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- [00:02]
Marcus Phelan
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- [01:01]
Robert Rodriguez
This Friday, see what critics are calling.
- [01:03]
Andrew Shakespeare
A cold blooded masterpiece.
- [01:05]
Marcus Phelan
Hello, Finny. You're dead.
- [01:07]
Robert Rodriguez
Dead is just a word.
- [01:10]
Marcus Phelan
Did you think our story was over? Discover the secret. It's brought us here for a reason. Behind the mask. What do you think happens when you die? It's time to find out. I'm not afraid of you. You should be. Black Fern 2. Only in theaters Friday. Rated R under 17. Not admitted without par.
- [01:30]
Andrew Shakespeare
Here we go.
- [01:32]
Marcus Phelan
Okay, ready?
- [01:34]
Andrew Shakespeare
One more.
- [01:35]
Marcus Phelan
All right, let's go.
- [01:37]
Andrew Shakespeare
Okay, finger.
- [01:38]
Robert Rodriguez
Go on.
- [01:39]
Marcus Phelan
Go on. Okay, go. Are you ready?
- [01:42]
Robert Rodriguez
Do it again.
- [01:44]
Marcus Phelan
Okay, go on then. And again. Keep going. We're running.
- [01:59]
Robert Rodriguez
Hello and welcome to episode 312 of Something about the Beatles podcast. So this one, no surprise to anybody who's been listening to the show this year and following either through the newsletter, which you can get at satb2010satb2010mail.com to sign up, or has been following the posts of the episodes this year that back in May we did an episode called Contentious Credits which which basically was an analysis of a lot of the information that's out there, a lot of it coming from sources that should know better, whether it's Giles Martin or Kevin Howlett who sort of taken over the Lewison position for Apple, writing the notes to the box sets that have been coming out, the special deluxe editions, as well as Lewison from Recording Sessions book. But other people as well, Ian MacDonald and various other things that have been out there circulating that purport to tell how the Beatles recorded their canon and who played what. And just a lot of information that you would think in the 21st century we have access to more data than ever. And in large part that is true. But it cuts both ways because it seems that a lot of people that presumably have access to things that we're not privy to would therefore have the most rock solid data to work from and present their findings in the liner notes or in the official tomes coming out. But in fact we find as students of the Beatles and amateur sleuths as it were, that upon closer inspection there are things asserted that do not make sense. And with the advent of the rock band Stems and, and the proliferation of isolations through various software now where you could separate things out and just clues picked up from the outtakes issued with the special deluxe editions where you can hear the voices and who's on the session and gain other clues that way to kind of piece together. Sometimes you have access to the recording logs if they pop up in various places online or, or the tape boxes. So my two guests today, returning guests, both hailing from Australia, both musicians and both decades long students of Beatle history. I'm talking about the granular kind that is way beyond most people, but in any event they've made a lifelong study of the Beatles. I'm speaking of Marcus Phelan and Andrew Shakespeare who were on the contentious credits one show back in May. And now we're circling back to cover a bunch of other songs that we'd informally been talking about amongst ourselves that we thought warranted another conversation. So the songs in this one include Long Tall Sally, I Don't Want to Spoil the Party, Michelle Paperback, Rider in Rain, Todd Pepper Reprise, and then some White Album tracks, Piggies Don't Pass Me By, Not Guilty, a number of tunes that there's more to know than we've been given through the official channels. And anyway, just our bit of scholarship to present where the data leads that is at variance with some of the stuff that's out there, including from the official sources. As noted, this is our follow up conversation and we think we've done a pretty good job of covering the most contentious songs here. But if after hearing this show and having heard the earlier show you think there's things that need addressing that we haven't gotten to yet, by all means you can shoot me a line at satb2010 mail or post it on the socials and let us know. But I think we've covered the subject until. And unless something else comes up that you think is worth a discussion, I couldn't have done it without these guys who really went above and beyond in their prep for the show doing the amateur sleuthing using their own ears. Marcus Phalen, I would suggest you check out his YouTube channel because he does a lot of deconstruction videos to illustrate in detail the stuff we're talking about here. But anyway, here we go with contentious Credits, Part two. This time it's personal.
- [06:27]
Andrew Shakespeare
Essentially, what we're here to do and what we're trying to do is look at a range of sources. Look at a range of sources and compare them, and then use a combination of factual stuff that's come out of those sources, plus, where necessary, some logic and probability to sort of come up with what is most likely. That seems to be what we're kind of about here. But I guess the other thing that I was thinking is, like, why do we care? Because there's a bunch of people out there who go, who cares? Who've played what is just the music. Just enjoy the music. But I've been sort of thinking about this over the last few days, and to me, it comes back to the word genius. And if you sort of think of the arts, there's so many areas of genius. If you look at, like a genius painting or a novel or something like that, it's very clear that one person did this, and that is a work of genius. Right? If you look at film and there's. There's some absolute masterpieces out there, a.
- [07:27]
Marcus Phelan
Lot of paintings, a lot of art these days is done actually by the Dominions. Actually, like, I know you are muddying the waters, Marcus. I mean, they've got the concept of everything, like in the painting or sculpture. But I. I know people, you know, they do all the detail, all the things. So it's like it's a group of effort as well.
- [07:45]
Andrew Shakespeare
But with films, obviously it's a group effort. But we know who directs, we have the names of credits for who did what. And if you're looking at the screen in terms of ensembles, acting, it's visual. You can see who did what.
- [08:00]
Robert Rodriguez
It's a great corollary to the guy that had written a book a while back that I had on the show once, Thomas Brothers. He'd written the book Help the Beatles, Duke Ellington, and I forget the subtitle but completely. He had come up with that great analogy, like you just alluded to when it comes to filmmaking, how very like making records it is in Beetle World, just to pick one example. It's a very easy thing to fall into the mindset of John's Strawberry Fields. Well, it's the Beatles Strawberry Fields, produced by George Martin. And the corollary he had was, there's the guy who writes the script, there's the director, there's the sound guy, there is the actors. It's a team effort to take that concept and bring it to life as it is with Beatle recordings, everybody's got their part to play in the finished product that we love so much and want to just investigate, get to the bottom of and try to understand that magic. Further, everybody has their role to play. And that's kind of what we're doing with this conversation is not to demystify it in a way that, oh, this is going to eliminate the magic from it. Rather, I think it makes it all the more impressive because these guys, whatever function needed to be served on a recording by recording basis, with the fluidity they had of they could play different instruments, they could fall into different roles, whether it's George playing tambourine on something rather than his normal part, or Paul playing lead guitar or John sitting at the kit, you know, for whatever reason, they fulfilled the necessities of making that a successful record with appeal to the public and weren't bound by any rules. Well, I can't. That's not my job. I can't do that. And that's, I think, what makes their body of work so magical is that they did whatever. What, by whatever means necessary is what they did.
- [09:52]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yes. If you accept that they produced some masterpieces, then the question is, well, how did this happen with other areas of the arts? We know with recorded sound it can be very difficult. So for me, I think that's what the driver is in trying to understand who did what. And granted, not every song that we're going to talk about today is what I would call a masterpiece. But I also think that we. I am interested in their body of work in total, and that means the work that's maybe not quite so revered a song like Don't Pass Me by is not rated up there with While My Guitar Gently Weeps, but we're going to look at them both, you know, because it's a body of work. But also the other thing, I suppose is when I see supposition, conclusions drawn incorrectly, and people putting things out there that are just plain incorrect, then that really is kind of a bit dangerous. I think in this day and age, when we're looking to kind of have a proper history in place before, you know, people start shuffling off, you know, I would like to see this stuff being as correct as possible. And I think at the moment it isn't. And that's part of my driver for this.
- [11:06]
Robert Rodriguez
Yeah, there's a lot of muddying of the Waters, for sure, and gratuitous things that get introduced into the discourse, I keep circling back to one of the songs we discussed the first time we did this, which was Old Brown Shoe, where we're Suddenly told After 50 years, Ringo's not playing drums on us by somebody purportedly in position to have access to data that we don't. And where it came from and why he felt the need to introduce that into the literature and the history, I don't know. But I think we, as fans, listeners, critical thinkers and people willing to go down the rabbit holes and deconstruct that stuff with the tools available to us and apply the common sense as you describe to the situation, come to the conclusion that feels more accurate and furthers our understanding and sort of reaffirms what we kind of knew all along anyway, in that instance. But it's not as clear cut in other recordings, such as the ones we examined last time or the ones we're doing this time. Because sometimes the people that were there are the worst witnesses. Sometimes the people that were there when Many Years from now was written in the 90s. And Paul describes I Don't Wanna Spoil the Party as a Ringo song. That's how he remembers it. What the hell is that? Not that we think any fan is walking around believing that, but you don't know what facts are gonna stick and which ones aren't. To the extent that I give you guys all the credit in the world for the deep research and study and hours you guys have put into this, applying your own musicianship, your own Beatle scholar cred to the situation, that we're shining light, providing clarity here. We hope that anybody listening to this going forward will have that mindset to carry forward. What was funny was we did the last show, I think, in May, and like right on the heels of that, somebody posted a YouTube remix of it's All Too Much with the headline John's Whatever it was Amazing Guitar, whatever it was.
- [13:08]
Marcus Phelan
No, Yeah, I know it's a sore.
- [13:10]
Robert Rodriguez
Point for you, Marcus.
- [13:12]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, the kids just keeps going. You think you've you cleared it all, but no one's listening. Some people are listening. Maybe not people that should be listening.
- [13:19]
Andrew Shakespeare
Let me take two examples from Abbey Road and the deluxe box set book from that, because we're not talking about that stuff today. So in one instance, Howlett really clears up who did what on Darling in a really great way. He says George is called on tape, sort of demonstrating a little bass bit and asking if this sounds right. So you go, okay, George played bass. Some will come up with a conspiracy theory that Paul secretly Went back in and replaced all the bass parts. They were in too much of a hurry for that. They couldn't be bothered if it was good enough, it was good enough, you know, so that's an example. But with Old Brown Shoe, I think the problem was. Is there. There wasn't really evidence on tape of who played what. Maybe you might have heard a word from Ringo in the background, but. So he came to a conclusion. He was filming Magic Christian, therefore he wasn't available. And of course, in the same book, we know that, you know, a few days later, Ringo is overdubbing congas onto I Want yout. So he is around.
- [14:21]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. And Twikino was like 40 minutes away driving. And the session started at 7 o' clock at night because George spent the earlier session demoing every single part, I think. So he knew exactly what he wanted. And yeah, he wouldn't have done the song without Ringo. I mean, this is so stupid.
- [14:39]
Andrew Shakespeare
And I'm thinking of that great scene in the Matrix, Christian, where it's such a wonderful scene. It's where I think it's. Roman Polanski is maybe sitting at the piano. Is it Roman Polanski? And Yul Brunner is in drag singing to him. It's hilarious. Well, it's very surreal, really. But that's a scene that doesn't feature Ringo.
- [15:00]
Marcus Phelan
So.
- [15:01]
Andrew Shakespeare
So Ringo wasn't necessarily required for all of the filming. So. So that's just an example of.
- [15:07]
Marcus Phelan
I think it was towards the end of the filming as well. So.
- [15:11]
Robert Rodriguez
Right.
- [15:11]
Marcus Phelan
He might, beginning of February, need it at all. The thing that mystery for me, for Darling, is why John is using George's casino. And that's a little. That's another nerd thing. Because I found out that the only way to do those arpeggios at the end, behind the bridge, you can't play it on because you need a whammy bar. And. Yeah, I replicated that. Yeah, I actually did the video doing those last arpeggios and it's. Yeah, it's George's guitar, because that's. Yeah. Or Paul.
- [15:40]
Robert Rodriguez
I thought you said you needed a casino with a finish on it.
- [15:42]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, your casino with a Bigsby arm, but this particular Bigsby arm, which has a certain distance between it and the tailpiece and that's where you get those notes. Because I tried it on the John type Casino without a Bixby and I thought. But then just compared and I think, no, it's not right. And then experimented all different guitars and what I had and was the casino with the Bixby arm, which George had. So that's around one of the things like, why did John use that guitar? But that's going into micro detail.
- [16:15]
Robert Rodriguez
Yeah, it's a micro detail, but I think it paints a picture. It gives us a real sense of. We're told, are these sessions where supposedly Paul is too embarrassed to ask John if he could sing harmony with them.
- [16:27]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [16:27]
Robert Rodriguez
But they are very much working together as a band by any means necessary. What we need to do to get these songs tracked and done properly. So John's stepping up to play what would normally be a George part. Because George is playing bass, because Paul's playing piano. Right. That's how it breaks down on the track. For a 50s type rocker, maybe they naturally wanted to do a sort of live get back type take. The way it would have been done in the 50s.
- [16:52]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [16:52]
Andrew Shakespeare
You're wanting to send me back down the rabbit hole to just grab a book and check if that final little ping thing at the end was separate, overdone.
- [17:01]
Marcus Phelan
No, it wasn't. Because they even released the outtakes. And every single outtake, he does it. So it's a. It's a John thing. He actually. He has his mind set on doing it. It was part of the arrangement you go to the outtake with. He comes with the. I don't know what number it was, but that comes with the Abbey Road set and it's there, so you wouldn't be overdubbing on outtakes. So it's live, I guess.
- [17:26]
Andrew Shakespeare
Speaking of such things, like, it's just incredible that we're recording today. You know how magic sort of happens around the Beatles. Well, I woke up this morning and opened up my emails and there's an email from the Beatles official site and it's just fantastic. It says that they've released a new single. And the new single is helter skelter, take 17. Now this was first released seven years ago on the box set.
