Take a Sad Song and Extract Every Last Ounce of Spontaneity from It: the Beatles Uber-Ballad Poll

Don't tell me, Give Ireland Back to the Irish?

My flippant half-baked theory about post-Beatle Lennon and McCartney is that Paul wanted to please everyone and often failed; John wanted to please no one and often succeeded.

Hmm. I think if Paul really wanted to please everyone, he would have made his first solo album a big budget extravaganza instead of what it actually is, and wouldn't have put out records like Wings' Wild Life. Given the amount of freedom that members of The Beatles had to put out whatever the hell they wanted, and it was more than most, then I can only assume that they all made the music that they wanted to make.

Listening to the post-Beatles solo albums, it's apparent to me that Lennon and Harrison both managed to develop their own solo sound away from The Beatles, whereas the difference between Abbey Road-era Paul and '70s McCartney isn't as drastic. It leads me to believe that in the later stages of The Beatles, that a lot of Lennon and Harrison's compositions were going through some kind of McCartney filter - or, in other words, Paul was the biggest driving force behind The Beatles, especially after they quit touring.

The big difference between the McCartney of The Beatles circa 1969 and the McCartney of the '70s is that he didn't seem to work as hard on his lyrics, really. But then, this is the guy that wrote 'She Came In Through The Bathroom Window'.

Just discovered it's his 73rd birthday today!

It leads me to believe that in the later stages of The Beatles, that a lot of Lennon and Harrison's compositions were going through some kind of McCartney filter - or, in other words, Paul was the biggest driving force behind The Beatles, especially after they quit touring.

^^ what happened, basically. He was the leader because John didn't want to be anymore.

that's pretty clear from the Let it Be film

Yup, this is essentially why I can't understand the type of Beatles fan that slags off McCartney's solo career. Abbey Road is considered one of the best things they ever did, yet it has more in common with what Paul was doing with Wings on Band On The Run and Venus and Mars than it does with Imagine or any Harrison solo record you could name. I definitely think that McCartney had a lot to do with the arrangements and production of Lennon's and Harrison's songs on Abbey Road.

I mean, god, I don't want to come out and say that Paul McCartney was The Beatles, but he definitely the dominant ingredient during their most revered period.

eh my most revered period is '65-'67

He was the dominant ingredient then, too...well, maybe not '65, but '66 and '67 definitely.

welll sorta - he provided the framing devices for Sgt Peppers and MMT but let's face it those devices are p stupid. John was writing better songs (for the most part) and still pushing the band in various directions

Yeah, I mean, McCartney contributed more, but his contributions weren't as significant as, say, "A Day in the Life".

But Lennon was veering on being a barely-there acid casualty by '67, and it seems unlikely that any of his best stuff would've been as fully realized without McCartney's chirpy cheerleading.

it seems to me like the Beatle-rot didn't really settle in w Lennon until the end of the White Album, after which his attitude seems to be m/l "fuck it"

It's acknowledged by every bio – John Lennon too – that Paul led the band from '68 onwards. John had checked out; George was miserable but the misery inspired the greatest songs he'd ever write.

Yeah, I mean, McCartney contributed more, but his contributions weren't as significant as, say, "A Day in the Life".

Which he wrote part of.

Right, yeah, maybe not the best example. He also came up with the orchestra-glissando idea to join the two songs.

Maybe "Tomorrow Never Knows" is a better example -- he played bass and one of the tape loops, but nothing more.

Paul's admitted several times that for years John was the leader, the one they were in awe of and all, as he put it, a little in love with.

john's sudden burst of creativity in late 1969/1970 -- "cold turkey," "instant karma," the POB album -- is all the more amazing because he hadn't given much of a shit about almost anything he'd played on for more than a year.

he played bass and one of the tape loops, but nothing more.

I don't know how many tape loops there are on the track, but if I'm not mistaken, he did all of them.

hmm

Five different loops were used in Tomorrow Never Knows: a seagull noise; actually a distorted recording of Paul McCartney laughing, an orchestra playing a B-flat chord, notes played on a Mellotron's flute setting, and a distorted sitar; best heard in the instrumental break following the lines 'It is being, it is being.' George Martin recalled, "We did a live mix of all the loops. All over the studios we had people spooling them onto machines with pencils while Geoff did the balancing. There were many other hands controlling the panning. It is the one track, of all the songs The Beatles did, that could never be reproduced: it would be impossible to go back now and mix exactly the same thing: the 'happening' of the tape loops, inserted as we all swung off the levers on the faders willy-nilly, was a random event."

it would be impossible to go back now and mix exactly the same thing: the 'happening' of the tape loops, inserted as we all swung off the levers on the faders willy-nilly, was a random event."

which prompts the question, who did the stereo mix, and how was it done? The timing and loops aren't identical to the mono (and supposedly first) mix, but they're fairly close. Did engineers take notes on the mono mix and do their best to recreate it for stereo? Did the Beatles do two run-throughs, one mono and one stereo?

As I understand it, Paul McCartney put the tape loops of 'Tomorrow Never Knows' together at home before the recording of 'Tomorrow Never Knows' took place, but they'll have been mixed live by The Beatles into the track, as there was no automation then.

when Ringo dies McCartney will finally be able to take credit for everything

(being facetious but I do kinda wonder sometimes about how Paul's "last Beatle standing" schtick has distorted narratives about the band)

All of this stuff was known about long before Lennon died, not sure what McCartney has said since to distort any 'official' narrative.

