Produced by George Martin: DVD Review

This BBC documentary, a profile of George Martin's career, provides an impressive interviewee lineup, including Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Jeff Beck, and Cilla Black. Rather than being interviewed themselves, Paul and Ringo sit down with George Martin and reminisce over photos and studio tapes. There is also some interesting 1960s footage of Abbey Road Studios, including the familiar 1964 session with the Beatles and a less-familiar (to me) studio session with Cilla Black.

I could not help but feel like wanting more from this DVD, as if the DVD were a trailer to a longer feature. There are many stories to tell from George Martin's producing career, and this DVD provides a brief, albeit a somwhat too brief, overview. A nice companion piece to the previous Beatles documentaries that have been issued over the years.

Book Review: Abbey Road to Ziggy Stardust by Ken Scott & Bobby Owsinski

Ken Scott, who began his career as tape operator and then engineer for the Beatles at EMI Studios, reveals fascinating insights in Abbey Road to Ziggy Stardust into the recording process and the history of what is now known as Abbey Road Studios. My first introduction to Scott was his "take 2" announcement on the slow version of "Helter Skelter" on Anthology 3 - not recognizing the voice (having listened to many outtakes, the voices of George Martin and Norman Smith were more familiar to me) and finding the name in Mark Lewisohn's liner notes for the disc, I thought at the time it would be interesting to learn what Scott saw and heard during the making of these classic recordings. Scott, along with his co-author Bobby Owsinski, in this book successfully presents the Beatles from a different angle than most, having worked on many Beatles and solo sessions, including the White Album, Abbey Road, and All Things Must Pass, among others.

Scott's memoir is a fine blend of the personal as well as the technical aspects of recording. In reading through the chapters there is an attention to detail that shows that stories are not simply relayed as remembered but that there was also research done to match them up with the history (as noted in the introduction, facts were independently verified whenever possible). In addition to the Beatles, also included are his remembrances of his work with many other artists, including Elton John, Pink Floyd, Procol Harum, Jeff Beck, Harry Nilsson, the Rolling Stones, Lou Reed and others. A must read for Beatles fans and those interested in music production.

The Lost Beatles Photographs: The Bob Bonis Archive, 1964-1966

Recently released by HarperCollins, The Lost Beatles Photographs compiles the photos taken by U.S. tour manager Bob Bonis on the Beatles' three major American tours from 1964 to 1966. The complete set comprises a mixture of black and white and color pictures that cover many facets of their tours: the behind-the-scenes relaxing at their hotels, the press conferences, the airplane trips, and the on-stage performances. It's also interesting to see photos of the Beatles' opening acts, who are often left out of similar histories.

The concert photos are wonderful and are mostly taken from close range from Bonis' vantage point, either on or directly in front of the stage. Of particular interest are rare pictures taken at Portland, Oregon in 1965, where the Beatles don their "Shea" outfits, behind-the-scenes rehearsals shot in Detroit, Michigan in 1966, where the Beatles play to a Revolver drawing backdrop. and color close-ups from the infamous Memphis, Tennessee concert where a cherry bomb was thrown onstage.

Providing a memorable look back at the people, places, and performances of the Beatles' U.S. tours, The Lost Beatles Photographs would make a welcome addition to any Beatles library and is a must for Beatles photo collectors.

Who Compiled the Beatles' Red and Blue Albums?

Q: The Red and Blue compilations came out in 1973 when John and Paul were estranged. Did they have a hand in selecting the tracks? Otherwise, who compiled the albums?

Allen Klein, acting as their manager at the time, is commonly reported as having compiled the albums, originally titled The Best of the Beatles, but eventually released as The Beatles 1962-1966 and The Beatles 1967-1970. John Lennon and Paul McCartney were apparently not happy with the compilations, the latter reportedly seeking an injunction against their distribution. The albums, however, soon received their blessing in early 1973 to combat pirate sales from another "best of" release. A Capitol Records press release stated: "We will be issuing, on Apple, a two-record set of vintage Beatle songs in an effort to counteract the sale of the bootleg Beatles records, called Alpha Omega, which are currently being blatantly advertised on television and in newspapers across the country. We feel it will be easier to fight the bootleg product with a rival package than through the courts. It's appropriate and right that the Beatles have, on Apple, the official authorized collection put together by themselves."

Lennon revealed in an interview later that year that their producer George Martin played a large role in the albums' compilation: "George (Martin) controlled the choice of the material on those albums more than any of us. They sent me lists and asked for my opinion, but I was too busy at the time. I think it was the pressure of the bootlegs that finally made us put them out after all this time."

Lennon in particular wasn't a fan of the stereo mixes on the albums. He commented, "The fast version of 'Revolution' was destroyed! I mean it was a heavy record, but they made it into a piece of ice cream!"

---

Submit your Beatles questions here.