- [17:51]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [17:52]
Andrew Shakespeare
And also has been available on streaming for years. And it's been remixed. Well, I beat it. I didn't hear a difference really. But also it's been available. It was also made available on streaming in the Anthology 4 thing because there's tracks there that obviously have already been released. So it's not one of those grayed out ones that you can't listen to yet. So I guess the first thing, of course is, well, a new single. Who's this aimed for? I suppose it's aimed for people who couldn't afford the box sets or somehow haven't gone into a deep dive into the box sets on the streaming platforms. But then the most interesting thing is the other thing on the official Beatles site saying that John's on bass and Paul and George are on guitars. So is the Beatles themselves, you know, along with their trusted minions Giles and Sam and Kev, you know, putting out information there. Which by our consensus anyway. And the consensus for many is just wrong. I think that anybody who listens to the take 17 of helter skelter and hears Paul demonstrating the do do do do do do do rhythm that he wants on the rhythm guitar for John to play, he's demonstrating it on the bass while singing it at the same time.
- [19:11]
Marcus Phelan
And also when he's singing it, he's. Sorry, when he's singing it. Like when the break. When the part where the solo happens in the final thing, he sings along with his baseline. He wouldn't be singing John's baseline. And anyway it's sort of.
- [19:24]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yeah, and we went through that last time and we kind of sorted it out to.
- [19:28]
Marcus Phelan
But it's still like the St. John the bassist myth still, it keeps going on. That's what. That's. You know, I love John use my hero. And he's. But as a bass player he was just hopeless. And Ringo says he hated playing it. He's the last resort. You kind of do. And like he plays on all too much. You can tell it's him on auto much because it's vigorous but it's such a dirty sound.
- [19:49]
Andrew Shakespeare
It must be drawn because he was. He was the rocker, he was the rebel. And we're going to have another track in this discussion that actually brings up that point again. But I'll leave that for now. But I just thought, wow, incredible. I woke up this morning to do this podcast and woohoo, there we are. The Beatles are telling us that John was on base on. Or the Beatles site is telling us that John was on base on.
- [20:12]
Marcus Phelan
They put take two on as well. Again, the slow version, the one recorded.
- [20:17]
Robert Rodriguez
In July, remastered, I suppose.
- [20:20]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. Like where John plays the 1e note for 12 minutes. People say when are we going to get the 20 minute version? I think maybe it is just a half the version of 20 minute. Be more of the same. I can't imagine them doing the same thing for 20 minutes again. I mean this mysterious take three. Boom boom boom boom.
- [20:39]
Andrew Shakespeare
Sounds like opiates were involved.
- [20:41]
Robert Rodriguez
Was it Giles that said if you want the 27 minute version so bad. Just played a 13 minute twice.
- [20:46]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, well that's what I think Might be a hint that it is actually the same. Or maybe. Maybe there is the one.
- [20:52]
Andrew Shakespeare
I would like to hear it once. And then I'm pretty sure I did everyone's play it again. I do, I do. I want to hear them once and then I'll just file them away in my memory bank. I know, it's awful.
- [21:02]
Marcus Phelan
You can't really do much more apart from just bending a note. You can't really play chords. I mean, maybe that's where it comes from.
- [21:09]
Andrew Shakespeare
You just sound incredibly. I mean, if you. If you actually compare those two versions, it's like in one version. So that one a few months before, you've got the plod, plob, plod where they just sound so, so uninspired. And yet you skip forward to September when they're doing the remake and they do that incredible vers of baby, I don't care which sounds, oh, I don't know. About 20 times more energetic than.
- [21:33]
Marcus Phelan
So John's guitar, he's really. He's really. You can hear that John's casino. Like this is the sound and he's all riffing to the 12bas or stuff. Like he's just playing great.
- [21:44]
Andrew Shakespeare
So the first version sounds opiated and the second one sounds like, I don't know, cocaine was involved but I don't wish to wed spread.
- [21:53]
Marcus Phelan
First version, he's just running through the songs. He started off acoustic guitar with that film clip in the White Album. And it works as acoustic guitar, you know, like playing. And you still see him sort of working out the words and parts. And he starts playing on the electric guitar for that take two. He does the da da da da da da da. But he's the only one doing that. He's the only one doing it on the basic track as well with the fast version. That's one thing. Why you know, it's Paul on bass because he's doing the. And the guitar just plays up and down strokes of John Lennon. Usual style. Yeah, the guitar overdubs. Guitars are overdubs for the. I think it's George and Paul together doing those parts. This sounds like two guitars. So I think George is involved in that song. I think he might be even playing the leads.
- [22:41]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, thankfully we've already covered that song.
- [22:43]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, we go there again.
- [22:44]
Andrew Shakespeare
But yeah, I just don't think the Beatles have been listening to the podcast.
- [22:48]
Marcus Phelan
No. No. Really not gonna. Yeah.
- [22:52]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yes.
- [22:53]
Robert Rodriguez
Well, shall we then start? The first song chronologically is one that. No sooner was the paint starting to dry on our first conversation together than we had this Discussion start on Long Tall Sally in your notes, Andrew, I think you made the case that it was a Beatles ebook that came up with this thing because the two guitar parts are on separate tracks left and right. That.
- [23:18]
Marcus Phelan
Let me see what you said.
- [23:19]
Robert Rodriguez
Although many claim that John plays the first solo and George plays the second one on this recording, careful study of the stereo mix reveals that at least in this case, a single rhythm guitar is panned to the right channel and stays there throughout the entire song. While both solos of the song are heard with the same guitar tone panned to the left channel. The masterful second solo with its building chords can be seen in live footage as played by George. So it can easily be assumed that the studio recording features two lead guitar solos, both played by George.
- [23:54]
Marcus Phelan
Easily assumed if you. If you're Simple Mind. I mean really, it was. It's just beyond a joke. Yeah, I just really bristling when I'm here because it was like for one thing they're not the same sound. They're totally different sound. You can tell that one's Rickenbacker and one's the thicker sound of the Gretch. It's this night and day and it's so easy to see when it's swapped. Basically they created a problem if it was a mono recording. Everyone's seen they've been playing the song live for months and months and months. It's always had the same arrangement. You go on YouTube and you can see John's playing the first solo and. And you wouldn't go into a studio engineer's gonna say okay, you've been doing the song, this arrangement. But unfortunately none of you gonna have played the solos for both. No, it doesn't happen like that. It's just you're creating a problem which isn't there. So it's not. Instead of addressing why the technical reason why they did this, they swapped the guitars for the solos. They just take them the wrong way anyway, looking at it in the wrong direction. We've got to look in why. It's definitely two guitars. Two separate guitars. And for some reason after John's solo when it breaks down part again, they switch. But this is like the mixing desk, the REDD51. I'm not really technical but I had to do a deep dive into the. And ask people about. And looking into the specifications of the desk and stuff and there's panning. You know, people forget you think there's always no panning that are like eight inputs and some. You can have two mics on each but you only could use one at a time for most of the channels. But how to actually reverse. This is amazing thing. They got that reverse stereo switch. So they can just go switch and that track changes panning. That's why it's not done during the recording. Switch channels now. So my theory is the backing track Imagine is just doing a stereo two track live recording. You can pan things like nowadays you can put the drums on the left or right or whatever, vocals in the middle, whatever. That's a decision you can make in your stereo picture for your recording. So my thing is basically that though if they're doing a live recording without the guitars and you just have the bass, drums and vocals getting in a mix and that's going on to two tracks and each guitar. Because maybe it was just. That's the thing about this song. What the special thing about this song is that there's two solos and in case I don't want to mess it up one guitarist. We'd have to go do the song again like Twist and Shout, you know, do someone messes up or whatever. We'll get into better take but maybe think, well we've got a great band take. Maybe the guitar Jong might mess up or whatever. So put on a separate track. Guitars get their own tracks so that you can mix it, you know when you can put it up and whatever and change it so. And when it comes to mixing, for some reason they think the left thing is the feature where the most of the band is and we switch over. The solo is always going to be on the left side for some. I don't know. We don't. We're not there. But it's definitely John on one guitar. Because when it changes over he does the same bending things for that. Because George has a, you know, climb up and that swaps. It's two guitars and they swapped after John solo. George is on the left and John is on the right and it stays where it is. So to me it's probably recorded as a two track backing track with the piano drums there in a stereo picture. They stay where they are. You know, it's not hard left. Nothing's really hard. Like listen to vocals and drums. It's like 30% whatever. So it's. Or even not even that. So it's like center left. So if you're going to have like. Oh, everything's got a direct. The panning and the channel is, you know. So you're going to have the one channel. Everything's going to be directly left. And if you're right. It's not like that. It's a stereo. They do things in stereo, like classical mixing. You don't have, you know, something hard left and hard right. There's always stuff in the middle.
- [27:47]
Robert Rodriguez
Is there any double tracking on that track?
- [27:48]
Marcus Phelan
No, there's one take. Yeah.
- [27:50]
Robert Rodriguez
Live. So with your four tracks, which they would have been using by 64 when they tracked.
- [27:55]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. This is the first songs that George Martin had mixed on this desk. So they were learning things. And I got this information from certain people. I got to inquire who. Nerds. I'm not a really technical person, as you can gather.
- [28:07]
Robert Rodriguez
Yeah.
- [28:07]
Marcus Phelan
And so I had tried to get my head around it. But like I was trying to picture like if I was recording now like a live track on two channels as you do, you can put guitars side to the left and right and that sort of stuff like that. You can picture things. They could do it as well for them. So if they were doing like a two track live recording, you could have piano on the right. Whatever is how you picture it. But that's why do you think the.
- [28:27]
Robert Rodriguez
Guitars each had their own track?
- [28:29]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, I think so. I think that's the only way.
- [28:31]
Robert Rodriguez
Vocal on another track and then bass, piano, drums.
- [28:34]
Marcus Phelan
On one track you've got eight mics and they get heaps of mics into groups. Like they can group tracks. The four channels are like group tracks where you can put, you know, a whole lot of one track. You can have four instruments or five whatever. How many microphones you go. They all go into that one and you can use the second one. So they're like. Yeah. And it goes into the tape machine. But so yeah, it's basically like they could pan, you know, it was like the decision to. Even when they're doing the two track recording. Please please me, they got high vocals on the right and on the back. That's more this decision because they're. It's for mono. So you've got more control and the vocals aren't. Nothing's really separate. You can still hear the band, whether it's spill or the reverb that's being channeled to one side. So it's not like just one vocal on the side that you can hear the guitar and band stuff like that. So there is a kind of stereo mix. But it's just to have more control over the mono mix so we can make sure the vocals don't get buried. We've got more to play with. So if you track the four track, it's the same thing. If you're just recording onto two tracks, the main band on that track, if the guitars muck up, we don't have to do the whole track again. We could go and do the guitar solos again. That's how I see it. This is a practical approach to thinking, oh, well, you know, so Paul doesn't have to sing it again a few more times.
- [29:54]
Robert Rodriguez
Or his voice out like.
- [29:55]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, voice out like that. Yeah, you know, we got a great take before, but, you know, someone stuffed up on guitar, so. Okay, John, you can have your own track. George, have your own track. Everything else is basically live takes.
- [30:07]
Robert Rodriguez
Andrew, did you want to jump in?
- [30:08]
Andrew Shakespeare
So at the end of our last taping, I just happened to mention what Beetle Book said and Marcus, you exploded with an expletive.
- [30:18]
Marcus Phelan
I'm holding myself back now.
- [30:19]
Andrew Shakespeare
Okay, so what that did is it went. I went, oh, okay. So I wanted to sort of have an exploration as to. As to what actually happened and why I might have the beliefs that I had. And I didn't really have a firm belief, I guess, that strictly speaking, when you listen to the original stereo mixes, particularly the ones where instruments you would probably have, say, typically three to four instruments combined on one track and then you'd have other tracks devoted or whatever. In this particular instance, clearly you've got guitar, bass and drums on one track. You would appear to have piano and another guitar on another track. And you've got a solitary.
- [31:02]
Marcus Phelan
No, you don't have a piano because piano would move as well. So if a guitar changed, the piano would change as well. It can't be on the same track.
- [31:11]
Andrew Shakespeare
I just wanted to put forward a few.
- [31:13]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. So how things.
