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- [00:02]
Paul McCartney
When you think about businesses that are selling through the roof, like aloe or.
- [00:06]
John Lennon
Allbirds, sure you think about a great product, a cool brand and great marketing.
- [00:11]
Paul McCartney
But an often overlooked secret is actually the businesses behind the business making, selling.
- [00:17]
John Lennon
And for shoppers, buying.
- [00:19]
Paul McCartney
Simple.
- [00:20]
John Lennon
For millions of businesses, that business is Shopify.
- [00:24]
Paul McCartney
Nobody does online business better than Shopify. It's home of shop pay, the number.
- [00:29]
John Lennon
One checkout in the world. You can use it to boost conversions.
- [00:33]
Paul McCartney
Up to 50%, meaning way less carts.
- [00:36]
John Lennon
Going abandoned and way more sales going through. To checkout, sign up for your $1 per month trial period at shopify.com income all lowercase go to shopify.com income to.
- [00:52]
Paul McCartney
Upgrade your selling today.
- [00:54]
John Lennon
That's shopify.com income.
- [01:00]
George Harrison
All right, here we go.
- [01:01]
John Lennon
New Phineas and Ferb is here.
- [01:03]
George Harrison
We're back, baby.
- [01:05]
John Lennon
For 104 more days.
- [01:07]
Paul McCartney
I know what we're gonna do.
- [01:08]
John Lennon
Today of summer vacation.
- [01:10]
George Harrison
I am ready for summer shenanigans. Let's do it.
- [01:12]
Paul McCartney
Oh yeah.
- [01:14]
George Harrison
We're gonna fuzz Phineas and Ferv once and for all. Are we gonna do this again?
- [01:18]
John Lennon
New inventions, shenanigans, inators adventures and songs.
- [01:22]
Paul McCartney
Brand new summer vacations.
- [01:24]
John Lennon
New Phineas and Ferb starts June 5th on Disney Channel and next day on Disney on disneyplus.dis.
- [01:30]
Paul McCartney
Once there was a way to get back home. I don't think you are on it doesn't sound like you are.
- [01:39]
George Harrison
Who was playing bas sound like anybody's.
- [01:40]
Paul McCartney
On it wasn't you, was it? Unless it was overdone. Why would you ever d paper one get back home?
- [01:48]
George Harrison
Because he was playing the piano.
- [01:53]
Paul McCartney
I think I'm playing piano.
- [01:54]
George Harrison
So who was playing bass?
- [01:56]
Paul McCartney
I think I over at the same time. He overdubbed it. Can you.
- [02:00]
George Harrison
You can hear the sound of it. It' directing j give many takes. He was keen.
- [02:17]
Paul McCartney
Maybe I played bass. I played bass on some with that six string Fender. Sounds like it.
- [02:22]
George Harrison
It was definitely Paul playing piano.
- [02:24]
Paul McCartney
So it couldn't. Well, you.
- [02:25]
George Harrison
You should be able to tell because let's.
- [02:28]
Paul McCartney
Shall we?
- [02:29]
George Harrison
You know, you just know.
- [02:32]
Paul McCartney
There are lots of.
- [02:33]
George Harrison
There's lots of four starts and breakdowns. That was take one. So we end up. Are you saying the bases couldn't.
- [02:39]
Paul McCartney
It couldn't have been overdub because it's on every turn.
- [02:41]
George Harrison
It was live. Okay, well then it must have been.
- [02:44]
Paul McCartney
Me or John playing it.
- [02:45]
George Harrison
Obviously you can't remember.
- [02:47]
Paul McCartney
Could have been ring.
- [02:48]
George Harrison
Well, look, we did have. We had a six string bass. A right handed base.
- [02:55]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [02:55]
George Harrison
So that for these kind of Conditions.
- [03:09]
Ringo Starr
Hello, and welcome to episode 305 of Something about the Beatles Podcast. You, the listeners, have let me know. There's certainly I've got a broad enough audience that there are people who like insider accounts, there are people who love the analysis of the Beatles, there are people who love the musical shows, and we've done quite a number of them, most notably the ones with musicologists Walter Everett, Jack Petrusselli and Cameron Grider of the RPM School. We've done a few of those. Well, here's something new that I wanted to get into. It's sort of a Venn diagram overlap between the musicianship shows I've done with the RPM guys, as well as some of the studio stuff I've done with Jerry Hammock, most notably co author of the new book Ribbons of Rust. So this is an analysis of who is playing what on Beatle recordings, an issue that I think there's a certain segment of the sappy listenership that is very interested in that, but it's something that I think gives some insights into how the Beatles worked. So there is value there. And my two guests today both hail from Australia, both of them are musicians, and one's name has come up on the show before one of the RPM shows, Marcus Phelan, a musician with a YouTube channel you guys should check out. It will be linked in the show description. Who's been doing this stuff for years, has played in Beatle tribute bands. And Andrew Shakespeare. Both these guys are musicians, both are wonderful Beatles scholars in terms of really researching this stuff and getting into the nitty gritt. So You've got Marcus's YouTube channel and Andrew, who has been floating the idea of writing a book. And I hope that he does, because if nothing else, it'd be wonderful to see the book out there, Shakespeare on the Beatles. And then maybe another Australian could do a companion volume, the Beatles on Shakespeare. That would be Duncan Driver. I'd love to see that. But we came together with a list of songs that we felt. There's been so much speculation about who is playing what on these songs. And I will say that the waters have been muddied by people in a position of authority who put things out there that end up, upon closer examination, ringing false. This is everybody from Kevin Howlett to Jeff Emmerich, a guy who, I will say it again on this show. His book, to me Here, There and Everywhere is utterly valueless in terms of using it as a research tool. Yes, he was there. But as we've depicted on the show, a number of times, sometimes the people who were there make the worst witnesses, and that includes the four Beatles themselves. In terms of saying things we know to be demonstrably false, empirically false. And in this post Aaron Webber world, we demand more in terms of analysis of the data. We all make errors, every one of us does, even me. And we try to do our best with the data we've got. So we offer this show as a sort of analysis, as the best data we've got by people who know what's what into coming up with answers with this stuff. And the beauty of it is, you may not see this as beauty, but to my way of thinking, it's a great illustration of showing that even with the sharpest minds at work, sometimes you can come up with two compelling arguments that are not in alignment. And you will hear some of that in this show. People whose Beatle intellect I highly value that come up with equally strong arguments that are on opposite sides. Which leads to the conclusion that as much as we hate it, as much as we resist it, sometimes there are things that are just unknowable and we'll say so. And that's, I think, the best you can do in my book or anybody's book, if we don't know something, we should say it and not come down with a conclusion that, oh yeah, this is it. Because you don't know 100% of the time, you could try your best. And that's what we do here. So I hope this will be the first of other such conversations with these two guys going forward, analyzing contentious credits.
- [07:21]
Paul McCartney
Even primary sources allegedly, like the George Martin ghostwritten book, Summer of Love, the Making of Salt and Peppers. I used that as my first protocol when I was trying to do a video. I did the video on fixing a hole and knowing what we know now, with outtakes and isolated tracks, reading it. The chapter on fixing a hole is fiction, total fiction. Nothing matches up. And it's really written away, like George Martin. I'm so proud. I'm actually going to play keyboards on a Beatles record. You know, gushing kind of language and that sort of thing.
- [07:57]
George Harrison
I was just going to add something when Revolution the Head came out and it was immediately hailed as this is the book we've been waiting for. This is the classic. But at the same time, another book came out by somebody, an author, I can't remember. It was called A Day in the Life. And it was a very similar book. It was about the same size, and it basically went through song by song, but they did it in kind of an album format. So they'd bring up an album and then sort of go through songs and give editorials on the songs and whatever. And I found that information to be a lot more accurate and a lot less pompous. I mean, I don't speak ill of the Departed, but there was a real arrogance, old school rock critique arrogance about the way Ian McDonald wrote about their music, you know, 100% deciding what was their music and what was that, not their good music. But the other thing is just that whole thing of, you know, printing credits as fact and then people adopting that tone as the go to book around critique of the Beatles and then swallowing it all as fact. And I suppose in the years since that book's come out with the net and Facebook and I know all the social media stuff, it becomes harder and harder to kind of convince people that what they have long thought is not correct.
- [09:18]
John Lennon
100.
- [09:19]
George Harrison
You know, I think that's one of the interesting phenomenons and maybe one of the reasons we're doing this is that, you know, people stick to their side of the story and get really quite upset if suggest what they've always thought is actually incorrect. Whereas I think there's a lot of us in Beetle Land who absolutely relish finding out that we were wrong about something and finding out something new. It's like a very exciting thing.
- [09:42]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [09:42]
George Harrison
And I don't know, in the last week I've spent quite a bit of time listening to isolated stuff on YouTube in preparation for this and it's been really exciting. Somebody just released an isolated track thing of revolution number nine. It's 45 minutes long and wow, what a listen. It is true.
- [10:01]
Paul McCartney
Right?
- [10:01]
George Harrison
You know, it's fantastic. It's fantastic.
- [10:03]
John Lennon
And that's the thing about books like that, written back in the 90s, Ian McDonald, he didn't have access to what we have access to now. And I think the bar has really risen on the scholarship and people aren't satisfied with parroting stuff that may or may not be true just because it came out of a source that wasn't properly vetted, like here, there and everywhere. And certainly Ian McDonald, I don't think he was even a musician, but he writes with this authority and as you say, arrogance, that my word is law and if I say it, it is settled law now. And of course we know better.
- [10:35]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [10:35]
George Harrison
So people, quite often, often in various resources, people state things as fact, but what you really don't know is what they're basing that statement on. So they don't sort of provide the evidence for this being stated as a fact, they just say this is a fact.
- [10:50]
Paul McCartney
Even with access to tapes, you can still get it wrong. If you don't know how to read the tape box or Judeo log, you know, if you can misinterpret, which is the classic case for Giles. Anyway, I listened to his interview or an interview where he did the like John played bass on that song. He claimed it, but it was so confused I was listening to it. I'm like, he's contradicting himself. First saying he was an Ervadab, then saying, oh, Paul is on piano and organ at the same time. Because you look at the track, the tape box that says track three, piano and organ. But then you say, oh, John has something to do, so maybe he probably played bass. And no, it's an overdub and Paul couldn't have played the organ and the piano at the same time. You need four hands and listen to the outtakes. It's just, it's always the organ comes in on the basic track, just on the bridge, that's all. So it's like John's been told it's John playing the organ and it's been told you can play on the bridge, but that's it. And George overdubbed more organ, all the high pitched sort of stuff. But yeah, it's. You can have the tape and access to the eight tracks or whatever. But if you don't know how it's been laid down, right, what is Nerva Dub and what isn't, you can give the wrong information as well.
- [12:04]
John Lennon
Or what's a punch in?
- [12:05]
Paul McCartney
Yes, people say, oh, they've got access to tapes and not really. They've probably got the digital, you know, using the digital tracks is what we all use and wouldn't have the actual reels to remix. It all be digitized without actually hearing dialogue. And you don't hear dialogue for overdubs anyway. You know, if you're doing a bass overdub, you're not going to hear John's voice or Paul's voice. So you just got to use your ear and your kind of knowledge. And I've got magazine interviews where George in two interviews says specifically talks about Paul's overdub. Bass OVERDUB ON LLAMA GUITAR GENERALLY weeps. George has it twice. I mean, you must remember it pretty well.
- [12:43]
George Harrison
So Giles said John did the R's and a day and the like.
- [12:46]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, yes, he did.
- [12:49]
John Lennon
We've settled that one on this show so we'll move on. We're Going to start with the list that we came up between the three of us, and some being more controversial than others. But the first one was one that was kind of on my radar because I'd remembered reading long time ago, this being pre. The kind of data and scholarship that we have now, that George had missed the session for Every Little Thing during the Beatles For Sale sessions and that John had played all the guitar on it. And I thought that was kind of curious, if so. And so we'd been discussing that between us. Andrew, you'd found an interview that Paul had done in 1964, close to the time of the sessions.
- [13:28]
George Harrison
Yes.
- [13:29]
John Lennon
Where he actually describes that song in detail, the recording of it, because it was. Every Little Thing was a song that he had sort of earmarked as a potential single. Therefore it was important. And so there is 12 string guitar on it. We know that 12 string guitar was George's baby that year, starting with his birthday and the coming home from the trip to North America. But in fact, we have plenty of reason to believe that it's John playing the lead on that song and George playing acoustic for Paul's interview.
- [13:57]
George Harrison
Well, okay, so with this particular song, I've read so many sources, so Every Little Thing's probably the first of these songs where it just feels there's a lot of disagreement or people are uncertain about what happened. And, you know, and unpacking it over the last few weeks and, you know, going through it with Marcus, I think we've come to some kind of agreement about this. The first controversy is I remember years ago reading somebody saying, this is one of the rare examples of John singing lead on a Paul song. And I just thought, really don't know about that. So, you know, I listened closely and thought, no, I can hear Paul.
- [14:32]
Paul McCartney
And.
- [14:32]
George Harrison
And it turns out that there was only ever one vocal track recorded. And it's two people at one microphone singing in unison in the verses and then splitting into harmony for the choruses, which is something that John and Paul had done quite a bit, mostly in 1963, the singles a and B sides. So if you know that there's only one vocal track and there's two voices on it, then you know that is John and Paul in unison. So. But John's voice is admittedly a little more dominant, just like it is in Eight Days a Week, which is recording.
- [15:07]
Paul McCartney
Exactly. Yes. It cuts through.
- [15:10]
George Harrison
I have theories about that. I mean, it could be just as simple as John being a little closer to the mic. But also, you know, John was openly on fire in 1964, he was probably at the peak of his early Beatles prowess as just a soulful shouter. He was amazing. So maybe his voice just came across as being stronger than Paul's during that particular take. But either way, it is John and Paul. I remember the first time I was lonely without her can't stop thinking about.
- [15:42]
Paul McCartney
Her now Every little thing she does she does for me yeah. And, you know, the things she does, she does for me.
- [15:58]
George Harrison
Boo. It's not John doing lead on a Paul song. That's just not the case. And then. Then the second thing is, is really about the guitars. Now. Paul In 1964, at the time of the recording or shortly after, said an interview that George played acoustic and John played the lead. So I know that Paul, his memory can be a bit faulty in these latter days and that there's, you know, a couple of examples like come together and she said, where clearly he hasn't remembered it right. Because we now have the audio evidence to support the fact that he has not got it right. And we'll get into those at some other point, I suppose. But in this case, he said it very, very close to the recording. So I think this is a case where you just need to take his word for it.