Merry Chrimble: The Curious Case Of The Beatles Christmas Records

by Roger Cormier

Despite the fact that none of them were available on iTunes until a few weeks ago, it's a safe bet that most people on planet Earth have heard most of the 196 songs The Beatles wrote and recorded. (Somehow they heard them. Somehow.) What most people have never heard are the seven records that the Beatles recorded and sent out to fan club members exclusively every holiday season. Because The Beatles were The Beatles, they made a seemingly perfunctory exercise in appeasing a fan base and justifying a yearly fan club fee into entertaining clusterfucks that can at times be mistaken for true art.

1963



In the beginning, they kept it simple, simply getting high on egg nog and reading copy. John is the loud drunk at the holiday party, shouting nonsense in lieu of singing the actual lyrics to holiday songs and dominating most of the conversation (sometimes in German for no apparent reason). He also leads the group in inventing the phrase "Merry Crimble", an interesting substitute for "Happy Holidays." Meanwhile Paul is his own diplomatic charming self, thanking all of the fans for making them about to be millionaires but letting them kindly know they're no longer into jelly beans (save those for Reagan). Ringo, as expected, gets the least airtime and barely gets one sentence out without being tickled or interrupted. George gives props to the fan club secretaries ("Good old Frita!"). He hopes they can go on "pleasing you" for a long time, a reference to their number one hit "Please Please Me", which is totally about oral sex (John Lennon was, of course, the writer of that song).

Drug of choice: Alcohol
Best Liverpoolian witticism: "Thank you Ringo. We'll phone you..."

1964



Paul leads off after a little piano intro by unsuccessfully swallowing a smile in admitting he's now fucking rich. John does not even bother pretending that he isn't reading off of a script as he thanks fans for buying his Lewis Carroll wordplay inspired book "In His Own Write". Taking John's lead, George also doesn't bother with the pretense and even points out the typos while thanking the Beatle People for seeing their movie "A Hard Day's Night", sometimes "more than once." (cha chinggggg.) Ringo's attempts at playing it straight fail when the other three keep giggling and distract him.

Drug of choice: Pot, Alcohol
Best Liverpoolian witticism: "Don't know where we'd be without (the fans)." "In the army."

1965



Eschewing the taking turns in their mocking script reading routine, the Fabs stumble their way through singing "Yesterday" and mash-ups of Christmas songs with contemporary music numbers (including a funny piss-take on Barry McGuire's "Eve of Destruction" which many considered at the time to be a lame Dylan ripoff.) While the group bothered with rehearsing their lines, manager Brian Epstein probably wasn't a fan of Lennon's Goon Show inspired fake newscaster bit or of the Vietnam references on a holiday record.

Drug of choice: Pot, Alcohol
Best Liverpoolian witticism: "Copyright Johnny!"

1966



Instead of parody, by 1966 the Beatles decided to reinvent the Holiday record: after the group goes through one verse and chorus of an original Christmas tune called "Everywhere It's Christmas", listeners are treated to vignettes involving two cheese eaters high in the Swiss Alps, a festive evening at the King's, a toast to her Highness on the H.M.S. Tremendous, Podgy and Jasper's trip to the supermarket and a Count Boulder leading a singalong about growing sick of banjos before returning back to "Everywhere It's Christmas". It's either genius or insanity. Or both. Or just British humor.

Drug of choice: LSD (John, George and Ringo), Pot (Paul)
Best Liverpoolian witticism: "Candles." "Matches." "Candles." "Matches."

1967



This record is similar to the 1966 one, but better. Instead of simply bookending an original holiday song, the Beatles stop "Christmas Time Is Here Again" for sometimes minutes at a time to get their bits in. These involve the gang auditioning at BBC House by singing two lines of a song about trousers (which we hear once again for good measure), Ringo as a General poorly elaborating on the job him and his troops had done, the group topping their earlier trouser song with a song about jam jars, George receiving applause and a nomination for independent candidate of parliament by erroneously claiming he is 32 and Ringo failing to make a phone call with his life seemingly hanging in the balance, as we are lead to believe with ridiculously dramatic sound effects. The last minute of the record devolves into the group maniacally laughing, followed by their producer George Martin announcing that they thank you for a wonderful year, in an "I know they seem fucking insane but they really mean well" tone.

Drugs of choice: LSD
Best Liverpoolian witticism: "And with the recent heavy fighting near Blackpool Mrs. Gee Evans of Sully Hall is gradually injured. She wants for all the people in hospital: 'Plenty of Jam Jars' by the Ravelers."

1968



The Beatles were a band that always evolved, and within a year, the band went from wildly inventive to incredibly depressing with their 1968 Christmas single. Because of all of their fighting, the band found their yearly fan club obligation of making a Christmas single to be a chore and literally mailed in their performances - all four of the Moptoppers recorded their greetings from their houses, with the exception of Ringo, who supposedly taped his from the back of his van in Surrey.

Radio 1 disc jockey Kenny Everett pieced together the snippets he received with clips from the just released White Album to make the record. Contents include a poem John wrote about Yoko and himself and George finally giving longtime roadie Mal Evans his due.

