George Harrison's Indian Songs for the Beatles

blue jay way is the highlight of magical mystery tour, apart from the strawberry fiels add-on.

love you to is definitely the worst of these, within you without you the most sophisticated. inner light is beautiful

I love Wonderwall Music

never heard wonderwall music, somehow. i really love the inner light -- missed opportunity that harrison didn't get the incredible string band to back him up on a late 60s solo LP!

oh man "Blue Jay Way" is turgid shit

Wonderwall is half Indian classical stuff and half prototypes for Mark Mothersbaugh instrumental interludes in Rushmore

sounds good. thanks to a friend's "False Raga" mix CD, i've been listening to a lot of these sort of half-digested indian grooves from European musicians in the late 60s-70s. kind of a cool little sub-genre.

Gabor Szabo - Jazz Raga is pretty fun in that vein, funky pop jazz w Eastern gimmicks, good Stones cover

Just the ones George wrote--not surprisingly, like "Norwegian Wood" and "Tomorrow Never Knows" better than any of them. I don't have "The Inner Light," not even sure that I've heard it. Of the other two, "Love You To."

(And only then in a relatively large sample size.)

Oops!

i'm gonna be a minority here voting for the inner light

I probably am too.

quite hard to find on yewtub, quite beautiful
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NH_twoe66HA

It's a lovely song. For me, it's unfortunately overshadowed (like many of the Past Masters 2 tracks) by vague associations with very bad early-90s first-person shooters, e.g. "Rise of the Triad" and the demo levels of "Hexen," which I must have been playing a lot of right when I got that CD. Not really a good fit but the music in those games must have sucked pretty bad.

Yeah, that's good--I was always aware that it was out there, but I think that's the first time I've heard it. To my ears, sounds more Indian than it does the Beatles (whereas "Love You To" sounds more like the Beatles than it does Indian).

It's a lovely song. For me, it's unfortunately overshadowed (like many of the Past Masters 2 tracks) by vague associations with very bad early-90s first-person shooters, e.g. "Rise of the Triad" and the demo levels of "Hexen," which I must have been playing a lot of right when I got that CD. Not really a good fit but the music in those games must have sucked pretty bad.

― Doctor Casino, Monday, October 21, 2013 4:32 PM (15 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha, i used to listen to eno's "music for airports" while i played "doom", kind of weird in retrospect

Doom soundtrack (and Doom 2 moreso) is pretty badass though.

Right w you guys. I played through Doom and Doom II while discovering the Beatles albums. "White Album" I played over and over as I worked my way through Doom II. Though yeah those game soundtracks were great as well.

Wonderwall soundtrack is AMAZING. I agree that "Love You To" is probably the weakest song but I voted it. The instrumental parts are pretty great.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtZW7SQABt4

i was not expecting a reference to Hexen on this thread :)

Beatles Anthology + iD software shareware just a right of passage for some people

my favorite is WYWY by a long way -- don't like the other two much.

clemenza, you've never heard the 'past masters' cds? i probably like those as much as any of the actual albums.

I know about them, just don't have them. When they came out in the late '80s, I felt like I had enough Beatles stuff, and I wasn't listening to them much at that point anyway. ("Yes It Is" is on one of them, right? That's one of my all-time favourites.)

yes, it is.

hexen rules

probably voting Love You To, but The Inner Light is one of those elusive underrated Beatles songs

voted for paint it black

Love You To, mostly because I love those distorted backwards guitars, but Blue Jay Way was the first one I thought of when I opened the thread.

'The Inner Light', I think, is the only one here to have actually been recorded in India.

Doom soundtrack (and Doom 2 moreso) is pretty badass though.

― Doctor Casino, Monday, October 21, 2013 5:36 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yea they were pretty good. my computer speakers were busted though, that's why i played the eno record

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

easily LYT.

WYWY

LUV U 2

hardest poll decision i've had to make in years

lyt/til even split, went for lyt almost arbitrarily

Love You To, mostly because I love those distorted backwards guitars,
― Defund Phil Collins (stevie)

Yeah, this. There's even more guitar on the 1999 Yellow Submarine Songtrack mix, just churning away. I don't think it's audible at all in the original mix.

love you to.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

giving all Harrison's Indian stuff a close listening lately. It's interesting how different all these three are from each other, in terms of structure and instrumentation. Also interesting that he pretty much never went in this direction on his solo albums and instead kept his subsequent stuff with Shankar separate. There's no tabla or tambura or sitar anywhere on All Things Must Pass, for ex.

