The big Apple was dropped last week. Now its time to drop the candy corn. For the next 40 days we will be swan diving into Halloween Season. As such, all things horror will be discussed. Nothing is off the table: film, music, fiction, true crime. Today we're going into horror fiction.
Horror fiction has been on a glorious resurgence in the past twenty years. This post aims to highlight that along with some of th other authors who have not gotten enough of a spotlight compared to the ones you'd find sitting on a shelf at Barnes and Noble. Sure we've read our share of Lovecraft, Stephen King, Shirley Jackson and Clive Barker. They are masters of the form for a reason.
Here are the children who were kept up late at night and reading The Haunting of Hill House and Carrie and The Colour From Outer Space and decided "I want to do that."
NOVELS
The Fisherman by John Langan
A novel of grief and eldrich gods. The Fisherman taps into a horrifying what if scenario: would you trade the bond you made with your best friend for the chance to see people in your life again who have been dead for years.
House of Leaves by Mark Danielewski
I feel obligated to include this one even though it is fairly popular. A book whose prose takes on the form of the house you are reading about. It expands, contracts. Words run off the page. It's about as immersive a narrative one can get from a book.
Off Season by Jack Ketchum
By far the grisliest book on this list. If its blood you've come for, look no further than this tale of feral cannibals.
The Elementals by Michael McDowell
The screenwriter of Beetlejuice got his start as a novelist writing horror paperbacks. His books delve into the Southern Gothic Horror genre. Imagine Barbara Maitland opening the door to the desert filled alternate world but instead of sandworms you have three houses built next to each other with the third one slowly being swallowed by the sand. Oh yeah, there's also specters among them. Stephen King called McDowell the finest writer of paperback originals in America. This book is proof of that.
Hell Hound by Ken Greenhall
Another book I discovered from Grady Hendrix's Paperbacks From Hell. It is told from the perspective of a dog named Baxter, a sociopathic bull terrier. How could you not be interested after hearing that premise?
A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay
The demonic possession genre is responsible for one of the scariest movies in horror: The Exorcist. It's the benchmark of not just that subgenre but what many consider for the horror genre itself. Paul Tremblay breathes new life into the subgenre by posing a terrifying question: what if the little girl possessed is really just suffering from mental illness. He then goes further: what happens if said mental illness is exploited by reality television? This one genuinely scared me.
Experimental Film by Gemma Files
Film, especially silent film is something that endlessly fascinates me. Cosmic forces trying to worm their way into our universe via lost Canadian film.
Mongrels by Stephen Graham Jones
A coming of age story where the narrator is born into a family of werewolves. Each chapter feels like a stand alone vignette which makes for a great reading experience.
The Cipher by Kathe Koja
"Nicholas is a would be poet and video store clerk with a weeping hole in his hand- weeping not blood, but a plasma of tears..." I heard about this through Grady Hendrix's Paperbacks From Hell. This opening synopsis of the book instantly put its hooks in me as a book I had to read. Reading was being witness to the unraveling of the human psyche. Koja's characters are unlikable, letting their base desires drive them without much hesitation or regret.
NOVELLAS
A Lush and Seething Hell by John Horner Jacobs
"A mix between Roberto Bolano and HP Lovecraft" is the kind of blurb to put on a book if you want to make me blind buy it. Jacobs takes cosmic horror and Latin American dictatorship and combines the two into story called The Sea Dreams It Is the Sky that continually made me say in my head "I wish I thought of this." The second story, My Heart Struck Sorrow deals with a librarian discovering a recording from the Deep South which may be the stylings of the Devil himself.
SHORT STORIES
The velocity of a short story is something I continue to turn to when I need a quick emotional punch. A jolt to the system.
Teatro Grottesco by Thomas Ligotti
This might be my favorite collection on this list, so I put it at the top. Grotesque factories, warped towns, clowns, puppets and half glimpsed horrors abound in these stories. Ligotti even touches on corporate horror in the story "Our Temporary Supervisor." Don't expect conventional horror. This is atmosphere and dread from a writer whose nihilistic worldview has become the influence of True Detective's Rust Cohle.
Also check out: Songs of A Dead Dreamer and Grimscribe
North American Lake Monsters by Nathan Ballingrud
Ballingrud's stories pack an emotional punch with no sentimentality to be found. The horror happens around the margins. These stories are more focused on fears of the social outcast and the people who struggle to maintain relationships.
The Beautiful Thing That Awaits Us All by Laird Barron
If you enjoyed the hard boiled noir aspects of True Detective and wanted it to delve even further into its cosmic horror leanings, this should be at the top of your reading list. Blackwoods Baby and The Men From Porlock are two of my favorite short stories and both are contained in this collection. If you love this and want to know where to go next, check out his other two cosmic horror collections The Imago Sequence and Occultation.
The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter
Fairy tales with a macabre, twisted bent to them. It's blend of sex and gothic horror is close to perfect.
Things We Lost In the Fire by Mariana Enriquez
The darkest corners of South America and the human mind are explored in this collection. Tales shift from psychological to Lovecraftian.
A Collapse of Horses by Brian Evenson
Coffee House Press put out a bunch of Evenson's work and I recommend all of it. If you need something to start with, his short story collections A Collapse of Horses and Song For the Unraveling of the World are tough to beat. If you like your horror existential, bleak, bizarre and filled with disquieting, Kafkaesque weirdness, Evenson's fiction is the place to go to.
We Live Inside You by Jeremy Robert Johnson
When Susurrus Stirs is a story that continues to haunt me. Parasites, body horror, and darkly comic tales that get under the skin.
Furnace by Livia Llewelyn
Erotically charged stories of the ultra strange. Sumptuous prose and unsettling dream logic.
Revenge by Yoko Ogawa
While this isn't full on horror, there are stories in here that stack up to any eeriness gleaned from more straightforward genre fiction.
It was 6 am and time for me to get up. Hunting season.
The wind blew against my face. The trees lined the horizon forward. I negotiated my way through a rocky snowbank that bordered a stream. The music fresh in my head. "Word are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup." Hunting trips with my dad carried with them the anticipation of cold weather, long walks and naps to and from the destination. Music would provide a coat of warmth. The sixties are a decade I carried around with me everywhere I went when I was young enough to be aware of pop culture. It's tendrils of influence stretch up to the present. No other pop culture artifact from that time period stirred me like The Beatles.
We stopped at a cafe on the way back home. I remember going to the restroom and humming "Lady Madonna, lying on the bed. Listen to the music playing in your head." My mind switching to the next song like a frantic railroad conductor switching tracks. "The minute you let her under your skin, then you begin to make it better." The songs cycling through by head. The only thing as exciting being the confectionary sugar adorned pancakes that await me.
We left the cafe and headed home. My discman waiting. The one CD I owned at the time- Past Master Vol. 2. I hit play. Track 1: Day Tripper. Up front, my dad is at the wheel. In the back with me, four lads from Liverpool. I retreat to a land of paperback writers and old brown shoes. Whether I was away from a device that played music or if I was listening to them on vinyl, or CD, they were there with me. The rhythms echoing in my bones. The melodies dancing in my soul.
Nothing's gonna change my world.
THE ALBUMS
Are you ready?
Brace youself!
Here they are!
Probably the most exciting thing about covering all these albums is seeing how The Beatles go from I Saw Her Standing There to Strawberry Fields Forever. The list of their achievements goes on and on but what always blew my mind was how much they were able to achieve in such a short period of time. Their career as it stands with John, Paul George and Ringo in the band spanned from 1962 to 1970. Even the most prolific bands like Pink Floyd, Rush, Genesis or the Rolling Stones go through comeback albums and different eras in a common 20 to 30 year period. The Beatles did it all in 7 years.
During the Beatles first trip to Hamburg, when it was John, Paul, George and Pete Best, their contract required them to play 6 nights a week for 6 to 7 hours a night. Up to that point they didn't play on stage for longer than 2 hours. They just didn't have that enough material. So they decided to play what they knew. The first Elvis Presley album from beginning to end, the first albums from Gene Vincent and Buddy Holly, and Eddie Cochrane. In doing so they find out what is good about these albums and what isn't good. If someone returned the next day, they made sure they wouldn't hear the same song. Even then you see the band challenging themselves. This was before a note was recorded in the studio. You see how they are able to develop in the studio in such a short period of time. The versatility gained from playing those songs and different styles show up all over the Beatles catalog. A variety of styles you can find in a single record.
The American experience of The Beatles begins on The Ed Sullivan Show. From a studio standpoint, their recording sessions began in 1963. Author and Beatles historian Mark Lewisohn offers another beginning: 1958. When John, Paul and George are first playing together. Since the studio albums are the subject of this post, we're going to declare 1963 as year one.
The wealth of Beatles books, documentaries, analyses, and studies is overwhelming. So it's important to parse out the cream of the crop. The toppermost of the poppermost. There are so many long and winding roads to go down when talking about this band. So for now, we are going to focus on the albums. Now the pictures are there, but you need the framework. You need history to know what was going on with them at the time to give context around the creation of each album.
What can be even more frustrating is with hundreds of books written on The Beatles, what history are you going follow?
In an interview with Beatles historiographer Erin Torkelsen Weber on the podcast Something About The Beatles, she neatly lays it all out. There are four major narratives when it comes to the history of The Beatles.
The first version we have goes from 1962 to 1970. In involves the unity and friendship of the band members, the necessity of the Lennon/McCartney partnership and the whitewashing of sex and drugs. Up until 1970, this was the version the band sold to people in their movies and press conferences.
The Paul McCartney press release that happens on April 9, 1970 effectively kills this narrative. A narrative already starting to crumble throughout 1968 and 1969. A vacuum is then created because he doesn't really leave a new version of Beatles history.
The vacuum is filled later in 1970 when John Lennon gives his famous Lennon Remembers interview with the head of Rolling Stone, Jan Wenner. It rejects every major element of its predecessor. Tensions among the bands members are talked about. He also states the Lennon/McCartney partnership never really existed. In several interviews following that, Lennon, Yoko Ono and then manager Alan Klein explicitly labeled Paul McCartney and his in-laws "conservatives", "bourgeoisie/middle class" and establishment figures. John's argument was that Paul's establishment leanings helped break up the band. The publishing of the interview proved controversy in itself. As it was against John's wishes to have it published. He likened the interview to a thoughtless reflex. A reaction you get after hitting your head against a wall and saying 'ow!'. And yet, the interview ends up influencing many histories written of the band after. I encourage you to listen to the interview in the link provided. The difference between reading it and listening to it is night and day and shows how sarcastic quips and tones are unable to translate to the written word.
By 1973, Lennon had retreated from these claims. Even softening his then brutal jabs at McCartney. Just listen to "I Know (I Know)"'s lyric "I love you more than yesterday" as a hint of him moving on. It's a big step away from "How Do You Sleep?". 1974 even saw them play together in a jam session with Stevie Wonder and Harry Nilsson. Spoiler alert: it sounds awful and they are coked out of their minds.
The publication of Philip Norman's Shout happens a few months after John Lennon is assassinated. It is considered "the definitive biography" up to that point. Norman, like Jan Wenner, was a Lennon partisan. George and Ringo are nearly non existant in this biography. The author would go so far as to make a claim as assinine as John was 3/4th's of The Beatles. The book would have an enormous impact on the narrative up to this point.
Two big questions loom like shadows over the history of the band: who is the greater genius- John or Paul? and secondly, who broke up the band?
The more primary sources that have come out since do show how essential George and Ringo were to the band. It wasn't just the John and Paul show. Even John has stated this. As far as who broke it up, Peter Doggett's You Never Give Me the Money remains the definitive take.
Mark Lewisohn publishes Tune In: All These Years Vol. 1 in 2013 and it remains the most democratic of narratives. Giving equal footing to all four members. Vol. 2 and 3 are to follow.
Lewisohn's other two essential books: The Complete Beatles Chronicle and The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions are key to any fan who wants to understand the impressively short amount of time The Beatles were able to put out classic album after classic album.
Another mandatory book on the music is Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick's Here, There and Everywhere, even thoughthat is dismissive of George as a songwriter until 1969's Abbey Road. Even Ian McDonald's Revolution In the Head sooner gives Revolution 9 a 4 page screed than really dig in deep on Harrison's work. Both were used for this post. The former for Revolver through Abbey Road recordings because of Emerick being the lead engineer on those albums. The latter was used on the albums as a whole.
Another source used was The Beatles Anthology DVD/CD set and book. 1995 was a big year for fans. The Anthology was presented in three formats: There were the three CD sets of demos, the 6 DVD box set, and the massive book. Fans wouldn't get this type of 'manna from the gods' again until 2009 when the remastered mono and stereo sets were released.
Frank Zappa said talking about music is like dancing about architecture. The dance with The Beatles has gone on since 1962 and it shows no signs of stopping. You can glean copious amounts of information from these sources but at the end of the day nothing compares to dropping the needle on Revolver and turning off your mind, relaxing, and floating down stream.
The way I structured this was a personal ranking of all the albums. The way I wrote about them was chronologically by recording. Album by album. Please Please Me from Abbey Road. Let It Be and Abbey Road in particular is a two part post.
Singles were excluded for the most part and will be included on a later post.
What I love to hear are other fans Beatles stories. How did you get into them? What is your favorite album? Please, by all means, comment below!
So gather round all you clowns as we dig into the albums. A splendid time is guaranteed for all!
-Luke
13. YELLOW SUBMARINE
An album on the bottom of many a fans list. What you get is 6 songs and George Martin orchestral stuff. 2 of the songs being from other albums. So 4 new Beatles songs. Of all their movie albums, this is their proper soundtrack. Especially with side 2.
A better listening experience is the Yellow Submarine Songtrack. You get stuff from Rubber Soul, Revolver, Sgt. Pepper and Magical Mystery Tour thrown in with the stuff from the YS soundtrack.
The Beatles are, if anything, a band for everyone. Yellow Submarine and Octopus's Garden can both be considered children's songs. So it's fitting that Yellow Submarine be the subject of their first and only animated film.
Only A Northern Song has a big Blue Jay Way vibe. "It doen't matter what chords I play." This is George commenting how John and Paul being the main songwriters, were benefitting again as primary shreholderns in the band's publishing company, Northern Songs.
All Together Now is a sing a long from Paul. Paul Horn is said to hav heard Paul singing the song at Rikishesh.
Hey Bulldog was a song whose recording was captured by a film crew. Paul's bass tone on the song is fantastic and harkens to his Pepper basstone.
It's All Too Much was written by George Harrison under the influence of LSD. The combination of cosmic philosophy and nursery rhyme whimsy is what makes it interesting.
Favorite tracks: Hey Bulldog
12. WITH THE BEATLES
Robert Freeman's portrait of the band resulted in an iconic album cover. The album was recorded over seven sessions across three months, from July 18 to October 23. In the studio, the band was still bound by the technical limitations of the time.
The album exploded in both Britain and America. The Beatles would come to America in February 1964. In an interview for Barry Miles' Many Years From Now, Paul addressess how they would introduce little tricks that would become signatures of the Lennon/McCartney partnership:
"I was doing literature in school, so I was interested in plays on words and onomatopoeia. John didn't do literature but he was quite well read, so he was interested in that kind of thing. Like the double meaning of 'please' that we use in 'Please Please Me'. In 'It won't be long till I belong to you' it was the same trip."
Seven of the albums 14 tracks (a standard number of tracks for the first few albums) were written by Lennon and McCartney. George recorded his first composition 'Don't Bother Me' and was emerging as a songwriter. Lennon and McCartney wrote I Wanna Be Your Man for Ringo. A tradition they started on their first album with Boys.
All My Loving showcased Paul's most complex piece of songwriting up to that point. It was the first song he wrote the words to first. Something he's hardly done since. Always to have a soft, mushy heart, Paul gives a lead vocal on the cover of Till There Was You.
Along with Billboard toppers like All My Loving, you got a handful of covers. Meredith Wilson's Till There Was You, Smokey Robinson's You Really Got A Hold On Me, The Marvelettes' Please Mr. Postman, Richard Drapkin's Devil In Her Heart, and Janie Bradford and Berry Gordy's Money (That's What I Want). You also see the band's love of American rock and roll with their cover of Chuck Berry's Roll Over Beethoven. An artist whose material they covered more than any other.
It's important to note that during the recording sessions, 4 track recording was introduced thus creating entirely new recording processes. One of the singles they recorded, I Wanna Hold Your Hand, contained a B-side This Boy. The maturity in the songwriting of the B-side and the fact that the band thought just to tack it onto their A-side single shows the talent that is pouring out of them already. Personally, This Boy stands out as one of my favorite songs from their first year of recording.
With the Beatles doesn't really rank high on my list because it's them still finding their footing. The "ready-set-go" vibe you get from Please Please Me isn't quite present on their second album.
Stereo or Mono?: Like Please Please Me, the recording process was meat to be mono.
Favorite tracks: All My Loving, You Really Got A Hold On Me
11. PLEASE PLEASE ME
"The way albums were marketed in 1962 was if a band made a hit single, an LP using the same title of the hit single would be recorded. Few, if any, would listen to the supporting tracks. George Martin, the Beatles' producer, knew he could do something different with the Beatles first LP. His aim was to catch both the excitement of their stage performance and the melody. Upon release, the album reviews noticed just that. It wasn't the usual cash-in but a run of songs each in its own way different and suprising. Record buyers up to that point didn't really care who wrote what song. On the back of the LP of Please Please Me, every song has the songwriter in brackets next to it. Sleeve notes indicated which songs were The Beatles own and which ones owed a debt to American groups like The Shirelles." Philip Norman, Shout!
The Beatles came into 1963 with a hit single under their belt, Love Me Do. They had written Please Please Me, Ask Me Why, PS I Love You, I Saw Her Standing There, Do You Want to Know A Secret the previous year. It took from 1958 to 1962 for all the pieces to fall into the place
-the first time John would meet Paul
-Paul bringing schoolmate George Harrison into the Quarrymen
-Brian Epstein becomes their manager
-Original Beatles drummer Pete Best getting sacked and Richard 'Ringo Starr' Starkey brought in
-George Martin agrees to produce their first album with EMI
They recorded their entire first album in 13 hours in a day long recording session on February 11, 1963. There have scarcely been a more productive 585 minutes in the history of recorded music.
John Lennon had a heavy cold when it came time to record. Engineer Norman Smith recalls they had a glass jar of Zubes on the piano. Parodoxically, next to it, was a big carton of Peter Stuyvesant cigarettes which they smoked incessantly. Recording the original material would start with John laying down There's A Place and I Saw Her Standing There in the morning and ending with Paul recording tracks for Hold Me Tight. The band would then rip through five covers. By 10 pm in the studio, someone had suggested the band play the Isley Brothers number Twist and Shout with John on lead vocal. Everyone's throats were tired by then. Norman Smith recalls "He sucked a couple more Zubes, had a bit of a gargle of milk and away we went." What you hear on the album today is Lennon shredding his vocals to bits. And that's how they finished their first album.
The first two albums show The Beatles wearing their influences proudly on their sleeve. Chuck Berry, Smokey Robinson, Motown. Even covering two songs by The Shirelles.
Paul was 16 years old when Love Me Do was recorded. It was meant to introduce the English to The Beatles. When the Beatles would tour with Roy Orbison, they would get a bit competetive upon hearing him perform live. They strove to improve all the time.
When Misery was recorded, Lennon and McCartney achieved eight writing credits. An unprecedented achievement for a pop act at the time. This was a group that wrote mostly original material without the help of other songwriters.
Twist and Shout ends the record and became a staple of their live set.
On their first album, John and Paul are already showcasing an extraordinary ability for harmonies. With Paul reaching the upper regiester and John hitting the low. Give a listen to the harmonies on the isolated vocal track of Please Please Me:
There's forgettable tunes here and there: A Taste of Honey and Baby It's You.
There's A Place is my favorite track on the album and the one that stands out as not being about love.
Stereo or Mono?: The two track recording process was optimized for a mono mix. Mono wins.
Favorite tracks: Please Please Me, Do You Want to Know A Secret, There's A Place
10. BEATLES FOR SALE
Beatles owed EMI two records a year. Beatlemania was at its height and they were touring. So after extensive touring and making a movie, they returned to the studio and put out Beatles For Sale in December 1964. Recording started on August 11 and lasted to October 26. In between the eight recording sessions they would make various radio and concert appearances. Leave My Kitten Alone is record but doesn't see the light of day until its inclusion on Anthology 1. I Feel Fine, another Beatles single, would be recorded in addition.
George Martin notes that they were rather "war-weary. They were always on the go. Beatles For Sale doesn't appeal to me much very now, it's not one of their most memorable ones. They perked up after that." The Beatles would later comment that 1964 was the busiest year of their career.