- [31:15]
Andrew Shakespeare
So the first thing is like, had made. I had sort of had some kind of long held belief that George played both solos. Now, before anybody jumps in, I discovered why I had this. This long held belief. And it was because way back in the. I read Carr and Tyler's Illustrated record and in that. This. I read this as an impressionable, you know, Second Gen fan. And it marveled at George's excellent solo in Longtool Sally. There was no mention of John solo at all. Now, keep in mind that at this stage I hadn't even heard the song. I didn't own all the albums and that was sort of a bit of an obscure track. I think the first time I heard it was when the Rock and Roll Collection was release. Released and then I bought a copy of my own. When the Blue Rarities thing from the box set came out separately in about 1980, I think it was already one. So that's when I finally heard it for myself. But I'd never really given much consideration to who played what solo, because I'd never seen any live clips of them playing it. Then I started to see live clips and as part of the research for this, I went and looked at every single live clip that I could find. And yes, sure enough, John plays the first solo, George plays the second. John does his little double stop bends in the verses. So long tall cell, those little bends that he does. And then in the last verse, George Harrison, quite visibly in the songs, does a little chromatic run up from F to G. So, well, long tall Sally built for speed so that's a George thing. We see him play that in clips. So it's quite obvious to me that the both of them played the solos. But this seems to be the only example of a song where the original stereo mix, where the guitars swap. Where they swap in the mix. Now, to my way of thinking, another source says that only three of the four tracks were used and bass, drums and guitar were on one. Piano and guitar were simultaneously played live and those were sent to another track. And then you have the vocal and so that's the three components. However, in the middle of the song, after the first solo, for the beginning of the third verse, the guitars quite clearly swap places in the stereo spectrum. So the question. No, it doesn't, it stays there. So the question then becomes, well, how is this possible? So I don't know if it's technically possible, but I would think that if you've got three components, say on track one, and that's the basic track, then if the input for each of those instruments would then get sent to track one, so bass, drums, guitar, those inputs are sent to track one to be on track one. Yeah. Then you would have inputs for the other guitar and the piano to be sent to track two, and then Paul's vocal is sent to track three. So this seems the most likely scenario, but I don't actually know if it's technically possible. If halfway through the song, can the signals be resent. Swapped? This is during the recording, resent to different channels, so swapped. So that's one of the questions. I think that's how it could have been done, if that is technically possible. But then you have the question of, well, why would they do that? Is it because they wanted to highlight the solos on the basic track? That's a little bit unusual because normally the solos by that stage, like with Can't Find Me Love, a few Months before, there was overdubbing, there was doubling, that solo was doubled. So my theory, maybe it's just a theory, is that maybe the solos were put on the left with a view to them being doubled at some stage. Maybe, maybe. And there was a spare track there for that to happen if they actually decided to do that. But in the event they decided that they needed a one take only and they didn't need to go any further with it. So if you think that the tracks that the guitars were being sent to could be swapped and they could just be rerouted to different tracks during the recording of the song, then that would explain the original stereo mix, that would explain the placements. So that's the closest to a theory that I've come up to. I mean, the whole thing of who played the solos, it's a slam dunk. We know that John played the first solo and George played the second. The confusing. The muddying of the Waters is partly because illustrated record. But I'm sure a lot of people don't even remember that book. I certainly do. Turns out I reread it for the first time in decades and remembered every word. So that muddied the Waters for me the first time because it didn't even mention John playing solo. And then the second thing is this whole thing of listening to the stereomics and reading Beatles ebooks and what they're saying is incorrect. But we still have that question of, well, how did the guitars swap? So that's a theory that I have that maybe they were just sent to different tracks during the recording process. Possibly with the view to double tracking. I don't know.
- [36:18]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, I don't think so. Can't Buy My love it's another thing. It's just. Yeah, I don't know why they had. They did another solo anyway, but probably because it was better. But they had lots of overdubs on that like I had hired, because the tape deteriorated in Paris. So the story is that Norman Smith added some height. They had to do some overdubs on that to basically fix it up. But for this one, going into the technical details of looking up the desks they had going from the 37 to the 51. It's all different aspects of it reading, saying, like there's the pan switch, where you switch and it reverses pans, it changes pan. This was a device on it. They had a stereo spreader. This whole thing about individual tracks and it's all either one way or middle or left. They're doing actually stereo picture for a lot of things, but just that there's not the same stereo pictures that we're used to these days. So for some reason they want to have the drums slightly to the left or whatever, so they can do that with stereo track grouping in stereo. So that's my theory anyway. I just think technically, finding out that there is a switch where you switch it in a mix or maybe record and maybe did the recording, I don't know. I think. I think it's something you. You do in the mix because you can just. I don't know. They think, well, we. We got the solos coming out of the one side. I don't know why, but finding out that there is a technical thing where flicking the switch or whatever, you can change the panning. To me, that was like, that's a eureka moment.
- [37:44]
Robert Rodriguez
But to your ears, it's absolutely a discernible difference between the two guitars.
- [37:48]
Marcus Phelan
It's absolutely like. Yeah, Sam. Yeah. As Andrew was saying, the. The bendy guitar goes on, changes things. So, yeah, it's just totally, totally. There's no question. I'm just 100 sure, you know, they would do it as they've been doing it, as you do it. You know, I went researching, I went sort of look at those Beadle books and all that kind of stuff online and there's people like, really like saying, oh, it's a slam dunk. You know, it's one person doing in the one guitar. Of course, it's all on the left and has the same tone. And you go like, no, it hasn't got the same tone. It's ridiculous.
- [39:05]
Andrew Shakespeare
It is unprecedented, though.
- [39:07]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [39:07]
Andrew Shakespeare
It is unprecedented in their canon that the guitar suddenly swapped sides. That's a very unusual thing. And especially for their early recordings where they had rhythm tracks lumped into on usually all assigned to one track. It's unprecedented that suddenly guitars swap places in the stereo spectrum. So that's why.
- [39:27]
Marcus Phelan
I don't know. That's why I haven't really listened to it. It depends. Like, I haven't really listened to all that ep, but apparently, like, this is the first time they got to use the desk and just don't know what's going. They're still sorting it out and maybe this is learning ropes, but it's a technical thing. That's the thing. It's not a musical thing to me. Musical problem. We know who's playing what because they're playing what they do on live and it's exactly the sound and everything. So the question is, like, why they change this anomaly that's all it's just an anomaly. It's just like a mystery in the technical space. So when he's there saying, oh, we just had this thing where we just. The sols was coming out on one side, so we just flipped the switch. So.
- [40:08]
Robert Rodriguez
But there's not too many songs in 1964 the Beatles recorded where there's two different solos by two different guitar players.
- [40:14]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, one. So I was just thinking like, well, we're going to do this, so we get it right and supporters have to sing it again and Ringo doesn't have to play again. So we just haven't got time. We've got four tracks. Yeah, well, let's put guitars on separate tracks and then if you're doing a live thing, the vocals would happen the same time. You could all go in the same two tracks. I mean, that's how to do it live.
- [40:36]
Andrew Shakespeare
I don't know why this textbook source.
- [40:39]
Marcus Phelan
That I have says three tracks.
- [40:41]
Andrew Shakespeare
It says that only three tracks were used. It must be said for a reason. It's not explained why. It just says that only three tracks were needed.
- [40:50]
Robert Rodriguez
And the source for that is what, an EMI logbook or something?
- [40:54]
Andrew Shakespeare
I don't know, because it doesn't matter.
- [40:56]
Robert Rodriguez
I'd be very curious about where that came from.
- [40:59]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, I don't know. And until there's a box set released of that song on it, we may not get to see a tape box. But I don't know why. That said, but the original stereo mix that bears that out, because you've got a whole bunch of stuff to the hard left. Bass, drums, guitar. You've got a whole bunch of stuff for the hard right, another guitar and piano. And then you've got one solitary vocal in the middle. I can only hear three tracks being used. And that's. I guess that's the Beauty of the 2009 stereo mixes, or which are really just remastered original mixes anyway. But the great thing about those is that you can hear where the tracks themselves are placed in the stereo spec. And it's really useful with songs that we're going to get onto later. Particularly, I think Rain was an example that we're going to get to where the four tracks are in very distinct places on the stereo spectrum. You need one over there, one slightly to the left, one slightly to the right, and then one way over to the right. So the 2009 masters are very, very useful in this way. The remixes are not very useful at all because they've melled the elements and taken them out of the tracks that they were assigned to. So in terms of scholarship, that's not actually very useful because it doesn't really say how the.
- [42:20]
Marcus Phelan
Where the tracks were assigned. It's quite deceptive for us that people understand the ADT for like two guitars.
- [42:27]
Andrew Shakespeare
That is true. So on YouTube if you go to the isolated tracks, that can be really useful. Can be really useful. You hear things you didn't hear. It's quite amazing really. But it can also be very unuseful because everybody's using MEL type separation software to do these things these days. And so you hear a bunch of things that are separated from the track that they were originally assigned to. So that's not particularly useful either. But so sometimes these things are useful and sometimes. Generally the 2009 stereo masters are probably the most reliable, the reliable source for these things I'm finding.
- [43:05]
Robert Rodriguez
And ultimately this is knowable knowledge. If one gains access to the multi track tape where you could see for yourself, are there three tracks filled here or four?
- [43:16]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yes, that's right. And in this case the 2009, it sounds very clearly to me like there's only three tracks used when. Which means that the textbook that I have would appear to be correct.
- [43:28]
Marcus Phelan
Why did he say only three tracks? I can't work it out. How can you determine?
- [43:32]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, there's two reasons. The first is this textbook says for whatever reason, only three tracks to use.
- [43:40]
Marcus Phelan
I'm forgetting about that for textbook. Just for how you can hear something and say that's.
- [43:44]
Andrew Shakespeare
I don't know why that writer is saying that. I don't know why they are just saying that. They probably have a reason for saying it. I'm not privy to that. But also I'm just using my ears and the original 2009 mixes, I can hear three tracks being used. Granted you could have a fourth track that was sent way over to the right as well. I don't know. Possibly regardless of that, you still have guitar, bass and drum lock to when they did.
- [44:12]
Marcus Phelan
Like when they first used four track recording, like I want to hold your hand. I mean they use the whole tracks. And even if they're doing something live, I just think. Yeah, I don't know, I just can't see how when you can't do it my way. Like, you know, guitars in each track you got four tracks.
- [44:27]
Andrew Shakespeare
I think another interesting point here is that, you know, I never thought we'd be going back to long tall Sally to look at anything because it is.
- [44:36]
Marcus Phelan
Interesting that the stereo thing is an interesting aspect of it. That's the only interesting thing of. Yeah.
- [44:42]
Andrew Shakespeare
And It's a great educator. If we were just talking about mono, we'd just be going, oh, yeah, great song. And if you happen to see a live clip, you go, oh, yeah, they both play the solos. Wouldn't be a problem. The problem comes because there's a 2009 Stereomaster that is a little confusing because the guitars swap. If you're aware that two people play the solos, then you know that the guitars swap. So then the question.
- [45:04]
Marcus Phelan
Anomaly.
- [45:05]
Andrew Shakespeare
It's a total anomaly. I've listened to their catalog forever and I can't hear another instance, particularly in those early days, where guitars or parts are rerouted to other tracks, seemingly during a recording. Yeah, so it's a. It's a bit of a strange one. I never thought we'd be finding a strange one this early in their career, but. Well, indeed we have.
- [45:27]
Robert Rodriguez
All right, so let's go to the end of 1964 and the Beatles For Sale sessions. I Don't Want To Spoil the Party. A song that, again, has had a bit of dispute about the vocals in terms of the harmonies and the verses versus the harmonies in the chorus, as it were.
- [45:44]
Andrew Shakespeare
So the first thing that I found in my research here was that, as you said at the beginning, Robert Paul said that Ringo did a great job of singing the song that John wrote for him. Well, turns out Ringo didn't want to.
- [45:56]
Marcus Phelan
Sing It's Got don't in It. So, yeah, that don't song. Right. It's the Ringo song.
- [46:01]
Andrew Shakespeare
So the second thing is. So if I go through chronologically, you know, Lewison and Karen Tyler and MacDonald, they don't have anything useful to say about this at all. Beatley Books says two overdubs were needed afterwards, one of which was John singing his harmony with himself in the verses. The Beatles Bible says exactly the same thing. So when you sort of skip to a textbook source, it's referred to as a dual lead vocal. And there's references to the Everly Brothers, so kind of seeming to indicate this song is mostly a duet. It also says that the acoustic bass and drums were all on one track. George's electric was alone on one track, and simultaneous vocals were recorded on another track. And those vocals were John and Paul. And then there was an overdub of Ringo doing tambourine at the same time as backing vocals by John, Paul and George were being done. And that is the oohs that happen on the third line of each verse. Now, if you listen really closely to those backing vocals, they're three parts. It's a three part harmony. So it's clearly John, Paul and George doing the backing vocal. So I think the thing is, is that this lower vocal, the one that goes under the main line in the verses, it's very John like. It is very John like. And I had made an assumption for a long time that it was John. But then again, a lot of people listened to come together and went, that must be John harmonising with himself on that low line in the verse. And I think that's partly because it's actually really, really unusual, very rare for Paul to take the lower line in a duet, in a harmony. But when he did, he kind of seemed to go for this thing of almost trying to mirror John or trying to match him. In my listening to this, listening very closely, there's some isolated tracks on YouTube and I listened very closely and I'm pretty sure now, particularly at the end of the second verse, that I can hear Paul singing that lower part. And logically, to me it would make sense, seeing as that two vocals were recorded at the same time and they were John and Paul, that the song was in fact a duet, except for one line in each verse where they superimposed three part oohs. So that's what I've come to. I think it is a John and Paul duet and Paul just sounds pretty like John.
- [48:37]
Marcus Phelan
You're right.
- [48:38]
Robert Rodriguez
So to take a step back where we might have for years before we had the information, we have now assumed that John was duetting with himself doing bottom and top part. Because John normally, traditionally, typically did the lower part of a two part harmony, but he's clearly singing the top part as well. But now we know it was recorded simultaneously on one track. John can't clone himself, therefore it has to be Paul. Clearly it's not John doing the lead on top vocal, so Paul has to be doing the bottom.
- [49:08]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, not quite, because theoretically, I'm talking.
- [49:12]
Robert Rodriguez
About in the verses. Bridge.