Who profited the most from the four Beatles not bothering to be in the same room with each other around the holidays? Tiny Tim, who George had perform his, uh, unique, cover of "Nowhere Man" while on vacation in America.

Goddamn Yoko ruined Christmas.

Drugs of choice: Heroin (John), Downers, Women
Best Liverpoolian witticism: "Well I think it's INSANE!!!!!!!!"

1969



1969 had a man land on the moon, but it didn't include The Beatles getting all of their asses in the recording studio for Christmas.

The funniest segment of the 1969 Christmas record would have to be that George Harrison contributed only one entire sentence to the festivities, possibly for punishment over inviting Tiny Tim over to the party the previous year. The second funniest aspect would have to be Ringo taking the rare opportunity to sing and to shamelessly promote his critically panned movie The Magic Christian. John wishing to have his cornflakes blessed in a specific manner was also humorous, but was overshadowed by him and Yoko taking up most of the record with their newlywed bliss and wishing of peace in the seventies. There wouldn't be nearly as much peace as the power couple was hoping for in that decade, and perhaps not coincidentally, the decade would be one without The Beatles.

Drugs of choice: Cocaine, Alcohol, Women
Best Liverpoolian witticism: "I'd like some cornflakes prepared by a Peruvian hand and have it blessed by a Hare Krishna mantra."

Thoughts on the Legacy of John Lennon

The lasting impact of John Lennon can be found almost anywhere rock music is heard today. Through creating the Beatles and the formation of a songwriting partnership with Paul McCartney, he modernized popular music and expanded the boundaries of creativity of the art form.

Reading about the Beatles over the years, it surprised me to discover the extent to which Lennon paid attention to the music charts; one would think he would have needed to seek this kind of validation for work that is so obviously of high quality. Regardless, the Beatles dominated the charts in almost every way and are still a benchmark in the measurement of popular music and its influence ("It's nice to be liked," he once remarked.) That caring about public opinion translated into an incredible personal availability to admirers who dropped by to see him, whether at his home in Surrey, England or out on the street in New York City.

After having revolutionized music by the time he was 30, he turned his attention and talents towards working for positive change. Interestingly, it was a letter from filmmaker Peter Watkins in 1969 that seemed to push his private beliefs on war and peace into the public domain. Recognizing that when he sang millions listened, he channeled his message through songs like "Give Peace a Chance, "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)," and "Imagine."

References to Lennon are so culturally ubiquitous now I almost forget they are there. It's common to see his visage in stores, homes, and restaurants (a few weeks ago I saw a painting of him with Santa Claus while at lunch). His influence is so strong that it's not surprising to hear his name referred to as a musical inspiration from the young and old or brought up directly in song, as in the Arkells' "John Lennon":

Why Did the Beatles Fire Pete Best?

From the perspective of the Pete Best camp, the story of his firing is usually told as a tale of jealousy, of three Beatles envious of Best's good looks, talent and female fan base -- turfing him at an opportune moment just before they made it big. The reality may have been different, but regardless it long remained a mystery to Best himself, as he was never properly provided with a reason for his sudden axing from the group.

A key decision maker for the group at the time (1962) was John Lennon, whose leadership continued to carry over from the Beatles' Quarry Men origins ("John is in fact the leader of the group," Paul McCartney said in a radio interview two months after Best's departure). In 1972, John was asked point blank why Best was fired during a radio call-in show (to John's amazement, ten years after the fact, two of the questions from callers that afternoon dealt with the subject of Pete Best). John replied succinctly that Best's poor drumming skills were the reason behind his removal. The full explanation, however, requires going back to a time in the Beatles' career where their future in the music business was anything but certain.

After being rejected countless times by record companies, including EMI and Decca, the Beatles auditioned for Parlophone Records and the time came for the group to record their debut single, "Love Me Do," after being given the somewhat reluctant go-ahead from producer George Martin. As evidenced by the demo heard on Anthology 1, Pete's drumming was anything but skillful or solid. Martin informed the Beatles in no uncertain terms that they could do as they wished for their live concerts, but he would be bringing in a professional drummer to fill-in on their recording sessions.

This became the pivotal moment that sunk Best's career as a Beatle. Here was a group member chosen for expediency's sake in 1960 in advance of an important series of gigs in Hamburg, Germany. He was someone that never completely gelled personality-wise with the other Beatles: he preferred being on his own to hanging out with the others, he did not share their sense of humor, he refused to adopt their soon-to-be-famous haircut style, and so on. This criticism from their new producer, seemingly endangering their all-important recording career, provided the Beatles with a perfect opportunity to bring in a drummer they actually wanted into the group, perhaps for the first time. Previously, they had selected drummers mostly for the simple fact that they owned a drum kit; "they were usually idiots," lamented John. Within days, Pete was out, and Ringo Starr, drummer for Rory Storm & the Hurricanes, was in.