My affection keeps switching.

have you heard Wonderwall? its a solo album and full of great Indian stuff. there's an incredible album by the London Radha Krishna society that released the Krishna mantra as a single and it's great.

from my understanding he was writing/supervising the material while Indian instrumentalists were actually playing it. makes sense he wouldn't want his solo career (the sparse thing that it is) to just be him doing that over and over.

like maybe he felt he was wading into in on a genre that was way deeper and required full-time dedication, the type of which he didn't even want to apply to his own rock career (thus the diversions, funding Monty Python films, etc.)

I have heard Wonderwall but it's been years, I should check that out again

was trying to think of other raga/indian-incorporating western pop - Kinks "See My Friends" and "Fancy", several Donovan songs (Three Kingfishers, Fat Angel, Peregrine), Stooges "We Will Fall", The Cure "If Only Tonight We Could Sleep", some Beck stuff, a couple Black Angels songs... I'm sure there's more I'm forgetting at the moment. Zep has some stuff that's obviously *influenced* by Indian musicians but I don't think they ever actually ended up using any on "Kashmir" or "Friends" (yes I have heard that session outtake of Page and the Indian orchestra)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Radha_Krsna_Temple_(album)

^this is what i mention above. it's really great stuff. George produced this and they released in '71.

feel like maybe he realized he was better as a promoter/facilitator

thanks I'll check that out! sure I've seen it mentioned but never listened to it

huh "Red Lady Too" off of Wonderwall sounds like it's the same chord progression as "In the First Place"

To be honest, I like all of these songs!

feel like maybe he realized he was better as a promoter/facilitator

iirc, he said that he gave up trying to play sitar once he realized how intense a lifetime study it was, and that he couldn't hope to attain a fraction of Shankar's mastery.

anybody heard this "shankar family & friends" album? produced by george.

https://www.discogs.com/Shankar-Family-Friends-Shankar-Family-Friends/release/1784383

I think so - "I'm the Urban Spaceman" under a pseudonym. It was a single for them.

A 1987 version of the Rockestra Theme by Duane Eddy.

Some serious manspreading going on in that George Harrison interview.

he played on them

― akm, Saturday, June 24, 2017 1:33 PM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Really? Hm. I know he played on other tracks on the soundtrack, but I think it's Peter Doggett's book that says he wouldn't play on the Beatles songs.

It was only because he couldn't find the brushes in time.

oh you're right. ha, I always thought he did play on those but I just saw a mccartney quote stating he didn't, because he didn't want to compare his original performances to the new ones

Those re-recordings are so fucking unnecessary.

Sure, but at least they got Paul to use "McCartney-Lennon" as the songwriting credits for the first time.

Thanks for the content guys---Alfred, I enjoy his voice with the Beatles and on his singles, but might get sick of it on a whole album, along with those 70s studio hacks you mention---would like to hear him sing "IT Don't Come Easy", which I didn't know he wrote and produced--maybe too bad he didn't do a duet album with Ringo---which reminds me, I liked his duets with Paul Simon on SNL, back in the 70s or early 80s.

*Some( of his singles, that is, mostly the later ones. Oh well, at least he gave us Handmade Films (for the sake of which, along world peace, he flew to Asian location and tried to mediate between Sean Penn and Madonna, yeesh).

along with world peace.

i think there's a version of "it don't come easy" with george on vox on some bootleg. it's not bad. i still like ringo's vocals better, but that could just be because i'm acclimated to them.