- [16:49]
Paul McCartney
Not only that, we have photos of the session. We're showing John and Paul together playing guitars. Paul's playing John's 325 upside down for the. Just for that part. And John does the sort of thing 12 string. There's pictures of both do together. So.
- [17:12]
John Lennon
And just on the surface, it doesn't sound like George's 12 string sound.
- [17:15]
Paul McCartney
No, no, it's. It's. It's slightly. It's more semi. Like a semi acoustic sort of sound, not so electrically sort of. But yeah, I've got pics of it and it's. Yeah, sort of novel because you see Paul playing the guitar upside down, but he's only playing the one string. So it's just doing. And at the end he's going kind of like jumping every little thing or whatever. So, yeah, so it's great. I know recently, just this last week, someone sent me some photographs from the session and go, oh, there it is.
- [18:08]
John Lennon
And those are the session photos that you see part of the group where you see Ringo at the timpani.
- [18:12]
Paul McCartney
Yes.
- [18:12]
John Lennon
Which he also plays on that track.
- [18:13]
Paul McCartney
And Paul on the piano. It got pictures of Ringo on timpani, Paul on piano doing the whatever sort of a descending B minor thing and the dun dun kind of thing. Yeah. So, yeah, it seems logical to do the Parts that sort of. Together because you. On the same track. So. Yeah.
- [18:34]
George Harrison
So if you go through an unpacking exercise and I think what we've come up with is that track one is clearly bass, drums and acoustic guitar and that's Paul, George. And recorded simultaneously was the vocal. So they all four were there at that point. Then it would seem that maybe George wasn't present because the timpani piano and 12 string photos. I don't remember George being in those. Marcus, you might get the. But I don't think so.
- [19:03]
Paul McCartney
Oh, I think he'd be around the session. Yeah. Because if he was there for the backing track, but because John's doing the. That sort of thing at the same time on the same track as he's doing the solo. So.
- [19:16]
George Harrison
That's right. So that takes care of two tracks. You've only got two tracks left. And the next one is the guitars. Now we can quite clearly hear, as you've pointed out, that there are two guitars playing simultaneously on that track. So therefore the next track is the two guitar overdubs simultaneously, Paul and John. We have the photos to prove that. And then the last overdub, we've got photographic evidence, as you say, it's Paul and Ringo simultaneously recording the Timothy piano. And yet I have seen sources saying it's George Martin on piano. That stated as the fact. But, you know. So I think it's this thing of like unpacking things using a mixture of evidence and facts, probability and logic. You have to kind of use all of those to come to some kind of conclusion that rings true. So I think, you know, working. Working on this over the last week or so, that's certainly what feels right to me. Do I have absolute 100% proof? Well, no, but I think about as close as you can get to it, really.
- [20:19]
John Lennon
I think it's a lot more solid than what we've been told thus far. Especially with the addition of the photographic evidence to the data we've got. I feel we're in pretty solid ground unless something else turns up. But I feel pretty comfortable with that.
- [20:32]
Paul McCartney
It's a fairly straightforward, this song, I think. I think it's the most straightforward of the. For sure, it's only four tracks to.
- [20:37]
George Harrison
Deal with and yet it's just four tracks. It's simple, it was done quite quickly and yet there's a lot of misinformation out there about just this song, you.
- [20:45]
Paul McCartney
Know, that George was part of it because in the Get Back movie, he. He specifically mentions the song, like, as something to cover because he Love, you know, every little thing. He was trying to remember how they play the chords, whatever. So I tell you. Which is a good. Oh, those. Those kind of songs. Yeah, yeah. So he must. He. He liked that one.
- [21:27]
George Harrison
Yes.
- [21:28]
Paul McCartney
So he was there.
- [21:29]
John Lennon
That's a really good point. And it reminds me of an Anthology when they're at Friar park and he's on the uke and he starts playing I Will, which he's not on in the studio recording. He wasn't at that session, but boy, he was a scholar of Beatles own material, whether he was there or not.
- [21:45]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, yeah, at times he didn't have.
- [21:47]
George Harrison
A child when Golden Summers was on there.
- [21:49]
John Lennon
Right, right. There's that bit too.
- [21:52]
George Harrison
And Paul Moxon says, George Harrison, great Beatles scholar.
- [21:56]
Paul McCartney
It's hilarious.
- [21:57]
John Lennon
Right.
- [21:59]
George Harrison
Yeah.
- [22:00]
John Lennon
So next on our list is one that I have to say that is probably elicited a lot more controversy because it is so atypical in the Beatles canon as a recording that made you wonder how it passed through quality control that day and ended up on the finished record and that is I'm Looking through you, the final take, which was the third version taped. We know the one from Anthology, the first one with the hand claps on it and minus the bridge, there was a second one we've not heard in between. But one of the things that caught my attention years ago when I was doing research was I think the hardcore fans are aware of that website, what goes on that tracks, the anomalies, and they had a great detailed account of the things you hear in the final recording of I'm Looking through you. And they quote a guy named David Ferry. Not the David Ferry, but a different one and I'll read from it. What he had to say was. My main argument surrounds the recording of the Rubber Soul track I'm Looking through youh, possibly one of the messiest recordings the Beatles made. It is rushed, terribly recorded and not particularly played well. Thus I have a theory. I believe, contrary to all of the reports, including Lewison and MacDonald, that this could be a solo Paul recording. After all, it was his song and quite a personal subject for him. The drumming is awful, with a noticeable rim shot being missed. No bass drum notes here, Untrue. It's there flumping away or hats and cymbals. Sounds like the old patting a knees percussion to me, recorded on top of a snare to keep time. The guitars sound out of tune and sound like Paul's style of play, especially at the end George was always a more organized guitarist and I can't see him committing this to tape when the Beatles were at their height. The guitar sound is also Paul. Maybe his epiphone casino. The tambourine work is poor also and the organ stabs should have been heavily compressed. In fact, the best input is the acoustic capoed guitar, most audible at the start of the song. Whatever. It's a messy recording, especially when compared to other Rubber Sole tracks, which are well played and nicely produced. I don't have the date at hand when it was recorded, but I'm guessing it was one of the last songs recorded for the album. It was. I do know, however, that Paul had been the main part of the song for some time. Was it dusted down quilky recorded to complete the album? So we can enumerate the issues with this. In the US you had that false start at the beginning that's not on the other versions. The one I grew up on, which I thought was fabulous. We've got miss. Their drum parts drop tambourine feedback throughout. What is going on with this track?
- [24:47]
Paul McCartney
Okay, I think it's not capo. I think it's sped up. Oh, I'm looking through you where did you go? Oh, yeah. It's just that sort of thing where they, you know, it's a bit slow. I don't think people really capos at first fret. It's not a beatly thing. I don't think so anyway. Not a.
- [25:19]
John Lennon
But various speed is.
- [25:21]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, it's just be like. Yeah, my take on it. I listen to the isolated tracks and there's proper drums on it. It's a kind of thing. And to me, okay, it's Paul on guitar, acoustic guitar, it's George on bass. So they must have had a bass even though they didn't have the basses we know until 65. But they must have had some access to bass. I mean, the Beatles. Listen to the isolated bass track. It doesn't sound Paul. It's. It works. But it's basic. It's kind of thing. It like you just feel like, oh, Paul. To throw in some kind of nice little thing. But it's. It's very utilitarian or whatever. It's just following the tonic or whatever the, you know, the bass note of just being simple. And I think, yeah, I think George played the lead. I'm not sure.
- [26:44]
John Lennon
But did you have a theory on why something so unbelievably loose, especially compared to the rest of the production on an album slipped through?
- [26:52]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, yeah. I don't know. Yeah, maybe they just. They struggled with the song. I Mean. I mean, I had different. All different versions. Finally come up with a version and patching it together.
- [27:00]
John Lennon
Dylan esque.
- [27:01]
Paul McCartney
Maybe it was rushed, I'm not sure. I don't think it's a solo thing. I think it's a bit silly. Yeah. I don't think they were really doing solo things. Especially a band type thing. It's just. Just. Maybe it's just a rough mix. You know, it's got what matches or something like that in that kind of percussive. So they're experimenting, doing silly things too.
- [27:17]
John Lennon
Right. Right.
- [27:18]
Paul McCartney
And I think that's just like a home recording, you know. Some things just weren't muted or whatever. It's a bit out of place. But the overall feel. Yeah. So I think it's overblown. The thing about this being a disaster, like if you isolate, if you go into this one so particular thing, you can really make things sound worse than they are. I just listen to it and think, oh, I'm enjoying this. You know, Like, I didn't. Wasn't sure whether I like the song.
- [27:40]
John Lennon
It's a great track.
- [27:41]
George Harrison
Yeah.
- [27:41]
Paul McCartney
And the guitar is great. So then. And it's Paul doing all the vocals. That's the thing. What's another thing? Another thing. There's no. No other person doing your vocals. It's. You don't sound different, but you. The low vocal. That's Paul. I'm looking through you. Where did you go? I thought I knew you. What did I know? You don't look different but you have changed. I'm looking to you. You're not the same. So maybe he did a lot of it by himself. I don't know. But there's actually. There's real drums on it. But for some reason it's. Matches or whatever louder than. Yeah, it's a strange mix, but it's still. Still sounds great to me.
- [28:36]
George Harrison
Yeah. I think this is. This is where we sort of have to bring in something else, which is the likelihood. And also patterns. We know. For Beatles For Sale, that was when they. And this has been part of the evolution of my listing, I suppose. Beatles For Sale was clearly the first time where they're really stuffing around or experimenting with arrangements and different kind of instruments just to add a bit of flavor. The first half of 65 is kind of characterized a bit. They still seem to be mainly using their basic lineup for basic tracks. But they start to put down three instruments instead of four. And then George, like the Help title track, you know, George will then overdub his guitar just so he can get it right. That first half of 65 was also characterised by Paul suddenly seizing the lead guitar and adding lead guitar to several songs. Right. So. But then, like, I always kind of thought that Rubber Soul was the. The last of the sort of like full band performance on Basic Tracks albums. But when you look at it, that's actually really not the case. There's instruments missing all over the place and you start to see the phenomenon of whatever instrument the person wrote the track on more often than not is what they play on the basic track. So that's kind of the new development for Other Soul. So I think there is a high probability that it's Paul playing the acoustic guitar on the song. I don't see John taking the time to kind of learn all those chords because it's a fairly. You know, it moves through the chords quite quickly.
- [30:07]
Paul McCartney
Everyone. George and John, they could easily play it.
- [30:10]
George Harrison
But I think there's.
- [30:11]
Paul McCartney
But I just think it's. I think it's. The songwriter usually is the one. Get it down quickly.
- [30:16]
George Harrison
So I think there's a very high. Just like I've Just Seen a Face from the previous album which didn't have any bass at all. I think Paul probably wrote this on acoustic and played it on the basic track. And I would imagine it would be George who was on bass because I think it's too nimble for John. And Ringo's on drums. But there's also. On that basic track, there's a tambourine. So we know that all four took part in it. But the likelihood is that it's probably John on tambourine. That's what I've come to. And then they didn't put the vocals on To Last. So the next thing they put on was just one track of Organ.
- [30:50]
Paul McCartney
Doesn't Ringo, simultaneously. Ringo play the organ?
- [30:52]
George Harrison
Yes, Ringo plays the organ. Now, there are some very, very strange note choices in that organ playing, particularly at the end, sitting like this.
- [31:01]
Paul McCartney
That's at it.
- [31:02]
George Harrison
That has totally nothing to do with the key that they're playing at all.
- [31:05]
Paul McCartney
But it is, you know, it's a G and a C sharp, D together. So it's. Yeah, you get the. It's. It's like. Yeah, it's sort of.
- [31:21]
George Harrison
At that time and the guitar, like. I think it's probably George. But the interesting thing is in the bridges. Why Tell me why? Treat me right? And goes bam, bam. It's incredibly out of tune. It sounds really cute, but dorky.
- [31:47]
Paul McCartney
I didn't notice that. The riffs are great. It's a great Riff.
- [31:54]
George Harrison
Oh, I like those riffs. It's just the. And the bridges sound incredibly flat.
- [31:59]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, well, savvy this.
- [32:00]
John Lennon
We mentioned earlier the possibility of the speed being altered on the acoustic guitar. If that was on the basic track, do you think they would have put the pitch where they wanted it and then overdubbed the instrument on top of that, adjusting to the tuning that was on the sped up acoustic track.
- [32:16]
Paul McCartney
I know, I just think the vocals are definitely done in A flat, so I think they would have. I just think it sounds G and I probably think, oh, it's a bit slow. And I sped the whole track up. Speed up the whole track and then do the vocals.
- [32:30]
John Lennon
Okay.
- [32:31]
Paul McCartney
Paul's easy to do that. I mean, he plays it live. When I was in the. Live last 20 years, whatever. He plays it in G, but he can't remember the intro so he's going to play up in the fourth fret. And I actually remember seeing a clip where I think I was trying to. One of the guitar players was trying to sort of show him where the play started off and forgot completely, which is. Yeah, it's really simple. It's up there. But a flat is just not rock and roll. But he's definitely singing it in A flat. So. Because, you know when you slow it down to G, I have to learn it. I've slowed it down to G and the vocals do sound a bit good, but I think it's George on bass. And that's what I thought last night. I was listening to it and going, it's this bit clunky. Slightly clunky, you know, confident, does his job. I wouldn't be surprised if George played based on some other songs around that period as well. Like, we can work it out. I've always sort of thought, sounds like Paul on guitar.
- [33:30]
George Harrison
Maybe somebody can answer another little riddle. I've got a resource here which I'm holding up. Yep, I can see this resource says that the organ, the lead guitar and the percussion were all recorded on one track. Does anybody remember if the organ and percussion. Percussion are played simultaneously on the track? Because apparently both are. Ringo.
- [33:49]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, well, it's easy to just. It's just a. Probably the same type of guitar. I even listen to that properly. But it's three notes. Just gotta do.
- [33:57]
John Lennon
This is the tambourine on the basic track?
- [34:00]
George Harrison
Yes.
- [34:01]
John Lennon
Okay, maybe this is where the matchbox comes in. But then he couldn't be playing organ at the same time unless he's one handing that and doing the matchbox with the other.