George Martin for his part was surprised, not having intended to change the group's lineup or lose the member whom he thought was "the best looking of the bunch." Despite the change in personnel, Martin refused to back down on the use of a studio drummer for the next session. "I don't even know who you are," Martin said to Starr, who was given maracas to play instead, while Andy White handled the main percussion duties. This was, of course, quickly resolved as Ringo became the Beatles' live and studio drummer, who would later tease George Martin with an indignant, "You didn't let me play, did you?!"

As for their former drummer, the Beatles never looked back, quite literally: they handed off the firing job to manager Brian Epstein and they assiduously avoided contact with Best when sharing a concert bill months later. The whole affair left Best stunned, as expressed in the interview recorded with his mother Mona, below. The Beatles went on to become the biggest rock group in history and they never so much as spoke to Pete Best again.

Did the Beatles Lip Sync?

"We were performers...in Liverpool, Hamburg and around the dance halls. What we generated was fantastic when we played straight rock, and there was nobody to touch us in Britain. But as soon as we made it, the edges were knocked off. Brian Epstein put us in suits and all that, and we made it very, very big. We sold out. The music was dead before we even went on the theater tour of Britain. We were feeling shit already, because we had to reduce an hour or two hours' play--and which we were glad [to do] in one way--to twenty minutes, and go on and repeat the same twenty minutes every night. The Beatles' music died then, as musicians. That's why we never improved as musicians. We killed ourselves then to make it--and that was the end of it." --Lennon Remembers, December 1970

Despite the current realities of pop stars lip syncing their way through concerts, the Beatles began as a live band and gradually transitioned into being more of a studio band before giving up on touring in 1966. Whereas currently, lip syncing is a device popularly used to disguise poor singers, the issue for the Beatles was their advanced recording techniques and songs which became increasingly difficult to perform live with the technology available at the time. While the Beatles toured for final time after the release of their 1966 LP Revolver, they never performed a single track off the album on any of the tour dates (though they reportedly rehearsed a few and decided against playing them live). The closest they came to this was performing live the Revolver-era single "Paperback Writer."

The Beatles' television shows were a mixed bag in terms of lip syncing vs. live and depended on the show's format (e.g. Ed Sullivan Show - live until the music video promos for were sent to the show beginning in 1966; Top of the Pops - lip synced; Around the Beatles - lip synced to recordings especially made for the program). Interestingly, union rules prevented the Beatles' music videos in some instances from being aired if they featured a lip-synced performance. The Beatles failed the test with the video "Hello Goodbye," obviously lip synced, but succeeded with the promos for "Hey Jude" and "Revolution," featuring a mixture of a live performance and the 45 single, enhanced by the presence of a studio audience and orchestra in the case of "Hey Jude."

A variation on this theme was present in The Beatles in Nederland television special from 1964 (featuring Ringo's temporary replacement Jimmy Nicol on drums). Perhaps for sound reasons, the special was set up such that the Beatles were to lip sync to their records, but the microphones were left on, leaving the Beatles to sing karaoke to their own recordings. It hardly mattered then, when the audience overtook the stage and crowded out the Beatles - the music played on without them.

Did the Beatles Know How to Read Music?

The Beatles never did learn to read or write music using traditional notation, and by all accounts were happy with that fact. Music was a discovery process for them that did not involve any books -- they once traveled across town for someone to teach them a B7 guitar chord. John Lennon's mother taught him banjo chords; they lasted with him through his early Quarry Men days until Paul McCartney showed him proper guitar chords. George Harrison learned guitar through lessons and painstaking practice. To acquire new material for concerts (mostly cover songs in the early days), they learned largely through listening to records and mimicking the sounds as closely as they could.

When it came to official transcriptions of their music, the Beatles could provide input if necessary, but the transcribing was left to others (e.g. Question: Which of the vocal melodies in "Baby's in Black" is the lead? Answer from Paul: Both). When classical/professional musicians were employed during recording sessions, the Beatles would often sing the melodies and George Martin would transcribe them into sheet music.

For their part, the Beatles liked not knowing how to read sheet music. George Harrison once remarked that he thought if he learned too much of music theory it would ruin the songwriting process in terms of having an innovative ability. Would John have written the strange time signatures of "Good Morning Good Morning" or Paul the interesting modalities of "For No One" as instinctively having the full knowledge of music theory at their fingertips? Perhaps not.

Rare Beatles Songs: "Window, Window"

Surfacing first during the Revolver-era in 1966, "Window, Window" was what George Harrison called "a nice song," written in the folk tradition and seemingly in the glow of his marriage to Pattie Boyd ("I once knew a beautiful girl..."). When played for feedback, John Lennon remarked that it sounded too derivative and the song was then passed over in favor of other material. The lyrics clearly needed work; when played for engineer Glyn Johns in 1969, Johns seemed amused at the rhyming scheme (e.g. "girl" rhyming with "curl").