- [49:13]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yeah, well, in the verses, when that kind of three part overdub was being done, it is possible that John could have sung the lower part and then they all did the oohs and then he went back to the lower part. So technically it's possible. It's possible when the duet was being done, that Paul only chipped in on the bridges. That is possible too, but I don't think it's very likely that Paul and John were standing there at one mic singing and then Paul just joined in at the bridges and John just sang solo for the rest of it. Why would they even bother having the both of them Recorded simultaneously. That's going to be the case. I think they would just do Paul as an overdub.
- [49:53]
Marcus Phelan
But when you actually listen to it, it's Paul. It's so Paul closely listen to it. Is very, very poor. And he also comes in late. When he goes, I still love her. I had a drink or two. You notice like a lot of time he doesn't come in because he's going from the high. I still love her. I had a drink or two. And I don't care. It comes late. If you're doubling it, you'll be spot on.
- [50:18]
Andrew Shakespeare
So John was a notoriously crappy double tracker.
- [50:27]
Marcus Phelan
Like, people say, like, use that amazing double tracker anyway. But I disagree. But. Well, he was.
- [50:32]
Andrew Shakespeare
But he also got words mixed up. I think he's got boy and girl.
- [50:37]
Marcus Phelan
Like, listen to. Slow down. Like, they both. I mean, police, Please me. Yeah. They all get their words wrong in that situation. But when you. I know. Doing your own song by this stage. But, like, really, it's one of the things where. Yes, you can. You think it's John. Like, you just listen to the whole thing. But listen to isolated tracks and listen closely. And more you listen to it, you go like, wow, that is so Paul. And you can hear him go from. That's the thing. You hear him go from the high to the. It's great. And coming in slightly late. Especially in the last. Like, I had a drink. I can't remember what line it is. But this is the first line. Misses the first line a couple. Couple of times. And that's from coming up high. He's just kind of. But yeah, like.
- [51:17]
Andrew Shakespeare
And it was recorded very quick.
- [51:19]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. It's one of those things where, like, I wouldn't, you know, I assume. Yeah, I agree. Yeah. It's just John doubling himself. It's like. It's so.
- [51:26]
Andrew Shakespeare
I always heard it as a John Self duet. I heard it because I think that Paul does an amazing job of matching.
- [51:32]
Marcus Phelan
He's a great mimic. He's a great mimic. Like, he can even do.
- [51:37]
Andrew Shakespeare
I muddied my own waters yeah, yeah.
- [51:39]
Marcus Phelan
Though tonight she's made me sad I still love her if I find her I'll be glad I still love her Though I've had a drink or two.
- [51:57]
Andrew Shakespeare
And I don't care there's no fun.
- [52:00]
Marcus Phelan
In what I do if she's not there I wonder what went wrong Waited far too long But I think I'll.
- [52:11]
Andrew Shakespeare
Take a walk and look for her.
- [52:14]
Marcus Phelan
But, like, it's understandable. I always thought sounded like him doing itself. And Reading those books and saying that. But this is like when you actually go to analyze these things of what we're doing, you find that maybe there's more to it than what we're told or what we thought.
- [52:29]
Andrew Shakespeare
Right.
- [52:30]
Robert Rodriguez
You're compelled to. When you have the more information, it tells you what the track breakdown is, which we didn't have, you know, all these years of listening. So that makes you be a little bit more receptive to other possibilities. And how would these pieces fit together now that we've got these constraints?
- [52:47]
Andrew Shakespeare
So it's nice to be in agreement on that one. That was great.
- [52:50]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, yeah.
- [52:51]
Robert Rodriguez
So now skipping to end of 65. Rubber Soul Michelle being a song that I think there's considerably a lot more dispute about this that has had Waters muddied, including the theory that Paul is playing virtually everything on the track. Andrew, since you've got these at hand, what you produced in advance, feel free. Do the setup.
- [53:16]
Andrew Shakespeare
Okay. So just sort of going sort of chronologically through the evidence. Kind of funny. You go back to Karen Tyler's illustrated record. Doesn't say who played what. Not useful. However, quite amusingly describes the song as flatulent and sugary. So that's nice. That's nice. Sounds like a great duo flatulence. That's great. I like the Nerc Twins. Yeah. So if we skip ahead to Lewison, we see he refers to the lead vocal being an overdub that was witnessed by a tape op as well as George Martin. Then we Skip to Ian MacDonald and we get the first real. I don't know, there's assumptions that we could have made about the song. But anyway, the first one where you sort of go where Ian MacDonald says that Paul played all the stringed instruments and that John and George only added back in toggle. So that's kind of interesting. Then we go to a textbook that I have and it contradicts the evidence that we have by so far by saying that tracks one and two were recorded simultaneously and track one consisted of Paul on acoustic and Ringo on drums. So Paul playing his own song that he wrote on guitar and demoed on guitar and have been playing for years. And Ringo on drums.
- [54:39]
Robert Rodriguez
Which is logical.
- [54:40]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yes, it's logical. While singing his lead vocal on track two. And apparently all of this was done in one take. It's a one take one that I wasn't really aware of, but there you go. So apparently the first overdub was Paul doing the guitar solo on his casino, followed by the bass. Then the last overdub was a bit of acoustic.
- [55:02]
Marcus Phelan
Doubling a little bit of acoustic. You do the bass second.
- [55:06]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, I'm just quoting a textbook here. So doubling the harmonies and all of this contradicts what the previous thing had said about all the acoustic guitars being recorded simultaneously. Also, where are the doubled harmonies? I don't actually hear any doubled harmonies, but apparently the harmonies were doubled, but I don't hear them, so. Yeah, that's right. Looking at the isolated tracks on YouTube, they don't really help very much. So look, for me, as I said before, Paul wrote the song on acoustic, he practiced on acoustic. I think it makes total sense that he and Ringo just played it for the basic track. And then later, that little rundown you were playing before Marcus, do you want to play that? That's the one. Yes. So, yeah, thank you. So that's the bit that's doubled on acoustic. And why would it not be Paul? It makes total sense. It's exactly the same sound. Paul played it, he doubled it in those bits. But then we come to the bass, we know it's Paul. He was very proud of his quote, unquote, Bizet thing. We know it's Paul. So when it comes to the solo, George Martin said that he composed that solo and that he showed George how to play it and that they both played it simultaneously and the piano was off mic. So you've got George being recorded but playing in unison with.
- [56:39]
Robert Rodriguez
So the piano that he's playing simultaneous with him was for what, the purpose of keeping him on track or something?
- [56:44]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, it's because George Martin wrote the solo on piano, demonstrated it to George and then they played it in unison, but the piano off mic so that George could follow what George Martin.
- [56:56]
Marcus Phelan
I don't believe that at all. I just think once you learn it. Once you learn it, you just do it, right?
- [57:01]
Robert Rodriguez
If you're not going to hear the.
- [57:02]
Marcus Phelan
Piano, George Martin doesn't play guitar. So he demonstrate the notes and, you know, George would do it, I think.
- [57:08]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, the only reason I would maybe contradict that is to say that why would George Martin say this? Why would he say this?
- [57:16]
Robert Rodriguez
Because he said that they played your Feet's too big at emi and we know that's not true.
- [57:21]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, yeah, but that's a little different in this case. He's got a very specific recollection of composing the solo, teaching it to George and playing it with him off mic whilst George recorded it.
- [57:33]
Robert Rodriguez
The first two points I have no problem with. The third one doesn't make any sense to me.
- [57:37]
Andrew Shakespeare
I guess my feeling after sort of Considering all this is that I do believe it's Paul and Ringo doing track one together. Even though the textbook says that the lead vocal was done simultaneously. I don't think that's very likely because we've got eyewitnesses there. Two people who are talking about remembering seeing him doing the lead vocal as an overdub. And it's on a separate track. So I'm kind of varying it towards the lead vocal being an overdub.
- [58:07]
Marcus Phelan
See, there's lots of pitches. That's the thing. It's one of those sessions which is really well photographed. Okay. And the thing is, everyone involved is holding a guitar. Whether they actually ended up playing parts on it. I think they did because John's playing nylon string. George is going from a 12 string to whatever. And there's a Stratocaster leaning against a chair. Whatever though with a caper on fifth fret, which to me. And I did a video with the solo played on the Strat capo'd with the tone. Middle pickup, the setting tone down and been distorted and like that was it. That was the sound. I feel like I got it. Nailed it completely. So George played it.
- [58:48]
Robert Rodriguez
Is there anything else we know from the Rubber Soul sessions that would have been played on a guitar cabled at the fifth fret?
- [58:54]
Marcus Phelan
That's the thing about this session. Everything's at the fifth fret. The bass is played on the fifth fret, which is like. I don't know if he ever did it again. I think he did Tomorrow Never Knows third fret. So it can play at a C octave. And so it's not unusual for Paul to experiment with. That was the first time he actually put. He mentions that he put a capo on a bass.
- [59:14]
Robert Rodriguez
And these are the first sessions where he's using the Rickenbacker bass.
- [59:17]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, yeah.
- [59:17]
Robert Rodriguez
So.
- [59:18]
Marcus Phelan
And so because it was written in C, you know, so it's easy to just transpose it up to F. And that's why we're guitars. I mean, even the lead guitar capoed at the fifth fret. So you can play like C. And it has the gritty chord and which is the. The great Frenchness of it. Gives that distortion which he uses in Stepping Inside Love as well. So I see the song is basically. Yeah, Paul did the basic track with the acoustic guitar and the drums. And John on a nylon string. You can hear it just reinforcing that descending thing. They do that sort of thing where they just highlight chromatic thing or something like that just to do it. And the harmonies definitely Double tracked. I do harmonies all the time. And sometimes you got to do double. You know, if you're doing oohs and sometimes triple times and you do it so closely that you don't really notice it. But like, I have replicated those vocals before years ago when I had to do a backing track for Michelle and had to cheat and put the backing vocals on because it's very hard to kind of singing. Basically the low note plays like the Dino while the melody plays the D flat. It's kind of with that chord you can sort of put you off. But it's a thick sound that when you're doing those ooze, you really want to double track them to get them really, really thick. Yeah, it bounce down. So it's a process of doing it. It's just a certain standard thing to do to kind of make them really, really solid. And they. They're too thick to be just the one pass.
- [60:45]
Andrew Shakespeare
So the interesting thing though here is you've got Beatles ebook saying that their harmonies were doubled and then they were bounced down to one track. But then you've got the textbook which has all the track separations, which doesn't actually have a record of doubled harmonies at all. So unless the textbook has missed out a step of harmonies being doubled and then bounced, it only actually has a record of the harmonies being done once. It is also missing the John rundown on the classical guitar at the same time. Well, yes, that's what I was going to say. So I think that it's missed out. It's not there.
- [61:21]
Marcus Phelan
His textbooks, they weren't there. That's the thing. No one was there. That's the thing. People who are actually writing these things as things like we can go by the photographic evidence that they were really involved in the song. So even to do like Foot on the Hill, John plays guitar on that one and like little bits and pieces here and there. But. And it was.
- [61:38]
Andrew Shakespeare
He suggested the best song.
- [61:41]
Marcus Phelan
It was like he said, paul, bring it. So he obviously liked the song and he created the great I love you, I love you part. So It's a Lennon McCartney song. So Lennon want to be a part of it. I'm sure he knows how to play the chords and the bridge. He came up with them and so why wouldn't. He probably came up with the descending thing too. I don't know. But it's just one of those things where, okay, you're doing one guitar, he's double up someone else playing it.
- [62:05]
Andrew Shakespeare
I agree. That's what happened.
- [62:07]
Marcus Phelan
It's no mystery. I think that's a big deal. And to me it's like.
- [62:10]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, it kind of is if there's information out there that's incorrect.
- [62:14]
Marcus Phelan
So we have a textbook here that everything's incorrect. That's the thing. Because it's just making assumptions. Everyone's making assumptions over time and educated guesses maybe, but unless you sort of there during the process of doing it and remember it, I mean they're just doing, trying to be fast and we're.
- [62:31]
Andrew Shakespeare
Doing the best we can.
- [62:32]
Marcus Phelan
But it's to me, I listen to it and like the harm is. And go. Yeah, I can tell it's doubled because it's just, you can tell it's just thicker and just do that sometime. You sort of do it early. I suppose they really worked on the song. So yeah, I don't really know the textbooks sort of have to do with it really.
- [62:50]
Robert Rodriguez
No problem with George playing the solo, right?
- [62:53]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [62:53]
Robert Rodriguez
It's not Paul doing.
- [62:54]
Marcus Phelan
No. Yes, George definitely doing the solo. Because that's the thing seeing the strap there in the pictures a few times and they, you know, they're using the Strat quite a lot. Those rubber sole. Basically every song's got capo on it. Yeah.
- [63:06]
Andrew Shakespeare
The other thing about that is that Ian McDonald was the first person who ever suggested that it was Paul doing all the stringed instruments. So where did he get that from? We have no idea.