The one keeping this from being higher is half of the album being covers. The album just came too soon after A Hard Day's Night for Lennon/McCartney to have written a full album's worth of quality material. The original compositions however, in particular the three opening tracks, are amongst my favorite songs in their catalog.
Their thirst for experimentation proved the album to be markedly different from their first two. You have John on acoustic, complimenting George's electric guitar work. Paul is playing the Hammond organ and piano. Ringo is tapping on bongos. George even thumps on an African drum. The recording session for Eight Days A Week is important because it was the first time The Beatles took an unfinished idea into the studio and experimented with different ways of recording it. The song would be the first pop song with a fade-up introduction.
Once again you have a Lennon heavy album. The dark lyrics from the last 3 songs on A Hard Day's Night are continued on the first two songs on this album. Lennon's dark lyrics would culminate on the next album, Help!. Though the lyrics are dark, the music itself is upbeat and poppy.
I'll Follow the Sun and What You're Doing are McCartney originals. The former being written when Paul was 16. This wouldn't be the last time he would go back to that well either.
Ringo's drums on What You're Doing is some of his best work. The opening sounds like something from The Byrds. Among the studio innovations was the fade in intro for Eight Days A Week, the first time it had been done on a pop recording. The multi tracked bass guitar on Every Little Thing along with the use of Ringo's timpani highlight the track.
As with some of the earlier works, this album does have clunkers. The cover of Carl Perkins' Honey Don't is just lifeless. Their exhaustiveness from their busiest years makes its presence felt with the decision to only have 8 original and the rest covers. Their next album, however is all originals.
US vs. UK
In the homeland, their fourth album is known as Beatles For Sale. In the States, it was released as Beatles '65. Even more confusing is the follow up album Beatles VI released in America. What you get is the majority of the original material released on Beatles '65 while Beatles VI has a bulk of the covers along with Eight Days A Week and What You're Doing.
Stereo or mono?: I've heard nobody favor mono over stereo. It wins out over mono for the same reasons A Hard Day's Night is best listened to in stereo.
Favorite tracks: No Reply, I'm A Loser, Baby's In Black, What You're Doing
9. LET IT BE
"I think we've been negative ever since Mr. Epstein passed away."
Paul McCartney, in the film Let It Be
In My Hour of Darkness Pt. 1
So many popular events of the 60's have taken on mythic proportions: the JFK assassination, the Manson murders and the Beatles. This isn't to trivialize the aforementioned events by placing a distinct piece of pop culture alongside them. What history has shown is how immediate interpretations of an event differ greatly from interpretations given decades after the event has taken place. Manson: The Life and Times of Charles Manson is a far more historically accurate than Bugliosi's Helter Skelter. The Warren Commision released in the wake of JFK's assassination has numerous holes in it. And for the story we are telling now, the break up of the Beatles can be seen as being caused by several factors as opposed to just "Yoko broke up the band." With the advent of so much material having come out in the wake of the Beatles split, we have the gift of being removed away from these events and looking back on them with clear lenses. 'Truth is stranger than fiction' the old adage goes. In the Beatles case, truth is far more complicated.
JANUARY 2-10, 1969
In the beginning weeks of 1969, Paul was insistent on getting his Get Back project come to fruition. Paul had wanted the band to return to its roots and embrace live performance again. The sessions would be recorded for a television special. Michael Lindsey Hogg would film the rehearsals for the film, Let It Be.
Rehearsals for the songs would begin on January 2. A vast number of songs would be performed.
Having peaked in songwriting and output on The White Album, it would be John who would come up short compared to previous outings with the band. Going so far as to reach back into past years to dust off non recorded tracks. The earliest being One After 909, a song written ten years ago, Across the Universe (a song demoed and recorded during the White Album), and four songs that would wind up on Abbey Road- Mean Mr. Mustard and Polytheme Pam (written during the White Album), Sun King and I Want You. Of the songs he would introduce for the Let It Be album, we would get Don't Let Me Down and Dig A Pony. In addition, he would play future solo efforts Child of Nature (now renamed Road to Marakesh before becoming Jealous Guy) and Gimme Some Truth.
This is particularly frustrating given that John would continually criticise the songs George brought in. I Me Mine being the famous one, prompting John to say "We don't play no Spanish waltzes in here." You see George wanting to colaborate with John and John not having any of it. John even mentions replacing George with Eric Clapton.
There are two reasons that can be seen as to why John doesn't have as much output as Paul or George during this period. The first is his full concentration on Yoko. The second being his heroin addiction. On January 14, John and Yoko are interviewed at Twickenham by a reporter from Canada's CBC-TV. It became known as the "Two Junkies" interview.
Gone is the class clown of A Hard Day's Night. Heroin had left him indifferent to the activities of the Beatles. And yet, that same year would prove to be his busiest since the days of Beatlemania.
Paul comes in with I've Got A Feeling, Two of Us, The Long and Winding Road and Let It Be. Songs that would end up on Abbey Road introduced by Paul in these sessions include Oh! Darling, She Came In Through the Bathroom Window and Maxwell's Silver Hammer, a song John, George and Ringo all agreed as having hated working on. As far as songs that would make it onto solo albums Paul once again brings out his song Junk and Teddy Boy as well as introducing Every Night, Another Day and Back Seat of My Car.
After The White Album was released, George Harrison had collaborated with Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan and the Band. The collaborations had fired his creativity, inspiring a volume of fresh material. Most of which would become his solo album All Things Must Pass. Just as notable was Clapton and Dylan giving him more validation that he would get from either Lennon or McCartney.
Because of this, George came into the Twickenham sessions with a wealth of material. In addition to the two songs that would make the Let It Be album, For You Blue and I Me Mine, he also had a number of songs that would wind up on his debut solo album. These songs would be the All Things Must Pass, Let Me Down, Hear Me Lord, and Isn't It A Pity. When they moved into Apple Studios, George would introduce Old Brown Shoe on the 27th. The next day he introduces what many consider his best song with the group, Something. On the 29th, George floats the idea of a solo album and John is totally for it.
Ringo brought in Abbey Road's Octopus's Garden, and two future solo album tracks in Taking A Trip to Carolina and Picasso. Even in their impromptu covers, you can hear Ringo providing the rhythmic backbone.
In addition to original songwriting, they would go into playing covers. Sometimes only playing pieces of the song, other times playing the full song. It is here where you see the music index in their heads spill out into the studios. Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, The Who, Gene Vincent, Canned Heat, Little Richard, Carl Perkins, Sam Cooke, Marvin Gaye, and Lonnie Donegan show up here.
In Pete Doggett's You Never Give Me the Money he explains how these sessions kicked off. "He (McCartney) played the boss, haplessly patronising his bandmates, desperately trying to prolong the agony in the hope that it might miraculously ease. Being wary with Lennon, he focused his encouragement on Harrison. Starkey stared ahead ahead in an appearance of utter gloom, wondering why he was still trying to provide a rhythmic backbone to this divided body. McCartney chivvied the other through fragments of new songs. Lennon diverted them onto the safe ground of rock n' roll standards that had comprised their repertoire a decade earlier. Harrison unveiled an array of freshly composed material, only to be met with polite boredom from McCartney and open derision from Lennon."
A fragment of one of the conversations from January 7:
McCartney: I'm only trying to help you, and I always hear myself trying to annoy you.
Harrison (sarcastically): You're not annoying me. You don't annoy me any more.
McCartney: We've only got twelve more days so we've got to do this methodically. I just hear myself saying it. I never get any support.
(silence)
McCartney: What do you think?
Lennon: About what?
Harrison: Hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil.
Starkey: I'm not interested
McCartney: I don't see why any of you, if you're not interested, get yourselves into this. What's it for? It can't be for money. Why are you here? I'm here because I want to do a show, but I really don't feel an awful lot of support.
(silence)
McCartney: I feel terrible. (to Lennon) Imagine if you were the only one interested. (silence) You don't say anything.
Lennon: I've said what I've been thinking.
McCartney: There's only two choices. We're gonna do it, or we're not gonna do it. And I want a decision. Because I'm not interested in spending my fucking days farting about here, while everyone else makes up their mind whethere they want to do it or not. I'll do it. If everyone else wants to do it, great. But I don't have to be here.
(silence)
McCartney: We should just have it out. If this one turns out to be like (the previous album), it should definitely be the last- for all of us. There's no point hanging on.
Harrison: The Beatles have been in the doldrums for at least a year.
Harrison: Maybe we should get a divorce.
McCartney: Well, I said that at the last meeting. It's getting near it.
John: Who'd have the children?
Paul: Dick James
(in reference to the Beatles songs)
GEORGE LEAVES...AND RETURNS
On January 10, at Twickenham, tensions rose to a boil and Harrison announced he was leaving the band. That same day, John, Paul and Ringo returned to the soundstage and carried on their project. Ono would sit on George's blue cushion and release an angry scream that ignited a Yoko-jam. They would go home without saying a word to each other. Before George left, it was reported that John and George came to blows. After he left the studio, John started playing The Who's A Quick One (While He's Away).
A weekend passed and on January 15, George returned for a five hour meeting with the band at Ringo's house in which he announced he was prepared to leave the group. He made a condition that he stay: they must abandon all talk of live performance and instead make an album using the songs intended for the TV special. Another condition was that the band must leave Twickenham Studios.
Mark Lewisohn notes that "it was at this point that it was at this point that the footage shot at Twickenham for a "Beatles At Work" TV production turned instead into the start of a feature film idea to be called Get Back."
And so it was on January 20, 1969, The Beatles went to Apple Studios Studios to record Let It Be.
Billy Preston added his talents to the band on the 22nd. His presence helped cut the tension between the four Beatles.
Alexis Mardas, or Magic Alex as they would call him, was a great friend of John. An inventor who was attached to the him of John because he would give him little gadgets as presents. He said going to EMI studios was no good and that he could build a better studio with a 72 track tape machine. When the Beatles got there, none of the equipment worked. According to George Harrison they had to "rip it all out and start again." So proper sesions wouldn't begin until the 22nd.
WHAT REALLY WENT DOWN IN JANUARY 1969
Here's where memory and history can get a bit tricky. It's such a strange period in the Beatles history and it was recorded for a film. Anyone who knows anything about film understands how powerful a single edit can be. Was it edited to show all the lows the band was experincing duing those rehearsals? Michael Lindsey Hogg's Let It Be famously shows a band falling apart.
So this brings up the question, are the Beatles recalling from memory what actually happened that month? Or, are their perceptions shaped by what they saw in the film?
Luckily we have some resources at our disposal. The book Drugs, Divorce and A Slipping Image chronicles this period in minute detail and offers counter narrative to the widely accepted idea that the Get Back/Let It Be sessions were, according to John, 'the most miserable sessions on earth.'
Another great source that covers this period is the podcast Something About the Beatles in the episode Winter of Our Discontent Pt. 1 and Pt. 2.
Peter Jackson has combed through 55 hours of video footage that Michael Lindsey Hogg shot and plans on building a new documentary around it. With the intent of providing a new level of insight into the group's dynamics during the album's creation.
THE SONGS
Across the Universe
A top track for me. It's been with me since I was a kid. I grew up on the Wildlife version from Past Masters Vol. 2 and would later come to love the Let It Be even more.
Recording:
The song started in the studio on Febuary 4, 1968. It was during this session that John and Paul had realized the song needed falsetto harmonies beyond the male vocal range. Being as big as they were, all they needed to do was step outside the front door and invite inside two of the many fans who religously congregated outside EMI Studios whenever The Beatles were inside. The two girls were Lizzie Bravo and Gayleen Pease. Their harmonies were taped for the "Nothing's gonna change my world" part of the song.
The song would have backwards bass and drums recorded that same day but would be wiped in favor of hamonised backing vocals by John, Paul and George on Febuary 8. John would even play mellotron on the song but that too was wiped and replaced by a tone pedal guitar part played by John.
On October 2, 1969, the World Wildlife Fund charity album was coming towards completion. Across the Universe would be included. Being on the wildlife charity album, it was felt that it should start and finish with added wildlife sound effects. So birds twittering and flying was added. When Phil Spector got hold of the February 1968 tape for Let It Be he added it without the effects.
Get Back
The title song for the group of songs on the Get Back album.
One of the version recorded during the sessions at Twickenham included the controversial lyric "don't dig no Pakistanis taking all the other people's jobs, get back to where you once belonged."
By the time it was recorded it transformed into a song about Jojo from Tuscon, Arizona and Loretta Martin who 'thought she was a woman but was another man.'
Two of Us
Starting from a working title of 'On Our Way Home', Paul says this was written about Linda. Listening to the lyrics of "You and I have memories Longer than the road the stretches out ahead", it might as well have been written about John.
Maggie Mae
A quick 40 second diddie. A traditional Liverpool song about an infamous lady of the night.
For You Blue
A Harrison composition that would belong toward the bottom of the pile of Harrison songs. It's almost like he had enough of the dismissive attitude from John and Paul toward his songs and saved the personal ones for himself and gives the band these 2nd rate numbers. This would change of course on the next album.
January 30, 1969: The Rooftop Concert
The Let It Be project had them originally playing live somewhere and then make an album in a live show. That never really happened because the album became the band in the studio. They decided to play an unnanounced gig on the rooftop of Apple Studios at 3 Saville Row on January 30, 1969.
The setlist:
Get Back (take one)
Get Back (take two)
Don't Let Me Down (take one)
I've Got A Feeling (take one)
One After 909
Dig A Pony
I've Got A Feeling (take two)
Don't Let Me Down (take two)
Get Back (take three)
The performances of I've Got A Feeling, One After 909 and Dig A Pony made it into the Let It Be album. One After 909 being a track John wrote as far back as 1960 and dusted off for the Get Back rehearsals. Don't Let Me Down would be included on the Let It Be...Naked album.
A quick note on Paul's I've Got A Feeling. The "Everybody's had a hard year" section was a lyric from John. It's become a myth that John and Paul refused to work with each other during this period. This song is an example proving it wrong.
The Simpsons writers being huge Beatles fans themselves, planted several references throughout the series. They would even get Ringo, George and finally Paul to guest on episodes. One of my favorite references was their take on the rooftop concert.
January 31, 1969: Final Day of the Get Back/ Let It Be Sessions
This day saw the Beatles record the songs unsiutable for their rooftop concert. Those songs were Let It Be, The Long and Winding Road and Two of Us. It would be Let It Be take 23 that would be used for the album. A take on which includes Paul saying "Sync the second clap, please", mimicking the film director's instruction to the crew.
Paul wrote the song in response to all the pressure he was feeling during this period in The Beatles career. "I use to lie in bed and wonder what was going on and feel quite paranoid. I had a dream one night about my mother. She had died when I was 14, so I hadn't heard from her in quite a while and it was very good. it gave me some strength. In my darkest hour, mother Mary come to me."
The Long and Winding Road
There's a sense of loss in the song without really being specific. The imagery is comes from Paul's experience of staying at High Park, his farm in Scotland, which is exposed to high winds and frequently lashed with rain. The long and winding road itself is the B842, over twenty five miles of twists and turns which runs down the east coast of Kintyre into Campbelltown.
Dig It
An excerpt from a jam made up on the spot by John.
I Me Mine
I like it a lot more than For You Blue. Is it stronger than another George song from this period in All Things Must Pass though? No.
This is where it gets tricky timeline wise. I Me Mine was the last song recorded by the band on January 3, 1970. Phil Spector would overdub an orchestra onto the track. Eight days later on April 10, 1970, Paul McCaertney announced the Beatles no longer existed.
Phil Spector or George Martin?
George Martin produced a stripped down version of the album in 2003. Gone are Phil Spector's Philiharmonic string sections he added to the likes of Long and Winding Road. Across the Universe sounds better on the Glyn Johns Let It Be but Long and Winding sounds better stripped down. Plus the decision to axe Maggie Mae and Dig It and add Don't Let Me Down does give the Naked version an edge.
John would call the Get Back/Let It Be sessions 'the most miserable sessions on earth.' This specific period has more material from it than any other because not only were the cameras rolling, so much of it was recorded. If you listen to the bootlegs you hear a band still collaborating and cracking jokes. While Paul would kickstart these sessions, it would be George who really held them together getting them out of Twickenham and adding Billy Preston to the mix. He had every reason to walk out and go solo. He had enough material as evidenced by the All Things Must Pass solo album made next year. But he also recognized how all four members benefitted from the band being together.
So much of the the band's history is controlled and planned out. It was this one month in January 1969 where they made things up as they went along. Chaotic yet colorful. I don't think an Abbey Road could have come out the way it did without the Get Back Sessions. What always strikes me about this period is that they easily could have hung up the towel and called it quits. Thing of it was, they just couldn't stop making music. It was a compulsion.
In a heroin fueled monologue, John Lennon told journalist Ray Coleman that Apple was in deep financial trouble. "We haven't got half the money people think we do. We have enough to live on, but we can't let Apple go on like it is. If it carries on like this, we'll be broke in a few months."
Word of Apple's collapsing would get to business manager who was notorious for squeezing cash out of record companies. His name was Allen Klein.
8. HELP!
Coming off their 60,0000-seat show at Shea Stadium, the Beatles were incorporating more artistic influences into their songs from the likes of Bob Dylan. 1965 was a landmark year for rock. Bob Dylan went from acoustic to electric on his biggest album yet, Highway 61 Revisited. Dave Clark Five's released one of their last hits Over and Over Again. Jerry and the Pacemakers sputtered out. The Byrds brand of folk rock started up. This was the first year where you can really see the fading away of traditional pop. The British Invasion was starting to take over. The Who released My Generation and the Rolling Stones released (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction. The Beatles added two great albums to the pile.
The title track represents a turning point on John Lennon's songwriting style. In the 1980 Playboy interview, he said "I was fat and depressed and I was crying out for help". He would say that this song and Strawberry Fields Forever were the most genuine songs he'd written and not just songs made to order.
Help! features the most covered song of all time, Yesterday. A song so familiar to all of us that even Paul thought he borrowed the melody from somewhere when he would play it to people. Even though he would make greater strides on the next album, Yesterday shows how evolved a songwriter he was up to that point.
Ticket to Ride features an interest in the texture of high amplifiction. The Who were recording their high volume songs around the same time as The Beatles and I would not be surprised if Lennon heard that and went "I want that sound." But there could be another reason for this. Before The Beatles went abroad to film the movie Help!, Lennon and Harrison encountered LSD. Spiked by an acquaintance who slipped into their coffee after dinner in London. It's hard to say if Ticket to Ride was a creative response to LSD. But it does point the way to a song they would record fifteen months later: Tomorrow Never Knows.
A misguided myth about the drumming of The Beatles is that if Pete Best was still a part of the band, it still wouldn't matter. This is absolutely not true. Isolate the drum tracks on Ticket to Ride. Ringo isn't given near enough credit as John and Paul. "Even as far back as his days with Rory and the Hurricanes, he was considered a guitarists' dream." Lewisohn points out in Tune In. "He wasn't a technical drummer, but he projected flash. He was just solid and reliable, metronomic, dead steady in all the right styles, tempos and beats, doing precisely what he was there to do." Ringo wasn't John Bonham or Keith Moon. He didn't need to be. The thing you keep on coming back to with The Beatles in terms of their instrumental ability is that they were in always in service of the song.
If you play any of his drum tracks you immediately recognize the song that drum track belongs to.
With the call and response of You're Gonna Lose That Girl You, Help! saw them starting to mature in the studio. They are still not quite there in terms of stacking albums top to bottom with their best work. That would come with their next album. You can see some filler show particularly on this album. Lennon has called out It's Only Love as some of the worst lyrics he's written. I'm no fan of the song either.
Their fifth album will be the last gasp of the "early Beatles" period. If you listen to the track I'm Down from Anthology 2, you'll hear at the end Paul McCartney saying plastic soul. What he is referring to is Mick Jagger's use of soul in the Stones music. The term 'plastic soul' would be the origin of the title for their next album: Rubber Soul.
Stereo or mono?: Like their two albums before this one, if you are going for clarity, pick up the stereo mix. No this is when things get tricky. There are 2 version available: the 2009 remaster which uses George Martin's 1987 remix of the album and the remaster of the original 1965 stereo album.
Favorite tracks: The Night Before, You've Got to Hide Your Love Away, You're Gonna Lose That Girl, I've Just Seen A Face, Yesterday
7. A HARD DAY'S NIGHT
Their first soundtrack. The name of which came from Ringo's misuse of the English language. An exhausted Ringo would coin it while filming. This prompted them to write the title song which would play over the now iconic credits of the band running from the fans.
The movie is something I would include in a Beatles Starter Kit. It shows their natural charisma and just how efortlessly funny they can be. Befoe they accepted the offer to make Hard Day's Night they had turned to several chances to appear in "jukebox films". Films where an act would make an appearance and then be out. With this, even in film they showed their standard for what they wanted. It wasn't until Richard Lester and the offer for HDN came that they agreed to do it.