My old boss recently told me about coming in as a player on a session for McCartney's son (Paul was producing). He said Paul was excellent as a producer, very laid back about suggestions but with a keen idea of what he wanted sonically from each musician. Old boss said the kid was "fucking weird", though lol

i think there's a version of "it don't come easy" with george on vox on some bootleg. it's not bad. i still like ringo's vocals better, but that could just be because i'm acclimated to them.

yep, here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=160&v=4p5yzdCa2GE

My old boss recently told me about coming in as a player on a session for McCartney's son (Paul was producing). He said Paul was excellent as a producer, very laid back about suggestions but with a keen idea of what he wanted sonically from each musician. Old boss said the kid was "fucking weird", though lol

― Acid Hose (Capitaine Jay Vee), Sunday, June 25, 2017 1:29 AM (seven hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Have you ever watched an interview with James McCartney? It's like gazing into an alternate universe where Paul McCartney is a fat, balding, introverted southerner.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yyi9Kqo3L5Q

Sure, but at least they got Paul to use "McCartney-Lennon" as the songwriting credits for the first time.

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Saturday, June 24, 2017 11:31 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I'm sure there are some early records where its this way around..

Yeah, check the 'Please please me' lp...

Dig this one - Macca had bought the rights to LMD and PSILY, so he gets it his way round and published by himself alone!

https://img.discogs.com/pjGEk5ST4L9TJ9dCiYjBu_wVm5g=/fit-in/600x599/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-4411022-1397392446-3720.jpeg.jpg

I think it's always been "McCartney-Lennon" on that record. First pressings it is.

I had a '70s pressing, same thing.

True, it was always McCartney-Lennon on PPM. But the songs on Broad Street were Revolver-era, and originally listed as Lennon-McCartney (not that Lennon hand much to do with writing "Eleanor Rigby," but still).

On which version of Broad Street are they "McCartney-Lennon?"

None that I've been able to find looking on Discogs.

Even the most recent UK 45 of "From Me To You" is Mc-L on both sides! ("Thank you Girl" is very Lennon song)

On which version of Broad Street are they "McCartney-Lennon?"

― timellison, Sunday, June 25, 2017 10:13 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

wikipedia sez:

A notable switch from past album song credits is the crediting of song writing to "McCartney-Lennon" as opposed to the usual "Lennon-McCartney" on all other albums.

It doesn't specify which issue. I don't remember anything in the music press about it at the time; it wasn't until Paul reversed the credits on his Back in the U.S. live record that people made a big deal about it:

On Back in the U.S., McCartney reversed the songwriting credits for nineteen Lennon–McCartney compositions to read "Paul McCartney and John Lennon"[11] – a move that author Howard Sounes describes as the live album's "chief point of interest".[12] This gesture was a further attempt by McCartney to establish his legacy following Lennon's death in 1980,[13] having been vetoed from adopting the McCartney–Lennon credit during the Beatles Anthology project in 1995 by his former bandmates George Harrison and Ringo Starr.[14]

The revised credits on Back in the U.S. incensed Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono, who threatened to take legal action,[11] while Starr said he found McCartney's actions "underhanded".[12][15] Some commentators observed that McCartney had similarly credited his Beatles songs to "McCartney–Lennon" on the 1976 live album Wings over America[16] and that Lennon had never publicly objected to the reversal;[13][17] in addition, the compositions in question were written with little or no input from Lennon.[12][18] When compiling Back in the U.S., McCartney had decided to act in response to Ono's dropping of his co-writer's credit for "Give Peace a Chance", on the 1997 compilation Lennon Legend: The Very Best of John Lennon.[citation needed] Despite their differences on this issue, McCartney and Starr united on stage for the Harrison tribute concert shortly after the release of the live album.[19]

Citation here, hi.

I noticed the solo "Lennon" credit for "Give Peace a chance" at the end of the "Live Peace In Toronto" movie.

np.

I looked at a bunch of versions of Broad Street on Discogs including a '93 CD reissue and every one is Lennon-McCartney.

I thought it was Wings Over America on which the credits are reversed.

Yes

aw man for a second i thought y'all were all talking about macca's awful "P.S. Love Me Do" from the late 80s.

did he really?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJkRxeoBY70

a move that author Howard Sounes describes as the live album's "chief point of interest".

Cold.

That "P.S. Love Me Do"...it's too obviously bad to be as bad as it is. It's like when your car gets broken into, and you see the broken window and you have a split second of disbelief like, "No, there's no way that's my car, because if it was, man, that'd really suck." Paul manages to sustain that split second of disbelief for 3:44. That's pretty impressive.