Harrison recounted the song's history during sessions for Let It Be in 1969 at the urging of Mal Evans, who apparently was quite fond of it; however, the song failed to find a home there either. "Window, Window" was last demoed for Phil Spector in the sessions leading up to All Things Must Pass, where Harrison called the song "a bit silly," evidenced by its bizarre second verse, where the protagonist goes out to "the shed" to "check out the paint and the lead."

January 1969 with Glyn Johns and Mal Evans:


May 1970 Demo for Phil Spector:

All Together on the Wireless Machine: McCartney or Not?

On November 25, 1967, BBC Radio 1's programme Where It's At broadcast a special on the Beatles' new Magical Mystery Tour double-EP set, and along with the program came the first broadcast of a piano/vocal jingle for the show's hosts Kenny Everett and Chris Denning, performed and composed by Paul McCartney - or so reports Mark Lewisohn in his book Complete Beatles Chronicle.

There are many who disagree with this fact: Allen J. Wiener in The Ultimate Beatles Recording Guide calls 'All Together On The Wireless' an Everett composition with "Paul on piano and doing some minimal vocals behind Everett."

And Doug Sulpy reported in an issue in The 910 newsletter: "...'All Together On The Wireless Machine,' which I don't believe has Paul McCartney (or any other Beatle) on it." (Vol. 8 No. 1, June 2000)

THE LYRICS
"The lyric 'Kenny Everett and Chris Denning all together on the wireless machine' should give you a clue who's performing it" -Doug Sulpy

Does it? Here are the lyrics:

"While sitting at my piano one day,
A magical thought came my way,
To write a number for the BBC
Kenny Everett and Chris Denning
All together on the wireless machine
Kenny Everett and Chris Denning
All together on the wireless machine..."

These lyrics reveal quite a few things about its composer...

"While sitting at my piano one day"
This could be interpreted as Paul describing himself sitting at his psychedelically-painted upright Knight piano, on which McCartney composed many of his songs, located in his music room inside his home on Cavendish Avenue.
"It had a lovely tone, that piano, you'd just open the lid and there was such a magic tone, almost out of tune, and of course the way it was painted added to the fun of it all." -McCartney

"A magical thought came my way, to write a number for the BBC"
Paul was not adverse to writing songs for others, or writing them from titles ("One And One Is Two", "Sgt. Pepper", "Magical Mystery Tour" being some examples, and later "Live And Let Die" and "Spies Like Us" from his solo career). In this case, Paul, being a composer, is describing his decision to write a number for the British Broadcasting Corporation and more specifically, DJs Denning and Everett's radio show Where It's At. Everett would often ask, half-jokingly, for songs written by the Beatles especially for him (like the "Goodbye Kenny Everett" jingle from 1968, or Lennon's "Monte Carlo" in 1971).

"Kenny Everett and Chris Denning"
In this line Paul mentions the two radio DJs of Where It's At. McCartney does not mention himself in this line because he probably intended it to be used in future broadcasts, and not just the November 25th edition. The various edits appearing on bootlegs in decades that followed proved that indeed it was used on multiple occasions.

"All together on the wireless machine"
Paul probably had this line in his mind and then wrote the rest of the song around it. The two people "together" on the "wireless machine" (radio) programme were Everett and Denning, which again explains why Paul does not mention himself in the song (but he does so in another way...). The title also bears a slight resemblance to "All Together Now", a song which he would release on Yellow Submarine a year later.

THE VOICE
Though the vocal on the recording is somewhat uncharacteristic of McCartney, he had used this type of voice before. Two examples of it include the BBC "posh voice" from the Top Gear promo spot recorded in July 1964, and on the Beatles' 1966 Christmas record entitled Pantomime: Everywhere It's Christmas. McCartney often would usually alter his voice in some way when playing material jokingly or on recordings that were not serious (with great evidence of this in his piano rehearsals during the Get Back sessions). With this song, Paul jokingly changes his voice to sing this off-the-cuff composition for the BBC. There are some minimal backing vocals, provided by none other than the zany Kenny Everett.

THE MELODY
The melody of this song provides the greatest evidence that McCartney is present on the recording. Starting off with the beginning, the opening piano melody up until "Kenny Everett and Chris Denning" is the exact piano part to "Hello, Goodbye", complete with its descending riff. This piano part was played by Paul on the final recording of "Hello, Goodbye" and his piano playing can be heard quite clearly on take 1 of the song (at the time title "Hello Hello"). Not only is the playing authentic, but "All Together On The Wireless Machine" was broadcast on November 25, and the "Hello, Goodbye" single was first released November 24. This means that "Hello, Goodbye" was an unreleased song at the time of "ATOTWM"'s recording, because Where It's At was pre-taped. Paul's jingle in all likelihood was the first item for the show to be recorded. The second section to the song, with a bouncy melody, bears a great resemblance to Paul's piano song "Please don't bring your banjo back..." from the Beatles' 1966 Christmas Record. Everett and Denning were DJs, not musicians, and there is no evidence that suggests they could even play the piano. And even if they could, what would have been the chances of them accurately reproducing the piano part for "Hello, Goodbye" (an unreleased song), and McCartney's disctinctive piano playing? The explanation for the use of the "Hello, Goodbye" in "All Together On The Wireless Machine" is simple enough: Paul was never afraid to plug one of his own compositions whenever the occasion arrived, and in this case it was the Beatles' newest single, so McCartney craftily put it in.