- [34:10]
George Harrison
Well, yes, that's right. But also another thing is it has been referred to as a matchbox, but as various sources point out, it sounds exactly like a hand being slapped on the thigh rather than a tap, tap on the matchbox. So who knows? Who knows? But I certainly don't believe the theory that it's all pulled. Absolutely. That's just not correct. Cute theory.
- [34:30]
John Lennon
To me, the biggest unanswered question is the lack of quality control. And where was George Martin when that was tracked?
- [34:35]
Paul McCartney
Maybe there's Russian.
- [34:38]
John Lennon
I mean, don't get me wrong, I love feedback.
- [34:40]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. Did they have headphones in those days? They're still. When did they start using headphones? I don't think Rubber Sol. I know. I don't think. I think it was like Revolver, when you first see pictures of them with headphones used to have monitors and something easy to feedback through the doing the vocal.
- [35:10]
George Harrison
George Martin was present for the taping of Don't Pass Me by. And it's got to be about the sloppiest recording there. That did let that one go through. I composed a majestic orchestral piece as a prelude to that track, which is very strange.
- [35:26]
John Lennon
Anticipating Phil Spector's orchestration for Long and Winding Road.
- [35:31]
George Harrison
Yes.
- [35:31]
Paul McCartney
Which song are you talking about?
- [35:32]
George Harrison
That thing called A Beginning, which was composed as an orchestral prelude to the passing by. Which actually sounds more like an off cut from the B side of Yellow Submarine.
- [35:42]
John Lennon
Right, exactly right. And they did end up using it in the film, of course.
- [35:45]
Paul McCartney
All right. Okay.
- [35:46]
John Lennon
Right. If we've buried that one, we can move on to fixing a hole. 1967, recorded at Regent Studio because EMI was not available. It was a smaller facility, as I recall reading the description. Not one that they would willingly spend a lot of time in if they didn't have to.
- [36:03]
George Harrison
I guess just one thing I want to say about this, because really, this. This is Marcus's passion, this song.
- [36:09]
Paul McCartney
It's my song.
- [36:10]
George Harrison
Marcus has spent a lot of time on this song, so I really respect that a lot. I think, once again, there's a probability thing here. Paul wrote this song on a keyboard, so it seems to me that it is very, very likely that he is playing first harpsful part. Because there are two. The first half school part on the basic track. And it seems that it was probably John who played the bass on that basic track as well. And Ringo played drums, so that. And there's a guy. There's a guide vocal as well. That's the basic track.
- [36:43]
Paul McCartney
The guide vocal is actually the vocal. That's the thing. It's Interesting. They. It was mixed down to, I think, one track. So basic track is Paul on harpsichord, John on bass. This is definite. Ringo on drums and I think George on maracas. To me, that's as far as George got. The quote somewhere where the quotes I found of George talking about this particular song, they're very derogatory. He's just putting shit on it. So it doesn't sound like someone who'd be proud of the stellar guitar work on it. And then actually in the vocal, Paul does a. Which is the guitar line. So I have the feeling that Paul knew exactly what he wanted on this song. The coders could find whatever George speaking about. He's complaining about the recording sessions. Like, I bring my guitar and Paul's saying, no, don't take it out of the case. And all I'd hear is fixing a hole over and over again. Fixing a hole over and over again, like. And then Paul come and overdub everything afterwards. So he actually said Paul would later overdub everything. So there was no guitar done on that in Regent. It was done all back at emi, so. And actually when they took the tapes back to emi, at first they thought this was unusable. Too rough. I mean, the bass playing is really incredibly rough. It's quite comical sometimes. Like, it's John. But yeah, so Paul did a great job. So they were going to chuck it out and they actually started doing another version. They realized, oh, we could fix up the original track. And Paul overdubbed the bass, doubled it up and fixed it up with it sort of more defined. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. John would be just going, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. So, yeah, you did a good job. That's what it sounds like. Got reverb on it and it's two basses together. So.
- [38:36]
John Lennon
Wow, that's interesting.
- [38:37]
Paul McCartney
Paul once said she was like, well, there's two reverb on it.
- [38:39]
George Harrison
But the two basses, Sam.
- [39:17]
Paul McCartney
And to me, the guitar is definitely Paul. Because the week before he recorded the lead breaks for sergeant Pepper's Lonely Heart Club Band, the title song. And we know he did it on a guitar, tuned down the whole step. And so a week later he's doing Fixing a Hole. And the only way to play the guitar properly is tune down a whole step. There's no other way of playing it properly. And I found out that lots of songs, quite a lot of songs, even from Rubber Soul onwards, Paul played his casino, tuned down the whole step. He tuned up for certain songs like Drive My Car to solo in that is tuned down the whole step. And just recently, someone very good demonstrator on YouTube on Sam Popkin, he did a baby, you're a rich man guitar demonstration. And he said it's played on a guitar, tuned down the whole step, which to me indicates that Paul played guitar on that one as well. So there's quite a lot of songs tuned down the whole step. But fixing a hole, it's the only way to play it. And, you know, I proved it. So people, because we used to like people say, oh, the drop D thing. It seems illogical to approach a song in. For guitar in F minor, think, okay, I'm gonna do drop D for this. And it doesn't make sense. It makes the chorus, guitars parts and the verse parts. It makes it more difficult when you do a drop D. I mean, it's good when you're playing live. Everyone does it playing live because you haven't got time to. No one's got sort of spirit guitars tuned down for one song or something. So you just do the drop D and you get this one E flat note in the solo. That's all it's for. Wasn't for that one E flat note, people wouldn't tune down a D string. But it makes sense when you have the whole guitar tuned down, you know, you're not playing normally playing an. An F note on the guitar anyway. That's my belief and I think it's right.
- [41:05]
George Harrison
So this is a tricky one because, like, if we go through sort of the track breakdown, I mean, I have a resource here that says that George Martin plays all the harps.
- [41:13]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, it's probably from this book.
- [41:15]
George Harrison
And Paul plays both basses. And that just doesn't ring true for me. So I can only say what really. I mean, we know that on the simultaneous recorded track there was harps called maracas, drums, bass and vocals. We know Paul sang it, we know Ringo played drums. So then it's a question who played what. I believe it's Paul on harpsichord because he wrote it on keyboards.
- [41:38]
Paul McCartney
Look at the evidence. We have the evidence on the outtakes and the whole thing. But yeah, it's. But if you read the George Martin book the Summer of Love, I'll just read a bit of it. Like Paul had decided to use a harpsichord as the mainstay of the rhythm. Even so the bass line is more important than the harpsichord line. Paul had to play bass guitar on it because nobody or can play the instrument quite like him. That meant someone else was going to have to play keyboards. This was Unusual because Paul always liked to play his own keyboards and his own compositions. The part of honorary standing keyboard player to the greatest group in the world was offered to me. It wasn't too difficult and it didn't seem likely to tax my non virtuoso technique too much. That's just complete bullshit. And it's not its voice, it's a ghost written book. And that's why the whole thing is like. It goes through detail about what you're going to say about which track and whatever, but it doesn't relate to. They said there's acoustic guitar on the vocal track. There's an acoustic guitar as well. There's no guitar there.
- [42:34]
George Harrison
The question for me is why does George Martin say he played on the song? And that is because he did, but he didn't play on the basic track. So when you come down to the very last track recorded, it's a simultaneous recording of harpsichord, so an extra harpsichord which you can hear on the recording, a second bit of drums and the doubled bass line. So you've got those three elements just on the one track. So yes, Paul did play that second bass. Absolutely.
- [42:59]
Paul McCartney
The harpsichord is basically at the intro. The. That's the intro. That's basically the overdub. It's just on the. So yes, filling up the intro. It's more dramatic.
- [43:10]
George Harrison
It seems very likely that George Martin did play some harps.
- [43:13]
Paul McCartney
Yes, he did. Yes, I'm saying he did.
- [43:14]
John Lennon
Paul is overdubbing the bass.
- [43:18]
George Harrison
On the whole thing, which he just.
- [43:19]
Paul McCartney
No, it's just the intro. He's just the strengthening the intro and maybe some other parts, I'm not. Not sure. But.
- [43:25]
George Harrison
So if we go through track by track, it's like first. The first is harpscorkers, drums, bass, vocals, right?
- [43:31]
Paul McCartney
Yep.
- [43:32]
George Harrison
The second one is the doubled vocal and then the third one is the lead guitar. I'm not sure whether I really should be giving my thoughts here to contradict what you believe, Marcus, do you think that's appropriate? Robert?
- [43:47]
Paul McCartney
To me it's played on the casino.
- [43:49]
George Harrison
I know it sort of just muddies the waters again, like when you have.
- [43:52]
Paul McCartney
A source, like the George Martin thing, I can see that being repeated throughout every sort of so called chronicle of it. Even in like Wilson's recording the Beatles, he correctly says at first Paul's playing harpsichord and that's. But then he says there are other things. George Martin says that he played harpsichord on it. So he's always hedging his bet. But they also, they always mention the guitar and in the book George says, oh It's a rather lengthy guitar solo, very loud. And the guitar solo is half the length of George's first guitar solo we hear on I Saw Her Standing there, which is 16 bars. I think this is eight bars. It's a short solo. But you go through all the Beatles Bible everything. They're all talking about this long solo and you know, great long solo and. And they're just paraphrasing this book. If you poison your. Your primary source, it seeps into everything and like maybe it's just a little detail, like lengthy solo and George played it really loud and. But when you look at it properly, he's like, it's not long, it's eight bars, it's very short and it's constructed and it follows Paul's and the way George spoke about in other quotes we talk about such baby singles out fixing a hole. He just hates it. And it's like, wow. Like it's not a guy who would be proud of his wonderful guitar work on us. It's great guitar work and it has to be played. This is 100 on a tuned down guitar. And Paul's guitar casino was tuned down at this period for a long period, even up till the Magic Mystery Tour. That's why it's.
- [45:28]
George Harrison
I'm just going to give my thoughts here. So that quote from George where he's talking about fixing a hole and where he's talking taking out his guitar out of the case and Paul saying, no, no, put it back. What he actually says in that quote is that, you know, you'd bring out your guitar and you'd say, no, no, put it back. We'll be doing that later. Which means to me, to my reading.
- [45:48]
Paul McCartney
But then he says, and then Paul will overdump everything. That's the final quote. So to me it's like it's. It's bitter.
- [45:59]
George Harrison
Yes, it is bitter. And George was notoriously bitter after they break up and things.
- [46:04]
Paul McCartney
George didn't play much guitar on sergeant Peppers. He was his gap year. He was into sitar, as he says, you know, he didn't. He hardly played guitar at all, especially on he play on John songs for sure. He's there on the title track, sergeant Pepper, but he's doing this called Bendy kind of stuff. It's him and Paul doing the rhythm first, but it's Paul doing all the leads on those songs. And like Paul complained like quote of saying, where's George? I didn't even know. He wouldn't turn up to sessions and I'd ring him up and he'd say, you know, George, why aren't you here? He said, I'm painting the house. And this is fairly recent sort of quotes. And so, you know, Paul's bitching about George. Not been there.
- [46:46]
George Harrison
I suppose I can only really go on my feeling here. And like, yes, it is. Obviously. Obviously the guitar is tuned down. I mean, the second to last note of the solo is lower than standard tuning. So, yes, it is very clearly tuned down. I totally.
- [47:01]
Paul McCartney
It's one of those drone songs that Paul does. It's like Tax Man. It drones on the open G string, which gives you the F note. So you hear. It's like. It's a drone song. So it's very much in Paul's niche. Taxman and Good Morning. Good Morning. They're all got drone type things. This is one of those. It's in that category. That's what people don't get. It's kind of like if you go to the. If this is tuned down, so you're playing the G string and the D on the B string. And so people hear this like low F note. And people say, oh, some people, we've done covers of it. So the F note is down. What are you doing with the lift note? And they say, just adding another guitar doing. But it doesn't work like that way. It's just. Just one guitar. And yeah, it's Paul. 100% Paul to me, anyway, to my.
- [47:53]
George Harrison
Opinion, for me, I feel that Paul's leads around this time, around this couple of years.
- [47:59]
Paul McCartney
And in fact, he's the only one doing the leads around this time. That's the thing.
- [48:03]
George Harrison
Well, for a lot of the Beatles career, when Paul played lead, it was not in a particularly considered way. It was in a fairly spontane way. And you just sort of like the Taxman solo was. Was one take, like, bang, done after George, you know, mucking around with it for hours. The only thing for me with fixing a hole and the reason why I just can't totally accept that it's Paul is because the part is so considered and so worked out and so perfectly executed, which is not really how Paul was playing at the time. He was doing quite exciting off the cuff sort of playing at that time. And it just feels like a George construction to me. But I can't be sure of that. That's just how I feel about it. The rest of it, I think we've kind of. We appear to have settled on. But that one remains an open question. It remains an open question. It just feels too George like in Its construction and execution.
- [48:59]
Paul McCartney
I don't know if it's into George stuff around that time. I mean, it wasn't. Just wasn't. What can you say what's from Revolver beforehand? I mean, she said kind of. And Paul and singers and your Birkin singers. Paul and George together. So who came up with that idea? I'm not sure that's constructed, Very constructed. I think Paul can construct things. But listen to. Like when it gets to the White Album, Paul's solos are very constructed, even acoustic things like Mother Nature's Son has got very similar things to Fixing a Hole. Anyway, I can't play at the moment, but yeah, Paul constructs stuff. I mean, you can do some wild things like. But like Taxman is very constructed. I don't know about first take. I'm not even sure whether it. I'm not sure whether it was slowed down to do it. I listened to it and go like that sounds sped up.
- [49:57]
George Harrison
I guess what I'm saying here is maybe we're not going to know the answers to everything. We can only come up with what we think is most. We can try to, but we can come up with what we think is most probable. But nobody's ever going to agree on everything. And that's. And that's okay.
- [50:13]
Paul McCartney
Sure. Okay.
- [50:15]
George Harrison
It's impossible to solve all the mysteries of the Beatles universe. We can have a good go at it.
- [50:19]
Paul McCartney
Yes.
- [50:20]
John Lennon
All right. We'll leave that one where it is and move on. 1967 it's all too much track that. Delane Leah Recording Studio Basement so this one, as you referred to earlier, Marcus George's Gap Year, 1967, where he's writing his songs on keyboard because he's putting his writing efforts into sitar. And it's another song apparently written on organ, like within youn, without yout and Only A Northern Song and Blue Jay Way. So it seems pretty natural that George would be playing the organ on that. And that's something I don't think there's too much argument with.