The alchemy of the songs, the spontaneity, Beatlemania and Lester's film created reverberations in the music industry felt to this day. The depictions of the band in the movie is what we all thought of them: John the sarcastic quick witted leader. Paul the cute, clever peacemaker. George with his wry humor and Ringo, the guy in the back. We knew their names.
The Album
Recording the album lasted from January 29 to June 1. Being a Capitol Records release in America and with the movie being released by United Artists, you have a complicated release history. Capitol could release the material recorded for the album however they pleased as long as it wasn't called "a soundtrack album". Capitol Records would release the single "A Hard Day's Night" along with Something New featuring all seven movie songs. UA would release the soundtrack on June 26.
This album has a melancholic streak going through it. John is all over it. McCartney has one song on Side B, 2 songs on Side A, 2 co writing credits with Lennon, and there is a Harrison song. No Ringo.
Those last three Lennon penned tracks carry this album home. Like the medley on Side B of Abbey Road I associate these songs as a loosely themed collection.
John would reflect in 1980 that the Hard Day's Night era "was the sexual equivalent to the beginning hysteria of a relationship", whereas Sgt. Pepper and Abbey Road were "the mature part of the relationship."
Stereo or mono: Recording had evolved into a 4 track process. This meant the stereo version is a true stereo mix. If you are going for clarity, stereo wins here.
Favorite tracks: Tell Me Why, Any Time At All, Things We Said Today, You Can't Do That, I'll Be Back
6. MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR
On December 3, 1961, the leader of the Beatles, John Lennon, made the third of three democratic moves. The first was bringing Paul into his circle. The second was allowing Paul to bring in schoolmate George Harrison . The third was having Brian Epstein manage them.
The Beatles had traveled to Bangor in Wales to meet Maharishi Mahesh Yogi on August 24th. A seminar on transcendental meditation took place. Three days later the heard the news.
August 25 saw Brian Epstein invited Geoffrey Ellis and Peter Brown, who both worked for him, down to Kingsley Hall. It would be his first social event since the death of his father. When a gang of rent boys failed to show up, he drove back to London to find some 'action' leaving his friends to continue without him. The next day he telephoned from his flat feeling groggy. His friend Peter Browne suggested he take the train down to the country instead of drive. Brian would say he would have some breakfast, read the day's mail and then telephone them to tell them which train to meet. He never called.
The inquest would show he took six Carbrital sleeping pills in order to sleeps. This wasn't unusual for him, but his tolerance had come to the lethal level. On August 27, 1967, Brian Epstein, dubbed 'The Prince of Pop' for helping discover The Beatles, was pronounced dead in his sleep from an accidental overdose.
In the months leading up to Brian agreeing to manage them, The Beatles were close to throwing in the towel. With Epstein now gone, The Beatles were without direction. So on September 1, they met at McCartney's house in St. John's Wood, London. An announcement would be issued that the band would be continued to be managed by NEMS Enterprises- now under the guidance of Epstein's brother Clive. During this same meeting, they agreed to continue with the Magical Mystery Tour project. By this time Paul was a creative captain steering the ship when the band might have easily collapsed amidst Brian's death.
"I was still under a false impression. I still felt every now and then that Brian would come in and say, 'It's time to record', or 'It's time to do this'. And Paul started doing that: 'Now we're going to make a movie. Now we're going to make a record.' And he assumed that if he didn't call u, nobody would ever make a record. Paul would say, well, now he felt like it- and suddenly I'd have to whip out twenty songs."
John Lennon, 1972
Anthology
We've been covering UK albums up to this point. Since Magical Mystery Tour was released as a double 7" EP in the UK and a full length in the United States and elsewhere, we are going to break with the trend and cover the American release. The way I see it, the album is a part of the mono box set and contains some of their strongest work from 1967. The idea was to produce a television special about an ordinary group of people taking a trip on a coach.
There was no script for the movie. Paul supervised the filming and was the only Beatles to endure the editing process. The reception for the movie would prove lackluster. This was Paul's baby. The poor reception for it introduced an unfamiliar sense of vulnerability into the group's morale.
The first session for Magical Mystery Tour is technically the first session for Sgt. Pepper. Since the song recorded originally meant to be on Pepper ended up on Magical Mystery Tour- 'Strawberry Fields Forever'. The song picks up where She Said She Said left off. John further pursuing the theme of sensations too confusing, intense or personal to articulate. For this song, the experience was based on his childhood. Strawberry Field was a Salvation Army home in Liverpool, around the corner from where John grew up. His aunti Mimi would take him there until he went independently. Of all the Beatles recordings, Strawberry Fields is known as one of the most complicated to record.
Take 1 was recorded on November 24, 1966. The song would change shapes in the studio several times. The first take is as far removed from the final version as possible, the only similarity between it and the record being the mellotron introduction. An instrument known for producing sound effects of instruments, John owned one of the first mellotrons and brought it into the studio to record.
Take 4 took place on November 28. It features overdubs of mellotron, drums, several guitars, bass and maracas.
Takes 5 and 6 showed the recording of the rhythm track growing faster and faster each session. This was mixed down onto Take 7 on which Lennon's voice was given more ADT. This take remained 'the best' for 9 days.
The December 15 session saw George Martin use three cellos and four trumpets to score the brass and string sound for which he and Lennon though necessary for the remake of Strawberry Fields. At the end of the take, John Lennon mutters "cranberry sauce" twice over. It was typical John. That would contribute yet again to the "Paul is dead" as being misheard as John saying "I buried Paul."
"John Lennon told me that he liked both versions of 'Strawberry Fields Forever', the original lighter song and the intense, scored version," recalls George Martin. "He said 'Why don't you join the beginning of the first one to the end of the second one?' 'There are two things against it,' I replied 'They are in different keys and different tempos. Apart from that, fine. 'Well', he said 'you can fix it!"
So George Martin and Geoff Emerick came into Abbey Road studios on December 22 to comply with John's wishes and they did it. For those who want to know where the edit takes place, listen closely to the 1 minute mark, after one of the "let me take you down" lines. Just be warned: once you hear it, you can't unhear it.
The same band that had recorded their first album in 13 hours had spent 55 hours in the studio working on 'Strawberry Fields Forever'.
Penny Lane was up next. Ian MacDonald says "to have been aged between 14 and 30 during 66-67, there was a sunny optimism that permeated everything and possibilties seemed limitless. 'Penny Lane' distills the spirit of that time more perfectly than any other creative product of the Sixties." Another childhood song for Lennon and McCartney. So succesful was the song for McCartney's writing, you can get the vibe of it in 'Fixing A Hole', 'Getting Better', 'With A Little Help From My Friends', and 'Your Mother Should Know'. The recording of Penny Lane is packed with sound effects: the fireman's handbell, for instance. Lennon would tell Rolling Stone "The bank was there, and that was where the tram sheds were and people waiting and the inspector stood there, the fire engines were down there. It was just reliving childhood." Paul had been toying with the title as early as November 1965. It was the name of the road in the suburb immediately to the south of Liverpool city centre, close to where The Beatles grew up.
For the finishing touches, Paul came up with the idea of adding in trumpets when he was watching David Mason playing Bach's Brandenburg Concerto Number 2 in F Major on a BBC show Masterworks.
The title track was recorded in an evening session where Paul laid out what the film was to be about. Like Lane, Paul had decided to add trumpets to MMT. Paul's words were a mix of traditional fairground barking and contemporary drug references. 'Rollup, roll up' was rolling up a joint. 'Dying to take you away' was a conscious reference to the Tibetan Book of the Dead.
Geoff Emerick recalls the Beatles showing up unusually late one night. They recorded for seven hours in a stoned haze, jamming endlessly. These could have been the first seeds of the instrumental track Flying. Fun fact: the cloud scenes over which 'Flying' is heard in the film was originally shot by Stanley Kubrick for 2001 A Space Odyssey but never used.
Fool on the Hill is about an idiot savant, a person everyone considers to be a fool but is actually a misunderstood visionary. Paul was thinking of gurus like the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi who were often derided and an Italian hermit he once read about who emerged from a cave in the 1940s to discover he'd missed the Second World War. An experience which is said to have contributed to Paul's image of the fool standing on the hill.
Now we get to George Harrison's contribution: Blue Jay Away. And what an eerie song it is. Derek Taylor, the press agent for the band was due to visit them when they arrived in Los Angeles, but got lost in the canyons and was delayed. There was a Hammond organ in the house where George was staying and he composed this song while waiting for his friend who was lost in the fog.
It was around May '67. Sgt. Pepper hadn't been released yet. The Beatles had agreed to make an animated film based off the song Yellow Submarine. They had not one but two films in the works. Not to mention the follow up soundtracks to those films.
Baby You're A Rich Man was recorded and intended to be apart of the Yellow Submarine soundtrack but got pushed into the MMT soundtrack. Like A Day In the Life, it is two songs stitched together: John's section, originally titled 'One of the Beautiful People', and Paul's 'rich man' chorus. The rich man in the song is purported to be Brian Epstein.
If Penny Lane embodied a sunny optimism of the time, All You Need Is Love took it one step further. Even during the first take, 'La Marseillaise', the French national anthem, was used to mark an international flavor of the June 14 recording session. A BBC publicity "the Our World programme was for the first time ever, linking five continents and bringing man face to face with mankind..." 400 million people actoss five continents saw this Beatles recording session. During the coda, John threw in Yesterday and Paul threw in She Loves You.
It's impossible to separate the music from that video footage for me.
Your Mother Should Know shows Paul paying respects to his father Jim's musical era.
When John was writing I Am the Walrus in August of 1967, the news of Brian's death was fresh in his mind. His mood was, as usual, parodoxical, interested in his own LSD- enhanced impressions. Ian McDonald writes in Revolution In the Head: 'The Eggman' in the lyrics is almost certainly Eric Burdon, who was known to his friend as 'Eggs' because he was fond of breaking eggs over naked girls during sex. Yellow matter custard dripping from a dead dog's eye originates from a playground chant John and friend Pete Shotton had as kids. 'Yellow matter custard, green slope pie/All mixed together with a dead dog's eye'. I Am the Walrus marks the start of a period in which its author allowed expressive integrity to override ordinary sense completely.
"Magical Mystery Tour is one of my favorite albums, because it was so weird. 'I Am the Walrus' is also one of my favorite tracks...It's from The Walrus and the Carpenter', Alice In Wonderland. To me it was a beautiful poem. It never dawned on me that Lewis Carroll was commenting on the capitalist system. Later I went back and realized that the Walrus was the bad guy in the story and the Carpenter was the good guy. I thought 'Oh shit, I picked the wrong guy' But that wouldn't have been the same, would it? I was the Carpenter...'Walrus' is just saying a dream- the words don't mean alot. People draw so many conclusions and its so ridiculous. What does it really mean, 'I am the eggman'? It could have been the pudding basin, for all I care. It's not that serious."
John Lennon
Anthology
John mentions in that interview that he was writing obscurely ala Bob Dylan. He was using the same mind that wrote In His Own Write to write that song.
Hello Goodbye was one of Paul's songs. It talked about the concept of twins: man woman, black white, ebony ivory (hey!), right wrong, hello goodbye. With Paul advocating for the positive. You say goodbye I say hello.
1967 was a huge year for Paul McCartney. He was a major component on Sgt. Pepper and the de facto director of Magical Mystery Tour. Now it was time to set in motion their record company, Apple.
Apple came into existence in April 1967 because the Beatles' tax advisers told them that if they didn't put money into a business, they would have to pay 3 million pounds in tax. Apple Corps was to be the holding company with subsidiary companies engaged in diverse business activities: Apple Records, Apple Music, Apple Films, Apple Publishing, Apple Electronics and so on. The boutique was helmed by longtime Lennon friend Pete Shotten. The company logo was suggested by Rene Magritte, The Guessing Game, that Robert Fraser had left casually propped up on Paul's living room table in the summer of 1966. Even in his business ventures, Paul was able to glean some type of 'a-ha!' inspiration. The Apple logo was designed by Gene Mahon and the rest was history.
The first time I heard about this fun fact I was giddy with glee. Here were two of my artists whose paths intersected. How cool! This whole era was replete with rememberance of things past, childhood fixations, and bits of history. All ticking boxes that go above and beyond just enjoying the aural bliss of the recordings but actively engaging with what influenced the band to write it.
The film's reception introduced an unfamiliar sense of vulnerability into the group's morale and threatened the unchallenged leadership McCartny had assumed over the previous 18 months. "Nobody cared about as much as he [John] did about being a leader." It was precisely that he didn't care anymore about being a leader that allowed Paul to seiz control. Paul worshiped Lennon since 1958 and had a subservience towards him. It gave him a sense of worthiness he couldn't find anywhere else. Even at the height of his creative fufillment he could still feel undermined by John.
Favorite tracks: Blue Jay Way, Your Mother Should Know, Strawberry Fields Forever, Penny Lane
5. SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND
There's a quote from Quentin Tarantino when he first saw There Will Be Blood: "We are very friendly combatants. We have a Marlon Brando/Montgomery Clift relationship. I feel I'm Marlon Brando and Paul is Montgomery Clift. And the reality is Brando was better because Montgomery Clift existed and Montgomery Clift was better because Brando existed...If I reach high points with Inglourious Basterds it will be because Paul released There Will Be Blood a couple years ago." Before making Pet Sounds, Brian Wilson listened to Rubber Soul religously. Pet Sounds in turn inspired Paul McCartney's songwriting and the desire to top what Wilson had done previously by releasing Sgt. Pepper. This type of one upmanship brings out the best in both creative combatants.
While preparing his next album, Smile, Brian is said to have listened to Sgt. Pepper and just felt defeated. It wasn't just Brian they left behind. By 1967 there were leaving live performance behind.
Two crucial competitors of The Beatles were out of commission for the year. Bob Dylan was recovering from a motorcycle accident. Brian Wilson was having a breakdown while making Smile, a project his bandmates did not support him on. It was a year of debut albums from The Doors and Pink Floyd. Jefferson Airplane released Surrealistic Pillow, Hendrix releases Are You Experienced?, The Who releases The Who Sell Out. The bands who made it the two years previous were upping their game while new bands like The Doors, The Moody Blues and Pink Floyd were releasing albums. Everyone was waiting for the next big thing. And on June 1, 1967 they got it.
An album with songs whose instrumentation pointed toward the future and whose lyrics relied on nostalgia. It wasn't just the music. It was the way it was released. A gatefold with printed lyrics. Cut outs of mustaches, paper sergeant stripes and a cutout of a statue from Lennon's house.
THE COVER
The cover is among my favorites by any band. It's maximalist design stands in stark contrast to the extremely minimalistic approach taken on the all white cover of the White Album. Peter Blake was suggested to Paul to design the album sleeve. Blake's Pop Art holds a sense of the accumulation of memorabilia and household scrap mementoes. When Paul met him he showed him rough sketches of his idea for the cover and Blake ran with it. He was given a list by Beatles friend and road manager Neil Aspinall that included influential figures through the centuries: the Marquis de Sade, Hitler, Nietzsche, Lenny Bruce, Lord Buckley, Alestair Crowley, Dylan Thomas, James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, William Burroughs, Robert Peel, Stockhausen, Aldous Huxley, H.G. Wells, Einstein, Carl Jung, Beardsley, Alfred Jarry, Tom Mix, Johny Weismuller, Magritte, Tyrone Power, Karl Marx, Richmal Crompton, Dick Barto, Tommy Handley, Albert Stubbins and Fred Astaire. George had also given a list that comprised of nothing but Indian gurus. John's list included Oscar Wilde, Lewis Carroll and Edgar Allen Poe. Paul's list ran frpom William Burroughs to Fred Astaire. The list departed from the original concept; people got dropped and others got added. Magritte and Alfred Jarry ended up getting axed for example.
"EMI realized that because many of the people we were depicting were still alive, we might be sued for not seeking their permission. So the Beatles manager Brian Epstein, who was very wary of the complications in the first place, had his assistant write to everyone. Mae West replied, 'No, I won't be on it. What would I do in a lonely hearts club?' So the Beatles wrote her a personal letter and she changed her mind."
Peter Blake
The idea was to have an interactive experience between band and listener. So many musicians of the time have a story from that summer from when they first heard the album. So many musical journeys began with this album.
For Paul, the journey began when he was on a safari in Kenya with friend Mal Evans, visiting the Ambrosoli Park at the foot of Mount Kiliminjaro. Their final night in Africa was spent at a YMCA in Nairobi before returning to London on November 19, 1966. It was during that flight that Paul came up with the idea of Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band.
"We were fed up being The Beatles. We really hated that fucking four little mop-top boys approach. We were not boys, we were men. It was all gone, all that shit, all that screaming, we didn't want anymore, plus we'd now got turned on to pot and thought of ourselves as artists rather than just performers. Then suddenly on the plane I got this idea. Let's develop alter egos so we're not having to project an image we know. It would be much more free. What would be really interesting would be to take on different personalities of a band." Paul McCartney, Many Years From Now
THE RECORDING SESSIONS
Sessions for Sgt. Pepper began on Thursday, November 24, 1966. 'Strawberry Fields Forever' would be the first song recorded. 'Penny Lane' was the second. Both were originally intended to be on the album. EMI decided to put them out as double A sides. We'll get to those two gems later. For now, let's stick to the tracks that ended up on the album.
If I were to construct a top ten Beatles songs, A Day In the Life would be in it. A fascinating anecdote I learned from one of my favorite movies Magnolia was how Paul Thomas Anderson structured it like A Day In the Life. Rising, rising, rising, crescendo. Then rising, rising, rising again.
The spark to John's songwriting was when he picked up the Daily Mail newspaper from January 17, 1967. '4000 holes in Blackburn, Lancashire'. It was reported that a Blackburn City Council survey of road holes showed that there was one twenty-sixth of a hole for each resident of the city. He finished off the verse with 'Now they know how many holes it takes to fill...' with Albert Hall being suggested by his friend Terry Doran.
The gleaning ideas from newspapers perfectly fits John's history. He learned to read from reading the newspapers on the knee of his Uncle George. Even in Lennon's interviews, it's headline-esque stuff he is saying. It grabs your attention.
"I saw a film today, oh boy..." The film was Richard Lester's How I Won the War about the English army winning the war. It wouldn't premiere until October of 67 but was talked about a lot in the press. It was also the film where John was given his famous circular glasses, which he wore till the end of his life.
The man who "He blew his mind out in a car" was Tara Browne, an Irish friend of the Beatles and a well known socialite, who died in a car accident on December 18, 1966. The details of the accident are in the song. These details would take on a life of their own as a contribution to the 'Paul is Dead' myth. With the premise of him dying in a car accident in 1966 and being replaced by a look alike.
Between John's second and third verses, the band spliced a verse from Paul that was an unfinished song of his. It was a breezy piece about getting out of bed and getting ready for school. "It was just me remembering what it was like to run up to the road to catch a bus to school, having a smoke and going into class...It was a reflection of my schooldays. I would have a Woodbine (an unfiltered British cigarette) and somebody would speak and I would go into a dream."
The bouncing off the momentum of each other's verses perfectly encapsulates the Lennon/McCartney collaboration. The recording would also be the result of Paul's two years of interests of experimentation in avant garde circles.
Now that the ideas were in play, the recording process was set in motion. Early takes have George playing the maracas, Paul on piano and Ringo on bongos. John counting himself in by repeating "sugar plum fairy." They didn't know it yet, but something would be taped for the song's middle eight structure. They had friend Mal Evans count out the bars 1 to 24. It reverberated with tape echo. The counting being in tandem with the tinkering of a piano, both building and building. To mark the end of the middle eight overdub section, an alarm clock sounded. This was where Paul's verse was to kick in.
Paul had decided that an orchestra be used on twenty four bars. George Martin immediately thought of the cost. George describes his reaction in Summer of Love: "Nonsense. You cannot have an orchestra for just a few chords, Paul. Waste of money. I mean you're talking about ninety musicians!...Thus spake the well trained corporate lacket somewhere inside me. Yet my imagination was fired: a symphony orchestra! I could see at once that we could make a lovely sound."
In the end, they settled on an orchestra. And so it was on February 10, recording the orchestra began. Forty one players, which they could double-track and make a whole. George Martin and Paul conducted the orchestra, leaving Geoff Emerick to get the sounds on tape in the correct manner.
The session was if anything else, an event. "The Beatles asked me, and the musicians, to wear full evening dress, which we did" recalls George Martin. Musicians wore clown noses, monkey paws, funny hats and carnival novelties. Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Marianne Faithfull and Donovan were all in attendance.
The entired session was filmed. It was reported that The Beatles were to make a television special about Sgt. Pepper but it never materialized.