THE CREDITS
"All Together On The Wireless Machine"
Recorded: 7 Cavendish Avenue, St. John's Wood, London - November, 1967
Broadcast: November 25, 1967, on BBC Radio 1's Where It's At programme
Paul McCartney: piano, vocal
Kenny Everett: backing vocal, "crashing" sound effects

AND IN ADDITION...
John C. Winn pointed out this after this article was first published:
"I have a recording of the 11/25/67 broadcast which provides further evidence.
It ends thusly:

CD: Listen, you!
KE: What?
CD: When we did that interview with John Lennon, I was there too. Why have I
not just been on the wireless with you two talking?
KE: You, Chris, are lying on the editing-room floor.
CD: Oh. In that case, a quick whistle from Paul McCartney.
(ATOTWL starts up, from the whistling part)
CD: Lovely. Come on, sing, Paul!
(Paul sings the chorus: "Kenny Everett and Chris Denning..." etc.)

It definitely sounds like Paul to me."

Me too.

Through the Lives

I recently took a look at a copy of Albert Goldman's The Lives of John Lennon for a few reasons. For over twenty years, it has stood as both a much maligned biography of a musical hero and a well-researched resource for other books that followed. Other Beatle books caveat that while the tone may be negative and the focus on salacious materials, there is still valuable information to be found here.

Though I picked up a library copy, it contains a written dedication inside indicating that at one point it had been a gift. "Dear Rob," it says, "I shopped around for a good non-fiction book for you. As you may have guessed, I couldn't find one.... this is a textbook. Learn what it teaches you, the subtleties, the tools, the method. And if I catch you using any of them, you're a dead man." If The Lives of John Lennon is indeed a textbook, surely none has been so thoroughly obsessed with sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll (in that order).

The book begins in typical biographical fashion with a section concerning a later portion of John's life (1979), as opposed to starting at the beginning. This is a device meant to draw the reader in, and Goldman begins firing on all cylinders, telling a story related to him by Kit Carter of Yoko buying heroin, Lennon's fraudulent househusband days (from Fred Seaman), and Lennon as the conpiracy-obsessed Naked Professor (as told my Marlene Hair). The latter two sources get brief and positive bios to boost their credibility, while their former friends (John and Yoko) get lambasted. It's hard to see the relevance of Yoko allegedly (and secretly) purchasing drugs to John's life -- it's even more difficult to see why this story should be placed front-and-center before all others. The answer is that sallaciousness sells copy, or so the theory goes. From reading the first 25 pages, it becomes clear that John and Yoko are both the protagonists and villains of the book -- miserable beings whose happiness was so fleeting it scarcely deserves a mention. Accuracy of the scandalous details aside, the focus offers up an unbalanced portrait. The premise that misery, drug addiction, and violence sells is ever-present, especially in the early pages. John's baking bread story gets a sentence, while pages are devoted to him walking around naked or screaming at children or barking out orders or... you get the idea. There are some insights in this prologue, such as how Lennon's views had progressed (or not) since Janov, but they are lost in a sea of National Enquirer gossip.

There are elements here that have a ring of truth and fit somewhat with other accounts. For other stories (namely, the more negative aspects), they have the problem of being verifiable by only one or two living when the book was published in 1988. On one side, the former employees, some with financial motives, and the other side, Yoko, who refused comment. Goldman defiantly said that Yoko could have sued if his account was inaccurate. She declined as she was advised it would only bring the book more attention. It would have been interesting to see how a battle like this of he said/she said would have turned out. When two people meet in a room and relay an account of what happened to someone years later -- who has the ownership of truth and how can the truth of such events be remotely established? This matters more, of course, when the tone is as negative as it is in the The Lives of John Lennon, and one form of "truth" is presented for mass consumption.

I think it was the tone and focus that led to such a violent reaction from Lennon fans at the time, some of which is viewable from a television appearance of Goldman with a live TV audience, posted here. Some of the criticism kept to things that were easily verifiable, such as facts that Goldman plainly got wrong: Philip Norman in the clip cites Goldman getting the record format of "Love Me Do" wrong -- others I quickly spotted in the early chapters included the backwards tape in "Rain" leading to the "Paul is Dead" rumors (it didn't) and attributing the "mockers" comment in A Hard Day's Night to John (instead of Ringo). But these are small points that any "Beatle expert" could have fixed in a matter of days, had the editors cared.