- [50:52]
Paul McCartney
Yes, he is. He's definitely playing the organization. No, no.
- [50:55]
John Lennon
Where we have more argument is who makes the utterance at the beginning and who's playing the lead guitar. I think we're pretty confident. Ringo drums all bass but lead guitar. Do we want to ascribe it all to John? Is he doing the feedback? Is Paul playing the lead and John the feedback? Where do we fall on this one?
- [51:16]
Paul McCartney
I think a lot of people think one of the reasons. Consciously people think, oh, is John playing the intro because he's voice first to your mother or whatever. To your mother. And so. Oh, it's John speaking to the microphone before it go hits the chord. And like. No, when you're doing the guitar, like there's no vocal microphone. It's an edit piece. The whole thing. That intro is edited because it's two strikes of the guitar. I know how it's done. So four bars of, you know, with feedback and you know, with the tape echo going on. And the last one, which is just the E string harmonic kind of. But you don't hear the harmonic. You don't hear the harmonic strike on the recording. And it goes like. Yeah, it's Paul on guitar and John on bass because it's so easy to tell it's John on bass because it's really, really rough and play some. When he breaks down, you know, the breakdown sort of boom, boom, boom, boom. He actually plays like C sharp or something like that. It's. It's very non Paul to me. It's easy. John hanging on one note. It's something easy to do.
- [52:31]
John Lennon
Now this is before they were gifted all that gear from Fender. Right.
- [52:34]
Paul McCartney
So, yeah.
- [52:34]
John Lennon
What bass do we think he would have been playing? The Burns.
- [52:37]
Paul McCartney
Well, if they had a bass. Yeah. Yeah. Plays based on fixing our holes no one seems to know. Like. Yeah. There's no pictures of what Paul and what George and John playing when they play bass. Well, as I was saying, I think it's George on bass on I'm looking through you. So I've been told that there is shots of a epiphone casino bass reveal or something. It's called, I was told this morning, which possibly be the one they used. It's like semi acoustic bass. They had access to that apparently. So I don't know what bass you're playing, people. Probably the Burns. But you listen to it. It's really. Yeah, it's. It's kind of very boring, that breakdown. Yeah, it's some really bum notes there. Paul's is on a roll. He was guitar king. He had his casino. He was feedback, you know, love all that. And George is playing the organ. So to me it's pretty straightforward. The hardest part was me was trying to work. Trying to work out the intro because it's like I went through all different ways of trying to do it. Putting through my tape echo and using the speed to slow it down for the second part. But I'm not sure. But listening to it and trying again, I realized, yeah, it's much easier than I thought. Everything's much better. Usually the simpler Way easy way to play anything is how the Beatles played it. You find the simple way, the easiest way, and it's usually the most logical way. And that's usually how they did it. Not really doing anything too virtuoso in terms of, like, clever kind of things, but just the stuff that works. It sounds good, it fits the song and, you know, a bit of studio trickery with the tape echo and all that sort of stuff. You can create this, the thing. But I think it's easily. I don't. People say, oh, it's John style. He's. But what's John style, you know, for guitar, really? I mean, where else would he. Has he played like that or.
- [55:05]
George Harrison
I've got a few things about this one. So the first thing is. I'm not actually sure it's John going to your mop. I'm not sure it's him doing that at all. To me, it sounds like George. Yeah, it just sounds like George to me. But I think it's one of these things, like people thinking that John shouted, I've got blisters on my fingers. Because that would be a John thing to do. I had somebody who believed it was John singing why don't we do it in the Road. Because it was rocky and gruff and that's just a John thing, you know?
- [55:36]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, it was the same thing. Same thing with the bass yelling to.
- [55:39]
George Harrison
Your muck or whatever it is. That's like a John thing to do. But it actually sounds like George with his voice raised to me. So I don't really know about that one. What we do know is that all this was done on a four track and four things were recorded simultaneously, which was drums, guitar, bass and organ. So the vocals, there wasn't a guide vocal done. So we know that they were all done. We know that Ringo played drums. George wrote the song on organ. I'm pretty sure he sat there and played it on organ. It was his organ year. I agree with you. I think it's Paul on guitar now. The reason I believe that is it goes back to what we were saying in the previous track, which is about Paul's kind of. He liked being spontaneous on guitar, probably. He was far. I think he was generally. Apart from his acoustic guitar tracks. I think he was generally a lot less considered in his approach to a playing guitar, lead guitar, but also playing lead guitar on George and John's songs, as we know. And Paul is a lot more considered in the parts that he comes up with for his own songs. And his post Beatles career, really Shows that his playing is. A lot of the time isn't quite as inventive as it used to be when he was contributing to John and George songs. But also like. And this is another example of an era. It's like, you know, Paul said that he was inspired by Jimi Hendrix to go to a guitar shop and say, I want one of those because I want to sound like Jimi Hendrix. Well, he bought that guitar and I think 65. Well, well, well, Hendrix even showed up. So Paul's not remembering that. But certainly by the time they recorded this On May 25, 1967, Hendrix was in their universe. And Hendrix was massively admired, particularly by McCartney contribute to him in concert to this day. So I think this is very. And it's an epiphone. I think this is very much Paul trying to do a Hendrix. Paul trying to do some of the stuff that his hero was doing. And as for the bass, I think, you know, John's perfectly capable of thrumming away on one note. But there is that bit sort of before the horns coming, where he goes up.
- [57:46]
Paul McCartney
He plays really bum notes.
- [57:47]
George Harrison
It's really. It's a really fun note. It just sounds like, you know. And Paul's bass parts that he put on John Paul songs were so incredibly inventive and wonderful. I don't. He would have put in a bum note deliberately and just gone, oh, yeah, we'll leave that. So, yes, I totally agree with you. And the second overdub was George's vocal. John and Paul on backing vocals and hand claps. And then the third one was the double vocal, more backing vocals, hand claps, tambourines, maracas, cowbell. So a bunch of percussion went on. And then actually quite a bit later in October, they put on the horn over that.
- [58:21]
Paul McCartney
There's lots of bouncing down then.
- [58:24]
George Harrison
So basically what happened is the four tracks they did were all bounced down to one. And that left three tracks, which is.
- [58:30]
Paul McCartney
Why it's hard to determine. A lot of time the guitar disappears and it's quite a muddy mix. It's a. It's another drone thing. See, it's a. It's Paul speciality. It's all at this, like. So it's all like the drone thing, which Paul with, you know, he plays guitar on Rain. He's doing a drone and guitar on that. So George. Yeah, I'm a George fan. Yeah, I played George in tribute bands since, you know, 93. So, like, I'm a big fan of George. But when I go to find. Do the tribute to George on fixing a hole you know, to my surprise, my horror, it's not George. It's not him. And same thing for, you know, like, I think I love to be playing all this stuff. But he really got his mojo happen again in White Album when, you know, Ravi Shankar said, you know, go back to being rock God. So from then on, like, he was going for it, like, yeah, he's White Album. He's really rocking again. 67 is keyboards, is sitar or organ, whatever. And he sort of let Paul going on with it. And I think Paul got out of his system sort of thing. But when it got down to the White Album and I'm the guitar player again, so Paul still do some leads and stuff on White Album for his stuff. But, yeah, George came back very strongly. But for. Yeah, for this one. Another drone one. Another Paul drone something. So, yeah, that's my story.
- [60:29]
George Harrison
Yeah, I agree. I think that whole thing is like, you know, John, it's. It's this whole image of John as being, you know, the one who's the outrageous one who does all the outrageous things.
- [60:38]
Paul McCartney
Exactly. They say, oh, hell of a skeleton and we'll get the hell of a skeleton soon.
- [60:41]
George Harrison
But he would make the feedback noise. But as far as I know, he didn't really do any feedback till Cambridge 69.
- [60:47]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And I'd just be like, more about.
- [60:50]
George Harrison
Yoko's influence, I think, than Hendrix.
- [60:55]
John Lennon
But sticking with the Yellow Submarine soundtrack, we move on to hey Bulldog. I think the bone of contention here is hey Bulldog. Who's playing the lead guitar on that? The promo film showing the tracking of that song. We got John on piano. I don't think anybody disputes that for the finished track. But he does have a guitar in his hands. You see at one point in that footage, him handing it to George. You don't see anybody playing the lead solo, unfortunately, at that shining moment.
- [61:22]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [61:23]
John Lennon
So I don't know if that was an overdub thought after they caught the footage they did or what, because they're.
- [61:27]
Paul McCartney
Doing it Lady Madonna.
- [61:29]
John Lennon
But I've had at least one person tell me, on the basis of the fact that there's triplets in it, that it must be John, because that was his signature move.
- [61:36]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [61:36]
John Lennon
What say you?
- [61:37]
Paul McCartney
I think what reason why they didn't have a film a solo because it was originally for Lady Madonna. FILM CLIP So probably there's no guitar solo on that. So I suppose I didn't feel the need to kind of do that. But I think maybe John Hanning maybe showing George some ideas sort of thing. Maybe so that's tossing back forward guitar. But I. I think it's George. I've got no real evidence to say, but I think they're kind of doing a film thing in the studio and you basically do your role, George's lead guitar player. So he did a style and it's not terribly hard, you know, it's just. It's got triplets in it, that sort of thing. But it's constructed like double stops and all that kind of thing. Just follows the chord like George does in lots of songs. It's chordal. John could play it as well, but I just. Yeah, I put my money on George. Not much money.
- [62:47]
John Lennon
But is there a practical reason, based on the tracks or anything else you can think of that would suggest one way or another?
- [62:55]
George Harrison
No, not really. If you go through the tracks, here's what we know. We know that on track one we had piano, guitar, drums and tambourine. Now we can see in the film clip Paul bashing the tambourine along with Ringo's drums. We can see John on piano. He wrote it on piano. It was one of the few songs that he had actually written on keyboards by that time. And there was guitar. That was George on his sg. They were all recorded onto one track simultaneously. So there's no bouncing, nothing. In fact, there's no bouncing on the song at all. It's extremely simple recording. So the next thing that went down was simultaneous again, extra snare. We've heard that kind of big, big echoing snare of Ringo's.
- [63:37]
John Lennon
Right. And the chorus.
- [63:38]
Paul McCartney
You can talk to me. Yeah, yeah, you can talk to me, yeah.
- [63:43]
George Harrison
It's a wonderful, wonderful sound. We've got Paul's bloody brilliant bass line.
- [63:50]
John Lennon
Sam.
- [64:24]
George Harrison
And we've got a guitar with. This is where there's guitar doubling coming in. So if we agree that George played guitar on then the. There's no reason to think that George wouldn't have doubled his own guitar there.
- [64:40]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [64:41]
George Harrison
The third thing that was recorded was the vocal, and that was just one vocal track. That was just them at the mic, one vocal track. But for the next superimposition, overdub, if you like, there was a third vocal, which is John doubling the you can talk to me bits and then guitar three, which is the solo. So here's the thing. If we know that it was recorded simultaneously and John's doing you can talk to me, he ain't going to be playing the solo at the same time on the same track. He's not going to have a mic propped in front of him to do that once again, this comes down to a construction thing. And I think this is George kind of getting back his rock mojo a little bit, which he'd also done in Lady Madonna. His RIP playing on that is very similar. It's a very similar feel. What a double A side those two songs would have made. My goodness, you know, it would have been the next Paperback Rider Rain, really. Not to dis the Inner Light, the.
- [65:32]
Paul McCartney
Lady Madonna riff is doubled with John and George playing guitars together.
- [65:38]
George Harrison
That's exactly right. Yes. For my feeling with this solo. And once again, it's a probability thing is that it sounds very constructed to me. It is very constructed. I've learned that solo and it's kind of constructed. It moves around the chords in that verse pattern, which is not something that John did. John didn't really move around chords very much in verse patterns. I know you've given a couple of examples where that's not the case.
- [66:01]
Paul McCartney
It's very similar to every little thing. The same notes a lot of time.
- [66:05]
George Harrison
Yeah.
- [66:05]
Paul McCartney
So that puts in John's favor in a way.
- [66:07]
George Harrison
But that kind of thing of like quickly flying up an octave, diddle, diddle there or, you know, all that kind of stuff, it just. It feels too tightly constructed for. For it not to be a George solo to me. It just feels like George. It doesn't feel like a John solo to me. But of course, the proof is. If there is any proof is the fact that the double vocal of John's went down on the same track at the same time as the lead solo. So John.
- [66:32]
Paul McCartney
Well, that convinces it for me anyway.
- [66:34]
George Harrison
John wasn't doing both at the same time. So for me personally, that settles that matter.
- [66:39]
Paul McCartney
I agree.
- [66:40]
John Lennon
Fast Forward to later 1968. Dear Prudence, August Ringo has walked out. So it's a different version of the $3.
- [66:48]
Paul McCartney
This is the big one. This keeps going on.
- [66:50]
John Lennon
There is a controversy or a debate over the coda and the drumming there.
- [66:55]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [66:56]
John Lennon
But let's focus on the rest of the track first. Is there anything contentious we can point to in terms of guitars or anything else? We know that Paul's playing drums on the basic track.
- [67:05]
Paul McCartney
Yep.
- [67:06]
George Harrison
I just want to ask Marcus one question before we start.
- [67:09]
Paul McCartney
Okay.
- [67:10]
George Harrison
And that is John's acoustic guitar, the main thing that goes throughout the entire song. Do you hear that as double track?
- [67:17]
Paul McCartney
I do, but it could be adt. But they were doing it at Trident. Did they have ADT there? I know it could be mixed back in in the emi, according to the.
- [67:27]
George Harrison
Information I have here. Two acoustic guitars recorded simultaneously. For that basic track. And that was John.
- [67:37]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, yeah. I hear too. If it was adt, it comes in on the fifth bar or something around here you hear another one come in. So either they put ADT on just from that point onwards and took it out again. When it comes to the decoder, I don't know, but I can hear it too.
- [67:59]
George Harrison
It's worth bringing in a Giles quote here. So when the original stereo mix, like many of their mixes, a bit weird because John's guitar was all the way over to the right. And then suddenly his voice appears out of nowhere in the middle when Giles mixed it. And I remember distinctly hearing that, wow, those guitars been. Have spread across the stereo spectrum. But he specifically said that he applied ADT to John's acoustic guitar because quote, unquote, that's what the Beatles did anyway, right?
- [68:28]
Paul McCartney
Oh, maybe. Yeah.
- [68:29]
John Lennon
Right.
- [68:30]
George Harrison
He chose to add ADT to that guitar, which indicated there wasn't ADT on it previously.