The famous piano chord to finish the song was recorded on February 22. Before that, it took two weeks for the Beatles to ruminate on how to end the song. Originally it was going to be Paul humming, but by then the track had become so ambitious, only a very special ending befitted it. Geoff Emerick writes in Here, There and Everywhere: "The inspiration for what was finally used again came from Paul, with an eager assent from John: a huge piano chord that would last "forever"...or at least as long as I could figure out how to get the sound to sustain." What is heard is the sound of John, Paul, Ringo and Mal Evans sharing three pianos and simultaneously hitting E major.
In the afternoon in early 1967, Julian Lennon came home from school with a colored drawing he said that was of his classmate, four year old Lucy O'Donnell. He explained to his father that it was 'Lucy in the sky with diamonds.' The words would of course be interpreted to spell out L.S.D. after the album was released and was even banned by the BBC. While drugs played a role in the Beatles, John says it wasn't associated with the creation of this song. The song draws on his inspirations of Lewis Carroll and his love of surrealism. John would claim that the hallucinatory images were sparked by Lewis Carooll's 'Wool and Water' chapter in Through the Looking Glass. As a child, this book and Alice In Wonderland were two of John's favorite books.
John and Paul would trade verses and choruses. Paul coming up with 'newspaper taxis' and 'cellophane flowers' and John coming up with 'kaleidoscope eyes'.
'Being For the Benefit of Mr. Kite' derived from a poster advertising a circus near Rochdale, Lancashire. Inspired by the finely wrought language of the poster, John composed a song using the actual words. John would tell George Martin that he wanted to "smell the sawdust" of a carnival. Martin nails it with his production.
John would tell Hunter Davies that he wasn't proud of the song. By his 1980 Playboy interview he would change his mind saying "It's so cosmically beautiful...The song is pure, like a painting, pure watercolour."
With A Little Help From My Friends became the song John and Paul wrote for Ringo. It was playful sing a long that has one of my favorite McCartney basslines. Joe Cocker's cover became the theme for a little ole television show about growing up in America during the sixties called The Wonder Years.
For 'Getting Better', Paul recalls coming up with the lyrics 'You got to admit it's getting better. Getting better all the time.' John would say in a laconic way 'It can't get much worse.' The phrase 'it's getting better' brought Paul back to 1964 with Jimmy Nicol, a drummer who filled in for Ringo when he was sick. "After every concert, John and Paul would go up to Jimmy Nicol and ask him how he was going on" journalist Hunter Davies says, "All that Jimmy would ever say was, 'it's getting better'. It ended up becoming a joke phrase and whenever they thought of him they'd say 'it's getting better."
On March 21, the band members minus Ringo went into the studio to record the backing harmonies of Getting Better. To keep awake for the session, John would take an amphetamine from his pill box; however, rather than taking an upper, he would accidentally dose himself with LSD. Geoff Emerick recalls him craning his neck and staring at the ceiling. John told producer George Martin, oblivious to John having just ingested LSD, that he needed to go up on the roof to "get a breath of fresh air." So they went up on the roof together. It was a wonderful starry night Martin recalls and John went to the edge of a parphet and looked up at the stars and said "Aren't they fantastic?"
Paul would take John to his house which was within walking distance of the studio. With Lennon tripping, McCartney thought that maybe he should trip in solidarity with him. It was the first time he took acid with any of his bandmates. "It was my first trip with John or any of the guys. We stayed up all night and hallucinated a lot. Me and John, we'd known each other for a long time. ANd we looked into each other's eyes, the eye contact thing we used to do, which is fairly mind-boggling. You dissolve into each other. And it was amazing. You're looking into each other's eyes and you would want to look away, but you wouldn't, and you could see yourself in the other person. It was a very freaky experience and I was totally blown away. It was a good trip."
'Lovely Rita' was Paul's song all about "meter maids" an Americanism her heard from the British traffic warden in early 1967. 'Fixing A Hole', another Paul song was, like 'Got to Get You Into My Life' from Revolver, an ode to pot.
A Day In the Life is without a doubt my favorite song on the album. Coming in second would be She's Leaving Home. A song that rivals Eleanor Rigby for that 'mournful' mood Paul has with the lyrics. John and Paul saw a story in the newspaper about who'd left home and not been found. "I started with the lyrics: she slips out and leaves a note and then the parents wake up and then...it was rather poignant, and when I showed John, he added the Greek chorus, long sustained notes, and one of the nice things about the structure of the song is that it stays on those notes endlessly."
The earliest song written for Pepper was 'When I'm Sixty Four' which Paul wrote when he was sixteen in Liverpool. The Beatles had a versatility their rivals could only envy and the decision to place this song after Within You Without You shows how wide their sonic pallette was. Beastie Boys brilliantly sample this in Sounds of Science off their Paul's Boutique album.
One of the reasons why Paul McCartney dominated so much of the album was because John was running out of things to say. 'Good Morning Good Morning' summarizes the situation. Cynthia, his wife at the time says "when he was at home, he spent a lot of time lying in bed with a notepad. He was basically dropping out from everything that was happening. He was thinking about things. Everything he was involved in outside the home was pretty high-powered." In this state of mind, inspiration struck John when a television commercial for Kellogg's Corn Flakes came on with the jingle 'Good morning, good morning, The best to you each morning, sunshine breakfast Kellogg's Corn Flakes, crisp and full of fun'. Paul's bassline is so fun to listen to.
What was happening to the songwriting was them intentionally moving away from love songs and embracing pop culture. From the sleave, to the inserts, to the writing.
George Harrison got a rare 3 songs for Revolver; a ratio of songs not given to him before or after that album. In Pepper he only gets one- 'Within You Without You'. It was his first explicit statement on Eastern thought since studying the sitar under Ravi Shankar. It put forward the notion that Western individualism is based on an illusion that encourages separation and division. In order to get closer and get rid of 'the space between us all', we need to give up this illusion of ego and realize that we are essentially 'all one'. None of the other Beatles were present when the song was recorded. George and Neil Aspinall played tambouras while session players played dilruba, tabla, violin and cello. It was the last song recorded for the album. This was the song to kick off Side B. I can't imagine being alive in the summer of 67 hearing this take over the popular culture.
"It was about three or four weeks before the final session when they started thinking about the running order of songs," says Geoff Emerick. Paul would contribute "Wouldn't it be good if we get the atmosphere? Get the band warming up, hear the audience settle into their seats, have the songs as different acts on the stage?" The audience cheer you hear from the title track seguing into 'With A Little Help From My Friends' is from the then unreleased Beatles concert at the Hollywood Bowl.
Two final brush strokes were applied the recording sessions:
The first was the decision to record nonsense and gibberish for 10 minutes and put it on the outer groove. It was chopped up, played backwards and recorded.
The second when John Lennon suggested that they insert a high-pitch whistle especially for dogs, 15 kilocycles, to make them perk up.
After 400 hours of recording, the sessions concluded on April 21, 1967.
Since this is the only proper place to talk about it I might as well get on with it: Carnival of Light. The one song I had hoped would make the cut for the 50th annersary deluxe super ultra edition. It didn't. It was even vetoed from Anthology 2 by George Harrison. This 13 minute and 48 second 'freak out' was recorded on January 5, 1967 during an evening session for a vocal overdub on Penny Lane.
A free form piece instigated and directed by Paul McCartney. It predates the avant garde sound collage of John Lennon's Revolution 9 by eighteen months. In 1966, the pop art group of Bender, Edwards and Vaughan painted and delivered a psychadelic piano for Paul. Upon receipt, they asked Paul to contribute a song for their mixed media event in London.
"The song has no rhythm, though a beat is sometimes established for a few bars by a percussion or rhythmic pounding on the piano. There is no melody, though snatches of a tune sometimes threaten to break through. The Beatles make literally random sounds, although they sometimes respond to each other...It most resembles 'The Return of the Son of Monster Magnet' from Frank Zappa's Freak Out! album."
Barry Miles, Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now
'Carnival of Light' premiered on at the Million Volt Light and Sound Rave at London's Roundhouse on the 28th of January. Paul has repeatedly tried to get it released, advocating for its inclusion on Anthology. In a 2008 BBC interview, Paul confirmed that he still had the master tape and expressed interest in its release and again it wasn't released. Nine years later the 50th anniversary tapes come out. Producer Giles Martin considered it at one point but ultimately it didn't feel like it was part of Sgt. Pepper. He did say he wished to do something with it in the future. We can only hope.
KEEPING THE HYPE IN CHECK
Pepper has gotten all the acclaim throughout the years as "the one". The masterpiece of masterpieces. Jann Wenner, Rolling Stone and its placement as Number 1 on the 500 Greatest Albums contribute to all that. The hype is so parroted in countless music circles that anything placed above Sgt. Pepper is considered "hip contrarianism."
"Sgt. Pepper is called the first concept album but it doesn't go anywhere. All my contributions to the album have absolutely nothing to do with this idea of Sgt. Pepper and his band; but it works because we said it worked and that's how the album appeared. But it was not put together as it sounds, except for Sgt. Pepper introducing Bill Shears and the reprise. Every other song could have been on any other album."
John Lennon, 1980
All We Are Saying, David Sheff
In the 1970 Lennon Remembers interview, Lennon would mention that while the production on Pepper was a peak, the music was better on The White Album because he was being himself on it. He felt more at ease with the production.
"It was becoming difficult for me, because I wasn't really into it. Up to that time, we recorded more like a band; we would learn the songs and we would play them...Before then everything I'd known had been in the West, so the trips to India really opened me up. I was into the whole thing: the music, the culture, the smells. I'd been let out of the confines of the group and it had been difficult for me to come back to the sessions. In a way, it felt like going backwards. Everybody else thought Sgt. Pepper was a revolutionary record- but for me it was not as enjoyable as Rubber Soul and Revolver, purely because I was going through so many trips of my own and I was growing out of that kind of thing."
George Harrison, Anthology
I tend to side with George in thinking Rubber Soul and Revolver are the more enjoyable records. You see John and Paul firing on all cylinders with their lyrics. Pepper, as John mentions, is more of a production. Known to take the piss out of just about everything Beatles related in that 1970 interview, this could be just another example of that. It is a great production though. When I listen to the album I am more inclined to listen to it straight through than just a song here or there. The fifth Beatle is often talked about as being either Brian Epstein or George Martin. Sgt. Pepper without a doubt proved George was the fifth Beatle.
As stated previously, the label rushed to put out Strawberry Fields and Penny Lane. Two songs intended for the album. The songs that would have been replaced are Lovely Rita and When I'm Sixty Four. If The Beatles had gotten their way, this would easily have been a 10/10 album for me and been in my top 3 Beatles albums. With the inclusion of Rita and 64 I feel that those two are not nearly as good as Fields or Lane. So, 9/10.
Stereo or Mono?: This is a tricky question. John points out that "you've never heard Pepper until you've heard it in mono." All the attention to detail was applied in making the mono mixes with The Beatles in attendance. Whereas the stereo was mixed without them present. In that sense the 2014 stereo mix was the one to listen to. Giles Martin recorded a stereo remix for the album's 50th anniversary that used the original tapes as sources. It too, is a must have in any serious Beatles fan collection.
Favorite tracks: Getting Better,She's Leaving Home, Within You Without You, A Day In the Life
4. RUBBER SOUL
"In 1965, we recorded this album. Things were changing. The direction was moving away from the poppy stuff like "Thank You Girl", "From Me to You" and "She Loves You." The early material was directly relating to our fans, saying "Please buy this record," but now we've come to a point where we though "We've done that. Now we can branch out into songs that are more surreal, a little more entertaining." And other people were starting to arrive on the scene who were influential. Dylan was influencing us quite heavily at that point." -Paul McCartney, Anthology
To me, Rubber Soul is the first album where it is stacked top to bottom with classics. Not a single song is a throwaway. The whole pop rock scene was changing in 1965. You had Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited becoming a major benchmark in music that same year. The Beatles had to either catch up and ride the tide or recede into the background like bands like Hermits Hermits.
It's the album I'd loan to a friend if they never heard anything by the Beatles. It also holds a nostalgic place for me as it was the first full length LP of the band I listened to. Rummaging through my parents vinyl collection in the basement for Beatles albums, I would find this. The stretched cover, taken by Robert Freeman suggested something slightly off kilter when you compare it to Freeman's work for Beatles For Sale or With the Beatles. The font design by Charles Front which became often imitated by artists in that flower power era was another arrow pointing forward to their future albums.
John Lennon created some of his best songs here with Nowreigan Wood (This Bird Has Flown), In My Life and Girl. Nowhere Man shows him detailing his feelings of insecurity. Norweigan Wood dealt with an affair he was having but didn't want his wife (Cynthia Lennon at the time) to discover. His song Run For Your Life is a song he considered one of his worst, stealing the opening lines from Elvis Presley's Baby Let's Play House.
The original draft of In My Life contains a number of Liverpool landmarks: Penny Lane, the Abbey Pub, the Old Dutch Cafe and the Dockers Umbrella.
"In My Life started out as a bus journey from my house on 250 Menlove Avenue to town, mentioning every place I could remember. And it was ridiculous. This is before even 'Penny Lane' was written and I had Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields, Tram Sheds- Tram Sheds is the depot just outside Penny Lane- and it was the most boring sort of 'What I Did On My Holidays Bus Trip' song and it wasn't working at all. I cannot do this! I cannot do this!
But then I laid back and these lyrics started coming out of me about the places I remember. Now Paul helped write the middle eight melody. The whole lyrics were already written before Paul had even heard it. In 'In My Life', his contribution melodically was the harmony and the middle eight itself."
John Lennon
All We Are Saying, David Sheff
Both Looking Through You and You Won't See Me were inspired by Paul's turbulent relationship with Jane Asher. While Drive My Car showcased a lighter side of his songwriting. He would add Michelle, one of his oldest songs that was written in 1959, to the album. It was inspired by Austin Mitchell, one of his tutors at the Liverpool College of Art.
George's two contributions, Think For Yourself and If I Needed Someone are among my favorite tracks on the album. Lyrically I'm sure fans were thinking to themselves "Is this guy a giant asshole?" You look at other tracks like Don't Bother Me" and it does point toward that. Nonetheless, his studio collaborations were key to the sound of the album. His influence of American R and B influenced the guitar and bass lines of Drive My Car.
Rubber Soul would also mark the first use of the sitar is featured prominently on Norweigan Wood.
A handful of the debates to be filed under John or Paul is who was the avant garde musician? If you ask me, George beat both of them to it. His introduction of the 12 string on A Hard Day's Night would be mimicked by The Byrds and so many other groups of the time. Here, he melds Eastern music to Western music with the sitar.
Even Ringo gets a moment. His first songwriting credit (Lennon/McCartney/Starkey) What Goes On. In terms of quality, it would be my least favorite on the album.
Ringo recounts the way songs were being introduced: "The first form in which I'd hear a newly written song was on guitar or piano. It's great to hear the progression of various takes of songs. They'd change dramatically. First of all, whoever wrote it would say "It goes like this." They would play it on guitar or piano, singing it every time- they would be learning to sing the song while we were learning to play it, over and over again."
In regards to the use of marijuana during recording sesions, John explains "We weren't all stoned making Rubber Soul because in those days we couldn't work on pot." Ringo backs this up saying that using too many substances causes the music to turn into shit.
The album was recorded in four weeks. In addition to the album, the double A side of We Can Work It Out and Day Tripper was recorded. Their hit singles from the sessions. George Martin's production would again prove monumental. The Greek-style guitar melodies on Girl and the fuzzy bass guitar on Think For Yourself for instance. His biggest contribution to the album was his piano solo for In My Life.
In an interview with Martin he notes that up to that point the albums were more of a collection of songs. With this album "We were thinking of albums as an entity of their own and Rubber Soul was the first to emerge that way." The album would mark the last collaboration with engineer Norman Smith. Smith would go onto engineer albums for another up an coming band- Pink Floyd. Geoff Emerick would take over engineer duties on future albums.
The Beatles always had a habit of being ahead of the pack in a way. Something that makes itself abundantly clear on the Anthology CD sets is just how right the Beatles were in their creative choices. One of the best example of this is this version of I'm Looking Through You:
Insert that in the middle of the album and you have a song that sticks out like a sore thumb. It just doesn't gel with the rest of the album. You got tambourines being played. A missed snare drum stroke by Ringo. It doesn't have the precision of the version that made the final cut. This isn't to say their precision is to be lauded. George Martin's thoughts on things like this had him more concerned about the 'feel' of a song. If it felt right, they wouldn't need to come back to the studio for another take. The Beatles would spend 9 hours recording 24 takes of this track. This was considered the master version until Paul came up with the middle section "Why, tell me why, did you not treat me right? Love has a nasty habit of disappearing overnight." He would change the tempo of the song.
Now listen to what they chose to be on the final product:
It's night and day. It's one of my favorite takes on the whole Anthology set. But you can see the mindset of Paul and his decision to change it.
Another wise decision was to leave off 12 Bar Original. A song that riffed on Green Onions by Booker T and the MGs.
US VS. UK
The US and UK track listings vary.
The US has I've Just Seen A Face from Help! as the album opener. It's Only Love is the Side B opener, or track 7. It is only 12 tracks instead of the UK's 14 tracks. The cuts that are missing are Nowhere Man and Drive My Car. The US Capitol Records version was the one so many people from America grew up on. Including Brian Wilson. Someone who would be so inspired by the album that it catapulted him into making Pet Sounds.
Though the US version does have a nostalgic place in my heart, the UK version I would point to as superior. It's the album as the the band intended. Drive My Car makes for one of their best openers up there with Taxman and Sgt. Pepper. The Lennon/McCartney/Starkey composition What Goes On opens Side B which you also don't get on the US version.
Stereo or Mono?
The 4 track recording process was starting to crack at the seams. Because more tracks were needed, multiple tracks would be bounced down to a single track to free up room on the recording. It was carried out to optimize the Mono mix. There isn't a true stereo mix of this one so Mono wins out here.
Favorite tracks: Drive My Car, Nowhere Man, In My Life, Girl, If I Needed Someone, Wait
3. THE WHITE ALBUM
"Each man has within himself a great storehouse of creative energy, peace and happiness...In order to feel the benefit of the storehouse, however, a man must have access to it; he must know that it is there, know how to reach it..."
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Towards World Peace
"The White Album was the tension album."
Paul McCartney, 1987, on the making of The Beatles
Why do you love The Beatles?
If I were to be approched with this question from a friend or acquaintance my answer would usually be because of how diverse their catalog is. They rarely repeated themselves and always strove to take on new challenges. This is common of any artist I love. King Crimson, David Bowie, The Coen Brothers, PT Anderson, and so on. You can pinpoint seismic leaps in artist catalogs: OK Computer to Kid A. For The Beatles they had achieved major acclaim with Pepper. Many music critics going so far as to say they changed the world of music. Kenneth Tyran called it "a decisive moment in the history of Western civilization." So where do you go after such a monumental feat? You go in the opposite direction.
A plain white cover. An album title as simple as 'The Beatles' embossed on the front. Inside you got goodies just as you did with Pepper. Four photo prints taken by John Kelly. A collage poster. Peter Blake's album design for Pepper exploded with color and had a significant impact outside of music and on fashion. For this album, Richard Hamilton was brought in to create a cover so simple and minimal in design, we now refer to it as simply 'The White Album'. It was Hamilton who proposed it be called The Beatles and that the first 5 million copies be numbered.
For the poster, Hamilton asked the Beatles to provide him with rare and unseen photos of the band. Hamilton composed the collage. McCartney remember the artist's studio in Highgate, London and being awed by him applying five small white pieces of paper to provide negative space among the photographs. These were the things that awaited eager listeners on November 22, 1968. If they only knew what was going on behind the scenes.
John Lennon first met Yoko Ono on November 7 (or 9?), 1966 at the Indica Gallery in London where she was preparing her art exhibit.
"This is it. This is what I've been waiting for all my life. Fuck everything. Fuck the Beatles. Fuck money. I'll go and live with her in a fucking tent if I want." John would tell his longtime friend Peter Shotten this in regards to meeting Yoko Ono. "She had a galvanising effect." Shotten confirmed. "She wasn't just the love of his life, she convinced him he was an artist, which he'd always wanted to be. You could even say Yoko brought John back to life."
Ono believed that creativity was a way of life, not a matter of waiting for inspiration. Under her influence it was no longer enough to produce art: Lennon had to become an Artist, whose every act would betray his ethos and emotion. John would abandon his wife Cynthia and begin a serious relationship with Yoko.
If you look at John's relationships with women you see a distinct pattern of strong, tough women. His mother Julia was strong. So was Aunt Mimi who John ended up staying with. Astrid Kircherr drew his eye in Hamburg. Cynthia was different. A suburban housewife. Yoko Ono was another one of those strong women whom John was so infatuated with.