After first reading the book years ago, I remember flipping through The Complete Beatles Chronicle and seeing a photo of John with a wide grin after a concert in 1963 and thinking that this did not fit at all with Goldman's account of Lennon's life. In Lives all I found was depression, disappointment, and of course, sex. To get an idea of Goldman's focus, I'll leave you with a great quotation from Ray Manzarek, keyboardist of the Doors: "Albert had his own obsession. I talked with Albert Goldman about Morrison, the beginning in golden sands, meditation, and all Albert wanted to know about was if Jim had had sex with Jimi Hendrix."

August 15, 1965 - Raw Shea Stadium Recordings

It's no surprise really that the Beatles felt the need to go over their live recordings made at Shea Stadium in 1965 and make overdubs, given the fact that the Beatles did not have monitor speakers (so they were unable to actually to properly hear what they were playing or how they were singing). On January 5, 1966, the Beatles went into CTS Studios in London an overdubbed new bass tracks, an organ track, and made entirely new recordings for "I Feel Fine" and "Help!" while watching their Shea footage on screen in the studio to match them up. Instead of recording a new version of "Act Naturally," they just scrapped it and inserted the original studio version they had done for the Help! LP. The most obvious sweetening occurred during "Twist and Shout," where part of a live version from the Hollywood Bowl (recorded August 30, 1965) was put overtop, briefly resulting in a double-tracked vocal from John!

This was how people heard the Shea Stadium concert (mostly through the TV special) until more recently. The original audio for "Everybody's Trying to Be My Baby" (a song cut from the special) was included on Anthology 2 and a bit of the live audio feed for "Act Naturally" surfaced in conjunction with a television appearance from Ringo on Phil Donahue's show. The original live audio of Shea Stadium was then sold at auction, followed by a release from His Master's Choice in 2007 of the line recordings called The Beatles and the Great Concert at Shea. This has meant that people with a bit of patience have been able to sync up the Shea footage presented in the original special and the remastered footage from the Anthology series to present the concert as it originally looked and sounded, the results of which are presented below.

Samples

Twist and Shout:


She's a Woman:


I Feel Fine:


Act Naturally:

February 16, 1965 - Recording "Yes It Is"

What's amazing about so much of the early Beatles recordings is how much was recorded live off the floor, including vocals. With a two-track tape recording system, this was almost a necessity (listen to the punch-in edit of a harmonic solo in "Little Child" for an example of how awkward edits resulted from this limitation). Advancing to four-track made overdubs a little easier and so when it came time to record "Yes It Is" with three-part harmony, the Beatles took the obvious route, recorded the backing track first and overdubbed the vocals later. This became standing operating practice on Beatles recordings after 1966, as instrumentation became more and more complex. Here, it was just beginning: George was occupied during the recording of the instrumental track with the volume pedal on his guitar, which he had first used in the studio earlier that day, overdubbing onto his song "I Need You."

What has always impressed me with Beatles recordings is the ability of John, Paul, and George in the studio to give excellent vocal performances on cue time and again. Listen as they go from an (intentionally) poor guide vocal from John to superb three-part harmony in a matter of hours: the session for "Yes It Is" lasted from 5:00 to 10:00 pm.

Here are takes 1 through 9...


...and the final version as it sounds on the master tape (take 14):

Holy Grail Recording #1 - We Can Work It Out (live) (1965)

In this series, In The Life Of...The Beatles presents the top 10 unreleased recordings of the Beatles.

In my personal opinion, the most desirable unreleased recording of the Beatles is a live performance of "We Can Work It Out" -- which may not exist at all. Perhaps the rarest of Beatles live songs, "We Can Work It Out" was performed for a brief time during the Beatles' British tour in December 1965, following the release of the double-A-sided "We Can Work It Out"/"Day Tripper."

Unless some enterprising person recorded this using a portable tape recorder (itself somewhat of a rarity in 1965), then a live performance of this song may be lost to history. It would be interesting to hear how the harmonies translated in a live setting of this wonderful song -- a great single and a true Lennon/McCartney collaboration. For now, all we have are pictures from the tour, showing both Paul and John on organ (presented at right) and Robert Murray's attempt at coming up with what it may have sounded like, presented below, along with the Beatles miming the song from the television special, The Music of Lennon & McCartney.

We Can Work it Out (Concert Outfake #2)

The Beatles In Concert

Holy Grail Recording #2 - 27-minute Helter Skelter outtake (1968)

In this series, In The Life Of...The Beatles presents the top 10 unreleased recordings of the Beatles.

I realize the legendary 27-minute version of "Helter Skelter" tops the lists of most people in terms of Beatles recordings they would like to hear, but just to mix things up I've decided to place it in the #2 spot. This recording has been written about extensively here and it is still no closer to being released. The last best chance was its consideration for inclusion on The Beatles Anthology 3 at the urging of Mark Lewisohn, who was asked by George Martin, "Why is this important?" For a hint of what it might sound like, here's an excerpt of take 2 from the same session, with a great vocal performance from Paul.