- [68:36]
Paul McCartney
Right? Yeah. Well, it sounds like two to me, I guess. Comes in. But at the same. When they're doing the. The drum track, there's another guitar, electric guitar doing it, doing the B and E strings. And it even does the. When it goes to that part, it still does it there, but it comes out after that. So there's so many guitar parts as in the bridge, there's a guitar doing. And in the decoder, it comes in decoder as well. And it doubles up like a. It's very much a John thing. It's like a reggae thing. What he's going. Yeah. So to me, that's John overdubbing that. Because at the same time is. That's. He's got the. Yeah. Sort of thing. George. I think I'm SG So I think it's double tracked and the guitar is double tracked. And so much layering going on. So many guitars. It's. You know, you just think, how do. I love to know how they constructed it even not going to the code, which is another edit piece. Because a lot of things that people don't mention is that the bass changes as well for the coder. So to me, the bass and the original drum track have been mixed together. Supporter gone bass. And when they got rid of the original drums, because they did get rid of it, you can hear the remains of it in John's vocal. It's leaking through his. John's vocal mic that they had to wipe off the whole bass track. So the bass changes. So you got this totally different bass sound for the coder, which could be played by Someone else, you know, you never know. It could be just to free up the tracks.
- [70:23]
John Lennon
Well, say more about that, the drum part, because now you're leading to the.
- [70:26]
Paul McCartney
Thing that's been the controversy. Yeah.
- [70:28]
John Lennon
There are people who've done research into this that comes to the conclusion that there's a Ringo overdub upon his return to the fold or before even the official date. Because apparently the fabled trip to Sardinia when he did his walkout either didn't happen then, but happened later.
- [70:44]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [70:45]
John Lennon
And that he could have been in town.
- [70:47]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [70:47]
John Lennon
During the time he formerly left the Beatles and stopped showing up at emi that he might have been brought in to finish that track.
- [70:54]
Paul McCartney
This photo is allegedly of him being here, but.
- [70:57]
John Lennon
Right.
- [70:58]
Paul McCartney
I don't buy it. I just don't buy it at all.
- [71:00]
John Lennon
Okay.
- [71:00]
George Harrison
The facts don't really doesn't work. I mean, one thing is Ken Scott, who was at Trident, he said that the recording and mixing was all done in a couple of days, you know, which is not quite true because it was actually a couple of months later or about five weeks later that they did first proper remix. But regardless of that, we only really have a record of the drums going down over on two dates and that is August 28th and August 30th. Ringo wasn't in the band. He wasn't round. There's no record of a final drum over dub being done on some other unknown date when he returned from Peter Sellers yacht. There is no record of that. To me, this sort of comes down to that thing once again of people listen to the drumming and go, oh, that's pretty good. Therefore it can't be Paul.
- [71:51]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [71:52]
George Harrison
And people sort of talk about the drumming on the last verse of Dear Prudence being like the most amazing drumming in the Beatles canon. I think that does Ringo great disservice. I think the thing about Dear Prudence, which makes it a very unusual song for them for that time, is that it's a builder. It's one that just builds slowly and it just turns into kind of a Stairway to Heaven esque explosive rock anthem. It's just built and built and built and built. And then this drumming, this very busy drumming over that verse is like a big climax to it. So because of that sense of build, I think people go, wow, that's really amazing. Therefore it can't be Paul, it must be Ringo. How many examples do we have of Ringo doing fantastic drumming?
- [72:33]
Paul McCartney
The thing about it, why it's not Ringo is because it's not a performance. You can tell a performance. Ringo Would do it, you know, as. It wouldn't go. But it's built. It's a composite.
- [72:42]
John Lennon
Constructed.
- [72:43]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. Constructed. That's a word. Yeah. It's using the tracks. Must have to spare some tracks around to comp it together. You know, as famously as the snare sound changes in one part, it's like the people saying, oh, that must be where the towel fell off snare. But doesn't ring true, you know, like. It's just. Everyone's playing parts where there's. At the same time, there's a tom going boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. You know, so it's like back in ussr, it's the. Everyone's having a go, everyone's bashing something together. But it's been edited really well, so it's not a performance. It's constructive.
- [73:16]
George Harrison
To hear the isolated bass tracks times three on Back in the USSR is quite a remarkable thing. You're listening to three different people playing chords simultaneously across the stereo spectrum.
- [73:28]
Paul McCartney
Well, that's how John plays the six. He plays it. Plays the chords. He. You know, he strums on. He's strumming it. I can dig it.
- [73:35]
George Harrison
But Paul and George also did bass on that song and they also did chords. So if you listen to the isolated tracks, it's quite fascinating listening to three Beatles playing three lots of chords on basses. It's quite coffee, really. Sort of back to Prudence. We know that the first thing that went down was two acoustic guitars and drums. We know that the second and third things were John's double track vocals. We know the fourth thing was George doing a guitar. Electric guitar. Fifth thing was George doing another guitar. Then the bass and the tambourine went down simultaneously. Then we've got backing vocals and hand claps and then more backing vocals and hand claps. And we know there was guests on that, Jackie and Mal. And then the final thing to go down was just a bit more drums. So that's. I think that's kind of the stuff in the last verse where you have. There is an extra snare going on that just sort of is trying to tie the quite loose drum track together. So that's what I.
- [75:03]
John Lennon
There's piano in there too.
- [75:04]
George Harrison
Yes, sorry, There is piano on. Not that it's mentioned. Oh, yes. I beg your pardon. I've missed a final overdub. The final overdub is yet more guitar, all on piano and probably. But somebody's on flugelhorn as well.
- [75:18]
Paul McCartney
George came in to play an octave up. He originally did the. Like.
- [75:25]
George Harrison
Yes.
- [75:26]
Paul McCartney
Then do the.
- [75:29]
George Harrison
Yeah.
- [75:29]
Paul McCartney
So, yeah, he did octaves on that, so isn't so.
- [75:32]
George Harrison
But I think what the point is is that we do know that all of this recording was done over 28th, 29th and 30th of August, and then the recording itself was finished.
- [75:43]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. So you don't go back. People say, oh, Ringo came back and overdub stuff. There's nothing in the records. And once it's. It's finished, like. And it's got so many overdubs. You just could not scramble this egg. It's so much there to unscramble. It would just be impossible to put more drums on or whatever.
- [75:59]
George Harrison
Like, I just think it's what I see. I think it's some people going, you know what, that's too good for Paul. It's got to be Ringo. Then it becomes, oh, it is Ringo. Did you know Ringo dropped that in as an overdub? Well, no, I don't know that. Who knows that? Has anybody got any evidence of that? What are you deaf? Of course it's Ringo. And so the Internet arguments go, and then you. Then you do what I guess a lot of us learn to do. You don't. You stop arguing because you realize there's not really much point. And then you just do your own private kind of stuff.
- [76:28]
Paul McCartney
If I get bored doing stuff, I just go back to the YouTube and say, oh, how's this going? And it's like, still going on.
- [76:33]
George Harrison
Yes.
- [76:33]
Paul McCartney
Discussion and you. Exactly. Just. Yeah, boredom. He's saying, no, I don't know, I just. You're waiting for some of the mix down or whatever. I'll see what's happening here. Yeah, it's for, you know, it's for all my guitar. Jenny Weebs, Hilda Skelter and Dear prunes. They're the three big goers in YouTube beetle world. And they keep going, keeps going on and on. And people will not change their beliefs. You know, once. Once you've set in your belief, no matter how much evidence you can give.
- [77:00]
George Harrison
The hours are a day in the life. I know it's settled law. It is for me, but it still isn't for a bunch of people. And even the people who are there disagree on it. And even the people who have worked on the remixes disagree on it. Giles says it's John. I can. He's only ever heard Paul, so I don't understand why anybody thinks it's John.
- [77:19]
John Lennon
Well, you've got, as you point out, the people who have their hands on the materials making inaccurate declarations. And now you've got the official historian, Kevin Howlett, putting out these booklets that are also introducing new errors of fact to the debate.
- [77:34]
Paul McCartney
Yes.
- [77:35]
George Harrison
And it seems quite evident to me that Paul and Ringo certainly aren't asked to proofread those books. And they probably have absolutely no interest in doing so anyway. They don't really care.
- [77:45]
Paul McCartney
No.
- [77:45]
John Lennon
And they wouldn't remember anyway.
- [77:47]
George Harrison
Well, maybe they would, maybe they wouldn't. But the. The thing is, is their silence on these matters allows these things to suddenly become fact. But some of them are clearly not right.
- [77:57]
Paul McCartney
Deep Rinse is my very favorite song. Of course, when I did Deep Dive into it. And guitar work is incredible. I just think it's George's best work.
- [78:06]
George Harrison
And you did a great version of it.
- [78:09]
Paul McCartney
Well, the thing is, it was working out. It's like listening to audio cues. This thing that got me interested was all this buzzing sound. There's a guitar track it's got working out which way it went. It showed me where George played it because it's. I. I can go on a deep dive in it. But these buzzing. These buzz noise. It's. You go like. So he's going up flat. So it means he's going up anyway. It showed me how to. And then when it goes. Know how to do it anyway, it goes a different way.
- [78:49]
George Harrison
So very hard to recreate spontaneity.
- [78:52]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, but it's the thing. One of those things. When you actually heard the isolated tracks, when you. On the record, you don't hear all this underneath. You don't hear all the kind of. All you hear is it. So you get these isolated tracks and suddenly here. Oh, all this really wild stuff going. And like, wow, It's a whole new world. And the same for the audience here is that there's all these things going underneath it. That's great.
- [79:30]
George Harrison
I think that's one of the points. One of the points is there is such a looseness to what they did. There's a looseness and a spontaneity, but it's also considered. So there's a real combination of that. And even if you listen to Abbey Road, which is, you know, suppose there's their slickest album. If you listen to the basic tracks.
- [79:46]
Paul McCartney
Yes, like, at all. Exactly.
- [79:48]
George Harrison
Listen to that piano at the end of Something that goes on forever. Listen to.
- [79:53]
John Lennon
As we said, you never give me your money.
- [79:55]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [79:55]
George Harrison
George is jamming. Yes. You know, there's a lot of stuff which is. It's not particularly slick at all. It really just shows the value of those engineers and that producer and kind of bringing Everything together and recognizing the best performances to use and the best bits of those performances to use. And I think at the heart. At their heart, they were loose, you know.
- [80:34]
Paul McCartney
Sam.
- [81:22]
John Lennon
Alter skelter.
- [81:23]
Paul McCartney
Yep. Okay, this is a great one again. Yeah, this is the perennial. Yeah. Like that's to be John. Because like it's just got John's aggression. And you know, you say, look, didn't you watch get back. You know, like he's struggling to play the chords on. Is George sort of giggling as he's showing in the notes on Long and Winding Road. And. And Paul's eye roll. Sort of giving up. It's just totally exasperated. He's like, he wants to give up. The thing is, when they did Long Running Road, the next version when they bought the new organ because he had his act together a lot better for that one. But for hell skill, we know it's okay. It's Paul on bass, so. And the mistake is back people quoting Mal Oven's diary. But he was. And you say to people, he's talking about when he wrote that. He's speaking about the first slow version, which goes. Went for 20 minutes. And John played one note the whole way through one E note. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Yeah. And it's just one chord song. I mean, Paul doesn't. Every now and again he plays a riff kind of thing, but guitar. But that's what Mal Evans was talking about. But it gets copied and paste, you know, when they're doing the marketing or whatever for the song. And people so think, oh, that's John's aggressive. He's an aggressive bass player. And it's floppy. Well, you know, you think it's 18th take or something like that of a song which Paul's doing a guide vocal and screaming it. You listen to the takes. Every version like he's screaming. So he's going for it. He's trying to get the most noises, grittiest things. So listen, some of the bass. Yeah, some of the bass is kind of sloppy in a way, but it's live. And you listen to a lot of live things. Listen to Let It Be on Rooftop. Stuff like isolated bass. Like it's a lot of it. It's quite rough. Yeah.
- [83:05]
John Lennon
The track is noisy by design.
- [83:06]
Paul McCartney
Exactly. Yeah. Just going for it. And it's Fender Jazz. I know people think, oh, it's John on the Fender 6. But the proof has come out in different outtakes. We hear the famous outtake of Paul instructing John Winter when to come in, you know, for the. Leave it for A do an extra bar. I can't remember what it was a certain part sort of thing but it's totally John that revolution type. And listen to the basic track John's not doing. He's not doing the riff at all. There's only one person playing the riff. That's Paul on the bass. Same as the original version. The slow version recorded two months before Paul's the only one doing the riff sort of thing. So those riffs are overdubbed. On the fast version I think it's Paul and George together. But the bass. You can hear the bass. Paul showing John how to play the do do do do do do do. Some people think oh it's just synchronicity between the great minds thinking like how Paul can. John can sort of. Yeah, exactly. Play along exactly with Paul's voice it's like wow, this. They're so synced together say no, no, people aren't like that. You know, like just. There's parts where Paul's singing and he's singing along with his bass line.
- [84:26]
George Harrison
When.
- [84:26]
Paul McCartney
He goes up a. And other certain things which. But you know in the riff thing. But John's just playing and you hear it up and down. He's typical up and down strokes kind of thing. Like it held the skeleton so yeah, he's just doing aces thing and does the color. So yeah, it's not a mystery to me.
- [84:53]
John Lennon
George is supposed to be playing a fretless guitar on this one.
- [84:56]
Paul McCartney
Every time I see hear people demonstrating that the Bartel fretless. It's never seen sounds nothing like what you hear you sort of think oh, it could be. I mean could that. Yeah, it has a sort of kind of rubbery sort of sound but I just think it's. Yeah, it's just normal. You might. I thought it maybe is playing on the original very slow version this really annoying guitar going all the way through. Oh, it's bending like. Is this like.
- [85:34]
George Harrison
It's like George to me.
- [85:35]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, it's all the way through but it's like to me it's like he's playing with the fretless. He's like he's got the. And he's just all he can do like play this sort of. But it's all the way through the song and doesn't really play anything. So I think he may be playing the fretless on that song and that by the time you get to the real thing it's like oh no, it's. It's useless. Yeah well like I even happened. This is Warm gun yeah, you go. It's played on normal guitar but it's just. You just bend it.
- [86:07]
George Harrison
But does these amazing things on your blues. Yes, I'm lonely and that's on the. Yeah, yeah.
