early years as they were just duplicating and interpreting the skiffle and jazzed up american blues of that time. In later years as they focused more and more on the studio the songs got more complex but the guitar became less important, the effects became more and more important. And thus we get into the debate of "playing" as opposed to "composing". The Beatles did not tour after 1966. Thus we really don't have a sense of how they were as live musicians except for a few glimpses (the Roof Top tapings of only a few songs). But, one telling note - Harrison asked Clapton to record the beautiful and complex guitar solo for "While My Guitar Gently Weeps".
Do you think the Beatles are overrated?
Oh, definitely. So are we.
Why?
In that moment, the Beatles… But how can you—I mean yes. I'll say yes. As a musician, yes. As a breath of fresh air and an injection of life into society, no, they were certainly not. They were exactly what was needed. It was a great enema.
What does that make you guys?
A great toilet bowl. [laughs]
...
Keith Richards is saying, as a musican (possibly referring to himself), I find them over rated. That is not the same as saying "The Beatles are over rated as musicians." However, it's hard to know the true meaning of his statement, since its a jumbled mess of words.
If you, or anyone you know, or have ever even heard of, can put together a band that did what they did, then we can talk about how to "rate" them. Until then, they earned and deserve every praise they ever got.
Anything else is nothing more than sour grapes.
i think keith has plenty of laurels of his own. i don't think its sour grapes.
you have to realize, keith has been doing this successfully far, far longer than the beatles did. period. i don't consider the beatles to be outstanding musicians either, nor do i consider the stones to be so. when the musical universe includes so many REAL players like bert jansch, charlie parker, charles mingus, even jerry garcia, the stakes are pretty high for pure musicianship. the beatles were good musicians, but what they really excelled in was songwriting. and when you consider that keith was influenced by and rubbed elbows with monsters like muddy waters, his standards are gonna be high.
the stones and the beatles had the feel, and they had talent. it was a whole package. in a way, that's harder to find. tho i will say, i do consider charlie watts to be one of the greatest drummers of all time. just saying. he swings.
I disagree with him though. just because it sounds 'simple' doesn't mean it was easy! tons of other popular bands have created their entire sound/chord progressions off of those two bands' songs! You listen to Poison and everything about that sounds like "the 1980s." It's dated and it's not 'fresh sounding.' you listen to the beatles or the stones and any of their songs (take your pick) could've been made in the 60s or 2012. I think there's something to be said for that and nothing about it is overrated.
You gotta love the guy. Well I do anyway. Perhaps he was showing humility for the Stones and honestly the Beatles were a bit bumble gummy there at the beginning
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