Final installment: July 14

Holy Grail Recording #3 - Revolver studio outtakes (1966)

In this series, In The Life Of...The Beatles presents the top 10 unreleased recordings of the Beatles.

There are too many great as-yet-unheard outtakes from the Revolver sessions to choose from. Here are some examples:

• "Mark I" ("Tomorrow Never Knows") - takes 2-3 - take 1 was released on Anthology 2.
  
• "Got To Get You Into My Life" - takes 1-4, 6-8. Take 5 was released on Anthology 2.
  
• "Love You To" - take 1 - An acoustic recording with George on guitar and lead vocal, with Paul providing backing vocals. The song was titled "Granny Smith" at the time.
• "Rain" - takes 1-5
• "Dr. Robert" - takes 1-7
• "And Your Bird Can Sing" - take 1, takes 3-13. Take 1 was reportedly unrecognizable in terms of how it ended up on the album (take 2 was released on Anthology 2).
• "Taxman" - takes 1-10 (take 11 was released on Anthology 2).
• "I'm Only Sleeping" - takes 1-11 (An early all-acoustic "take 1" was released on Anthology 2).
  

Here's an outtake that did surface thanks to the Anthology series (released on the "Real Love" single), this is "Here, There and Everywhere" take 7 (with overdubs from take 14):



Next installment: July 7

Holy Grail Recording #4 - Etcetera (1968)

In this series, In The Life Of...The Beatles presents the top 10 unreleased recordings of the Beatles.

A Beatles song that has never been heard to this day, "Etcetera" was recorded at EMI Studios on August 20, 1968 as a demo by Paul McCartney, who had previously (back in 1965) intended to give the song to Marianne Faithfull. Paul took the tape home after the session, so he retains the only known copy. Revisiting the song in 1968, Paul may have reworked the song, as he was initially dissatisfied with it himself:

McCARTNEY: "I knew Marianne Faithfull so it was natural that I would be asked to write a song at some point. I did write a song but it was not a very good one. It was called 'Etcetera' and it's a bad song. I think it's a good job that it's died a death in some tape bin. Even then I seem to remember thinking it wasn't very good. There was always the temptation to keep your better songs for yourself and then give your next-best songs to other established people, so when it was someone like Marianne, who at that time was a newcomer, those people would tend to end up with fairly dreadful offerings of mine. I suppose, thinking back on it, after 'As Tears Go By' maybe they were looking for more sort of a 'Yesterday', something more poignant, more baroque. I probably thought, well, this is really all I've got at the moment. I'll send it round and hope it's all okay, and maybe they'll put a baroque thing on it and that'll make it okay. She probably did 'Yesterday' because they figured, 'Well at least it's better than "Etcetera"'."

Here's a set of Marianne Faithfull's early performance clips, including "As Tears Go By" and "Yesterday":



Next installment: June 30

Holy Grail Recording #5 - Cavern Club live set (1962)

In this series, In The Life Of...The Beatles presents the top 10 unreleased recordings of the Beatles.

Paul McCartney purchased at Sotheby's in 1985 a tape of a live set of the Beatles performing at the Cavern circa July 1962. None of it has since seen the light of day, but the song titles alone make it an extremely unique item. The set list includes:

• "Hey Baby"
• "If You Gotta Make a Fool Of Somebody"
• "Hippy Hippy Shake"
• "Please Mr. Postman"
  
• "Roll Over Beethoven"
• "Ask Me Why"
• "Sharing You"
• "Your Feet's Too Big"
• "Words Of Love"
• "Till There Was You"
• "Dizzy Miss Lizzie"
• "I Forgot To Remember To Forget"
• "Matchbox" (vocal: Pete Best)
• "Shimmy Shake"
• "Young Blood"
• "Dream Baby"

Here's an example of what some of it may sound like. This is "The Hippy Hippy Shake" from a few months later, at the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany, December 1962:



Next installment: June 23

Holy Grail Recording #6 - Summertime (1961)

In this series, In The Life Of...The Beatles presents the top 10 unreleased recordings of the Beatles.

In October 1960, Allan Williams arranged a recording session for Lu Walters (bass player from Rory Storm & the Hurricanes) at Akustik Studio in Hamburg, Germany. Backing him that day was the Beatles, including Rory Storm's drummer at the time, Ringo Starr. The cut that the Beatles played on, George Gershwin's "Summertime," may be the first recording ever to feature all four Beatles (John, Paul, George, and future Beatle Ringo; left out were Pete Best and Stuart Sutcliffe, who were also members of the Beatles at the time). When Allan Williams visited the Beatles during the making of Let It Be, he mentioned that he still had an acetate of this recording (unfortunately, he didn't bring it along while the cameras were rolling!). Unfortunately, Williams later lost the disc after leaving it behind it at a pub. It hasn't been seen since, making it perhaps the rarest Beatle recording known to exist. Whether it really still does exist, however, is anybody's guess.

This version by Gene Vincent may be how the Beatles approached the song:



Next installment: June 16