- [86:24]
Paul McCartney
So I think, yeah, to me, like the proof is. Proof isn't that I can't remember what the uptake is but where Paul is speaking it just shows that this song.
- [86:32]
George Harrison
Is an interesting example of how your thinking can evolve. Because you know, once upon a time in my youth being a second gen fan, you know, I wouldn't have even worried about who was on bass. And then I knew that Paul was the bass player. So oh yeah, it must be Paul on bass. Suddenly I find out this information that John's on bass. So I went through years online of when people go, oh, that's Paul's best bass line. I would correct them and go, oh no, that's John. Now information has come to light that that's not the case. And you know, I'm looking at a resource here that clearly says that it's John on bass. But we know that two guitars, bass and drums went down simultaneously. So all four were playing.
- [87:15]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, it's only three guitars. Oh, one guitar is. It's just three people playing.
- [87:19]
George Harrison
Well, I'm talking about the basic track.
- [87:22]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [87:22]
George Harrison
So the basic track has two drums. Right.
- [87:25]
Paul McCartney
That's the thing. That's one of those things where I thought maybe there was two guitars but I can't hear another guitar. I can only hear the one guitar. So George is sitting it out.
- [87:34]
George Harrison
I can hear two making. I can hear Paul and George. Paul and George making a bit of racket.
- [87:39]
Paul McCartney
Nobody's playing the riff yet except the bass, the bases.
- [87:44]
George Harrison
But here's the thing. So on the 2018 bass out thing, the first thing is that they're warming up by having Baby Uso Square. They're doing Baby Uso square. So we've only got like a minute of that jam and I know that apparently they were may have been on particular substances that night and been speeding off their heads or whatever they might have been on. But that take has like 20, 30 times the energy of virtually anything they did in January 69. So you know, go figure. But Paul's playing bass on it. Paul's playing bass on that. So what does he do? Suddenly he's go, oi, oi. Here John, you have the bass, I'm going to take over the guitar. You clearly hear him just before Helter Skull starts singing along with what he's playing simultaneously on the face. You can Hear him do that. There's audio evidence that Paul is playing the bass on the track. So that's the evolution for me. It's like, oh, great, now I've got some new evidence. This changes my mind. Fantastic. I've learned something new.
- [89:24]
Paul McCartney
Well, it's the default position that Paul is the bass player in the Beatles. So when he's not playing bass, there has to be some reason why he's not playing bass. That's my thing. So we know and get back because they want to have the pretense of doing no over dubs and that sort of thing. So John gets lumbered with the bass because guitar was deemed more important. So George's guitar. So otherwise George would play bass. He's much better bass player than John.
- [89:49]
George Harrison
Even if you look at the songs that kind of made it to get back. You've got Two of Us. Paul's playing acoustic guitar. Let It Be Long on Whiting Road. He's playing piano one after 909. Well, that's basically a John song. So Paul's on bass. And Dig A Pony's a John song. Paul's on bass, etc. Etc. For you, Blue. We know there's no bass on that. Get Back. Well, he composed it on bass. We saw him compose it on bass. And it's probably the simplest bass line he ever played in the Beatles. So he's playing bass Vet I've Got a Feeling. Well, it's a duo kind of song and he kind of had to play bass on it really. But if you come back to Helter Skelter, I think it's just so clear that we know that it's him on bass now.
- [90:30]
Paul McCartney
We just know that it's that sound. I mean, that. That jazz sound, that crunchiness, it's.
- [91:14]
George Harrison
Too dirty for Paul. But then you listen to Glass Onion. What a bite and crunch that has. You listen to Even I'm so Tired or Piggies in particular. The real crunch to that sound.
- [91:24]
Paul McCartney
Exactly. Yes.
- [91:26]
George Harrison
Paul is quite capable of getting down and dirty. And it's not just that rebel John who's capable of doing that. You know, Paul has a lot of different approaches to everything.
- [91:36]
Paul McCartney
So, you know, Julia, you know, John is a soft. Like he's Julia and he does some rocking for a few songs. But yeah, it's the default position is Paul is a bass player. So give me a reason why he's not playing bass on particular song. You know, because otherwise he'd overdub it like White Album. Like, you know, George's sitting for Honey Pie, that sort of stuff. It's all very simple. Rocket Raccoon. They don't really have spectacular bass lines for things like that. So. Yeah. Well, to do it the same spit do at the same time. As much instruments you could get onto the one track, the better. It's like in Abbey Road, like Gold Slumbers and that sort of thing.
- [92:15]
George Harrison
You know, rounding off Skelter, you know, we've got. Somebody's got blisters on their fingers. Why do people. I know we've talked about it already, but, you know. Because John's the rebel. John's the one who would scream something.
- [92:26]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But. Yeah, but he gets to be rebel because he does it. He does it really well.
- [92:34]
George Harrison
Fantastic.
- [92:36]
John Lennon
Do we think George is playing guitar in the basic track along with John?
- [92:39]
Paul McCartney
I don't think so. I can't. I can only hear. I know this more I listen to it. I just think, no, there's only one guitar. I used to think there was one guitar doing sort of playing the lowy note, bending it kind of thing. But more. Listen to, like. No, it's just. I think because there's two guitars doing them.
- [92:57]
John Lennon
So he's doubling up Paul for that part at least.
- [93:00]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. And I. I can't really tell. He's going to solemn. I don't really know. He's doing a solo that's poor. It could be. Yeah. I don't know. But it's got the. Yeah, it could be George, too. I mean, it's a Paul song, so you might want to pull rank and like, oh, I've got something for this and. Or it could be both. Could be. He's taking turns, you know, it could be pulled in the. Yeah. Kind of very rubbery sort of sound. And George Union, sort of Abbey Road, kind of Eric Clapton type thing. I don't know. They could both play it, but unless someone comes out and fills.
- [93:42]
George Harrison
We know that there's four guitars on it. So if what I have in front of me is to believe there were two guitars on the basic track, who we think are John, George. And then there was another track of simultaneous guitar. Two guitars being played. And we know that that's. That's the riff is part of that.
- [93:59]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. I can't hear another guitar. How many times I hear it. And the isolated tracks. I've had it for, you know, 15 years and I've. Where is that? There's only one guitar. And they could do that. Keep it simple. Like you work on if someone took tambourine or. We didn't really need a tambourine on that thing or. But I think other guitar. Sometimes you hear another guitar because it's just the one guitar feeding through the vocal track and gives that kind of ADT effect, I think, anyway. But I have to listen to it again. Maybe I can find another guitar, but for the moment I can't find it. But it's definitely Paul on bass and I know it's. It's going to go on forever and ever. No one's going to believe that, but I don't know, what can you do?
- [94:42]
George Harrison
I don't see why they wouldn't believe it when we have the audio evidence when we can hear him singing.
- [94:47]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, but because it's been written and it's official. It's been all people sell the Beatles Bible and such and such and this in the official thing. I don't have the official booklets, I never get those. I can't afford those re releases and. But I listen to. It's not on YouTube or whatever or it's great, but. So the booklets. I don't. I've got no idea what they say if people tell me that, oh, it's John on bass. And I know.
- [95:10]
John Lennon
Well, this next one to. Fairly recently till the 50th anniversary, I don't think there was too much contention other than who's playing bass because of a George quote in an interview. That's Old Brown Shoe, but come to 50th now we've got a new contention introduced by Kevin Howlett as to who's playing drums on the track, which to this point anybody with ears didn't have. But suddenly now it's part of the official legend.
- [95:34]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, this is. Yeah, this is. Yeah, this is the one.
- [95:38]
John Lennon
Are we in unanimous agreement without even having a debate, that's Ringo playing drums on old brown shoe?
- [95:43]
Paul McCartney
100%, no doubt whatsoever.
- [95:46]
George Harrison
Absolutely.
- [95:47]
Paul McCartney
It's just.
- [95:48]
George Harrison
I think if you just look at Kevin Howlett's assertion was that he couldn't have played because he was filming the Magic Christian. So there's a few things wrong with that, you know, just to spell it out for people who haven't heard of this stuff before, the first thing is, is that the Magic Christian was largely filmed in London. Now, I'm not sure that ringo was occupied 24 hours a day for months and not allowed to do anything else.
- [96:11]
John Lennon
No, they weren't on location and based on what I've seen, he had weekends and evenings off.
- [96:16]
George Harrison
Well, yes, I did try and look for the shooting schedule, but I couldn't Find it. So if you found it, wonderful. But the thing is, it was a short session. It was a relatively short session. It was one evening. The basic track, which was. There was no percussion overdubs at all. So it was just the drum track.
- [96:31]
Paul McCartney
Well, George demoed it before everyone in the session beforehand. He had it all. So he was there earlier and he demoed it, which we never. We didn't. I don't know what happened to that demo. No one's ever heard what he. Maybe it was wiped off over for the Beatles session, but so George would have worked out exactly what he wanted and so by the time they all turn up, they knew what to do.
- [96:51]
George Harrison
I guess the thing is, is that, you know, we do know from exactly the same records like the Kevin Howlett stuff is that three days after this track was done, Ringo added the congas to I want you to. So what, the filming had wrapped and he was suddenly available again to come and do a conga overdub.
- [97:10]
Paul McCartney
Twicken them anyway, so it's like a 45 minute drive, I think.
- [97:13]
George Harrison
I think that this is. It's like. He doesn't say there's any evidence that Ringo didn't play drums on it. He just says he couldn't have because of this.
- [97:22]
John Lennon
This is not new information. We knew he was shooting magic Christian since 1969 and not until 2019 did suddenly this get thrown into the mix as well because he was making this film the same day they recorded this. I don't know what he's basing that on, but clearly not the audio evidence.
- [97:39]
Paul McCartney
No, no, it's just got Ringo's DNA all through it.
- [97:43]
John Lennon
Oh, yeah, we could talk about that. The floor Tom and stair at the move he'd been making at least as far back as 64. Tell me why yeah, tell me why.
- [97:53]
Paul McCartney
Tell me why yeah, yeah we could.
- [97:56]
John Lennon
See him in A Hard Day's Night doing it in that back shot where they're doing the. The concert sequence. So we know what it looks like either.
- [98:02]
Paul McCartney
Oh, yeah, yeah. And Paul says himself he can't play shuffles and it's a. It's a shuffle and it's. And whenever Paul's done a shuffle, like Hell on Wheels, it's constructed together. It's. You listen to it. It's got a drum machine thing and the. The ride symbol is recorded separately, going all the way through. So it's how I do drums, you know, home recording, you know, because I'm not a great drummer. But you do edit and you put bits and do the kicks do things separately or whatever if you need to. But Hillman Wheels. Yeah, it's all. It's put together like it's piecemeal. Yeah. And well, I reckon. Well, listen to the outtakes. You can tell that on the basic track that George is not on guitar. It's one thing you can 100 say so of course the guitar makes mistakes when George is singing, you know, like. Comes out of the. I want to love it. The guitar does the riff again. Yeah. So in that, like, if you're making this. If you're singing it, you don't make the mistake on your own thing. I want to love. That's right. You know, it happens all the time. So I think it. That's only one reason. I thought maybe John on the guitar because he'd be prone to make mistakes, but pretty sure it's Paul on guitar.
- [99:09]
John Lennon
And we'd been told back when recording sessions book came out from Lewison that John had played a rhythm guitar part that then got wiped in favor of organ. I guess the tape box was marked rhythm guitar, but then that was crossed out and then somebody wrote organ like it was a revision of the track. But we have no real evidence that he played rhythm guitar ever on it. And it got wiped, right?
- [99:32]
Paul McCartney
No. In the outtakes we hear there's no other guitar. This is three. There's piano, guitar and vocals. What else is there?
- [99:40]
George Harrison
And I beg your indulgence here because I think this is the one where I got. I got really quite passionate about this one. It was because of the Kevin Howlett things I just really wanted to figure out for myself. And like, you know, the final thing I'd say about the drums is that through the period of a few days in January 69, Ringo eventually came up with pattern that he kind of reproduced three months later.
- [100:03]
Paul McCartney
Well, George says himself said he mouthed it, sort of. There's actually the audio of him doing it and then Sonny ring. All right, so what are you going to do? You're going to go to the dentist.
- [100:31]
George Harrison
Or maybe many things. I have never really heard him as a Ringo impersonator or like, oh, now I will remember what Ringo did months ago and I'm going to reproduce that.
- [100:40]
John Lennon
Yet there are people out there who believe this conspiracy theory that when Ringo would go home for the day, Paul would wipe his drum parts to replace them himself. Oh, yes, it's on the level of Bernard Purdy.
- [100:52]
George Harrison
Right.
- [100:52]
Paul McCartney
I think that was Peter Brown. Peter Brown said that? Yes. And those they said, I think sort.
- [100:57]
George Harrison
Of got to come down to probabilities here. So we're all in agreement that we believe it's Ringo on drums and that Kevin Howlett just muddied the waters for some reason. God knows why. We do know that on the basic track there was a guide vocal which wasn't used. There was a guide vocal that wasn't used. We know that there's a guitar and it sounds very much like an epiphone to me. Casino. And we know that there's piano. Now, George, this is where we come back to who wrote the song on what. So George wrote the song on piano. It's a very difficult instrument, that piano, you know, as he. As he tells Billy Preston. But he showed it to them on the piano and yeah, they did a bit of experimental swapping around in late January when they were looking at that song. But essentially, you know, George wrote it on piano. It's like John did a rare track, hey Bulldog, you know, before he went all Imagine on us. So then in February he has a birthday present, 26th birthday present to himself. He records a demo of Old Brown Shoe again and he puts on. So he does it on piano as the basic track and sings along at the same time and then he overdubs electric guitar and the guitar part that he puts on there is nothing like the guitar part, that soundtrack of the song. So why wouldn't. And also if you look at the guitar part that's played on that basic track, it's already in places. All that's in place. I don't know if you've ever tried playing that and singing that at the same time. Pretty difficult to do. It's. But going bump a dopa dump ba dum ba on the piano. The two handed thing on the piano is quite possible. So when did John ever show up and play on a George song but Paul played nothing in the studio? Did that ever happen? No, it didn't. So we know there's four elements. So there's a vocal that wasn't used. We know there's drums, we know there's cards piano. I contend it's George on piano playing the same part that he wrote the song on that he demoed on in February, that he recorded prior to the day, early in the session, again on piano while singing. And then later that day he played the piano and sang for the basic track. That is my belief. Therefore I think it's highly unlikely that John would have played guitar on it. So we. We'll come back to that in a minute But I believe it's Paul playing that guitar part and I think that he's being loose on it in a way that he wouldn't be for his own tracks. And maybe he's a little looser with John George tracks. So that's why I remember the Speed Kerfuffle when the Blue Remixed Blue came out a few years ago and people going, oh, Giles has left out guitars. He's left out, you know, the little riff that's played in the verses.