Rikishesh
The bulk of the White Album was written in India. The Beatles had visited Rishikesh in February 1968 to study Transcendental Meditation with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. The carefree atmosphere proved conducive to collaboration.
"I wrote quite a few songs in Rikishesh and John came up with some creative stuff. George actually once got quite annoyed and told me because I was thinking of the next album. He said, 'We're not fucking here to do the next album. We're here to meditate!' It was like 'Ohh excuse me for breathing.' You know. George was quite strict about that. I was doing a song 'I Will', that I had a melody for quite a long time but I didn't have the lyrics to it. I remember sitting around with Donovan, and maybe a couple other people. We were just sitting around one evening after meditation and I played him this one and he like it and we were trying to write some words."
Paul McCartney, Anthology
"I couldn't sleep and I was hallucinating like crazy- having dreams where you could smell. The funny thing about the camp was that although it was a very beautiful and I was meditating about eight hours a day, I was writing the most miserable songs on earth. In 'Yer Blues,' when I wrote 'I'm so lonely I want to die,' I wasn't kidding. That's how I felt...up there, trying to reach God and feeling suicidal."
John Lennon
Philip Norman, John Lennon: The Life
Paul would be the first to leave. Then Ringo. John and George stayed. Various accounts have been written as to what caused them to leave angrily. The most common being the Maharishi making a pass at Mia Farrow. According to Susan Shumsky's Maharishi and Me: Seeking Enlightenment with the Beatles' Guru, there were three reasons. The first being Maharishi did in fact make a pass at Mia Farrow among other women. The second being a failed film project. The Beatles had wanted to make a documentary of the Maharishi when they were there. Four Star Films, a production company who owner Charlie Lutz, was there at Rikishesh at the same time, had already agreed with the Mahrishi to film him for 5 years. This incensed John and George so much when they found out that they would stay in their rooms.
The Beatles first trips to Hamburg share a parallel with their trip to Rikishesh. They would travel to Hamburg to refine and master their craft of playing live. To play off one another through collaboration. The days of Rubber Soul and Revolver where each member were in tune with one another had long since past. It was in Rikishesh where they would have a creative outpouring of songs but would be written seperately. They left Rikishesh and returned to London on April 21. A magical mystery tour if there ever was one.
the Esher Demos
Toward the end of May 1968, the band gathered at Kinfauns, George's bungalow in Esher to record demos of their compositions. Two dozen songs were recorded. Enough to fill a double album.
All of the demos can be found in the 50th anniversary deluxe edition of The White Album. 27 total. Let's break it down.
From the 27 demos, 19 made it to the White Album.
-21 of the 27 songs were written in Rishikesh.
-5 were written after their visit to Rikishesh.
-Piggies was started in 1966 around the time of Taxman was finished and demoed.
-2 of the 27 demos were passed over from the White Album and made it onto Abbey Road: Mean Mr. Mustard and Polytheme Pam.
-Sour Milk Sea was handed off to an Apple act, Jackie Lomax.
-3 ended up on Beatles solo albums: Junk, Circles and Child of Nature. Junk would find its way onto McCartney first self titled solo album. George Harrison's Circles was resurrected in 1982 for the Gone Tropo solo album. Child of Nature would become Jealous Guy on John Lennon's second solo album Imagine. The melody is the same but the lyrics are very much different. (Thankfully)
-John's What's the New Mary Jane and George's Not Guilty were attempted for the White Album but neither made the final cut. The latter making George's self titled solo album from 1979.
-An additional 9 songs that we know of were written or started in India that were not demoed at Esher: Don't Pass Me By, I Will, Long Long Long, Why Don't We Do It In the Road, Wild Honey Pie, Cosmically Conscious (Paul), Derdun (George), Look At Me (John) and Teddy Boy. Of these, 5 would make it to the White Album. Of the remaining 4, 3 made it to solo releases and George's Derdun would be recorded but never officially released. Cosmically Conscious would be released as a hidden track of Paul's 1993 solo album Off the Ground. Teddy Boy wound up on McCartney's debut solo album. Look At Me ended up on John's 1970 Plastic Ono Band.
-There were 7 more songs written after the Esher Demo sessions that were released that year. Six on the White Album plus Hey Jude.
If you count the 4 songs done by The Beatles at the beginning of the year: Lady Madonna, The Inner Light, Across the Universe and Hey Bulldog you have a staggering 49 songs recorded or demoed by the group between the end of 1967 and the release of The White Album in November 1968. A degree of productivity unmatched in any of their years working together.
George Martin remembers being a bit overwhelmed by them and being underwhelmed at the same time, noting that some of the songs weren't that good. He wanted them to take the best songs and whittle it down to a single album. The Beatles refused. This was significant because it would mark a major creative decision the producer and the band didn't see eye to eye on.
Before we get to the recording at Abbey Road Studios, it's important to get one other thing out of the way: the drugs. Transcendental Meditation was sought to subplant drug and alcohol intake for the band. And for the most part it worked. In the summer of 1968 however, John succumbed to a new drug: heroin.
"John was very curious" Ono revealed. 'He asked if I had ever tried it. I told him that while he was in India with the Maharishi, I had a sniff of it in a party situation. I didn't know what it was. It was a beautiful feeling. John was talking about heroin and said "Did you ever take it?" and I told him about Paris. I said it wasn't bad. I think because the amount was small I didn't even get sick. So I told him that. When you take it- "properly" isn't the right word- but when you do a little more than a small amount, you get sick right away if you're not used to it. So I think maybe because I said it wasn't a bad experience, that had something to do with John taking it."
May 19 saw John and Yoko record Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins. He was catching up quickly to Paul's adventurous avant garde curiosities.
Recording sessions
Sessions for The Beatles began on May 30, 1968. Many factors combined to disturb them. George Harrison believe that Western music paled alongside the glory that was India. He resented being treated like a pupil by McCartney. In August, Ringo left the band for two weeks because of the constant sniping of from McCartney and the heightened tension among three close friends. Geoff Emerick who had been close with the band for five years also walked out. "If John had made a nasty crack about the Maharishi that George resented, they would have a go at each other while gathered around a microphone to do backing vocals. If Paul criticized Ringo's drumming, Ringo would get moody; if George dared question any of Paul's suggestions, Paul would get in a snit. And if any of the band members had done anything that an overly defensive John would view as a potential slight to his new girlfriend, he would be lashing out at all of them with his acid tongue." He would recall that "the atmosphere was poisonous."
Ken Scott's account of the recording of The White Album differs substantially from Emerick's: "Over the years there has been so much written about the animosity that supposedly pervaded the studio. It's all been blown way out of proportion. Of course, there was some strife, but there always is during any project, and what The Beatles experienced making The White Album just wasn't that different from what I've experienced on most projects at some time or another."
From what we have available to us on Anthology and the recently released demos from the 50th Anniversary release, the latter view has become more plausible amongst fans. It isn't entirely one or the other. It's half and half. There was tension for sure, but The Beatles always put that on hold when it came to advancing their music.
Revolution 1
Recorded: May 30; May 31- June 4
The inspiration
Revolution was John's reply to the Spring of Revolution in 1968. He believed that the only worthwhile change would be from the inside rather than revolutionary violence.
"All I'm saying is I think you should do it by changing people's heads, and they're saying we should smash the system. Now the system-smashing scene has been going on forever. What's it done? The Irish did it, the Russians did it and the French did it and where has it got them? It's got them nowhere. It's the same old game. Who's going to run this smashing up? Who's going to take over?"
The recording
Yoko Ono announced her presence in the studio by constantly being by John's side. Usually sitting on one of the amps close to him. People had been in the studio before. Mike Nesmith of The Monkees being in the studio during Pepper. This was different.
The May 30th session took 18 takes of Revolution. As soon as Geoff Emerick pushed the talkback button, he announces "Take 18". John deliberately kept Emerick's words as part of the song and that is what you hear on the album. This take went on well onto the 10 minute mark. The last six minutes containing discordant instrumental jamming, feedback and John screaming "alright" repeatedly.
On take 19, for the vocal overdubs, John wanted to alter his voice in some way so he laid on the floor of Studio 3.
Don't Pass Me By
Recorded: June 5, 6, 22
The inspiration
As early as 1963, Ringo mentioned writing his own song.
"It was written as a country and western but Paul and John singing it with that blues feeling knocked me out. Are the Beatles going to record it? I don't know. I don't think so, actually. I try and push it on them every time we make a record."
The recording
A country and western flavored song, this song started out life in the studio as Ringo's Tune (Untitled) and then became 'This Is Some Friendly.'
Revolution 9
Recorded: June 6, 10, 11, 20-21
If I could ask John Lennon about one song it would be about Revolution 9. How much of it was planned? How much was improvised? Before I appreciated on its own terms, it became a track synonymous with the Paul Is Dead rumors. Playing it backwards and hearing 'Turn me on dead man." I would listen to it solely for that reason. Later years after getting into more experimental music, I would listen to it regularly. It represent the height of John's experimentation and something that is far more interesting than what Yoko and him did with Two Virgins.
The inspiration
John had conceived Revolution 9 as a picture of a revolution. An "action painting."
The closest musical influence I can think of, is Frank Zappa's The Return of the Son of Monster Magnet. A musician who would have several run ins with Beatles members throughout the years. There is no proof as to what John was listening to at the time to inspire him to create this. Just conjecture.
The recording
Revolution 9 was only recorded with John, Yoko and George Harrison. John would spend days preparing tape loops of sound effects, some of his own making, others culled from the Abbey Road collections. The session for this composition helped cement the album being a collection of four men's solo recordings rather than a group effort. Never before had one or more Beatles left the country while group recording sessions were in progress. But on June 7, George and Ringo flew to the USA, not returning until June 18.
It opens with Alistair Taylor, who was Brian Epstein's assistant, apologizing to George Martin for forgetting the claret before the sad piano.
Mark Lewisohn divided all the overlapping sounds and spoken comments into: George Martin saying "Geoff...put the red light in; a choir, a backwards symphony; backwards violins; an orchestral overdub from 'A Day In the Life'; banging glasses; applause; opera; backwards mellotron; humming; spoken phrases by John and George and a cassette tape of John and Yoko screaming the word 'right' from 'Revolution'.
The most famous of the sound effects was 'number 9, number 9, number 9'...Engineer Richard Lush explains that the 'number 9' came off an examination tape. John thought it was a hoot and made a tape loop of it. "It's the highest number in the universe. After that you go back to 1." Lennon would say.
Lush also recalls John and George Harrison saying strange things on the mic like: "the Watusi, the Twist', "take this brother may it serve you well." Ono is heard saying "you become naked."
What is most interesting is John shutting out Paul (who was then in America) out of the sessions. The mid sixties saw Paul rubbing his shoulders up against many avant garde and experimental acts trying to synthesize that into pop music. He was into John Cage and German composer Stockhausen at the time. Why wouldn't you include someone as musically adventurous? By the time it was recorded, both Paul and George Martin, someone who was always on the cutting edge of innovation, wanted it excluded from the album.
Between 1968 and 1970, John had a creative burst. Going down the avant garde path in 1968 with this track and Plastic Ono Band in 1970. He never got as ambitious afterwards. Then again, none of the Beatles really did anything as ambitious as what they did in the sixties. Their musical peers would pretty much pick up the baton and sprawl out in every direction.
Blackbird
Recorded: June 11
The inspiration
One of the stories that surrounds Blackbird is that one day Paul awoke In Rikishesh to the sound of a blackbird singing. Another suggests it is about the reports of race riots in America. Barry Miles' interview with Paul narrows it down even more: "I had in mind a black woman rather than a bird. Those were the days of the Civil Rights movement, of which we all cared passionately about."
While John was experimenting with sounds, Paul recorded Blackbird which features him on acoustic guitar. The tail end includes the sound of chirruping birds taken from "Volume Seven: Birds of A Feather."
Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except For Me and My Monkey
Recorded: June 26-27
The inspiration
John would say this song was a reference to his relationship with Yoko. "Everybody was seemed to be paranoid except for us two, who were in glow of love...everybody was sort of tense around us."
Monkey or monkey on my back was forties and fifties slang for heroin addiction.
The recording
The new method of recording for this particular album was rehearse, rehearse, rehearse. Instead of spooling back the record player to record proper over the rehearsals, they treated the takes as rehearsals themselves. Few songs on Sgt. Pepper went past 10 take. Few songs on The Beatles stopped there. Harrison's Not Guilty made it to 102 takes before ultimately being vetoed off the album by George himself!
Good Night
Recorded: June 28/July 2
The inspiration
John stated in a 1980 interview for Playboy that 'Good Night' was written as a goodnight song for his son Julian. In the same way 'Beautiful Boy' was written as goodnight song for Sean. He gave it to Ringo to sing. The track was so heartfelt and tender that upon release, many attributed it to McCartney.
The recording
As per usual, George Martin would write the string arrangement. It would be the last song on the album.
I always picture silent films in my head when I think of the opening of this track. Specifically the way John plays the piano in the opening. Not too big a fan of this one even if it does bring a unique reggae flavor.
The inspiration
"I had a friend called Jimmy Scott who was a Nigerian congo player. He had many expressions. One of which was, 'Ob la di ob la da life goes on'. I used to love this expression. In actuality, 'Ob la di ob la da' is Yoruba for life goes on." -Paul McCartney
The recording
"This was a McCartney composition that Lennon detested." Geoff Emerick asserts. John viewed it as "more of Paul's granny shit."
The song took shape on July 3. Take 1-7 was recorded with Paul on acoustic guitar and Ringo on drums. Take 4 being the one Paul liked the best.
A brass band was brought in to play an arrangement. Paul was not satisfied an insisted on remaking the song. Featuring, as it did, John's loud piano to kick things off.
Paul McCartney recalls the recording of the track: "I remember being in the studio with George and Ringo, struggling with an acoustic version of the song. John was late for the session but when he arrived, he bounced in, apologising, in a very good mood. He sat down at the piano and instantly played the blue-beat piano intro. We were very pleased with his fresh attitude. It turned us on and turned the whole song around."
Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da was completed on July 15 and the next day, engineer Geoff Emerick quit because he could not stand the tension.
Cry Baby Cry
Recorded: July 15, 16, 18
Such an overlooked song that hides on Side 4. The mixture of playful lyrics while the menacing decending chord is playing makes for a dynamic song.
The inspiration
In his book The Beatles, Hunter Davies tells of Lennon having the shape of the song in late 1967. "I've got another one here, a few words, I think I got them from an advert: Cry baby cry, make your mother buy. I've been playing it over the piano." Around the time he was in India, John decided to add a descending chord pattern on guitar and leaned on the nursery rhyme Sing A Song of Sixpence to fill out the lyrics.
The recording
Due to Geoff Emerick walking out on July 16, Ken Scott filled in for him on Engineer duties and would work on the rest of the album. Emerick would not work with the band until April 14, 1969.
The 'Can You Take Me Back' coda of the song is from Paul and was recorded on September 16. The Beatles (minus George) were in the process of recoding I Will when Paul broke into an unrehearsed off-the-cuff song. The 2:21 improv was recorded and kept on a tape for 'odds and ends'.
The next day, the studio focused on Cry Baby Cry. The took out a 28 second section from it and included it between the end of Cry Baby Cry and the beginning of Revolution 9.
The same guy who wrote Yesterday wrote this! Hell, the same guy who wrote Blackbird wrote this. It's taken on new meaning since it was picked up by Charles Manson in the same way he used Revolution 9 and Piggies to interpret them as messages to him about a coming race war. There is that association. To me, it represents The Beatles working on the opposite end of the spectrum from the aforementioned softer ballads. The White Album is an album that made me go "What can't this band do?"
The inspiration
The idea for Helter Skelter came from a music paper's rave review of a new single by The Who, 'I Can See For Miles.' Paul didn't think the single matched the praise and set himself the challenge of writing something even heavier.
The name Helter Skelter comes from a spiral slide at a British fairground. Paul would say that he "used the symbol of a helter skelter as a ride from the top to bottom- the rise and fall of the Roman Empire- and this was the fall, the demise, the going down".
The recording
The song exists in a heavy version, a slow version and an acoustic version
Three takes were recorded on July 18. The first being 10:40, the second 12:35 and the third, an epic 27:11. Almost a half hour. The longest ever Beatles recording. Each take developed into a concisely played jam with long instrumental passages. The 27 minute take of Skelter has long since fallen into Beatles lore in the same way 'Carnival of Light' has.
The version of Helter Skelter met Paul's wishes to record a cacophony of noise. The problem was that it was long enough to take up an entire side on a record. So on September 9, The Beatles taped a remake. Chris Thomas oversaw production due to George Martin being away. From Mark Lewisohn "All sorts of instruments were bandied about. The end result was take 21. John played bass guitar and a decidedly unskilled saxophone, Mal Evans played an equally amateurish trumpet, there were two lead guitars, heavy drums, a piano, built-in distortion and feedback, backing vocals from John and George, various mutterings and the icing on the cake- a supremely raucous Paul McCartney lead vocal." It was Ringo who laid the finishing touch, playing so hard that he shouted "I got blisters on my fingers!"
Sexy Sadie
Recorded: July 19, 24; August 21
The inspiration
John Lennon originally wrote this song as a bitter screed against Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in reference to what concluded their stay at Rikishesh. It was rewritten to avoid a court case.
The recording
Most of the day was spent jamming for the July 19 session. Included in the jam is a dedication to Brian Epstein called 'Brian Epstein Blues' and a six minute instrumental jam of George Gershwin's 'Summertime'. The song was eventually remade a few days later. It lasted to 47 takes and John still wasn't happy with the sound. It was completed on August 21.
While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Recorded: July 25; August 16; September 5-6
In my top 5 Beatles songs. This is George knocking it out of the park. It's an arrow pointing toward the classic rock of the 70's.
The inspiration
"Around the time of writing My Guitar Gently Weeps I had a copy of the I Ching- the Book of Changes; which seemed to me to be based on the Eastern concept that everything is relative to everything else, as opposed to the Western view that things are merely coincidental. This idea was in my head when I visited my parents house in Northern England. I decided to write a song basd on the first thing I saw upon opening the book- as it would be relative to that moment, at that time. I picked up a book at random-opened it-saw 'Gently weeps'-then laid the book dwon again and started the song. Some of the words to the song were changed before I finally recorded it- as can be seen here:
I look at the trouble
and hate that is raging
While my guitar gently weeps
While I'm sitting here
Doing nothing but ageing"
George Harrison, I Me Mine
The recording
George had been patient. "I'd always have to do about ten of Paul and John's songs before they'd give me a break." Now it was his turn. The July 25 session had the song recorded as an acoustic version. Like Sexy Sadie before it, it would be remade on August 16. Yet a further remake of the song began on September 3. Between these sessions, they would record Dear Prudence on eight track and that made the band to record all of their songs on 8 track. And so, the very first eight track recording at Abbey Road studios were for this song. George would spend the whole session trying to record a backwards guitar solo. They had spent the whole night trying to get it to work but it was eventually scrapped. This was where Eric Clapton started getting involved in the song.
Upon the September 5 session, George listened to a playback of what they had recorded previously. He didn't like it so everything was scrapped. Another remake was to begin with a total of 44 takes recorded that day. It was revealed that take 26 was 'the best' and it would the remaining overdubs would be filled the next day. It is this take you hear on the album.
Not Guilty
Recorded: August 7-9, 12
George's output that was left off and on the album really shines. Not Guilty, Circles, Sour Milk Sea, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Long Long Long, Piggies and Savoy Truffle are all worthy inclusions on any album.
Inspiration
Said to be inspired by the counterculture it could also be seen as his response to being shut out by John and Paul.
Recording
The marathon session for this song lasted to 102 takes. It should be mentioned that there were not 100 complete takes. Only 21 were seen through to conclusion and the last take, 102, was a reduction mix of take 99.
When overdubbing began, Brian Gibson recalls George asking them to put his guitar amplifierat one end of the echo chambers with a microphone at the other end to pick up the output.
Mother Nature's Son
Recorded: August 9, 20
This is so peaceful and serene after the bluesy Yer Blues. It's the brass the elevates the track.
The inspiration
Inspired by the partial message from the Maharishi concerning the unity of man and nature, Paul got to work on Mother Nature's Son.
The recording
"Paul was downstairs going through arrangements with George (Martin) and the brass players. Everything was going great. Everyone was in good spirits. Suddenly, half way through, John and Ringo walked in and you could cut the atmosphere with a knife. An instant charge. It was like that for ten minutes and as soon as they left it felt great again. It was very bizarre." -Ken Scott, The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions, Mark Lewisohn
During the recording of Blackbird, John was present in the studio for a little while. Before he surmised he wasn't need and left to work on Revolution 9, he brought forward a suggestion for "a little bit of brass band." Paul replied "Yes, that would be lovely," Paul immediately switched to Mother Nature's Son remarking "that would be nice with a brass band." You can hear Paul trying out various vocal inflections on Take 15.