Depression permeated many of the songs that Harrison wrote during this period, an issue that was not helped by his continued heavy drinking and cocaine use

The main criticism I remember from the Roy Carr hatchet jobs on the Harrison solo albums, apart from the weak singing and songwriting, was the humourless preachy self-righteousness and all round sourness - I've never heard so much of a second of any of them btw!

not sure what McCartney has said since to distort any 'official' narrative.

eh he's p relentlessly self-promotional and sometimes I suspect some of it is revisionist. I mean we all know he wrote "Yesterday" by himself, trying to retroactively get his name first in the songwriting credit is just the kind of dick move you might expect of an egomaniac - also the Let it Be "Naked" thing etc.

xpost:

Well yeah, there's a lot of Harrison's solo stuff which just isn't all that fun to listen to, especially when he gets stuck in mid-tempo mode.

George is occasionally funny, tho not so much in the 70s

trying to retroactively get his name first in the songwriting credit is just the kind of dick move you might expect of an egomaniac

... not to mention buying out Denny Laine's share of "Mull of Kintyre"!

If you're going to accuse him of revisionism, you might cite a particular instance of it. What was wrong with Let It Be Naked?

I said I suspect I didn't say I could prove

it's not like I was hanging out at Beatles sessions

No, Yoko was bad enough <----- jk

glad yr here to defend Sir Paul's honor though heh

I'm reminded of something one of the Beatles said (can't remember if it was George or Ringo) about how there were various things only the four of them know the real truth about, and that they had long ago decided to keep to a consensus account rather than differ in public, and I kinda wonder how much that consensus holds (or will hold up) when only one of them is left

a not particularly revisionist example would be how much Paul has come to champion George (particularly since he passed) when for all intents and purposes it seems like George absolutely hated Paul (and for fairly understandable reasons) from like '68 through the 80s.

like to here Paul tell it now him and Lennon were in awe of George circa Abbey Road and that seems to be a rather sentimental gloss

All he's said is that "we" knew George "was peaking on those later albums" and has praised "Something" consistently over the last thirty years.

Oh, I don't know what conflict may or may not have existed or may or may not have been all that significant. I'll say this, that song on Chaos and Creation in the Backyard DOES SOUND LIKE A GEORGE HARRISON SONG. Like something from Cloud Nine or the Traveling Wilburys.

yeah and he played "Something" on the ukelele on that concert DVD that came out after George died too. I thought there were additional quotes to that effect beyond the Scorsese thing you mention.

xxp

The best indicator that the Beatles were a family is the degree to which George and Paul loved each other but neither could stand being around the other for very long. During the Anthology footage it's clear that being in the same room as Paul and coerced into a nostalgia he doesn't feel bothers the hell out of George. There's this bit when the three are sitting awkwardly on the grass reminiscing about India and it's clear George doesn't want to deal with Paul's forced good cheer.

His version of "All Things Must Pass" from that concert is awesome!

like, Paul's going "Do you remember, George, going down to the village? Remember? George?" and George is impassive behind a ukelele and Ringo looks like he'd rather be eating beans in his room.

well, Paul's a politician, and while I'm sure he was surprised at the extent to which George was mourned by musicians he wasn't going to fight it either. Plus, I suspect he genuinely wanted the challenge of playing the piano and singing the harmony on "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" and participating on "All Things Must Pass."

His version of "All Things Must Pass" from that concert is awesome!

I haven't seen this in years and years, am I misremembering which song he did or did he do both?

Let It Be... Naked is arguably as "produced" as Spector's Let It Be in places. Yeah, sure, they've removed the choirs and orchestras and stuff, but the tapes were cleaned up in a way that just wouldn't have been possible in 1969/1970. There was even pitch correction and digital editing in places, so it's about as true to the "warts and all" style that the record was supposed to be as Spector's version.

Basically the project confirmed that Lennon was actually right: Spector took the tapes, which were badly recorded and had a shit feeling to them, and made something releasable out of it.

I'm sure he was surprised at the extent to which George was mourned by musicians

Ooh, I doubt that. Shakey, he did both of those songs.

However, in the Scorsese doc Paul places emphasis on the phrase "and financially" when he speculates on the reasons why George got into songwriting after "not being much interested" at the beginning. It reminds me of another pompous moment when The Police got together to drink and tell stories in '99 and Sting, the author of "We'll Be Together" and "Desert Rose," made a dig at Copeland and Summers writing songs because they saw the financial sense in it.

The best indicator that the Beatles were a family is the degree to which George and Paul loved each other but neither could stand being around the other for very long. During the Anthology footage it's clear that being in the same room as Paul and coerced into a nostalgia he doesn't feel bothers the hell out of George. There's this bit when the three are sitting awkwardly on the grass reminiscing about India and it's clear George doesn't want to deal with Paul's forced good cheer.

― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, June 18, 2015 9:28 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

There's that bit where they're in a room playing: Ringo on drums and George and Paul are on acoustic guitars, and Paul is like "let's do 'Blue Moon of Kentucky'" and it's so clear that George doesn't want to. But does it anyway.

lol yes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpV7EdctMtI

George wanted to play "Wah Wah"