- [63:17]
Marcus Phelan
He got it from his own opinion because he's a writer and he's using his imagination and a lot of people really dig that book. And I know it's brought up as a kind of encyclopedia bible, but it's just the guy writing very well written. I haven't read it for ages. And it's just his opinion like you go through it, I bet 90% of it is wrong. I reckon if I went through it, I think yeah, that's wrong, that's wrong. That's wrong because he's just making like everyone's doing, they're making assumptions. Until we got all these outtakes and isolated tracks. A lot of it was in the mists of time was became legend and you don't know why. But if the primary source is wrong, as I said last time, last podcast talking about the George Martin book Summer of Love, the Making of sergeant Pepper. It's a ghost written book and that's the source for a lot of the like for the science Pepper reprise. What we're going to talk about, for fixing a hole as we talked about the last time and you read it and it's total fiction. There's nothing relates to reality. Comparing it to the outtakes and the audio things that we know until it's not his voice, it's a quickie sort of written thing, and it's somehow or other you can actually analyze it now in like, closely as we were doing. It doesn't stand up to reality. It doesn't. So that's the primary source and it's what Shoes Double Horse use. But be the books, be the Bible, whatever they all use for fixing a hole in the Sgt. Pepper reprise, that is the primary source. So that's where you got all the myths coming from. And when those myths have been demolished as we get more information about the actual outtakes and isolated tracks and that sort of thing. So a lot of things are up for grabs. So, yeah, I'm sorry, but Ian MacDonald, I do not classify him as reliable witness in any of this sort of stuff. He's a great writer and he's got great pins and they're beautifully written stuff. But as a technical thing, let's just put him away.
- [65:06]
Andrew Shakespeare
Paul McCartney corrected him for good reason.
- [65:09]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [65:10]
Andrew Shakespeare
And, you know, I think the only reason there's any debate about this solo is because Ian McDonald suggested that Paul played all the stringed instruments.
- [65:18]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [65:19]
Andrew Shakespeare
And really that's about.
- [65:21]
Robert Rodriguez
Based on nothing we can discern.
- [65:24]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. But his assumption, it was an enjoyable.
- [65:27]
Robert Rodriguez
Read in the 90s, back when we had fewer things to read.
- [65:31]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [65:32]
Robert Rodriguez
And I know it was very. It made a big impression on a lot of people, but it was the kind of thing that when I started returning to it after acquiring further knowledge, I found it harder and harder to read. And it's like it really plummeted in my esteem over the years as better sources came out. For sure.
- [65:49]
Andrew Shakespeare
Just that final thing about Michelle is It's not just MacDonald saying that Paul played all the stringed instruments. It's also the textbook is saying the same thing. The textbook is saying the same thing. The textbook, it's another source that we have available to us.
- [66:07]
Marcus Phelan
There's lots of sources for this.
- [66:09]
Andrew Shakespeare
But that textbook also misses out the John doing that chromatic rundown.
- [66:15]
Marcus Phelan
It's like no big deal, but it's just basically, you can hear the some people who've done videos, like Mike Pacelli, who does some really good ones. I went looked at his one and he like, definitely had the nylon string doing the chromatic part. And like, it sounded like, man, it sounds right. It just sounds right. Good on him, you know, like, he did it right. In my thinking anyway. I see Little videos, I think they do it all wrong. And even if some of these stuff has been wrong, but on this one, I was thinking, wow, that's. That's really good. So it convinced me anyway, you know, and, like, going to listen to again, like, yeah, I can hear that nylon string doing a chromatic thing. And as I can hear the second guitar, which is obviously Paul as well. So Paul's doing the main acoustic guitar parts twice. Or mainly the chorus or twice, whatever, but. And George is doing the solo on the Strat, according to me. And. Yes. I don't know. This whole myth thing of Paul being this auteur, just doing everything. I know, it's just like, come on. Like, it's a John and Paul song. Like Rain. Like Rain. Like the same thing. We go.
- [67:46]
Andrew Shakespeare
Can I just go back to finishing my sentence? So the textbook says that Paul played all the stringed instruments. It also misses out John doing that chromatic rundown. And if the backing vocals were indeed doubled and then bounced to one track, it misses that out too. So that's that room for revision. And of course, we don't have anything from Howlett on that yet, so that'll be interesting when it comes, if it ever comes. I guess I have a little theory here that with the proliferation of remixes, amateur remixes coming onto YouTube these days, I'm wondering if Apple have sort of backtracked from the idea of doing box sets at all, because what's the point in hearing remixes or paying for remixes when everybody out there can do all the.
- [68:32]
Marcus Phelan
Well, there won't be any outtakes for this one because they did it in, like, the first take. It's the thing, as he's saying, so it's on the four track, so it's complete. We've got a complete package there. So there's no sort of thing, oh, we can hit. Listen to this in stages. I probably could go to the four tracks and, yeah, if they do, that'd be great. So you can't really tell, you can't really prove that the vocals were done twice because it's. It's there, embedded. I can only take it from my listening, using my ears and think, well, yes, I know, I can hear that. I think, yeah, that's doubled. I can't trace it technically. I can't go back to a textbook and say, like, this is where they did it, whatever, that. It's a process where you're just doing it, building up the tracks and you sort of leaving one spare, whatever, maybe bouncing down to another. But sometimes you dump down to two tracks and sometimes put it back again at that stage. But I just don't go with as Paul as a sort of thing. You look at the sessions photographs that are really involved. They're all there. John playing guitar. John co wrote the song. It's his song as well. He wrote a great part and so of course he wants to be playing on it. Like even if it's just chromatic thing weren't there. And it's very hard to unscramble that egg when it's already put together the process. You can't tell what stage who did what. I think the bass would probably come before harmonies. That sort of stuff like that. You kind of do like that. I don't know. But I can just listen to it and think, yeah, that's doubled harmony. And I can hear the chromatic doubling up. And other people hear that sort of too. Like when I look at Mike Bocelli and he goes, yeah, he does that. And you're like. And I think, well, yeah, it's. It sounds right. So Yeah, I discount McDonald and all these textbooks or whatever. It's a band thing. They are all involved. And that's my theory and I'm sticking with it.
- [70:17]
Robert Rodriguez
Next on the list is we can work it out.
- [70:18]
Marcus Phelan
Well, I think. Okay, I think the contentious thing is like that Paul plays the guitar and there's John on the tambourine and then George on the bass. That's my contentious thing listening to.
- [70:29]
Robert Rodriguez
And George Martin on harmonium.
- [70:31]
Marcus Phelan
No, no, I think that's an overdub. Like that's John during the overdub, definitely. Okay. But for the basic track, those songs around the Rubber Soul album, this is around the time of Michelle, like the week before or like around the same time. I'm looking through you. That's also like within days of this recording. It's the sort of thing where the songwriter will come in with a song and play it. My reason why I first got sort of inklings that perhaps George was on bass many years ago. Watching the video. Because I did quite a few videos or three video of this song. There's only one or two up there at the moment. I was noticing that George was playing, doubling up the bass for the bridge. Life is very short. Another time, Fasting Fire and the I always thought party goes this sort of part. And also that's interesting. He's doubling up the bass. And when I was playing in a tribute band, I always thought like, what am I? I'm just playing the country gent and the John Lindham guys doing the acoustic guitar as you're doing live. I was something to do. I can double up. At least I can do what George does on the film clip, I think, oh, well, that's interesting. And then listening to the isolated tracks come out and like the bass. Because at the same time, isolated tracks, they had like Day Tripper done around the same sessions. You compare the bass sound and playing together and it's like. It's just totally, totally different. Okay. Like the sound is. This is within days or same day kind of things, like. So listen to the ISO track of. We can work it out. And it's. It's sort of functional. It's not usual pause like Rubber Soul bass playing is. And then you watch the actual videos. That's one of the videos where Paul doesn't even attempt to mime the bass any, if at all. He's using his finger. He's just like playing around. He doesn't finger the nose half the time. And when he comes to the bridge, every time on the videos, you see him go the bridge, he goes to the wrong octave from the record. It's up here on the D string. And second time, when he goes to the second part of that bridge, it goes down to the lower one, which George is doubling up on the guitar. Climbing on the film clip. So got me thinking. Well, sounds very much like George on bass. Functional. He does some sort of chord sometimes like he does on Good Day Sunshine sort of thing with the fifths. Watching the video clips and Paul on all the tapes, he's really sort of disdainful of his bass miming. Just sort of playing all over the place and not playing the right octaves or that sort of thing. And he goes alive. And every live show he does, he's done it since the 80s or whatever or 90s. He always plays acoustic guitar. You never see him play a bass.
- [73:34]
Andrew Shakespeare
Can I ask a question?
- [73:35]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [73:36]
Andrew Shakespeare
So they played this song on the December 65tour in the UK, right? We know that John played the harmonium or keyboard or whatever he played.
- [73:45]
Marcus Phelan
So what did Paul play live with the Beatles? Oh, yeah, they're playing bass. Of course, I don't or something, but I haven't actually seen that clip.
- [73:52]
Andrew Shakespeare
There's no clips, there's no recordings, there's no clips.
- [73:54]
Marcus Phelan
All right, so, yeah.
- [73:55]
Andrew Shakespeare
What?
- [73:56]
Marcus Phelan
Even George, when he's playing guitar, like watching clips, he's barely. He's not really doing it. And you watch Paul playing it live and he does all that. You. He does all that every single time I've watched Band clips of his recent, you know, last 20 something years or touring. Every time he does that song, it's acoustic guitar and going with the evidence of the video clips of promo where you watch it. He's just got his hand resting on the top of the bass half time and probably bored of being in that studio for doing all these silly clips for. You know, they did the gymnasium things and like kind of the boxing things and Breen goes riding the bike. That sort of sessions, that sort of things. You tell they're over and sort of. Yeah, but Paul, you just look at him, he's just like. He's just basically like holding the bass and sort of nonchalantly plucking the bass with his finger.
- [74:47]
Robert Rodriguez
So then if it's George playing bass on the track, do we think that was laid down as part of the basic track with Paul playing?
- [74:53]
Marcus Phelan
I do think it was done, basically. That's why it doesn't sound as good as Day Tripper, which was, you know, Paul playing and they're talking. They sort of like this outtake where John is complaining or getting things. I think he was playing the tambourine and because that's. When you think about it, it's probably the hardest part of the song. It's just so busy to go through that, to doubling up all the time, all the way a song and he goes. And when you get to the waltz part. Because that outtake where Paul is talking to John and he's. You know the outtake I'm talking about.
- [75:42]
Robert Rodriguez
It'S on YouTube, right?
- [75:43]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. They got this talking. They're talking about like Paul's saying, we can work it out.
- [75:49]
Robert Rodriguez
Take one.
- [75:58]
Marcus Phelan
I know how it goes is when it go. Thing is, that actually is Ringo who stuffs up that take. But the tambourine, you. It's so busy. I can see like. Oh, man, that's like. To get it right. That's more difficult than, you know, getting the guitar right. You know, it's like Paul telling John it's. Yeah, it's easy to do that, but on tambourine it can be quite a hard thing. So anyway, it's my theory. I think the more I think about it, yeah, it's Paul on guitar and they're like working fast. You know, you sort of come up with a song and you know your part. And John plays the harmonium. He came up with that part maybe on the harmonium, I'm not sure. But yeah, to me it sounds like a George bass line. So that's my theory. I'm sticking to it again, just.
- [76:49]
Andrew Shakespeare
I suppose just a couple of things. I think the first thing is that, you know, I don't have particular opinion on what is a George bass line and what isn't.
- [76:59]
Marcus Phelan
Sometimes it sounded like. And they had epiphone basses as well, apparently. So I found that. So you could have been using the epiphone or the new. What is it called? The Burns. The burns, yeah.
- [77:09]
Andrew Shakespeare
65 was the year really when they got. They started doing this thing of Hugh wrote it on a particular instrument. That's what you do on the basic track. Now, Paul had already demoed the song playing the same guitar part on the acoustic guitars in the interest of expediency and with what they were starting to do in 1960, 65, it makes total sense that Paul played the guitar for the basic track and therefore it makes total sense that it would be George on bass. So, yeah, I'm 100% on board with all of that.
- [77:43]
Marcus Phelan
Right. Yeah.
- [77:44]
Robert Rodriguez
Do we think the tambourine was part of the basic track or do we.
- [77:46]
Marcus Phelan
Think that was an overdue. Yeah, it was. That's the thing. That's why John was having trouble with the. Having to do it on it. For some reason they wanted that one.
- [77:52]
Andrew Shakespeare
But here's the interesting thing, right? So Ebook says it's Paul on bass. The Beatles Bible, you know, the one book to rule them all that says Paul is on base. Ian MacDonald says Paul's on base. Lewis Illustrated Wickle doesn't say anything. The textbook source that I have says that Paul is on base as well. The point being we know that this is potentially wrong. But the point that I'm making is all the sources that we have out here potentially have incorrect information. That's the whole point, which is the whole point of having this conversation, I guess to maybe put forward a different logical perspective that contradicts the evidence that we've been given as fact. And of course all these people are stating these things of fact. Well, they're actually saying why they are, why they believe this or what evidence they have of this. So I guess we're just coming at it from a different perspective.
- [78:48]
Marcus Phelan
Well, it's understandable to. Because Paul is the bass player and like any on the video clips, he's playing bass. And that's what you do. So the default position is that always Paul plays a bass and if he doesn't play a bass, there has to be a reason for certain, which is why we got into like Hilda Skelda, that sort of thing. Paul is the bass player in the band. So but when he's not playing the bass, we have to come up reasons why he doesn't play the bass. And has to be a good reason, because he.
- [79:15]
Andrew Shakespeare
And from 1965 onwards. From 1965 onwards, that reason is mainly because he wrote it on piano or he wrote it on guitar and that's why. And the bass was more often than not an overdub after the fact. Paul really becomes the multi instrumentalist from about 1965 on. If you look at Rubber Soul, I'm looking through you. I'm sure that's Paul on acoustic guitar. Yeah, I've Drive my car. He plays the slide guitar now. He plays the bass on that one. That's a little bit different.