- [103:45]
Paul McCartney
Oh, he's.
- [103:45]
George Harrison
Some of that. He's dropped them out. Oh, my goodness. What they actually did is that guitar part was doubled, but not doubled perfectly. Sometimes Paul forgot to play those bits. He didn't play them, it was quite loose. But when they mixed it for stereo originally in 69, they put those guitars on top of each other. Exactly like on the two guitars for she said, she Said. They didn't have them separated. So the imperfections, if you like, were somewhat masked by them being actually mixed together. Not on the same track, but they were panned together. So you've got this kind of doubling effect together. So I believe that Paul played the guitar on that basic track and you know, he made a pretty good fest of it. It was fine. And he and George probably figured out the. Those bits prior to that. So then you come to the first overdub and the first overdub is once again, it's a simultaneous one. It's two people playing something at the same time and they are the second guitar, which mostly doubles the first guitar and the bicep. So the question is, why on earth would George double a part that Paul has just played? He wouldn't. He would just double his own part. George said, and I believe it was 1976 when somebody was trying to curry favor with him by saying, oh yeah, that sounds like Paul being his typically busy self on that song Old Brown Shoe. And George goes, well, no, that's me being my busy self. So George was very quick to correct and say I played the bass on it. So if George said that he played bass on his own song and he remembered it and he corrected an interviewer, I think that's pretty trustworthy. And if we know that that guitar and that bass is recorded simultaneously and we know that George is on bass, then it must be Paul doubling his guitar on that second bit of the recording. So then we've got a few more elements, I'll just go through them.
- [105:51]
Paul McCartney
Yes, that's true. But just say one thing about the remix, which was a good thing. The bass is much more clearer and is definitely a six offender. Six. You can hear the sort of exactly same sound. I couldn't really tell that in the original version. It's just sort of. But hearing the. Hearing it in the remix with all. Yeah, it's not a great remix, actually. It's like. It's one of the worst remixes I've ever heard. Guitars are really tuned down. Like they're not there, you're not. But the bass is. You listen to it and like. Yeah, it's rough bits. It's. It's typical, like. Like George is winging it a bit. You know, he's going for it. But when he gets a certain chord, he's sort of. He's going descending, whatever. But it's not the drilled kind of McCartney style. It's got that looseness to it. But the sound is. Sounds like. So that's just typical Fender 6. It's the sort of tone and it's easy to play it. You're just playing like a guitar. So those riffs on a jazz bass or something like that, or Rickenbacker. Yeah, it's really hard. But on the Fender 6, it's just like a guitar. So you can play it much more easier. So, yeah, it's definitely George and what you say. Paul doubling up. Not all the guitar, but just the sort of. And sometimes he forgets. He forgets. Of course you're doing it on the same time. You're not going to go back and say, oh, just do another version. Because I mucked up around this part. Whatever.
- [107:13]
George Harrison
The remix, in a sense does us a favor because it splits those two guitars. So we know. We know that it was doubled in perfectly. And look, the rest of how the recording went down is pretty. It's not contentious. Particularly tucked himself into a little corner and faced the wall and sang his lead vocal while John and Paul were doing some backing. John had arrived by this time. There's witnesses who say they saw them working on the backing vocals for ages. Then a fourth track went down of more backing vocals, so there's more shouting and yelling and all that kind of stuff. And then the final two things were. George put down an organ part. We know that he liked to add keyboards to his own songs. And then two days later he added his keyboard perfectly worked out solo. And during the mixing process of that, some ADT was added in increasing amounts. Whilst that solo was probably during the mixing phase. But ADT got added. So it just sort of sound suddenly sounds at the end like the guitar is spread and it's doubled. But in fact they've ADT'd it and spread it incrementally and there you've got the end of that. So to me, you know, after a lot of looking at this, this is what rings true for me. So just in summary, Ringo drums, Paul guitar, George piano for the basic track, and then Paul doubling his guitar and George playing bass like he said he did.
- [108:45]
Paul McCartney
There's also sticks. Ringo playing sticks as well.
- [108:49]
George Harrison
That's not listed in my resource, but you're absolutely right. You're absolutely right.
- [108:53]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. I don't know. It's done the same. Same time as something anyway. Maybe it was done the same time as.
- [108:59]
George Harrison
Yeah. Not. Not sure whether it will.
- [109:01]
Paul McCartney
As you can tell by the panning on the original one, whether it's like it's on the same track. It's usually. It's in the same panning position.
- [109:08]
George Harrison
The fact that that percussion is missing from my resource will.
- [109:11]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [109:12]
George Harrison
It just goes to show that even the best resources, they're not always going to get it right. Just not.
- [109:17]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, yeah. No one seems to mention the. Yeah, that's very important part of the song as well.
- [109:23]
George Harrison
You're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. Makes it gallop along.
- [109:33]
John Lennon
So this leaves us with Come Together.
- [109:35]
Paul McCartney
All right. Okay.
- [109:36]
John Lennon
Being another one that. I felt like the Waters got unnecessarily muddied when Emmerich told the story about watching Paul play the electric piano part over his shoulder and then sort of nudging him aside and then.
- [109:49]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, that's just so stupid. It's really. People don't do that. You know, you're like. The thing is, it's not as easy as the left hand is doing a walking thing and John's piano. Left hand is usually just playing the bass note, you know, like, just not really doing much. It's kind of. It's playing a different rhythm. It's only someone like Paul could play the other ones. Going, boom. Walking up in the different kind of time thing. You don't really hear it until you hear the isolated track because it's, you know, like a lot of the stuff, like Dear Prunes, you only hear the. The high bits, but below it, it's going this walking bass line. And that's. That's beyond John. You just don't do that thing. It's you. When something's done, it's done. You don't want to say, oh, that's good, I want to do it. Yeah. It's like school kids, you know, it's just not like schoolyard. These are professionals. And if you can do it like Say, George say, like, if Paul, you can do it, do it his own songs. Like John say, like, it's just trying to get the song finished and whoever can do that part will do it. There's no ego.
- [111:26]
John Lennon
That's a John signature move. Just bash it out and get it done.
- [111:29]
Paul McCartney
So, yeah, it's. Don't belabor it for that thing. Poor on keyboards, for sure. Yeah.
- [111:34]
George Harrison
I gotta say, it's a. It's a total curiosity as to why John chose to do it in the key of E at the one to one concert. Yes, exactly. And making it so that he couldn't reach the notes in the chorus. I mean, that's the way I played it when I was a teenager thinking, oh, it must be an E. Yeah.
- [111:51]
Paul McCartney
He doesn't.
- [111:51]
George Harrison
He does it like, I knew better. You play Smoke Water and Eatons and Gin.
- [111:55]
Paul McCartney
You know, it's just absolutely how he could do that. Like. Yeah, maybe he forgot.
- [111:59]
George Harrison
That's because he didn't play guitar on the main track.
- [112:01]
Paul McCartney
Exactly.
- [112:02]
George Harrison
So I think that's where we come to, you know, who did what. The big curiosity. I mean, the electric piano thing. When I read that from Jeff Emmerich, I thought, as if. As if John's going to look over Paul shoulder, go now, move aside. I'm going to do it instead. No, no, no, no. John liked work very quickly and when it was done, it was done. And whoever played then, he actually played minimal stuff on songs and he didn't contribute a lot to the overdubbing process. Anyway, that was mainly Paul and George. Curious thing about Come together. Well, there's a few things. One is the backing vocals. Paul muddied the waters very early on. I think it might have been about 71 or something.
- [112:39]
John Lennon
No, it was 70 talking to Ray Connolly.
- [112:42]
Paul McCartney
Ah, right, okay, right.
- [112:43]
George Harrison
So he said he was too embarrassed to ask John to sing on it. But that doesn't mean that he didn't ask John to sing on it. It just says he was too embarrassed. He doesn't say, therefore I didn't sing on it. Once again, it's like putting one and one together and getting three. He didn't say that he didn't sing on it. He just said that he was embarrassed to ask because that was the state of their relationship at the time. And also he was talking at a time when they had all publicly fallen out finally and the supposed split had happened and all that. He was just giving example of the state of affairs at the time. And yet you listen to the isolated tracks and there's Paul doing His baritone thing, which is. I love that voice that he uses. He used it quite a lot in 68, 69. And, you know, it was an amazing voice that he first brought up for Lady Madonna. It's a wonderful voice.
- [113:33]
Paul McCartney
That is Elvis voice.
- [113:37]
George Harrison
He uses all three of those voices. And you never give me your money. And I just love the effect of that, the beauty of his vocal tracks. And that for me, that is the great underrated Beatles song.
- [113:47]
Paul McCartney
For me, I think he does all the harmonies as well on that song.
- [113:51]
George Harrison
Well, he does, though we get to the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 beats.
- [113:54]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, exactly.
- [113:55]
George Harrison
But anyway, back to what I was saying. We have audio evidence. We know that Paul does the backing vocals in the verse. And John sounds like John is doubling himself in the choruses. And the last.
- [114:07]
Paul McCartney
Even the photos.
- [114:08]
John Lennon
Exactly right.
- [114:08]
Paul McCartney
They're both around the microphone and you see Yoko's feet, tall, jam, football, monkey finger, Coca Cola, I know you, you.
- [114:23]
John Lennon
Know me.
- [114:27]
Paul McCartney
Come together right now over me.
- [114:35]
George Harrison
Very clear that Paul does sing on. But the other big enduring mystery for me, and I used to argue about this years ago or try and figure it out, is why I can only really hear George on guitar. And for all the parts, they all just sound like George to me. It just sounds. Seems that that's what they are. But of course, you read so many bits of evidence that say John's on guitar. And so I was like, well, where's he on guitar? Where's he on guitar? The first thing is if you go and look through the tracks, there are actually six guitar tracks put down. But what you see is that one of them, at least, or two of them were never used. And I just thought, oh, okay, right. But when you listen to, like I've been doing research over the last couple of weeks, you can hear there are guitar parts that were played that were put on the track but were mixed out, were not left. My contention is that John, and it seems to me that John probably did contribute some guitar via an overdub, but it wasn't used. Because all I'm really hearing is I'm hearing George playing rhythm in the verses. I'm hearing George continuing that rhythm the whole way through the song. And I'm hearing George doing harmonised lead in the solo. And I'm hearing him doing the single lead at the end. That's all the guitar, apart from that little volume swell in the prelude to the Last.
- [115:55]
Paul McCartney
Well, actually, tell you now, there is another guitar, the ghost guitar, and it's actually on the final thing as well. But it happens during the keyboard. So squ. Like, I only found that this out a couple of days ago. Oh. I never noticed it before on the outtake with a. It was really loud and it goes on for a long time, but actually, I'm a final record. Yeah. And it's definitely a casino. It sounds exactly like this. Have a listen again. It's there. So that could be John doing his.
- [116:38]
George Harrison
I'll have another listen. I certainly heard that in the isolated tracks and was very surprised to hear it. It was great to hear it. It was great to hear a new part that I never heard. They are the gift that keeps giving. But I can't really hear it in the final mix. But I'll listen after this and see what I can hear.
- [116:52]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, it's there. Like, I was surprised because the keyboards are distracting you, but there's this other guitar. You find these things and it's like you never heard before. And you go, wow. There's so much still to find out.
- [117:08]
George Harrison
Well, that probably solves the mystery of why John is alleged to be playing guitar on the song.
- [117:13]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, yeah.
- [117:14]
George Harrison
Virtually inaudible on guitar on the song.
- [117:16]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, true. But, yeah, I never heard it before, but I just found it like, whoa. It's great. Learn things all the time.
- [117:23]
John Lennon
It's only during the keyboard break.
- [117:25]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, it's just like. Yeah, that's why you don't hear it. But here, just the guitar track.
- [117:36]
John Lennon
Somebody think that's on the basic track? No, no, it's an overdub.
- [117:40]
George Harrison
It's one of the many guitar overdubs.
- [117:42]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. Because basic track was just George going.
- [117:49]
George Harrison
Now, here's an interesting thing. So the electric piano was recorded apparently simultaneously onto one track with another guitar.
- [117:58]
Paul McCartney
Right.
- [117:59]
George Harrison
I contend that Paul was playing the piano while John was playing that little hidden part, Right?
- [118:04]
Paul McCartney
Yes. As he's looking over his shoulder.
- [118:08]
George Harrison
Yes, yes, I think they were. Maybe that's where Jeff Emmerich's memory gets a bit confused, because I think that they were working together on that part.
- [118:16]
Paul McCartney
They kind of like the same notes and you go.
- [118:19]
George Harrison
Yes.
- [118:24]
John Lennon
That actually makes sense.
- [118:26]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [118:26]
George Harrison
So maybe Don was looking over his shoulder to get an idea of what to play on the guitar. And then. Well, quite clearly here, they recorded it simultaneously. Wow.
- [118:34]
Paul McCartney
There's still things to find. There's so many songs and so many. So many mysteries to unravel.
- [118:40]
John Lennon
Crack the coat.
- [118:41]
George Harrison
One thing that's worth saying is that the isolated tracks are just an absolute gift. It's wonderful. It's a new way of hearing the music. It's fantastic.
- [118:48]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. When I first heard Good Morning. Good Morning realized everyone got it wrong. Everyone in the world had got it wrong. Because the bass disguised what the chords were doing.
- [118:58]
George Harrison
That's right. And the horns.
- [119:00]
Paul McCartney
Because bass will play C sharp while A minor is going on. And sort of the secret things. Why sometimes you unravel these things. It's. You realize why it sounds so interesting or good. Because things you don't know about this. Of course, the guitar is playing A minor and the bass is playing C sharp. But we don't know that. We just know it sounds interesting. And like Michelle. Because Michelle is. It's major. Like Michelle My Bill. This is B flat, but it's got a. The vocals sing. Sings D flat while the guitar plays a D and the harmony does a low D. You get that Frenchie kind. That's why it gets so Frenchy. Because it's. It's kind of chord. And the combination with Good Morning. Yeah, it's A minor. Nothing to do to save his life. I got a tune. But sometimes bass is doing this run. But you go. So it's really weird. And when you hear the. So when I actually heard the isolated track for the first time, everyone who did Good Morning, like, wow, that's amazing. All minor chords in the F minor. And we always think it was just all sorry, attitude. There's so much to find out through isolate tracks.