Yer Blues
Recorded: August 13-14
Ringo's count in kicks off the Beatles second foray into heavy music. If you thought the previous mixes were heavy, the 2018 mix adds extra oomph.
The inspiration
Written in India while he was 'feeling so suicidal', John's Yer Blues was a parody of the British blues scene.
The recording
When George was recording Notr Guily, he had the idea of doing it in the control room with the speakers blasting, creating an on-stage feel. Ken Scott remembers John Lennon coming in at one point and saying "Bloody hell, the way you lot are carrying on you'll be wanting to record everything in the room next door." The room next door was tiny and had no proper studio walls or acoustics of any kind. Lennon replied "That's a great idea, let's try it on the next number." That next number was Yer Blues.
What's the New Mary Jane
Recorded: August 14; November 26
Were the Beatles fans of Pink Floyd? Former Beatles engineer produced Floyd's debut album Piper At the Gates of Dawn and Syd Barrett's vocal, especially on See Emily Play, is the first thing I think of when I listen to What's the New Mary Jane.
The inspiration and recording
Between Two Virgins and this song, Yoko Ono was having an increasing influence on John's artistic output. The song was ultimately left off the album presumably because of lack of space but more likely because of peer pressure. John and George are the only ones who were involved in the session. Though Yoko and Mal Evans are heard to be joining in at times.
Rocky Racoon
Recorded: August 15
Songs whose lyrics are broad character sketches are among my favorite.Two of my favorite albums are Nick Cave's Murder Ballads and Elton John's Goodbye Yellow Brick Road for this very reason. They are mini movies unto themselves.
The inspiration
Sources point to Robert Service's 'The Shooting of Dan McGrew', a poem that tells a story of love and revenge with similair sounding characters. There's a gunfight, a character named Dan and a female character's who's repeatedly referred to as "the lady known as Lou" ("she called herself 'Lil' but everyone knew her as 'Nancy'.") Paul would say that the lyrics just flowed out of his head. In Many Years From Now, Paul talks of how Rocky Racoon was his take on the western. "The bit I liked about it was him finding Gideon's Bible and thinking 'some guy called Gideon must have left it for the next guy."
The recording
All four Beatles were present for this recording. It was recorded in 10 takes. A major difference between the sessions for Not Guilty and Sexy Sadie.
August 17 marks the day George Harrison and his wife Pattie Harrison leave for Greece on holiday. He would return on August 21 to continue recording.
Wild Honey Pie
Recorded: August 20
I would happily trade Wild Honey Pie for Not Guilty. In terms of being a transition, it makes sense. It reminds me of how The Who made The Who Sell Out with all the fake advertisements.
The inspiration and recording.
Like Can You Take Me Back, Wild Honey Pie was an off-the-cuff McCartney recording. Spontaneity being the key.
Back In the USSR
Recorded: August 22-23
The Beatles had many great openers: Taxman, Drive My Car. This was one of them. It's a great way to open an album when the bulk of it was inspired by the Beatles flight to India. The landing of the plain seguing into Dear Prudence is one of my favorite moments. The Beach Boys-esque rocker followed by the gentle touch of Dear Prudence sets up the album: this is going to go in many directions, so sit back and enjoy the ride.
The inspiration
Paul mentions in Many Years From Now that Back In the USSR was a spoof of Chuck Berry's Back In the USA. This wasn't the only inspiration. When the Beatles were in Rikishesh, Beach Boys member Mike Love was with them. "I was sitting at the breakfast table and McCartney came down with his acousting guitar and he was playing 'Back In the USSR' and I told him what you ought to do is talk about the girls all around Russia, The Ukraine and Georgia. He was plenty creative not to need any lyrical help from me but I gave him that idea for that little section." What resulted was a Beach Boys spin on the lyrics.
The recording
When George came back from Greece on August 21, another member was to take a leave of absence. As they began to lay down the backing track for 'Back In the USSR', Paul ticked off Ringo over a fluffed tom-tom fill. They had already argued about how the drum part should be played. Anthology has Ringo recounting "I left because I felt two things: I felt I wasn't playing great, and I also felt the other three were really happy and I was an outsider."
The drummer would spend his vacation in Sardina on Peter Seller's yacht. So who is on drums for Back In the USSR and Dear Prudence?!
It was Paul.
The final touch was added in the song's mono mix: the sound of an aeroplane taking off and landing.
Dear Prudence
Recorded: August 28-30
My favorite John song on the album. It's one of his strongest vocal performances. The rising lyrics of "the sun is up the sky is blue It's beautiful and so is you" never fails to ignite my heart. Paul's bass on this track just sounds fantastic. Ringo came back into the band after the recording of this track and the band had less than two months to complete the album before Christmas.
The inspiration
Written by John Lennon while in Rikishesh, the song was inspired from a fellow TM student, Prudence Farrow. The younger sister of actress Mia Farrow. According to Prudence herself, she was meditating since 1966 and had tried to get back on course in 1967. Being on that course was so important for her that she would run to her room after lectures and meals. John, George and Paul would all sit around jamming and she just flew to her room. This was John saying 'Come out and play with us. Come out and have fun.' "Greet the brand new day."
The recording
Recorded at Trident Studios on an eight track, the song only required one take. The eight track facility meant that it could be recorded track by track, each one being perfect a number of times while simultaneously wiping previous attempts.
The next day Mal Evans and Apple artist Jackie Lomax joined in occasionally.
The distinctive fingerpicked style was taught to John by Donovan, another guest at Rikishesh.
Glass Onion
Recorded: September 11-13
To me, this is John making fun of the psychadelic period the band went through. It's him fucking with the people who read way too much into the music.
The inspiration and recording
"Here's another clue for you all. The Walrus was Paul." John pieced together the song using references to other Beatles songs.
John would return to the studio on September 26 to add sound effects and it would be George Martin to suggest strings at the end.
I Will
Recorded: September 16-17
The inspiration
In India, Paul remembers playing the song for Donovan and says it's one of his favorite melodies he's written.
Steve Turner writes in A Hard Day's Write that "there's a sense of anticipation in the lyric, provoked by the knowledge that Linda and her daughter were arriving in London the next week. Paul had previously only met Linda in London during ther Sgt. Pepper period and on two subsequent visits to America, but he obviously felt he knew enough about her to be confident in offering his love ;forever and forever."
The recording
The September 16 session for I Will is another session I'd love to have been a fly on the wall. George was not involved so it was Paul, John and Ringo recording 67 straight takes of the song. Paul even slipping into ad-libbing the 'Can You Take Me Back' song that would find itself tacked onto the end of Cry Baby Cry.
Another ad libbed piece was from Take 35, where Paul went into a brief improv of Step Inside Love, a song he wrote for Cilla Black. Los Paranoias, a make it up as you go along piece followed it. The phrase Los Paranoias was a running joke with The Beatles. John would mention that they would called themselves that in Anthology. He was bring up the phrase again in his 1973 Mind Games album with the track 'Dr. Winston O'Boogie and Los Paranoias'.
I Will (Take 13) showcases a much more laid back atmosphere now that Ringo had returned. Rattle dem skulls.
Birthday
Recorded: September 18
The inspiration
"What happened was The Girl Can't Help it was on television...And we wanted to see it, so we started recording at five o'clock. And we said "We'll do something, just a backing track. We'll make up a backing track...And we came back to my house and watched The Girl Can't Help It. Then we went back to the studio again and made up some words to go with it all. So this song was made up in an evening." Paul McCartney, Radio Luxembourg, November 20, 1968
The recording
Paul was the first one in the studio and by the time the others joined him he had already written the song.
Piggies
Recorded: September 19-20; October 2
The inspiration
According to George Harrison, Piggies was a social comment. He was stuck for one line in the middle until his mother came up with the lyric 'What they need is a damn good whacking!' which is a nice simple way of saying they need a good hiding.
Of course, Manson interpreted this literally.
The recording
Chris Thomas had been the producer and found a harpsichord in Studio One that had been set up for a classical recording. So he discussed wheeling it into Studio Two for the session. George had liked his idea and suggested Chris play it. While Chris and George were fiddling around with it, he started playing a new song to him- 'Something'. "I said 'That's great! Why don't we do that instead?' and he replied 'Do you like it? Do you think it's really good?' When I said yes he said 'Oh maybe I'll give it to Jackie Lomax then, he can do it as a single!" This never happened of course. It would find its place on Abbey Road and we would all win.
The next day saw John in the control room creating tape loops of pigs snorting and grunting.
Happiness Is A Warm Gun
Recorded: September 23-25
When I first heard the White Album, this was my favorite song off of it. It's a song that can be divided into three parts. As soon as I heard OK Computer for the first time and Paranoid Android came on, I noticed they had done the same structure for their song. This was one of the earliest songs I listened to that had odd time signature changes. I would get into prog rock which had that all over the place. But to hear it in the most popular band in the world was something. If Revolution 9 was a sonic collage, Happiness Is A Warm Gun shows Lennon using snippets of lyrical ideas to form a collage.
All of the Beatles are quoted as saying they like this song. Paul even named it the best song on the album.
The inspiration
The song was written in three parts. The second "I need a fix...Mother Superior" came about during the Esher demos. In a 1970 interview, John says Mother Superior is Yoko because she's always one jump ahead.
An overt reference to heroin, John's drug of choice, was made: "I need a fix cause I'm going down."
The next part was based on something John saw in print. The title "Happiness Is A Warm Gun" is from the May 1968 edition of American Rifleman. "Happiness Is A Warm Gun was from the cover of a gun magazine George Martin had in the studio when we were making the double album. On this cover it had a picture of a gun that had just been shot and was smoking, you know. I thought 'Wow! Incredible!' you know, the fact that happiness was a warm gun that had just someone shooting something or somebody...I thought it was a fantastic, insane thing to say!"
Derek Taylor tells of a story in which "a chap my wife Joan and I met in the Carrick Bay Hotel on the Isle of Man. It was late one night drinking in the bar and this local fellow who liked meeting holiday makers and rapping to them suddenly said 'I like wearing moleskin gloves, you know. It gives me a little bit of unusual sensation when I'm out with my girlfriend." Hence the lyric "She's well acquainted with the touch of a velvet hand." The "man in the crowd with the multicolord mirrors on his hobnail boots" was something Taylor saw in the newspaper about a city soccer player having been arrested by the police for having mirrors on the caps of his shoes so he could look up girls skirts.
"Lying with his eyes while his hands were working overtime" came from another thing Taylor read where a man wearing a cloak had fake plastic hands, which he could rest on the counter of a shop, while underneath his cloak he was busy lifting things and stuffing them in a bag.
"These were all different segments of songs that I wrote altogether and stuck them all in once piece. Just like a collage, instead of an album like Pepper. This was all done in one song and it went through all the different styles of rock n' roll...I love it, I think it's a beautiful song. I like all the different things that are happening in it." John Lennon
The recording
The decision to weave these three songs- none of which had similair themes- together, was made on September 23. It went through 45 takes. Mostly because of the complicated tempo changes between 3/4 and 4/4 time.
Honey Pie
Recorded: October 1-2, 4
More of Paul's granny shit. Can you blame him though? His father Jim McCartney was a ragtime guy so he has it in his DNA. Regardless, he continues to how versatility all over the album with this 1920's jazz style number.
The inspiration
"Both John and I had a great love for music hall, what the Americans call vaudeville, I'd heard a lot of that kind of music growing up with the Billy Cotton Band Show and all that on the radio. I was also an admirer of Fred Astaire; one of my favorites of his was 'Cheek to Cheek' from a film called Top Hat. I very much liked that old crooner style, the strange fruity voice that they used, so 'Honey Pie' was me writing one of them to an imaginary woman, across the ocean, on the silver screen, who was called 'Honey Pie'. It's another one of my fantasy songs. We put a sound on my voice to make it sound like a scratchy old record."
Paul McCartney
Barry Miles, Many Years From Now
The recording
Once again, the Beatles record the song at the eight track facility at Trident Studios.
Savoy Truffle
Recorded: October 3, 5, 11, 14
The inspiration
George got the inspiration from hanging out with Eric Clapton. "At the time he had a lot of cavities in his teeth and needed dental work. He always had a tootache but he ate a lot of chocolates. He was over at my house and I had a box of 'Good News' chocolates on the table and wrote the songs from the name on the lid."
The recording
Recorded at Trident Studios on October 3, it still needed finishing touches later on. So 8 days later at Abbey Road Studios, George Martin suggested that Chris Thomas score it with saxophones. Six saxophonists were called in to perform an overdub.
Martha My Dear
Recorded: October 4-5
There is an exuberance in Paul's song that is hard to top. Even amonst Beatles songs. I'm talking specifically about what happens at the 1 minute mark. "Take a good look around you" How can your spirit not get uplifted during that part?
The inspiration
Martha My Dear started out as a piano exercise by Paul. He remembers surpising people by playing the piano lesson because it was above his level of competence. While he was blocking out the words, he found the words to Martha My Dear. He had bought an old English sheepdog puppy in 1965. He named the dog Martha and she was his first pet.
The recording
As Lewisohn points out in Complete Recordings, Martha My Dear may very well have been a one-man show for Paul. Parts were recorded after a six-hour brass, woodwind, and string overdub for this and 'Honey Pie' on October 4.
The chords of 'Long, Long, Long' were suggesting to him by listening to Bob Dylan's 'Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands'. He was fascinated with the movement from D to E minor to A and back to D and he wanted to write something similar.
The recording
A sixteen and half hour session lasting from 2:30 pm to 7 am took place on October 7.
It took 67 run throughs of the rhythm track before the 'best' version was found. One additional sound was recorded that day. Chris Thomas recalls "There's a sound near the end of the song (best heard on the right stereo channel) which is a bottle of Blue Nun wine rattling away on top of a Leslie speaker cabinet. It just happened. Paul hit a certain note and it started vibrating. We thought it was so good we set it up again. The Beatles always took advantage of these accidents."
I'm So Tired
Recorded: October 8
If I'm Only Sleeping and Yer Blues had sex, this would be the result. A lethargic rocker with interesting changes in tempo.
The inspiration
As with Yer Blues, the song was written in India recallings hours of insomnia, chain smoking alone in his quarters and cursing Sir Walter Reigh for having discovered tobacco.
The recording
The October 8 session was incredibly productive. Even if it did take 16 hours. Two songs were recorded and finished with no overdubs to follow.
Here is Take 14. A version I almost prefer to the one that made it on the album.
The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill
Recorded: October 8
The inspiration
The song recounts the true story of Richard Cooke III, a young American college graduate, who visited his mother Nancy while she was on the TM course if Rikishesh. The tiger hunt the song refers to took place 3 hours from Rikishesh.
Bungalow Bill was an allusion to Buffalo Bill, the performing name of American cowboy William Frederick Cody. It became bungalow because all the accomadation in Rikishesh was in bungalows.
The recording
For the first time in Beatles recorded history, a female lead vocal is recorded. It it Yoko saying "not when he looked so fierce." Chris Thomas recalls it being a free for all. Everyone in the vicinity of the studio joined in. Among them was Maureen Starkey, Ringo's wife.
Toward the end of the song you can hear Lennon say "Eh up!", which, when the album master tape was compiled, provided the perfect cue for the beginning of 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps'.
Why Don't We Do It In the Road
Recorded: October 9
A song about animals fucking should be this smooth.
The inspiration
"I was up on the flat roof meditating and I'd seen a troupe of monkets walking alone in the jungle and a male just hopped on to the back of this female and gave her one, as they say in the vernacular. Within two or three seconds, he hopped off again, as if to say 'It wasn't me', and she looked around as if there was some mild disturbance and wandered off. And I thought, bloody hell, that puts it all in the cocked hat, that's how simple the act of procreation ism this bloody monkey just hopping on and hopping off. There is an urge, they do it, and it's done with. And it's that simple. We have horrendous problems with it, and yet animals don't. So that was basically it."
Paul McCartney
Many Years From Now, Barry Miles
The recording
"That's Paul. He even recorded it by himself in another room. That's how it was getting in those days. We came in and he'd made the whole record. Him drumming. Him playing the piano. Him singing. But he couldn't- he couldn't- maybe he couldn't make the break from The Beatles. I don't know what it was. I enjoyed the track. Still, can't speak for George, but I was always hurt when Paul would knock something of without involving us. But that's just the way it was then."
John Lennon, 1980
All We Are Saying, David Sheff
"It wasn't a deliberate thing. John and George were tied up doing something and me and Ringo were free, just hanging around, so I said to Ringo: 'Let's go and do this.'
Anyway, he did the same with Revolution 9. He went off and made that without me. No one ever says that. John is the nice guy and I'm the bastard. It gets repeated all the time."
Paul McCartney
The Beatles, Hunter Davies
Julia
Recorded: October 13
In many ways, this is John's first solo track. It perfectly caps off Disc 1 if you're listening to the CDs.
The inspiration
The name comes from John's late mother but referenes Yoko in the lyrics. Yoko Ono's name in Japanese means "ocean child". "Seashell eyes" also harkens back to Lennon's description of her in Lucy In the Sky of Diamonds "the girl with kaleidoscope eyes."
The recording
The 32nd and final song intended for The Beatles was the John Lennon composition, Julia. Being as sparse as it is, the song only demanded 3 takes. Like the McCartney recording of 'Why Don't We Do It In the Road?' before it, 'Julia' was a solo Lennon recording.
The sequencing
From Mark Lewisohn's The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions:
The Beatles convened in Abbey Road Studio for the final mastering. It took place on October 16 and 17. This was The Beatles first and only 24 hour session. In addition to being frantic, it took place without George Harrison who flew out to Los Angeles on October 16, leaving John, Paul, George Martin, Ken Scott and John Smith the task of working out the LP running order from the 31 songs available. The 31 songs proved hard to work with for George Martin as they were just too varied in style to slip into an easy category. After dropping What's the New Jane?, an approximated structure was given:
-the heavy songs on Side C (Birthday, Yer Blues, Everybody's Got Something to Hide..., Helter Skelter)
-George's four songs were spread out over one per side
-no composer had more than two songs in succession and each side last between 20 and 25 minutes
-as a joke, the songs with an animal in their title (Blackbird, Piggies, Rocky Raccoon) were placed together, in succession on Side B.
Another decision was to link each cohesive song, either with a crossfade, a straight edit or simply by matching the dying moment of one with the opening note of the next. The Beatles like Sgt. Pepper had none of the customary three second gaps between songs. Back In the USSR was conncted through Dear Prudence with an airplane landing. Bungalow Bill cuts into While My Guitar Gently Weeps with John's "Eh Oh!". The entirety of Side D is on of the best pieces of sequencing in the Beatles catalog: kicking off with Revolution 1, the rocking guitar fading out and Honey Pie fading in. The 20's jazzy feel fading out of Honey Pie and the drums and piano from Savoy Truffle kicking in. The final notes of Savoy Truffle and leading up to John's vocals in Cry Baby Cry. Paul's "Can You Take Me Back" being taken from the odds and ends tape and used to introduce Revolution 9 along with the chatter between Alistair Taylor and George Martin. A song I use to skip, I now listen to it straight through. Especially in succession with Good Night. Revolution 9 is the nightmare. Good Night is the dream. And to that I say:
Favorite tracks: Dear Prudence, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Happiness Is A Warm Gun, Martha My Dear, I Will, Julia, Yer Blues, Helter Skelter, Long Long Long, Savoy Truffle, Cry Baby Cry, Revolution 9
2. REVOLVER
There's a scene in Mad Men where Don Draper puts on Revolver and drops the needle so it lands on Tomorrow Never Knows. He reclines in his chair and the episode goes into a montage. The sound is so alien to him that he takes the needle off the record. The episode cuts to black and the music blasts back in. Even Don Draper can't stop the cultural wave.
1966 was the year that everything changed for The Beatles. They would perform their final concert in Candlestick Park in San Francisco, California on August 29, 1966. They were now a studio band more interested in engaging the listener.
Two things would cast a shadow over The Beatles in certain circles of popular culture. The first was in January 1966 when Lennon gave an interview to Maureen Cleave of London's Evening Standard newspaper. It would be infamous for his comments on Christianity. "We're more popular than Jesus now". Pictures of Beatles albums being put into piles of trash and set ablaze would be the result. The second was LSD.
Could The Beatles have produced such work like Sgt. Pepper or Revolver without LSD? Maybe. But it would sound markedly different. Acid unlocked the Beatles willingness to experiment, write in new ways and pursue a multi faceted creative vision. The sounds they were producing in the studio could not be reproduced outside of it.