- [79:44]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. George came up with the riff. The Otis Redding kind of. Paul doesn't play exactly, Sammy, because George sort of slides it along. Paul just plays like, the scale.
- [79:55]
Andrew Shakespeare
I've just seen a face. That's Paul on acoustic. He wrote it on acoustic.
- [79:59]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [80:00]
Robert Rodriguez
All right.
- [80:01]
Andrew Shakespeare
Okay.
- [80:01]
Robert Rodriguez
We got this one covered.
- [80:02]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, I think so, yeah. Is there any recent thing? I mean, I've. You know, I've always sort of in the back of my head think, oh, George probably might have played bass. But that was. But just, you know, when you get more of these deconstructed videos and you listen to it close and you go like, wow. You know, then it's like, yeah, it.
- [80:19]
Robert Rodriguez
Makes sense the more you pay attention.
- [80:21]
Marcus Phelan
And you go like, yeah, that's just like. Especially comparing, like, the beautiful sound of Rickenbacker on the Day Tripper. It's like, whoa. And you realize that two different players on this song. I'm sure if Paul's playing bass on We Can Work it out, it would be much more prominent. You can hear he's kind of buried in the mix. It's sort of like Paul's bass is usually. This stage is pretty well distinct. Yeah. It's defined the sound, you know, because Rickenbacker, he's really found a new way of playing with the new sound. It really. That's what explodes when he's moved to the Rickenbacker. Because Rubber Soul is like. The bass really becomes. I mean, a lot of people have the theory, like, you know, he was boring before then. He still did great stuff. But when it gets to Rubber Soul, after Influence of Pet Sounds and James Jamison Motown, he's. He's really more busy and he's come up creatively and he's like, Michelle, he's like. Still loves that. He's the bus. A sort of bass Line boom, boom, boom, boom. Like he's just.
- [81:21]
Andrew Shakespeare
But interestingly, you know, I spent last weekend jamming with a friend. She's learning bass. And so we were tackling a whole bunch of Beatles songs and that was good. And then I tried to teach her Song One off song off album one. I saw her standing there and she gave up extremely quickly.
- [81:38]
Marcus Phelan
That is it Chuck Berry song bass line?
- [81:40]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yeah, it certainly is. But it's also. You need experience to play a song like that and play it well. You just do. It's not just. It's not. It's not enough.
- [81:50]
Marcus Phelan
All that live stuff. Long toss Sally. Like, the bass is just incredible. You know, like walking bass. But when people say, oh, he was boring before. Then his YouTube thing where a guide talks about like, you know, and it's like, no, not really. But you can see where it really gets more defined by Rubber Sol with the new instrument. And he's more inspired and you can really. Instead of just doing the fifths and that's a boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom kind of stuff, which is on the first couple of albums. But, you know, he still did interesting stuff like yeah Boys and Longtors Sally. And you know, All My Loving is a great bass line. I mean, it's one of those. The first things that you actually could sing. It's a, you know, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. You know, like in. Yeah, it's. It's a melodic line and that's one.
- [82:33]
Andrew Shakespeare
Of the chorus last weekend.
- [82:35]
Marcus Phelan
Beautifully constructed. Yeah.
- [82:37]
Robert Rodriguez
Did you show her it's all too much?
- [82:40]
Andrew Shakespeare
No, she taught herself All My Loving and Help and she was very. And Dr. Robert very pleased with herself, you know.
- [82:47]
Robert Rodriguez
Nice.
- [82:48]
Andrew Shakespeare
So it was just fun. The songs just sounded great immediately. They always do.
- [82:52]
Marcus Phelan
And Paul can be very sparse when he wants to be. Like, when he's like Dr. Robert, like, people say, oh, you know, it's very boring, but it works perfectly. Kind of samba or whatever it is, sort of like. Sort of thing. And so, yeah, he's. He's disciplined. He's great. He can be very sparse when he. When a song requires being sparse. But he be busy when it's. You know, when it's got the room to do it.
- [83:17]
Robert Rodriguez
Even when it's sparse, it could be dynamic in.
- [83:20]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, yeah.
- [83:20]
Robert Rodriguez
A big groove. I'm thinking of Get Back. You know. It's probably the simplest bass line he ever did. And it's so sharp. It's so on point. It's just perfect days on the A.
- [83:31]
Marcus Phelan
When the chord changed G to D or whatever. Like that he just hammers on an A. And I think he goes to D once. Oh, well, end of the song and that kind of thing. But, yeah, it's just beautiful.
- [83:42]
Andrew Shakespeare
And it's interesting that that's a song that he wrote on bass and then plays on the bass track. And that it's a very easy bass line. And he sings over it.
- [83:52]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [83:52]
Andrew Shakespeare
You know.
- [83:53]
Marcus Phelan
Well, it's kind of easy, like. But it's deceptively, you know, it's played by an expert and. Because he's playing, like, the octaves as well, and a lot of time and just his. Yeah, you know, he's just easy stuff as, like. Yeah, it's a lot harder than you think, in a way. It's not guesswork, you know, every inch of this territory.
- [84:13]
Robert Rodriguez
What are you most excited about doing now?
- [84:15]
Marcus Phelan
Okay, what's Chronology? Chronology.
- [84:18]
Andrew Shakespeare
It's Paperback Rider.
- [84:19]
Marcus Phelan
Okay. And Rainback.
- [84:21]
Robert Rodriguez
Rider.
- [84:21]
Marcus Phelan
Rain. Yep.
- [84:23]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, I know that we talked about lumping them together, but in the end I couldn't because the issues are really quite different. And the Rain ones are a lot more complex. With Paperback, there's different sources say that. They all say that Paul plays guitar on this track.
- [84:38]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. Yeah.
- [84:38]
Andrew Shakespeare
But then different sources. One says that George played the second guitar. Other says that John did. And, you know.
- [84:45]
Robert Rodriguez
And the other played tambourine when was playing guitar.
- [84:48]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yes, that's right. And then the textbook all says that it's unknown as to which of them played the guitar on that track.
- [84:56]
Marcus Phelan
I know. Can I answer? Yeah. It's Paul and John on guitar, like on Basing Track. Right. John's playing a tremolo kind of. I think he's playing like, Gretsch sort of thing with that sort of model. But he's playing a G sort of chord, you know, like tremolo going like.
- [85:14]
Robert Rodriguez
This is a casino with the. The finish.
- [85:16]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, yeah. Sort of with a tremolo sort of sound. And Paul's doing all the guitar thing. But George, he does play some guitar, but it's only on the bits, like Paperback Writer. Paperback or Wrong key. Sorry. So he just. Because at the end of those parts, like Paperback Writer, Paul's going like. Or sometimes he just doesn't. Not really sure what he's finishing on. So they've overdubbed the Paperback Writer. So it's just two times, I think George on his sg, just doing a. So it's like an accent, a nice tail. Just tidying up the end bits of the verse. So it's not like, you know, kind of messy.
- [85:55]
Robert Rodriguez
Yeah. Do you think this is an overdub. Or on the basic track.
- [85:58]
Marcus Phelan
It's an overdub. Yeah, it's. He's just doing. I think he's. He must be Tambiana. Paul on guitar, John on guitar, Ringa and George on tambourine. And basically this. Really how much it is. And they do overdub the harmony stuff. But yeah, just those little parts there they sort of could have done on vocal track. I'm not sure this is. Yeah, it's just turning up the end of the bits just because, you know, it's a bit messy. You know, Paul's messy.
- [86:22]
Robert Rodriguez
So the contention in this track is who's playing the second guitar, George or John?
- [86:27]
Marcus Phelan
Because it's photos and everything. You just off on a session. It's one of sessions that's photographed.
- [86:32]
Andrew Shakespeare
I'm convinced it's John. I mean, George was photographed practicing on the Burns bass during their rehearsals. And they basically did this song from the ground up. Rehearsing, rehearsing, rehearsing in the studio. And then they recorded it. And then I think basically they knew that Paul was gonna overdub his bass. So George didn't play. Yeah, didn't play. For the basic track, there are three parts of three harmony vocals. And they would appear to be Puncheons sharing the bass track. But the other thing is that little doubling of that riff right at the end of the verse, that bit logic would suggest it would be Paul doubling himself rather than George Harrison.
- [87:12]
Marcus Phelan
Different sound. It's a totally different sound. It's the sound of the sg. It's quite clean because Paul's got a really dirty casino sound. And listen to it. It's like. It's just. Even if it's like di. It's very clean. It's a clean sound. So it's just the tidying up. It's just a thing you do with pop records. You get like a little bit. This bit rough there. And it's the thing. It's gonna. So let's just put a bit of half riff there. And it's just. It's. This is the top and tailing. Top and tailing. Sort of, you know, just. Just make it neater. It could be George and I just. Yeah. And you see pictures. There's pictures of him on George on sg. So that's the thing. There's photographic evidence, audio evidence and. Yeah, I just. It's one of those things where. But it's definitely John on. On your second guitar. And I think they carry on to rain. It's the same thing. Same thing. We're moving on to that one yet.
- [88:03]
Robert Rodriguez
Yeah, yeah, yeah. What about Rain? What do you think's the.
- [88:06]
Marcus Phelan
It's Paul and John.
- [88:07]
Robert Rodriguez
You think it's Paul and John on guitarist Paul?
- [88:09]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, it's. See, Paul takes a lot of. You know, this is not like everyone's like a John song, but it's. He's saying it's a Beatles song. Paul has a lot of ownership. He takes a lot of pride in this song. So he feels like he did half the work on it. Especially when you consider, like, he played the main guitar. That's him doing the tuning of the. I got it prepared especially for the show to get the tuning of the. How they did it. Because they do it in a. You know, we're going to talk about the B flat fiasco. That's just absolutely loony. I mean, when they put that, you know, the. That outtake of B flat with a bass on it as well, and it was like. It just sounds like the Chipmunks, you know, like, it's ridiculous. Just the backing track. So they would have done that in a tone up, which is logical. And pause. I don't know what. Where you got the tuning from, but the key to the tuning is in the coder. It does the arpeggio. Can you hear that? So that was the clue to work out what the tuning is. It's very much in Paul's drone sort of thing, and it's done in a. And it's done sort of faster. But.
- [89:29]
Robert Rodriguez
So what would be the reason? That wouldn't be George, who is also into droning.
- [89:33]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, because that's the thing. Paul, to him is like. Just as much as his song is John's. So he's got ownership of it and he is the one coming up with the riff. And, you know, it's very basic kind of, in a way, but it's the. How they came up with the tuning. I don't know, because this is really like a really low. That's A and that's E. A low E, and that's another A. And it's an A octave and a C sharp and an E. It's a great chord, that one. It's like a C9 when you play it, not like tuning. And you can hear this low note all through the isolated tracks. So it's a really thick sound and George could have played it. But a lot of the texts I've seen say, yeah, it's Paul. What does Lewison say something? Did he say anything about it?
- [90:49]
Andrew Shakespeare
So in Illustrator Record, the song was dismissed in one sentence as primitive psychedelia. That's it done. I guess that book was published in the 70s and took a while for Rain to sort of gain its cache, really. But, you know, ebook says it's John and George on guitars. The Bible says there's John and Paul on guitars.
- [91:11]
Marcus Phelan
Amen.
- [91:11]
Andrew Shakespeare
The textbook, textbook says it's John and George on guitars. So we've got a real mixture of stuff there. So I guess the first thing, if you just want to move to the logic thing, is since when did Paul McCartney ever skip out on contributing to a basic track? When did he ever go? You know, guys, I'll leave this one to you because I don't want to hog the limelight and I'm only. I'm going to overdub the bass and we all know it's going to be a cracker of a bass line, so.
- [91:40]
Marcus Phelan
I'll just sit as well. Yeah.
- [91:42]
Andrew Shakespeare
No, no, no, no. Paul. I really believe that Paul is on guitar for that. And so the other contentions are what you said earlier is like the whole assertion in the box set that it was recorded in the key of B flat seems to indicate to me that Kevin Howlett is not a guitarist. And his assertion that the bass part was overdubbed in B flat is just ridiculous.
- [92:09]
Marcus Phelan
So many fast runs. Yeah.
- [92:11]
Andrew Shakespeare
So I guess the question I had for you, Mark, is do you think that the bass was recorded in the key of A, or do you think it was recorded in the key of G?
- [92:19]
Marcus Phelan
I think G. I was having a good listen to it last night and there's some really fast kind of like Hard Day's Night kind of solo sort of kind of thing. In A, it's reasonable, but not that much faster. But in G, I just think it's. Yeah, you would have done in G. You did Payback Rider in G. It seems more logical. I suppose you can get a deeper sound if you want to get an even deeper sound for the bass by doing it in A.
- [92:46]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, if I. A, B, the bass sound on Paperback Rider and the bass sound on Rain. I think that the bass sound on Rain is a little more sonorous than the comparatively brighter sound on Paperback Rider.
- [92:59]
Marcus Phelan
So, yeah, you could do an A. And I can really be like. I don't know, it's just you always do what's easiest, you know, you never make it harder for yourself. And if you're going to do some sort of fast stuff and you do it in the key that you. You're comfortable sort of in whatever, and you could you know, you could have done that A. But I just. I mean it's a good bass sound but he's. He's got that sound bit afterwards. As you know, he's like. They're still experimenting. Experimenting for like the Payback Rider. Experimenting with the speaker and all this other stuff like that was just. So maybe they'd worked it out better by the time they got to do the next session. Whatever with the. It was more experimenting with the Payback Rider. And by the time they've really nailed it for the rain thing. I'm not sure what I did. But my guess, it's a guess is that he did it in G. There's.