- [120:33]
George Harrison
Isolated tracks can muddy the waters somewhat in that. Now that AI is capable of pulling apart components on a single track.
- [120:40]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [120:41]
George Harrison
If that is the way it's presented, then that kind of undoes who played what simultaneously on a track. So sometimes it's better to go back to the older. Say the rock band stems isolated tracks to get an idea of. Because that's more likely to have the unseparated components.
- [120:57]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, that's true.
- [120:58]
George Harrison
So we are in an age where it becomes a little more difficult to tell what went down on what track.
- [121:04]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. You have to listen to lots of different things. Like, I was working on Paperback Rider recently and I thought, oh, this could sound good with a tune down guitar. You play an A and it's like, oh. And it sounded like, oh, I didn't. I think he did it like that. It sounds great. And I was doing a video of it and. But I thought, I have another. Listened to it. I'll go find any other tracks. And I found one where they actually had Paul playing a guitar during the Paperback Writer. And then I found out that by listening to that, my theory didn't work because you can hear him. His finger Going off the. Before it goes though this D7 to get to the G chord. His finger flicks, does that. Oh, no. It's a sure sign. So he's playing in normal tuning. So it ruined my whole theory. So, yeah, sometimes the theory's great. You can go with it and try it out in different songs and you think you got it right. Yeah. And it's like. And then you find here another track and you hear, oh, what's happening there? And the audio clue tells you. To me. Anyway, I hear that sort of thing. I hear that when you bump a string or something like that. Yeah. It's a clue to telling you that I got it wrong.
- [122:14]
John Lennon
It's a simple thing. That's right.
- [122:16]
Paul McCartney
Yes.
- [122:16]
George Harrison
I remember hearing a bootleg of Paperback Rider and hearing those ghost chords that they used as guide chords for the harmonies at the beginning.
- [122:23]
Paul McCartney
Yes. I'm saying that's what I'm just doing now.
- [122:25]
George Harrison
Yeah. Those are those chords.
- [122:26]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [122:27]
George Harrison
But what that made me realize is that's how they constructed the harmony. So the first chord, that is a harmony that suits that chord. And then they just hang on to that to the end of the whole thing. The second harmony, they bring in suits the second chord and then they hold that and then the third chord and so on. They basically are holding four different chords to the end of that whole passage. Which is how you end up with all these incredible. Not clashing, but overlaying notes that belong to a whole lot of separate chords. It's because they're all. To those separate chords. So figuring out that that's how they can. That was really mind blowing for me.
- [123:02]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. Because when I was doing my theory, I hadn't heard those ones and my theory worked perfectly. But hearing those. Oh, no. Yeah.
- [123:15]
George Harrison
Yes.
- [123:15]
Paul McCartney
Because I tried to do it and it's like, didn't make sense. Like, why would you do that? Two notes going.
- [123:20]
George Harrison
Well, here's a theory. You know there's two guitars on that song, Right. There were two guitars played on the basic track. My theory in that case would be whoever it was doing the second guitar. I think it was John.
- [123:32]
Paul McCartney
Yes.
- [123:33]
George Harrison
Would be the one playing those ghost chords. Then Paul just comes crashing in with that riff and he's ready to go with that rip. He doesn't have to jump from the D7.
- [123:42]
Paul McCartney
All George does, he doubles up on it. On a Paperback Rider before the paperback. Right. Just after. Yeah. Like, he doubles up. It's even written down. That's. That's what he does. That's all he does. Like.
- [124:06]
George Harrison
Do you Think it's feasible that he might have played the ghost chords as well?
- [124:09]
Paul McCartney
No, that's John doing vibrato. That's what John does. When I get to the Payback, I. Sometimes Paul forgets to do the riff like Writer. He does that the second time. Payback.
- [124:30]
George Harrison
Writer.
- [124:32]
Paul McCartney
So George is doing that Paperback Writer, and it's written down, basically. That's what he does. I think he might have played Tampering, maybe in the basic track. I'm not sure we can revisit that one.
- [124:44]
George Harrison
Yeah, they practice that song with George on bass and then recorded with him on tambourine.
- [124:49]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, yeah, I think that's right.
- [124:51]
George Harrison
I think the thing is that a lot of people think this is trainspotting. It's just going too deep. It's whatever that one is.
- [124:57]
John Lennon
The Beatles.
- [124:57]
George Harrison
But for me, the Beatles. I'm a Second Gen fan, so I've been with them a long time, and I've been very obsessed with them for a long time. And I've loved them for a long time. But the thing that remains for me is intrigue. I find the music and how they manage to create something so lasting, I find that incredibly intriguing. How did they create something so lasting? And I'm still unpicking that. And for me, the who played what kind of stuff is not just trainspotting, it's about trying to unpack the magic and just the components of that magic. It's a very satisfying thing for me as a Beatles fan. A lot more satisfying than the more gossipy stuff that surrounds their story.
- [125:36]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. I don't know anything about birthdays or whatever. I try to ring tuning, but I just get past about five pages in.
- [125:45]
George Harrison
Oh, I loved it. Loved it.
- [125:46]
Paul McCartney
I know, but I just, you know, my span of attention is minute. I just get bored very quickly.
- [125:52]
John Lennon
Well, the beauty is, as both you guys have pointed out, anytime there's something after all these years, there's something new to learn and to hear it and see it in a different way, that's wonderful. It doesn't get any better. The intrigue keeps going.
- [126:03]
Paul McCartney
I love to have a book on how they made Dear Prince, for example. Like, it's just so laid and it's just how the stages of it. Well, when was the drums put in and how they do it, because why the bass track changes and just the whole construction of that song, it's just such a great song. And the way it's arranged, it's magic. It's. I can't imagine any better. Oh, yeah.
- [126:22]
John Lennon
I've always esteemed that Song very highly. But after hearing you guys discuss it today, it's like I am manifestly more impressed with the achievement that that represents.
- [126:33]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [126:33]
John Lennon
How that whole thing was just orchestrated. It meshes so much grander than the sum of its parts. It's just amazing.
- [126:39]
George Harrison
When I think of Dear Prudence and this has been like a relatively recent realisation. I mean, Led Zeppelin were huge for me as a kid, too. And certainly in my approach as a musician and as a guitar orchestrator, I love doing that stuff. Jimmy Page and the work he did on orchestrating parts was very, very important to me and still is in the music that I make. And Dear Prudence, to me, it almost starts that off. I know that may be overstating it, but that idea of building up an orchestra of guitars and building and building and laying and laying and engaging, increasing. I don't really hear precedent for that before that song particularly. I think it's actually in terms of the whole approach of using eight tracks, because that was the beginning of their eight track experience. Using those eight tracks to create a guitar orchestration. I think it was actually hugely influential and I think the song was really quite underrated from that arrangement perspective. I think it's a very important song.
- [127:33]
John Lennon
Yeah.
- [127:33]
Paul McCartney
I was always surprised how many guitars I could find. And there's even interesting things. Like one of the guitars plays a chord at the end. Like there's a D, but sort of. I can't do it. Yeah. But it's a. So when a guitar, it goes ends on. On plays on a while the other things do. So it's one of those things you find.
- [127:56]
George Harrison
I hope people go and find your recreation. But on YouTube, it's quite something.
- [128:02]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. I was proud of that one. And it proves why it's not an octave device used for the guitar at the end, because they play slightly different things sometimes.
- [128:09]
George Harrison
It's some of George's coolest playing some of his coolest fills.
- [128:13]
Paul McCartney
I think he's genius.
- [128:14]
George Harrison
Oh, just so much as he really went up another level on the White Album and then Abbey Road. My goodness. His playing on that album is just.
- [128:23]
Paul McCartney
Exactly when he gets to do it on John's song. He's got more freedom to do for Deep Rinse. Like, I don't know whether you'd have that much freedom to do it on a Paul song.
- [128:32]
George Harrison
And yet he contributes such exquisite parts to you. Never give me your money. She came in through the bathroom window. Wonderful.
- [128:38]
Paul McCartney
Yeah. That's incredible. Yeah. Yeah. His guitar work on Every Road is insane. Yeah.
- [128:43]
George Harrison
And George name checked Those two songs as two of his very favorites off Abbey Road. So he's raising Paul, which is a really nice thing to see.
- [128:51]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [128:52]
John Lennon
I'd read quotes where he really had a distaste for that rosewood telly. But his soloing on the Rooftop is just absolutely magnificent.
- [129:01]
Paul McCartney
The mystery is Howdy went from that wawa. Crazy annoying. Listen to the outtakes. You know, get rid of that. Wow. Please, man. It's not even rhythmic. It's this sort of really wow to get from the stage of even the day before the Rooftop, you know, doing Dig a Pony again. Then suddenly on the roof, it's like, what? He must have gone home. And he's like, I've gone home. I'm going to work on his songs. And he just. Yeah, it was like, what the difference is. Like, it's the thing when. When the lights on, when it all happens, you know, they can be mucking around. It sounds awful. You listen to hours and hours of the same song and it's just not getting anywhere. And it's just. It gets out of tune. And suddenly when the light's on or whatever, or they're on on the roof, it's suddenly what?
- [129:45]
John Lennon
That switch is flipped.
- [129:47]
Paul McCartney
It's a totally different band, and it's perfect. George's solo is just incredible.
- [129:53]
George Harrison
That wawa, it reminds me very much of the Cheech and Chong song called Black Glassing, where it's a very funny piece where coral, Coral. Stop that Wawa. And eventually the wawa gets yanked off cowl and castle. That's what it feels like.
- [130:08]
John Lennon
First time I've heard somebody bring up that song in 50 years.
- [130:11]
Paul McCartney
What song is that?
- [130:11]
John Lennon
Black Lassie.
- [130:12]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [130:13]
George Harrison
It is hilarious. It's a great parody, you know, but one after 909 now, I think we would probably be greeted. It's not the greatest song. It's a great performance. But one of the things that makes an incredible performance is George's lead playing on it. Now, for somebody who really struggled to jam and struggled to just pull fantastic things out of the air, boy, does he do it on that song. To me, that is his hottest blues rock licks. It's incredible, particularly in the second verse. There are just some really fantastic licks in there. I don't know how he did that. I don't know if he went home and practiced fervently for a couple of nights to make sure he got it right, but it feels more spontaneous than that. So I guess that just shows that when they had to, they could pull the magic together and they could Just play well together. When they had to, they could just do it. Maybe when they were just stuck around in the studio for hours getting filmed, they weren't going to be that great, but they always eventually brought it and eventually produced something that was wonderful. They just did. But George, wow, he did a great job.
- [131:12]
John Lennon
Yeah. I think it was a Paul Intuit. It's. Give them a challenge and they'll rise to the occasion. Yes, A completely unreasonable challenge put before them.
- [131:20]
George Harrison
Absolutely.
- [131:20]
John Lennon
Before they pull it off.
- [131:22]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [131:22]
George Harrison
Well, they produced three number ones during that session. It's more than most bands would achieve in 20 days.
- [131:28]
John Lennon
Right, yeah.
- [131:29]
Paul McCartney
And they go from stage like two of us, whereas guitar, kind of. And to the acoustic. I think John might have suggested try it on acoustic.
- [131:38]
George Harrison
Do you think that that initial run at Two Of Us inspired Ringo's drumming for Get Back?
- [131:43]
Paul McCartney
Maybe, yeah. Yeah.
- [131:45]
George Harrison
Well, it sounds exactly like it.
- [131:48]
John Lennon
Yeah. Apparently it exists on film, even if it's not in the finished cut of Get Back, because when Gary Astrid was on the show, he had made reference to Ringo reaching out to Peter Jackson. How did I come up with that drum part? Oh, we've got it, we'll find it, we'll send it to you. And so we haven't seen that footage, but apparently Ringo left.
- [132:07]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [132:07]
John Lennon
So maybe that's what it was, you know, Ringo, what you're doing on tour bus, why'd you put it here?
- [132:12]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, it's a magic feel, like how you can make a marching feel like only Ringo could do it. And I've been told that it's kind of idiosyncratic to play that thing. And if people try to copy the marching thing, they can't do it because Ringo's quirkiness does ghost note or something like that. So it's a total field.
- [132:30]
George Harrison
Just as remarkable as all that is. If I listen to the verses of While My Guitar Gently Waits or something and listen to the absolute minimum bass drum snare that he's doing.
- [132:41]
Paul McCartney
Yeah.
- [132:41]
George Harrison
Not even a hi hat. Not a symbol and sight nothing. It's just the sparsest thing you could possibly think of. And it works absolutely perfectly because of what's around it. The whole less is more stuff is so underplayed.
- [132:54]
John Lennon
I think they were locked in.
- [132:56]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, Ringo just seems to lock in completely all the time, really. He's like. It's like a drum machine, you know, he's just there. He's just there and he keeps it simple and it has to be encouraged by Paul. So Paul has great ideas for drama. I mean, he's, you know, saying don't let me down on the ride. Cymbal sort of thing like. Yeah, he's great. He's a great things for songs, arrangements and Ringo can think of things himself as well.
- [133:23]
John Lennon
Still has to execute him.
- [133:24]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, he can play it. Paul can't really execute. He does the Ringo type rolls and stuff like that. And we think he plays the drums on Don't Pass Me By.
- [133:34]
George Harrison
Paul plays the drums on there?
- [133:35]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, it's lots of drums. It's more overdub drums and it's more like going through. It's just because Ringo's playing the keyboards.
- [133:41]
George Harrison
It's the sloppiest drum performance in their whole repertoire. That song.
- [133:46]
Paul McCartney
Yeah, sounds great. Sounds fantastic. I love it though. I know.
- [133:49]
George Harrison
We've moved on to another one now. Sorry, Robert.
- [133:53]
Paul McCartney
It's.
- [134:33]
John Lennon
Something about the Beatles, created and.
- [134:35]
Ringo Starr
Hosted by Robert Rodriguez, executive producer Rick Way, title song performed by the Corgis. Something about the Beatles is an evergreen podcast.
- [134:58]
Paul McCartney
Now I want everybody to listen while Carl plays with his wawa. That was Carl and his wawa. Thank you very much, Carl. That's just fine. You go stop now, Carl. Carl, you can stop now. Give me that.
- [135:40]
George Harrison
Wah, wah.
- [135:41]
Paul McCartney
Carl, you ever try to play while I'm singing about a great American dog?