Up until this point, John more or less in the driver's seat. There was an eagerness to try out new things. Even when an idea didn't pan out, Paul picked up the ball and ran with it. John and Paul were on equal footing by 1966. As Robert Rodriguez points out in his book about Revolver, "John led Paul further outside existing boundaries than he was usually inclined to go, while Paul tended to rein in John's excesses." After Revolver, The Walrus was Paul. Just as John's engagement in the group started to wane, Paul hit a creative streak: Sgt. Pepper, Magical Mystery Tour, the formation of Apple as a clothes shop and record label; the Get Back project; and Abbey Road. Revolver marked the exact midpoint in the shift between the dominance of John and Paul.
Recording began on April 6, 1966. The first track recorded would be the last on the album- Tomorrow Never Knows. Drones haven't been used in Western music since the 12th century. The Indian drone used here challenges seven centuries of music. The unique drum sounds for Ringo ended up being the first drum loop recorded. What engineer Geoff Emerick did was bring the bass drum microphone closer to the drum than ever before. "There's an early picture of the Beatles wearing a woollen jumper with four necks. I stuffed that inside the drum to deaden the sound. It became the sound of Revolver and Sgt. Pepper really."
McCartney would bring in tape loops and would overdub them in the studio. The textural innovation being unprecedented in pop music. As Ian MacDonald notes in Revolution In the Head, the tape loops would include: a seagull (0:07), an orchestral chord of B flat major (0:19); a Mellotron playing on a flute setting (0:22); another Mellotron oscillating in 6/8 from B to C in its string setting (0:38); and a rising scalar phase on a sitar (0:56).
Amidst the instrumental experimentation, John's lyrics includes a line taken from Timothy Leary's version of the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Nothing really sounded quite like his vocal. It was the sound of Lennon's voice being fed through a revolving Leslie speaker inside a Hammond organ. This effect begins 87 seconds into the song. George Martin remembers "John said to me 'I want to sound as though I'm the Dalai Lama singing from the highest mountain top. And yet I still want to hear the words I'm singing."
One of the things John hated was having to record his vocals twice. So one of the engineers, Ken Townsend, invented ADT (Automatic Double Tracking). Vocals on pop records were often enhanced by having the vocalist double his part by singing along with what they had already recorded. The Beatles wondered if there was a gadget that could do it for them. Townsend came up with the idea of altering the speed of tape machine by small increments. By running another machine it was possible to duplicate a vocal or instrument from the master. ADT was used all over Revolver and Sgt. Pepper.
The experimentation would continute on John's next track I'm Only Sleeping. As they were taping George's guitar solo, the tape operator put the tape on tails out and it started playing backward. The band was ecstatic over the sound and asked "Can we do that?" so George Martin said "Yes, sure we can do that." John is even heard yawning on the track 2 minutes in. His sleeping patterns would be the genesis of the song.
And Your Bird Can Sing is among my all time favorite Beatles songs. Even though Lennon dismissed it as throwaway later on. It features some of George's best guitar work.
She Said She Said closes out side A. During the Beatles US tour in the summer of 1965, they rented a house on Los Angeles' Mulholland Drive. On August 24, they played host to members of the Byrds. Apart from Paul, the two parties would spend the day tripping on acid. Actor Peter Fonda joined them and attempted to comfort George Harrison who thought he was dying.
"I told him there was nothing to be afraid of and all he had to do was relax. I said that I knew what it was like to be dead because when I was 10 years old I'd accidentally shot myself in the stomach and my heart stopped beating three times while I was on the operating table because I'd lost so much blood.
John was passing at the time and heard me saying 'I know what it's like to be dead.' He looked at me and said 'You're making me feel like I've never been born. Who put all that shit in your head?"
Peter Fonda
When recording the track, Paul walked out of the studio following an argument, leading to the speculation that George played bass on the track.
In an interview with Barry Miles, Paul recalls how "One day I led the dance. like "Paperback Writer", and another day John would lead the dance, like "I'm Only Sleeping". It was nice, we weren't really competitive as to who started the song, but the good thing was if he wrote a great "Strawberry Fields", I'd try and write a "Penny Lane". So we kept each other on our toes."
McCartney was usually the one to write love songs. Some of the greatest love songs to be sure. Revolver saw him branching out in subject matter. Paul considered "Eleanor Rigby" a breakthrough in his songwriting. A move away from poppy side of music into more thoughtful lyrics. George Martin would arrange the string octet that played on the song. A step up from the orchestral instrumentation on "Yesterday". Martin took inspiration from Bernard Hermann's staccato sounds of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho.
The origin of the lyrics Eleanor Rigby would be disputed between John and Paul. With John conceding in a 1980 Playboy interview that it was "Paul's baby." John would recall early on in the songwriting process that it was a group effort, with George contributing the "Ah, look at all the lonely people." and Ringo suggesting the Father McKenzie's evening preoccupation ("darning his socks"). John's childhood friend Pete Shotten claims to have come up with these two lonely people crossing paths only in death, when the priest officiates Rigby's funeral.
Paul claimed to have made up the name Eleanor Rigby because it flowed well. This came into doubt in the 1980s when a headstone marking the remains of Eleanor Rigby was found. The graveyard adjoined St. Peter's Church, Woolton- the location where Paul and John met for the first time in July 1957.
Docter Robert is suspected to have been inspired by Robert Fraser, an art dealer who helped direct the art for Sgt. Pepper and introduce Paul McCartney to cocaine. A substance he would admit to using with abandon on the Pepper sessions. The song was actually written about Dr. Robert Freymann, who ran a clinic on Manhattan's East 87th Street.
With Revolver, session musicians were contracted frequently. Five horn players were recuited for the brass section on "Got to Get You Into My Life". Emerick would go so far as to place mics into the bell of each horn.
One of my favorite Paul McCartney tunes is "Here, There and Everywhere". A song that has that classic McCartney songwriting buildup. He has stated several times that The Beach Boys' "God Only Knows" influenced him when composing and arranging "Here, There and Everywhere". Lennon would tell Hit Parader that it was one of his favorite songs.
"Good Day Sunshine" is Paul's nod to Lovin' Spoonful's Daydream. It's my least favorite track on the album. Between Rubber Soul and Revolver though, the weakest track out of both is "What Goes On".
"For No One" is a song I would count in my top 10 Beatles tunes. Written when Paul and Jane Asher were on a skiing holiday in Klosters, Switzerland, the track employs harpsichord, piano and a beautiful french horn solo from session player Alan Civil.
Before Revolver, George Harrison's output would single him out as "the grumpy one". This album saw him addressing topical concerns in Taxman. The song that was chosen to kick off the album.
Another song that George penned was, I Want to Tell You. A commentary on communication breakdown. "It's about the avalanche of thoughts that are so hard to write down or say or transmit." George would explain.
His obsession with Indian culture and Eastern philosophy would consume him for the rest of his life. This was especially apparent on instrumentation for his sitar- heavy song Love You To. George would recuit another sitar player as well as someone to handle tambura- a zither-like Indian harp- and the tabla, an Indian hand drum. The song was another example of the Indian influence all over the recording sessions: "Tomorrow Never Knows", "Taxman" and the single "Rain".
Almost every Beatles album had a Ringo number written by John or Paul. For Revolver, Paul had composed Yellow Submarine for Ringo to sing. The little solo by the brass band was something George Martin and Geoff Emerick included by raiding the EMI effects library.
It would be a misstep to assume the Beatles were solely responsible for Revolver. George Martin was a vital ingredient to this process. A tireless seeker of new sounds and constant innovation.
Geoff Emerick played a key role in capturing the sound of Revolver. Because he knew no rules he tried different techinques. Because the Beatles were so ambitious and creative, they said yes to everything. The Chemistry of George and Geoff was perfect. If it had been another producer and another engineer, things would have turned out quite differently.
The cover was designed by Klaus Voorman. Someone who knew The Beatles since their first trip to Hamburg in 1960. It perfectly represents their new visual direction.
Rubber Soul and Revolver are often looked at as brothers. George Harrison famously likened them as "Volume 1 and Volume 2." When in fact they are mirrors of each other. Rubber Soul has a strong acoustic vibe with songs that fell within the respected pop genres. Revolver, the more experimental of the two. Just as Rubber Soul saw John coming into his own as a writer, Revolver saw a major breakthrough in Paul's songwriting. The psychadelic experience expanded the band's creativity by quantum jumps and the results were revolutionary.
Mono or Stereo: Just like its predecessor, Revolver is best listened to in Mono.
Favorite tracks: Eleanor Rigby, I'm Only Sleeping, Here There and Everywhere, She Said She Said, And Your Bird Can Sing, For No One, Tomorrow Never Knows
1. ABBEY ROAD
My Favorite Album
Your favorite movie or album or TV show or book defines you. It's a window into your personality. I started this blog as a screed to my favorite TV show, The Wire. It evolved into a place where I write about all the other media that has consumed my life. My favorite movie for nearly a decade has been Magnolia. Just recently changing to Apocalypse Now. The book I would champion for years as my "number 1" was Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian. That was, until I read 2666 by Roberto Bolano. Music has been another feature here. Whenever I branch out into the multitude of genres that are out there, I eventually find myself on the way back home to my favorite band, The Beatles.
"Everything from Rubber Soul onward" is my answer to the question "What's your favorite period of the band?" Each album is special. Rubber Soul was the first proper album of theirs I listened to. Revolver was the album where they are all coming into their own as performers and musicians. Sgt. Pepper and Magical Mystery Tour are always duking it out as to which one I prefer. The White Album showcases them at their most musically diverse. This leaves Abbey Road.
The finality of their career or their final artistic statement. A cursory look at their recording history revealed Abbey Road to be the last to be recorded but released before Let It Be. This made the song 'The End' seem fitting. Each member of the band didn't know at the time that this would be their last album. Even George Martin didn't think it was.
While every other piece of media I consider "Favorite or Number 1" changes through the years, one remains constant: Abbey Road. Learning about the making of the album cemented it even moreso. It wasn't "I'm going to lock myself in the studio and create this masterpiece!" It was an album made in the midst of each of their daily lives. Turmoil was brewing in the band outside the studio. Inside the studio, they were able to pull it together enough to make a piece of art. It's a miracle that this album should sound this good.
Like the White Album before it, each song is a pallette cleanser from the last one. Come Together is Back to the USSR's brother just like Something and Deat Prudence being cousins. By having these disparate style bump up against one another, a freshness of sound is highlighted on each track.
In My Hour of Darkness Pt. 2
If you've made it this far, you'll notice that the Beatles had a number of collaborators and friends: Besides Brian Epstein and George Martin, there was Neil Aspinall and Mal Evans (road managers), Derek Taylor (press agent), Klaus Voorman (cover artist), engineers Geoff Emerick and Norman Smith, and Bob Wooler (the person to introduce them to Epstein). You have their girlfriends and wives: Cynthia Lennon, Jane Asher, Pattie Harrison, Maureen Starkey.
Then you have the intruders. The people who were looked on by the public as invading the band's space and getting in the way of their creativity: Yoko Ono, Linda Eastman and Allen Klein. Beatles press agant Derek Taylor describes Allen Klein as "essential in the pantomine as Demon King. Just as you thin everything is going to be all right, there he is."
Pete Doggett describes Klein in You Never Give Me the Money: With the exception of Alexis Mardas, nobody in the Beatles' history received a more damning verdict from historians than Allen Klein. Eric Idle would satirise his myth by casting John Belushi as Klein-like figure Ron Decline, so terrifying that his employees would hurl themselves out of a building to avoid meeting him.
Both Yoko and Linda would assume milder roles in the breakup of the band. Yoko after John's death and Linda proving to be a caring mother and champion of animal rights. Klein received no such rehabilitation. Even though later Beatles historians describe him as a scoprion and grossly overweight, three of the four Beatles found him irresistible. John in particular.
It would be John whom Klein cozied up to first. Naming every song he worked on. John was still in an uncertain frame of his mind after destroying his ego with LSD. Now he was in recovery and utterly vulnerable to this ego boost. By paying attention to Yoko and giving her equal stature to John, Klein was able to make the relationship to John flow smoothly.
On Feburary 1, Allen Klein met with the Beatles at Apple's headquarter's at 3 Savile Row to discuss finances. Also present was John Eastman, Paul McCartney's soon to be father-in-law. Eastman advised the band to buy Brian Epstein's former companty NEMS for 1 million pounds. Two days later, Klein is appointed the Beatles manager. John was going with Klein and George and Ringo were going with John. Paul on the other hand had wanted John Eastman to manage them. He would be outvoted 3-1. The subsequent fall-out over management was one of the key factors in The Beatles break up.
The Beatles never lifted a single from one of their albums, but with Abbey Road, Come Together/Something was released on October 31. It illustrated the band's shifting attitudes towards money making and artistry. Klein allowing this to happen gave the Beatles a hit and much needed income. He also brought in Phil Spector to work on Let It Be. A move which led to years of resentment from Paul. He alienated many of those in the band's circle.
Paul would marry Linda Eastman on March 12. That same day, George and Pattie Harrison's home would be hit in a drug raid conducted by Sgt. Norman Pilcher of the Drugs Squad.
Sessions of Get Back/Let It Be ended in time for Ringo to start principal photography on the Peter Sellers black comedy The Magic Christian.
John marries Yoko on March 20 on Gibraltar. I'll let John tell you the rest of the story:
1969 was John's busiest year since the days of Beatlemania: He appoints Allen Klein as his manager, formed Plastic Ono Band, performs live in Cambridge, Toronto and Londonl marries Ono on Gibraltar; honeymooned in Paris; made a lightning trip to Vienna; staged bed-ins for peace in Amsterdam and Montreal; changed his middle name to Ono; bought and moved in to Tittenhurst Park; took holidays in Wales, Scotland, Greece, India and Denmark; was hospitalised after crashing a car; flew to the Isle of Wight to watch Bob Dylan perform; made several films; resolved to leave the Beatles; returned his MBE to the Queen; released Unfinished Music No. 2: Life With the Lions; recorded and released Cold Turkey, Give Peace A Chance, Wedding Album and Live Peace In Toronto 1969; made an unreleased experimental album; gave an array of television, radio and press interviews; and launched the "War Is Over" poster campaign.
But we're getting ahead of ourselves. Let's zero in on July 1-the day John crashes car in Scotland. In the car was John, a notoriously bad driver, at the wheel. With him was Yoko, her daughter Kyoko and John's son Julian. The weather was poor that day. Lennon panics after seeing a foreign tourist driving towards him. Both John and Yoko were taken to Golspie's Memorial Hospital. John was given 17 facial stitches and Yoko 14 in her forehead. Kyoko got four. Julian was unhurt.
July 1, 1969 was when the Beatles would reconvene in Abbey Road Studios for the recording of the Abbey Road album. The crash delayed John's return to London. He would rejoin the Beatles on July 9. Yoko was wheeled into the studio on a double bed with a microphone suspnded above her head to add thoughts to the session.
If you ask me, they filmed the wrong sessions.
Pattie Harrison, Mal Evans, Linda McCartney and Yoko
THE ABBEY ROAD SESSIONS
Two key figures would return for these sessions: George Martin and Geoff Emerick. They would also make use of a new piece of technology- the Moog synthesizer.
I Want You (She's So Heavy)
Recorded: February 22 (Trident Studios); April 18, 20, August 11 (Abbey Road Studios)
Inspiration
I Want You was written asn outpouring of love for Yoko. The obsessiveness is reflected in the repetition of the lyrics and the intensity if reflected in it's hypnotically heavy finale.
In trying to be lyrically succinct, John fashioned the song using only 15 words: I Want You, So Bad, It's Driving Me Mad, She's So Heavy, Babe, Know, Yeah.
Recording
Even though work on Abbey Road didn't begin in earnest until July 1, a number of the songs on the album were already under way. The sessions that took place at Trident Studios had 35 takes of I Want You. The location of Trident being chosen because Apple Studios was going through a technological re-build at the time.
The April 18 session at Abbey Road Studios sees John, George, John Kulrander, Jeff Jarratt, and Chris Thomas overdub multi tracked Lennon/Harrison guitars for the song's finale. On August 8, Lennon used the white noise generator from a Moog synthesizer to get a howling wind effect.
"Lennon was so enamored with the white noise that George Harrison overdubbed with the moog synthesizer that he actually had Ringo supplement it by spinning the wind machine secreted in the Studio Two cupboard. As we sat in the control room mixing the trackm he started to become obsessed with the sound. "Louder! Louder!" he kept imploring me. "I want thne track to build and build and build. he explained "and I want the white noise to completely take over and blot out the music altogether."
I looked over at John as though he were crazy, but he paid me no mind. Over one shoulder I could see Yoko smiling a taut little smile, her tiny teeth gleeming in the light. Over the other, I see a dejected Paul, sitting slumped over, head down, staring at the floor. He didn't say a word, but his body language made it clear he was very unhappy, not only with the song itself, but with the idea of the music- Beatles music, which he considered almost sacred- was being obliterated with noise. In the past he would have said something- perhaps just a diplomatic "Don't you think that's a bit much, John?"- but now Paul seemed too beaten down to argue the point with a gleeful Lennon, who seemed to be taking an almost perverse pleasure at his own bandmate's obvious discomfort."
Geoff Emerick, Here There and Everywhere
The August 11 session saw re-recordings of harmony vocals from John, Paul and George saying the words "she's so heavy". With this, the song was now complete. The problem was John Lennon was undecided on which version to release- the original Trident master or the April 18 reduction of same, with different overdubs. He had inserts of the new "she's so heavy" cut into both versions to delay the final decision. This came on August 20, when they decided to remix both and then edit the two mixes together.
"The song ended up being 7:44 im duration but in the end was a sudden, full volume slash in the tape: it did not fade out or reach natural conclusion, the inference being it could have gone on forever. Actually, the tape would would have run out at 8:04 but the suddenness of the ending was powerful. "We were putting the final touches to that side of the LP" recalls Alan Parsons, "and we were listening to the mix and John says "There! Cut the tape there'. Geoff cut the tape and that was it. End of side one!"
Mark Lewisohn, The Complete Beatles Recodings
Something
Rehearsed: January 28
Recorded: April 16, May 2 (Abbey Road Studios); May 5 (Olympia Sound Studios); July 11, 16, August 15 (Abbey Road Studios)
Ever listen to a song and feel like your spirit is on fire? Your eyes begin to well up and you are inexplicably moved by the arrangement of words and music. That's what Something does to me.
Inspiration
In his autobiography I Me Mine, George recounts that Something was written with Ray Charles in mind to sing it. A 1968 album track by James Taylor, an American songwriter signed to Apple, called 'Something In the Way She Moves' also proved inspiration. During the recording of The White Album, George wrote Something on the piano in October. It wasn't included on the album because the track selection had already been completed. George would offer the song to Joe Cocker and Jackie Lomax but, in May 1969, to include it on Abbey Road.
Paul considers Something George's greatest track along with While My Guitar Gently Weeps and Here Comes the Sun.
When Frank Sinatra covered it, he'd introduce it as his favorite Lennon/McCartney song. Even in his own compositions, George lives in the shadow of the two songwriters.
Recording
Recording began on April 16 with Ringo being absent due to filming on The Magic Christian. On May 2, a re-make of Something happened with Ringo back on drums. At Olympia Studios, Paul overdubbed another bass part and George taped his guitar solo. In later sessions for the track, a new George Harrison vocal would be recorded.
Paul drew from rock n' roll ballads of the late Fifties, Jackie Wilson's in particular. He wanted his voice to sound raw on the song so he sang it again and again each day for a week before recording it.
Recording
"Perhaps my main memory of the Abbey Road sessions is Paul coming into studio three at two or 2:30 each afternoon, on his own, to do the vocal on Oh! Darling" says Alan Parsons. "That was a feature of the Abbey Road sessions: you very rarely saw all four Beatles together. It was either John, Paul or George working on their various things, perhaps only getting together to hear something back."
John would later comment on Paul's vocals on Oh! Darling: "Oh! Darling was a great one of Paul's that he didn't sing too well. I always thought I could've done it better. It was more my style than his."
Octopus's Garden
Recorded: April 26, 29, July 17-18
Inspiration
"I wrote Octopus's Garden in Sardinia. Peter Sellers had lent us his yacht and we went out for the day...I stayed out on deck with (the captain) and we talked about octopuses. He told me that they hang out in their caves and they go around the seabed finding shiny stones and tin cans and bottles to put in front of their caves like a garden. I thought this was fabulous, because at the time I had just wanted to be under the sea too. A couple of tokes later with the guitar- and we had 'Octopus's Garden'!"
Ringo Starr, Anthology
Recording
The session on April 26 is another "I wish I was a fly on the wall" moment. It is said to be creative and fun.
The recording sheer for this session quotes the Beatles as producer, although Chris Thomas gas a memory of being in the control room with Jeff Jarratt also at the helm. "George Martin informed me he wouldn't be available. I can't remember word for word what he said to me, but it was something like 'There will be one Beatle there, fine. Two Beatles, great. Three Beatles, fantastic. But the minute the four of them are there that is when the inexplicable charismatic thing happens, the special magic no one has been able to explain.' Sure enough, that's exactly the way it happened. It was the special chemistry the four of them had that nobody since has ever had."