- [93:47]
Andrew Shakespeare
Actually other notable things with the backing vocals. Some sources say there's. It's just Paul and George doing backing vocals. Other sources say it's all three. If you listen to it, it's clearly a three part harmony. It's John, Paul and George. And the higher harmony in the chorus, the fifth harmony above the fifth harmony where doubling that rain Shine I don't mind and all that. But that was done on the same track as the backing vocals. So somebody added it at that.
- [94:26]
Marcus Phelan
I don't mind Shine.
- [94:39]
Andrew Shakespeare
The weather's fine.
- [94:44]
Marcus Phelan
I can show you that when it.
- [94:48]
Andrew Shakespeare
Starts Starts to rain when the rain.
- [94:51]
Marcus Phelan
Comes Everything's the same I can show you I can show you it is John.
- [95:05]
Andrew Shakespeare
It is John. So unlike. I don't want to spoil the party. It's opposite. John is taking a high line above himself during the backing vocals. The three part backing vocals are done and then he does a. He does it himself. It is so. And you know what proven when you hear it isolated. It is so clearly his voice.
- [95:26]
Marcus Phelan
And you know what really proves it at the very last time they do. Or the last. You can hear Paul practicing the high one only once. The very last time or whatever. Two times. So at the same time the really, really high harmony comes in and you actually hear the practicing. Is funny. I only just noticed that last night. Oh, that's really cute. That settles it for me. That's great. Solid evidence. And like, wow. You suggested that John did the harmony. I didn't know. I thought it was obviously Paul. But listening to it go, wow. Yeah, he's right is John.
- [95:57]
Andrew Shakespeare
We're kind of lucky that, you know, they did the stereo mixes pretty hurriedly and that's why we have all that leakage and the practices going on. But the other thing that's interesting about this song is who gets the credit for the reverse vocal idea.
- [96:11]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [96:12]
Andrew Shakespeare
So this is a really interesting one. John claimed it was his idea and he went home and got stoned and spilled the tape.
- [96:18]
Marcus Phelan
Hard to believe.
- [96:19]
Andrew Shakespeare
And went, wow, that's amazing. And came in and told everyone about it.
- [96:34]
Marcus Phelan
Rain comes, they run and hide their heads.
- [96:57]
Andrew Shakespeare
And George echoed that, said, yeah, that's an idea that John came up with. Yeah, yeah. Which is presumably because John told him that. But the amazing thing is that George Martin, in June 1966, two months after the release of the single, said that the idea was his. And he showed it to them and he suggested it and they were all delighted with it. So logic would sort of say to me, why would George Martin publicly say two months after the release of the song that he originated the idea if he was just plain out fibbing? I don't really think that's very likely. George Martin certainly had a huge amount of form in terms of tape experimentation and vary. Speeding and doing all that kind of stuff with the Goons and swinging for Sellers and all that sort of. So I think it's actually pretty likely that George Martin did originate this idea, particularly because he said it so soon after the release of the track. That's my theory. I don't think John's right. I'm sure he probably did that accident.
- [97:59]
Marcus Phelan
Many times, actually take a tape copy with them. Acetates or something. When did they actually have, like, acetates to take home with them rather than. Rather than tapes. So you wouldn't put an acetate backwards, but a tape. You can.
- [98:15]
Andrew Shakespeare
I'm giving this one to see John.
- [98:16]
Marcus Phelan
Sort of spooling a tape onto. I know, maybe. Yeah, maybe It's. It's a certain thing.
- [98:21]
Andrew Shakespeare
I think it's highly likely did. He did do backwards stuff at home by mistake because he was stoned.
- [98:26]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah.
- [98:26]
Andrew Shakespeare
I just don't know if it was for this song. Yeah, right. He said this years after the fact. He didn't say it two months after the fact. Like George Martin.
- [98:33]
Marcus Phelan
Right. It. Well, yeah.
- [98:35]
Robert Rodriguez
Mystery does the Ray Cathode stuff. George Martin was absolutely experimenting in sound independently of the Beatles.
- [98:43]
Marcus Phelan
Yes. Yeah, absolutely.
- [98:44]
Andrew Shakespeare
You're right.
- [99:22]
Marcus Phelan
Okay, so is that song moving on? Yeah, moving fast now.
- [99:25]
Andrew Shakespeare
God, we're cracking through it last.
- [99:27]
Marcus Phelan
So what's next?
- [99:29]
Andrew Shakespeare
It's the Reprise. Sergeant Pepper Reprise.
- [99:31]
Marcus Phelan
Okay. Yeah.
- [99:32]
Robert Rodriguez
Okay. What kind of contention do we have going on here?
- [99:35]
Andrew Shakespeare
So, okay, there's a few here. So the first thing is, if we go to Mark Lewison, he says that all four of them are singing. Okay. The next thing is Ebooks. And that says all four are doing backing vocals and Then in Beatles Bible it says all four are doing the vocals. Ian MacDonald says all of them are on vocals as well. And the textbook source that we use says that all four of them are singing as well. Howlett, however, says nothing about Ringo singing at. Well, the first thing he does is he lists Ringo as singing as well. And then he contradicts himself in the actual narrative part underneath where he doesn't say that Ringo sings. It always says it's John, Paul and George only on vocals. So one of the things, and this goes back to what you suggested before about adt Marcus, is that they adt those vocals, so they're spread over the spectrum so you can't hear them just on one track. So it kind of muddies it a little bit. And the 2017mix isn't very useful because that now has kind of separated some things from the original tracks, the outtakes, the Anthology version, it's got a guide vocal and some pretty ropey lead playing which would probably indicate that it's live rather than overdub. But anyway, so as far as the vocals go, when I really listen closely to that, I hear a three part thing.
- [101:07]
Marcus Phelan
Sergeant Pepper's Lonely, sergeant Pepper's Lone, sergeant Pepper's Lonely Club Band.
- [101:25]
Andrew Shakespeare
I certainly can't hear Ringo's homely bray in the background there at all. So I'm really not quite sure what the evidence is that Ringo sings on the song at all, because anytime he.
- [101:38]
Robert Rodriguez
Has sang, like in Flying or in side two of Abbey Road, is to sing an ensemble. You hear it. Yeah, absolutely. So it occurred to me.
- [101:49]
Andrew Shakespeare
Beautiful night. My God.
- [101:50]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, I don't hear.
- [101:53]
Andrew Shakespeare
I don't understand why all these sources are saying that all four of them are singing is. It's because they're having one final hoorah as a band at the end of the album they all got together.
- [102:05]
Marcus Phelan
Beautiful ending with all together.
- [102:07]
Andrew Shakespeare
Or to sing a single song together comes after the reprise, you know. No.
- [102:13]
Robert Rodriguez
They say anything about his mic not working?
- [102:15]
Andrew Shakespeare
No, it certainly doesn't say that. In fact, they all would have been around one microphone. But the other thing is that apparently Ringo is on tambourine and maracas.
- [102:26]
Marcus Phelan
There's no Moroccans on it as far as I was.
- [102:29]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, there are maracas.
- [102:32]
Marcus Phelan
I'm thinking of Rain. I was thinking of rain on the.
- [102:34]
Andrew Shakespeare
Same track of Maracas and Tamarina on the same track. How can Ringo play them simultaneously?
- [102:42]
Marcus Phelan
George, beyond maracas, He's a maraca king. He's like. He plays maracas on lots of stuff. Fishing a hole that's all he does.
- [102:48]
Andrew Shakespeare
But then.
- [102:49]
Marcus Phelan
But yeah, like, that's the thing, basically, if it's just two people a year, I mean, Ringo, when he first started playing with the Beatles in the sessions, like, George Martin was like, they'll be doing a song and there'll be Ringo with his drum kit, playing the sticks with the tambourine and the, you know, maracas in the same time. He said, like, no, Ringo, we don't have to do this at the same time. You know, just stick to the drums. But that's how he thought, you know, you'd playing live and you got the tambourine, you got this thing in your hands and you can do it all. Stuff. He could do it all and probably good, but he didn't need to do it for the recording sessions. But, yeah, I think I'd be George on Marquez and Ringo and.
- [103:24]
Andrew Shakespeare
And the textbook source, they say. They say, yeah, there were maracas and tambourine recorded simultaneously. Ringo was on tambourine and somebody else was on maracas. And then it's really good that they say we're not sure who it was. I really like it when people say we're not sure.
- [103:40]
Marcus Phelan
The main thing about this song is about what was on the basic track. And that was sort of the. Well, now we have outtakes and that sort of stuff. We know what was on basic track and we can tell that George is playing lead, John is playing guitar and Paul is playing the keyboard, which is not actually, they say organ, but it's like. I don't know what sort of instrument it is, but it's like a. It's like an electric piano meets organ kind of. Maybe it's.
- [104:03]
Andrew Shakespeare
It's a Lowry.
- [104:04]
Marcus Phelan
I was right.
- [104:04]
Robert Rodriguez
Because it's going like a delusion.
- [104:06]
Andrew Shakespeare
The sky Lowry, I would assume. So let's say the second Lowry. Yeah. But there is another mystery that comes from listening to the isolator tracks on YouTube is that it's very clearly a piano part and an organ part played simultaneously. So where are they? They're there. Like, there's a boom, boom, boom, boom.
- [104:24]
Marcus Phelan
Boom, boom, boom, boom.
- [104:25]
Andrew Shakespeare
There's an eighth note.
- [104:27]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the basic track.
- [104:29]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yeah.
- [104:30]
Marcus Phelan
But none of these are the song. And it needs to, like, this is like, you know, I'm sorry, Ringo, putting you off by singing whatever is.
- [104:37]
Andrew Shakespeare
No, no, no, not. I'm not talking about the organ part on the basic track. I'm talking about an overdub of a piano.
- [104:42]
Marcus Phelan
But no, I'm saying the basic track is basically like a piano or whether it's a piano, as I'm saying, is the Lowry. Because it's. It's. That's the basic track with the hidden playing. He's showing like the. The. He's dump chords. But he's only doing kind of thing F minor to A flat to B flat, but. And he stays on the bas. Doesn't change the note with like. He's Lonely Hearts Club. And we hope you will enjoy the. And so it's George Martin book. It's the Summer of Love. They. It's like, oh, they all played live. You know, he sang live and everything was live. And go through outtakes and realize that's not true. You know, we can tell that. So pause. On the keyboard of some sort. Don is playing guitar where there is an organ. And maybe. Oh, I don't know. I gotta hear the whole thing again. Whatever. But there may be maybe the left. It's the. When he plays a chord. It's more like an organ. I'm not sure. But you're saying all these sources.
- [105:40]
Robert Rodriguez
Andrew, don't mention it at all.
- [105:42]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, what we know is that. And you can hear this on the basic track, outtake and all that is that Paul is definitely playing an organ of some description on the basic track. The mystery is, is that there's also. In the isolated tracks, there is a piano part, but you can't really hear it in the final.
- [105:59]
Marcus Phelan
It's not a piano as a piano. It's electric piano. I think it's like electronic sort of keyboard. Which means it could be mistaken with the Lowry or whatever sort of thing they use. I kind of think offhand what the other keyboards are.
- [106:13]
Andrew Shakespeare
I'm talking about an overdub.
- [106:15]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, but what is Jorgen supposed to be doing?
- [106:18]
Andrew Shakespeare
No, I'm talking about a mystery piano overdub.
- [106:21]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. Yep.
- [106:22]
Andrew Shakespeare
Which as far as I'm concerned, remains a mystery because I'm not sure where it is in the mix.
- [106:27]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. I don't hear. Mistook the basic track piano as the nova dub.
- [106:35]
Andrew Shakespeare
All I know is that no source is listed at all as existing. And yet there it is on the isolated tracks. It's like those ghost guitars and come together where the isolated tracks suddenly show. There's these weird guitars that we never heard before in the mix. They just. They are there. We just didn't know about them.
- [106:54]
Marcus Phelan
But you actually.
- [106:55]
Robert Rodriguez
We didn't know on While My Guitar Gently Weeps that seems to be doubling the bass.
- [107:00]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, yes. And that's the one we're coming to. Yeah.
- [107:03]
Robert Rodriguez
But pre rock band we didn't know was there.
- [107:05]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, so that's right. But it was. There's not none of the bass. It's another. It's just a 12 string. So if we get onto that and there's no second bass. There is no second bass on llama guitar. Gently Weeps that is a myth. And in a bridge, it's doubled by the tor string, which is probably a George. When I saw them. That's sort of. Anyway, that particular pattern in Walmart guitar. Gentle Weeps in the bridge. It's very much like a George Pitt sort of melodic thing. And you got Paul to play that and he doubled up on the 12 string. Yeah, yeah, it's very melodic, kind of. It's a real set piece. You know, it's one of sort of things. You write it, you think, like, you know, he's demon. How many times that song. All right, well, so we finished, like, Thousand Peppers. My thing is basically it was a keyboard pause. Playing a keyboard of some sort of. Sort like a piano kind of thing. Maybe it's Lowry or whatever. And it's live. George is playing lead and John is playing guitar and drums, of course. And Yobi dubs. Yeah, it's a 3P. There's no Ringo doing the vocal. Sorry, Ringo. Well, I don't hear him anyway. He's very noticeable and so maybe he's doing some cheering in the background, I don't know. But, yeah, thank God we're finished. He's probably going like, thank God. Because he's been sitting around there. Poor Ringo. During. You know, Sash and Pepper's like, Back.