July 17 was when sound effects were added to the track. Not too dissimilair to Yellow Submarine's recording three years ago.
Here Comes the Sun
Recorded: July 7-8, 16, August 6, 15, 19
Yet another incredible song from George and proof that he was at his creative peak in 1969.
Inspiration
Around the time Apple was in negotiations with Allen Klein, George Harrison decided to retreat to Eric Clapton's house in the spring. "I was walking in his garden. The relief of not having to go and see all those dopey accountants was wonderful, and I was walking around the garden with one of Eric's acoustic guitars and wrote Here Comes the Sun."
Recording
With John absent from the sessions because of his car accident, George, Paul and Ringo went into the studio on July 7 to record. Take 9 from the 50th Anniversary of Abbey Road shows them on fire in particular highlighting Paul's prominent basslines on the track.
"I first heard about the Moog synthesizer in America. I had to have mine made speciallybecause Mr. Moog had only just invented it.
Handclaps and a harmonium overdubs were added on July 16.
August 15 was the day any song from the LP that had an orchestral overdub were done in one go. For 'Here Comes the Sun': four violas, four cellos, one string bass, two clarinets, two alto flutes, two flutes, two piccolos.
Maxwell's Silver Hammer
Rehearsed: January 3, 7, 8, 10
Recorded: July 9- 11, August 6
Inspiration
The only mention of Paul's avant garde leanings is the mention of the word 'pataphysics', a word invented by Alfred Jarry, the French pioneer of absurd theatre.
The song was Paul's analogy for "when something goes wrong out of the blue, as it so often does, as I was beginning to find out at that time in my life. I wanted something symbolic of that, so to me it was some fictitious character called Maxwell with a silver hammer."
Recording
July 9 was John's first session having come back from recovering from his car accident. It was also on this day, Yoko was wheeled into the studio on a bed.
The next day, according to Geoff Emerick, a blacksmith's anvil was brought into the studio for Ringo to hit. They had it rented from a theatrical agency.
Billy Preston, Paul McCartney, and an anvil! The object which would end being what Mal Evans hit for the song.
Come Together
Recorded: July 21-23, 25, 29-30
A funky rocker that kicks things off on the album. Not a song I particularly love, but a strong enough opener for this album.
Inspiration
Come Together had originated as a theme song for Timothy Leary's abortive 1968 campaign to become governor of California. Leary's slogan was 'come together, join the party'- the come together part being from the I Ching. Two of the song's lines referring to old flattop came from Chuck Berry's 'You Can't Catch Me'. John would be sued for plagiarism because of this though it can be seen as bing nothing more than an affectionate nod to the music of his youth.
Recording
Originally faster and feeling too similair to Chuck Berry's 'You Can't Catch Me', Come Together was slowed down at the suggestion of Paul. In the studio, John would clap his hands immdiately after each time he said "Shoot me!". He tapped a tambourine part way through.
July 25 saw overdubs for the harmonies. Paul later expressed regret that he didn't harmonize with John on the track.
The song was inspired by Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. Yoko was a classically trained pianist whose interests had moved towards the avant garde. During 1969, Yoko played Moonlight Sonata No. 4 in C-sharp minor, Op. 27, No.2. In an interview with David Sheff, Lennon says that he asked her to play the chords backwards and he wrote 'Because' around them. "The lyrics speak for themselves; they're clear. No bullshit. No imagery. No obscure references."
Recording
Because was the final song to be recorded for Abbey Road.
"On 'Because', for example, very much a John song, it needed the combined singing of the three men. So obviously it became a joint effort. This particular track started off with John having the idea, the sort of riff on guitar, which he played to me, and the basic song, which he sang to me. And what we did then, we created a backing with him still playing that guitar, that riff, and I duplicated every note that he played on guitar, on the harpsichord, and Paul played bass" George Martin describes the session in a 1987 interview with Richard Buskin. Ringo would be used to beat a hi-hat during this to create a regular beat so the guitar and harpsichord could be played in time. Having got the track, the harmony vocals were recorded. They then overlaid three voices, and another three voices. So what they got was a nine-part harmony all the way through.
The medley
In my third year of college I took a summer elective on which the subject was the music of The Beatles. One day in class, the teacher asked what everyone's favorite Beatles song was. When it was my turn, I ended up saying the Side 2 Medley of Abbey Road. This was techincally a cheat since it is 8 little songs strung together. 9 if you include Her Majesty.
We've seen individual band members like Lennon take pieces of ideas and string them together and create a song with Happiness Is A Warm Gun. A Day In the Life features a Paul song sandwiched in the middle of a John song. The medley on Side 2 of Abbey Road is a natural evolution of these experiments with structure.
You Never Give Me Your Money
Recorded: May 6, July 30, August 5
Inspiration
The song is made up three disparate parts just like John's Happiness Is A Warm Gun. McCartney's 1969 notebook has three titles for the song: You Never Give Me Your Money, Out of College and Sweet Dream.
"This was me directly lambasting Allen Klein's attitude to us: no money, just funny paper, all promises and it never works out. It's basically a song about no faith in the person that found its way into the medley on Abbey Road. John saw the humor in it." Paul McCartney, Many Years From Now
The second part-"Out of college, money spent..." - is a fond look back at the early days of The Beatles. Back when they yearned to be "the toppermost of the poppermost", having left college with no money and few job prospects.
A guitar solo acts as a bridge to the "one sweet dream" part of the song. This section was written when Paul was with future wife Linda, purposefully getting lost in the countryside.
The climax of the song, "One two three four five six seven, all good children go to heaven"
Recording
The first recorded takes of the song ended abruptly just before the "all good children to to heaven" ending.
Paul came up with the crossfade of You Never Give Me Your Money into Sun King on August 5. Paul spent the afternoon in the srudio with a plastic bag containing a dozen loose strands of mono tape and transferred them onto a four track tape. The effects were of birds, bubble, bells and crickets chirping.
Sun King
Rehearsed: January 2, 3 and 19
Recorded: July 24-25, 29
Inspiration
Lennon alleges that the song came to him in a dream. The title most likely came from The Sun King, Nancy Mitford's 1966 biography of French King Louis XIV.
"When we came to sing it, to make them different we just started joking, saying 'cuando para mucho.' We just made it up. Paul knew a few Spanish words from school, so we just strung any Spanish words that vaguely sounded like something. And of course we got 'chicka ferdi'- that's a Liverpool expression; it doesn't mean anything."
John Lennon, Anthology
Recording
Before they recorded Sun King/Mean Mr. Mustard, Paul recorded 'Come and Get It', a song he would give to Apple artist Badfinger.
After King and Mustard were recorded the session driften into a jam, with John singing Gene Vincent's 'Who Slapped John?' and 'Be-Bop-A-Lula'.
Organ overdubs would be laid down on the July 29.
Mean Mr. Mustard
Rehearsed: January 8, 14, 23, 25
Recorded: July 24-25, 29
Inspiration
Originally written in Rikishesh, Mean Mr. Mustard had its genesis in a newspaper article about a man who kept his money hidden in his rectum- something John found amusing but had to change for the song.
Recording
Both Sun King and Mean Mr. Mustard were recorded together as one piece. In the original version, Mr. Mustard had a sister called Shirley but John changed it to Pam when he realized it could segue into 'Polythene Pam.'
Her Majesty
Rehearsed: January 9, 24
Recorded: July 2
Inspiration
The Beatles met Queen Elizabeth to receive their MBEs on October 26, 1965.
Recording
On July 30, when mixes and crossfades were being done to the songs in the medley, Paul heard Her Majesty and said "I don't like 'Her Majesty', throw it away,' John Kurlander remembers the session:
"I'd been told never to throw anything away, so after he left I picked it up off the floor, put about 20 seconds of red leader tape before it and stuck it onto the end of the edit tape. The next day, down at Apple, Malcolm Davies cut a playback lacquer of the whole sequence, and, even though I'd written on the box that 'Her Majesty' was unwanted, he too thought, 'Well, mustn't throw anything away, I'll put it on at the end.' I'm only assuming this, but when Paul got the lacquer he must have liked hearing 'Her Majesty' tacked on at the end. The Beatles have always picked up on accidental things. It came as a nice little surprise at the end."
John Kurlander
Mark Lewisohn, The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions
A long standing Beatles mystery was why the final acoustic guitar chord is missing from 'Her Majesty'. The answer is that it was left buried in the unreleased rough edit of the medley, at the beginning of 'Polythene Pam'. This also explains the crashing guitar chord at the beginning of 'Her Majesty'- it is actually the last note of 'Mean Mr. Mustard'.
Polythene Pam
Rehearsed: January 24
Recorded: July 25
Inspiration
Another song written by John in Rikishesh, like Sun King/Mean Mr. Mustard, it was recorded with She Came In Through the Bathroom Window.'
The character of Polythene Pam is drawn from two women at different times in the band's existence.
The first was Pat Dawson, a Liverpool resident who was a fan of the band in their early days.
"I started going to see The Beatles in 1961 when I was 14 and I got quite friendly with them. If they were playing out of town they'd give me a lift back with their van. It was about the same time I started getting called Polythene Pat. It's embarrassing really. I just used to eat polythene all the time. I'd tie it in knots and then eat it. Sometimes I used to burn it and then eat it when it got cold. Then I had a friend who got a job in a polythene bag factory, which was wonderful because it meant I had a constant supply."
Pat Dawson
The second woman was the girlfriend of English beat poet Royston Ellis, for whom the Beatles had performed as a backing band in Liverpool in June 1960. In 1963 John would have a memorable encounter with his girlfriend. "I met him when we were on tour and I had a girl and he had one he wanted me to meet. He said she dressed up in polythene, which she did. She didn't wear jackboots and kilts, I just sort of elaborated. Perverted sex in a polythene bag. Just looking for something to write about."
She Came In Through the Bathroom Window
Rehearsed: January 6, 7, 8, 9, 24
Recorded: January 21 (slow version); July 25 (album version)
Inspiration
Inspired by the activities of a fan who climbed into Paul's house in St. John's Wood when he was away for the day. "We were bored, he was out and so we decided to pay him a visit," remembers Diane Ashley. "We found a ladder in the garden and stuck it up the bathroom window which he'd left slightly open. I was the one who climbed up and got in." A Hard Day's Write, Steve Turner
Golden Slumbers
Rehearsed: January 7, 9
Recorded: July 2-4, July 30-31, August 15
Inspiration
Paul was at his father's house in Cheshire, England tinkering around on the piano. Paging through a songbook, he came across a traditional lullaby 'Golden Slumbers'. He went ahead and made his own melody adding new words as he went along.
Carry That Weight
Rehearsed: January 6, 7, 9
Recorded: July 2-4, July 30-31, August 15
Inspiration
The song brings back Paul's worries about the twilight days of The Beatles. Hence the orchestral refrain of You Never Give Me Your Money in the middle of the song.
The End
Recorded: July 23, August 5, 7-8, 15, 18
The song shows what the band might have been like had they remained together. Ringo's drum solo and the guitar solos which were developing among their contemporaries in the 70's were already present on Abbey Road.
Shakespeare would end his acts with a meaningful couplet so that the audience would know they were over. Paul followed this method: "I wanted it to end with a little meaningful couplet, so I followed the Bard and wrote a couplet."
Recording
"The idea for guitar solos was very spontaneous and everybody said 'Yes, definitely.' Well, except for George, who was a little apprehensive at first. But he saw how excited John and Paul were so he went along with it. Truthfully, I think they rather liked the idea of playing together. Not really trying to outdo one another per se, but engaging in real musical bonding. Yoko was about to go into the studio with John and he actually told her 'No. Not now. Let me do this. It'll just take a minute.' That surprised me a bit. Maybe he felt like he was returning to his roots with the boys. Who knows?"
Geoff Emerick
Here There and Everywhere
August 15 saw overdubs to Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight/The End. 12 violins, four violas, four cellos, one string bass, four horns, three trumpets, one trombone and one bass trombone were used.
JULY 30, 1969: SEQUENCING THE MEDLEY
This trial edit was designed to highlight any major faults in the theory of the medley. It became known as The Long One among the band and production staff.
AUGUST 8: THE COVER
The Beatles would be assembled at Abbey Road Studios on August 8. But not for anything music related. The famous zebra crossing photograph for the album was taken by Ian Macmillan and based on a sketch by Paul. It would be Paul's third album cover idea.
AUGUST 20
The session John decided to edit both the Trident mix and the April 18 mix of I Want You (She's So Heavy).
It was also during this day when the band decided to sequence the album. There were two variations: the two sides of the album were reversed so that the medley was on side A. It would be decided that the final placement should have the medley at at the end on side B.
It would be the lasy day all four of them were together in the studio where they changed the face of music forever.
AUGUST 22
Two days later, a photoshoot took place in the house and grounds of Tittenhurst Park, John and Yoko's home in Sunninghill near Ascot, Berkshire. Linda McCartney shot 16mm footage to capture this occasion. 7 years to the date of their first photo together with Ringo as their new drummer.
THE TAPE
It's September 8 and the Beatles just wrapped recording on Abbey Road. They are all together at Apple HQ at 3 Sevil Row minus Ringo, who is in the hospital because of an intestinal complaint. John brings a tape recorder and says "Ringo, you're not here- but this is so you can hear what we're discussing."
What they talk about is plans to make another album and a single to be released in time for Christmas. You hear John suggesting that each of them bring in songs as candidates for the single. Four songs a piece- John four, Paul four and George four. Two from Ringo "if he wants them."
The idea was supposedly shot down by Paul. Now this is just conjecture because we don't have the full tape or transcript of it. Nor do we know the full context. This tape first made its appearance in Beatles history in Anthony Fawcett's 1976 book One Day At A Time and later on in Nicholas Schaffnr's 1977 book Beatles Forever.
DIVORCE
September 12 was when John received a call from a promoter inviting him to the Toronto Rock and Roll Revival festival. He agreed on the condition that he play. Lennon called Eric Clapton, Klaus Voorman and Alan White. It was to be the live debut of John's Plastic Ono Band. More than just that, it was the day John decided to leave The Beatles.
"We were in Apple and I knew before I went to Toronto, I told Allen Klein I was leaving. I told Eric and Klaus I was leaving and I"d like to probably use them as a group. I hadn't decided how to do it, to have a permanent new group or what. And then later on I thought, 'Fuck it, I'm not going to get stuck with another set of people, whoever they are.' So I announced it to myself and the people around me on the way to Toronto a few days before. On the plane Allen came with me, and I told him, 'It's over."
John Lennon, 1970
Lennon Remembers, Jann Wanner
Eight days later, John decided to tell the rest of the Beatles. In McCartney's recollection, 'Our jaws- me, Ringo, George and Linda, because she happened to be nearby- dropped.' But Harrison wasn't there, and Ringo could only remember a sense of relief rather than shock. McCartney would ask 'What do you mean?' and John replied 'I want a divorce, like my divorce from Cynthia. It's given me a great feeling of freedom..' It was then they entered into a deal with Capitol Records on the pretense of unity. The deal ensured that whether they worked together or alone, they would earn much more from their record sales.
From George: "Everybody had tried to leave, so it was nothing new, Everybody was leaving for years. The Beatles had started out being something that gave us a vehicle ti be able to do so much when we were younger, but it had now got to a point where it was stifling us. There was too much restriction. It had to self- destruct, and I wasn't feeling bad about anybody wanting to leave, because I wanted out myself."
From Ringo: "It was a relief once we finally said we could split up. I just wandered off home, I believe, and I don't know what happened after that." He saw Lennon's decision as a moment of integrity. "As anyone will tell you, if we had wanted we could have carried on and made fortunes, but that was not our game."
If you look at what the members did on 1970, you see them already releasing solo albums. Several songs from those albums being rehearsed or demoed with The Beatles years previous. Lennon rationalised the band's split as starting his whole life again. Ringo rationalised it as "everyone had ideas he wanted to do, whereas everyone used to have ideas of what we wanted to do, as a group."
Six days later, Abbey Road was released in the UK.
THE DREAM IS OVER
Paul McCartney was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. "I remember lying awake at nights shaking." His tie to a band he joined in 1957 was strangling him. Since Allen Klein's arrival he had been reacting, not acting. It was time for him to take control over his professional life. Eastman and Eastman, the company Paul had once wished to manage The Beatles, would announce their first two projects and April 7: the McCartney album and an animated film based around the strip cartoon character Rupert Bear. Derek Taylor rang Paul and said he couldn't stand all those Beatles questions. So he sent him a list of questions so Paul could provide answers. This was from Paul's recollection in 1984. Derek Taylor on the other hand insists Paul made the questions himself.
Whatever the case, included in the questions was:
Q: Is your break with the Beatles temporary or permanent, due to personal differences or musical ones?
A: Personal differences, business differences, musical differences, but most of all because I have a better time with my family. Temporary or permanent? I don't know.
On Thursday afternoon Paul called John, who was in therapy with Arthur Janov. "I'm doing what you did. I'm putting out an album, I'm leaving the Beatles as well." Lennon replied, "Good. That makes two of us who have seen sense."
The following mirror, Lennon heard about The Daily Mirror's story of which ran the headline PAUL IS QUITTING THE BEATLES and realised that Paul beat him to the punch. "I phoned John" explained journalist Ray Connolly, a close friend in those final years, and told him what Paul said. He was furious and said "Why didn't you write the story when I told you?" Ray told him that he asked him to too to which John replied "You're the fucking journalist, Ray!"
John had begun the band as the Quarrymen in 1957 and it was John who wanted to end it. It was a source of ownership for him. Paul didn't even say that he did quit the band in the interview. Once The Daily Mirror article hit newstands though, there was no turning back. By the end of the year, Paul would file suit against the other three Beatles and Allen Klein to leave. This coupled with the Daily Mirror headline saw him as "the guy to break up the Beatles." The truth is never that simple.
George was optimistic: "Everyone is trying to his own album and I am too. But after that I'm ready to go back with the others." Even Lennon said "I've no idea if the Beatles will work together, or not. I never really have. It was always open. If somebody didn't feel like it, that's it! It could be a rebirth or death. We'll see what it is. It'll probably be a rebirth."
Yoko Ono didn't break up the band. But she did manipulate Lennon and exploit the rift that would develop between John and Paul. Before she met him she was a little known avant garde artist. With him, she enjoyed the benefits of fame. Having known John Lennon, Ray Connolly describes him as "a cushion who wore the imprint of the last person who sat on him." This would also attribute for Allen Klein's impression on him. Ono insisted that she and him were equal. John going so far as to have her sing on The White Album. Even though she wasn't on his equal artistic footing, John wouldn't hear of it.
"After Brian [Epstein] died, we collapsed. Paul took over. We broke up then. That was the disintegration. The Beatles broke up after Brian died" John would say in a 1970 interview. "We made the double album. It was like if you took each track off and like I told you many times it's me and a backing group and Paul and a backing group. And I enjoyed it you know. But, we broken up then."
Paul McCartney was the band's biggest fan. After Epstein's death, he had assumed a leadersip role with the band in his conception of Sgt. Pepper, Magical Mystery Tour, the Get Back Sessions and Abbey Road. The cruel irony was that his ego would get in the way. Given how immensely talented he is, it's understandable he would have ego. Yet in his relentless drive to keep something he loved from fracturing he inadvertedly help fracture it more.
Paul McCartney had an unstoppable artistic output. The songs just didn't stop coming to him. The problem was that he didn't have a friend on the other end to ask if the song needed anything else. The Lennon and McCartney songwriting partnership brought out the best in them. That these two lasted in a band together in a band for 7 years is incredible. Their partnership brought out the best in George. All three were the better for having Ringo contribute the rhythmic backbone to the group. The fame that came to them in 1963 became unbearable for three of them by 1969. Dugs, alcoholism, failed marriages and death would plague the members in later years. None of them would be able to escape the comparisons of their solo output to their work in The Beatles.
AND IN THE END...
I found that writing was a major relief of the pressure and anxiety I'm feeling. Have 6 different books splayed out on my bed and jumping from one to the next like an obsessed Robert Graysmith. The key thing about it was is that the passion never wavered. I have countless drafts saved on this blog that remain unpublished because I either lost interest or wasn't satisfied. The bottomless love I have for this band's music helped me resist any distraction that might have come up.
I'm still that little kid in the van letting four musicians from Liverpool take away all my troubles. Or a college student humming Tomorrow Never Knows. They've been with me my whole life. I always find myself singing lyrics. "Places I remember...", "I read the news today oh boy...", but perhaps most meaningfully is the couplet at the end of Abbey Road:
"the love you take is equal to the love you make".
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