- [108:40]
Robert Rodriguez
To my chess game.
- [108:41]
Marcus Phelan
Yes, exactly. It's just sort of sitting there and like, he's a drum machine. He has to sort of sit around and like, they're doing 100 takes different things. Like this sterling job you did. So. Yeah. So isn't. Isn't. Is one more guitar. Next one we want to talk about next on my list. I haven't got my list here, so.
- [108:58]
Andrew Shakespeare
I've got a massive essay here.
- [109:00]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. Didn't we discuss this the last time? I know one off by heart. It's one of those ones where it's like. I've argued with it so many times. It's one things of the. The pet ones, like. Yeah, I know. And it's. And it's. It's the one with the persists for like, hell of a skill to where, like, John played bass and, like. No, no. And people say, oh, it's a raw bass line. It's really messy and it's like no, it's not. It's wonderfully constructed chords and it's piece of genius the bass and it's very much poor as George says in interviews. Guitar player and playboy interviews he did around like 87 and 91 I think it was. And the way specifically mentions Paul's bass. He doesn't normally do things like that. Specifically mentioned Paul but that's what he says about oh, Eric playing the guitar and Paul's overdub bass. So it's the two distinctive things he remembers. So put to bed anything idea that John had anything to do with the bass. I know exactly what John plays on this song and I put it to you.
- [110:01]
Andrew Shakespeare
Okay, so if you look at Lewison, the first thing that Lewison says is that the Eric Clapton guitar was overdone.
- [110:09]
Marcus Phelan
Lewison I did the thing on this like I got the dates and everything right. He got the dates wrong. This section is one of his like not his shining thing, whatever. But it's understandable as well because you go through the logs, they've got different. On a tape box, for example, it has September 5th but also includes. It's using the tape that they used on September 3rd. So he's using the same tape but you sort of. So what was actually happened on September 3rd is on the tape box saying September 5th. The documentation is so misleading and if you go by that. But he mistakes Eric. Eric comes on the day before he plays on the fifth and he has Eric clap overdubbing on the sixth, which is wrong. We now we know exactly what now. And he has John playing guitar on the 5th. But it's not. It's actually Eric playing guitar on the 5th. He's mistaking. He must be mistaking Eric for John.
- [111:00]
Andrew Shakespeare
So just to go back to running through it. So Lewison says that Clapton did his overdone.
- [111:05]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. And it's wrong.
- [111:06]
Andrew Shakespeare
And then we have Ian MacDonald who says that Paul does play the bass and that John as well as Eric plays lead guitar. So that's kind of interesting. He also describes the song as being ponderous and having dull grandiosities. So that's kind of nice. And that apparently predicts the simple stadium plotters of the 70s. He's kind of got a point, sort of I reckon but you know, I. I don't know if I find you.
- [111:38]
Marcus Phelan
Shouldn'T blame the 70s stuff on like you can't retro.
- [111:42]
Andrew Shakespeare
I do think hey Jude and While My Guitar Gently Weeps had a very big influence on.
- [111:47]
Marcus Phelan
For sure it doesn't, you know.
- [111:49]
Andrew Shakespeare
But anyway, if we Move on. If we move on. So the textbook source that we use says that it's Paul on base. Then we come to Howlett and also Giles Martin. So Giles Martin says that in an interview, said that it was both John and Paul on bass. And Howlett says that it is John on bass. So once again, we've got these people who are speaking the absolute truth that we all need to know. And they're all contradicting each other. So I think what I want to go through just to break all this down is probably just to go by the tape box. Because this is one of the ones where we've got a very clear illustration of what's on each track. Drums. We know that's Ringo, track two. Guitar.
- [112:33]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, I know it off my heart.
- [112:35]
Andrew Shakespeare
Track three, piano and organ, which some people refer to Paul as his jumping between piano and organ during the basic track.
- [112:43]
Marcus Phelan
What Giles said as well.
- [112:45]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yes. And that's actually.
- [112:47]
Marcus Phelan
No, but this is actually not true.
- [112:50]
Andrew Shakespeare
Because the piano and organ are being played simultaneously on that track. And Paul, unless he's doing a Rick Wakeman of having his hands on different keyboards, which I really don't.
- [113:03]
Marcus Phelan
He needs at least three hands or four, like, because it's.
- [113:06]
Andrew Shakespeare
Which I really don't.
- [113:07]
Marcus Phelan
Doing them left and right. And the organ is playing. So you need three hands to do it.
- [113:11]
Andrew Shakespeare
So the assertion that John is playing organ on that is correct. And then on the bridges.
- [113:18]
Marcus Phelan
He's only allowed to play on the bridges because he's sharing a track with a piano. Piano is more important. John, you can play. Yeah, you play new organ, but you're just playing the chords on the bridges. That's it. And you listen to the outtake. Yes, and all the outtakes. The organ comes in on the basic tracks. Only comes in on the bridges and it's not there anytime.
- [113:37]
Andrew Shakespeare
That is correct. And then track four is the acoustic and lead vocal, George. Then track five is the rest of the vocals. So George doubling and Paul adding his harmony. That's on one track. Then track six is bass, which we know. And then track seven is that bridge guitar.
- [114:03]
Marcus Phelan
Sam.
- [114:40]
Andrew Shakespeare
The 12 string doubling. I do have something to say about this, but I'll just say in the meantime. So that's where you hear the. The bass line being doubled. The bridge bass line. And also percussions on there. So it's tambourine and castanet. Now, we don't know who plays the castanets or if they're castanets or sticks. I think it's actually more likely they're sticks. Not Castanets because of the speed. Pretty hard to go on castanets with your fingers. I think it's probably much easier to go. And then track eight is apparently some additional organ by George.
- [115:18]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, he does lots of.
- [115:20]
Andrew Shakespeare
The only thing I wanted to say, because I think that's all quite clear to me, the only thing that I wanted to say was that when I hear the isolated track off that overdubbed guitar in the bridge, there are three notes playing an octave apart. There's a bottom note, there's a middle note and there's a top note. It's not just a 12 string with two notes. There are three notes that I can hear. So then the question I have is how is that song?
- [115:44]
Marcus Phelan
I still don't hear. There's no.
- [115:46]
Andrew Shakespeare
When I go to the isolated tracks on YouTube and listen to that isolated.
- [115:50]
Marcus Phelan
Part with the bridge, there's no guitar by itself. It's just 12 string is always with the bass. I've never heard any 12 string by itself. It's always with the bass.
- [116:01]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yes, I agree with you.
- [116:02]
Marcus Phelan
That's why I just don't know an I can. So it's not four. You'd have. If it was three sounds coming out, you'd hear four sounds. Would you?
- [116:09]
Andrew Shakespeare
So that's why I'm playing the devil's advocate here that it is possible that that bridge over dub had the bass again by Paul with George doubling it on the 12 string. Because there's very definitely three notes in there an octave apart. And that Paul might have doubled his bass line while Paul played along with him in unison. And they did that.
- [116:33]
Marcus Phelan
Okay, okay, I'm gonna.
- [116:34]
Andrew Shakespeare
I think that is a possibility.
- [116:35]
Marcus Phelan
Well, I don't think so. I just think it's. The bass is overdubbed and at the same time George is there. He's overseeing the overdub and he's playing special part that he's written. Was written the other parts or the chords.
- [116:49]
Andrew Shakespeare
But the 12 stringers.
- [116:51]
Marcus Phelan
When it comes to this part, it's whatever goes on. But that's. That's a very much a George kind of. You know, it's a song.
- [116:59]
Andrew Shakespeare
I'm not just feeding authorship of it. I'm just saying 12 string is on the back track.
- [117:05]
Marcus Phelan
No, no, it's. Yeah, yeah, true. Yeah, that's. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Well is. Yeah, but what's it say on. You know, I've got to get a tape box, but I've got with me. But I'm pretty sure he would have played around at the same time.
- [117:17]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, the tape box is very clear. It's the. The percussion and that bridge 12 string are on the same track, right?
- [117:23]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, yeah. But I just don't know why say there's another bass line. I just. I've never heard people say there's another bass line. I've never heard it.
- [117:31]
Andrew Shakespeare
Unless the. Unless the isolated track is playing tricks on me by somehow including the bass line onto that 12 string. That could be the case. But the isolated track has three separate notes an octave apart. Octaves apart. I don't know how that is. It may have just kind of lumped the bass in on it. Because we do know that the 12 strings.
- [117:53]
Marcus Phelan
When you hear the stem, we're hearing the stems. That's what we get in the isolator. Not actually individual tracks. So they're bundled things together. So the 12 string is with the bass on any isolated track you have. So I just don't see here four sounds. I hear one bass and two notes of a 12 string. It says three. Three octaves all together. That's what I hear. Is there. You're saying there's four octaves on that?
- [118:17]
Andrew Shakespeare
No.
- [118:18]
Marcus Phelan
So I just don't.
- [118:19]
Andrew Shakespeare
No.
- [118:19]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah. So it's not individual track. These are the stems we are listening to. So they're not. Things swap over different. You listen to the stems and the way. The way the stereo picture that things songs guitar will go move on to another track and the bass will move on. You know, it's. It's under drums and perhaps the bass is by itself. But everything like acoustic guitar. When it comes to the solo, the acoustic guitar will go to another stem. So it's not like we're hearing eight tracks isolated.
- [118:47]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, that makes sense because on the tape box it doesn't say that there's also a bass on the same track as the percussion and the torch string. So I think it is somehow leakage.
- [118:56]
Marcus Phelan
You just think why would you do it? That's the thing. Why? Why. What's the logic in doing two basses and the torso string? You actually. You barely hear it in the. In the mix anyway. So you just wonder why you bother. And because John wouldn't be in overdub session the thing what Lewison got wrong because he dates the Clapton as overdub and he puts on the same day as the sixth, which is the same with the. Actually overdubs were done. But we know fact that it was actually the day before Lewison sort of gets the demos. He puts like before Eric comes in, whatever. George has done another demo whatever of the song and then scrapped it with backwards tapes and all sorts of stuff like that. Backwards guitar. But that happened the day before. That was the. You know, not all. The third it was because the tape box has written or the tape studio logs has the same sort of date or whatever or they're using the same tape box so there's a date. But the actual Eric Clapton came and they did the basic track on the 5th and there's no demoing beforehand. That was previous session where George was by himself demoing the song doing backwards guitars and all sorts of stuff like that. So on the 5th of September, Eric comes in, they're doing live and there's. John's involved like yes, she played the organ. Because George was very dismissive of John. He said like, well, I can't remember if John was there. Was he there and. But he was there. You can tell. He's. He's playing the organ. Something has to be playing the organ and it's very basic organ and on all the basic tracks that have heard our taste, the organ only plays on the bridges. That's consistent through it. And George overdubbed all that high pitched organ. More organs and yeah, he's his baby. So when it comes to the overdub session on the 6th, don't think John would be around. He's probably doing something else in the part of the studio because George is working with Paul, getting the bass done and finishing off doing it all and doing the harmonies and that sort of stuff. Another vocal and I just don't see any room for John to be around. He's not shithouse bass player. Okay, John, you're going to play together with Paul on this track and with me. And I don't think we're all in.
- [121:07]
Andrew Shakespeare
Agreement that John is a nonbody.
- [121:08]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, yeah, good.
- [121:10]
Andrew Shakespeare
So piggies, the reason this is contentious. Well, there's a few things. There's a bunch of things that people leave out and here they are. Some commentators leave out the fact that there's a kick drum being played by Ringo when he plays the tambourine. Some of them just don't mention all. But the biggest thing really is about the grunts. So it was suggested by Lewison in quoting and by. I think it was Ebooks making a suggestion that the pig noises could have been a combination of tape loops and the Beatles themselves doing grunting. However, if you actually listen really closely to the isolated tracks, there is one solitary human pig grunt that happens after verse one. There's one solitary grunt and it wasn't used. It was Mixed out because it actually came to the point where the string started. So if you listen to it, it's actually all tape loops. It's all tape loops that John apparently had a wonderful time compiling from old 78. So that's all good. But the really interesting thing about this one is how the Internet kind of ran with this turn into something else and said, John did the grunting on piggies. And I've read this so many times, John was responsible for making pig noises on a George song. I think, once again, this is John the rebel, John that anarchist, you know, who would dare to make pig noises and grunt away over a George song. It's actually just not true. It's all tape loops and John compiled them. So really, that's it.
- [122:57]
Robert Rodriguez
You know, I have no dispute with that.
- [122:59]
Marcus Phelan
Yeah, you can sort of hear like, oh, that sounds like John. You know, like you can sort of hear. But then this life seems with like a barking dog in the background. I was trying to look at last night like. Like, trying to have a good listen to it. But, yeah, then in the end I thought, like, it's probably pig. Like, you know, we know what John's.
- [123:18]
Robert Rodriguez
Pig sound sounds like because he does it in A Hard Day's Night.
- [123:21]
Marcus Phelan
That's right, yeah. Yeah. You swear, Right.
- [123:25]
Andrew Shakespeare
So if we push forward, we've got Don't Pass Me By. This is another one because some commentators say Ringo's on drums and Paul's on piano. And some people say Ringo's on piano and Paul's on drum.
- [123:38]
Marcus Phelan
I'm with the latter, and I think you are, too, Andrea.
- [123:41]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, you know, I'm just going to jump straight to the textbook. So the textbook says that it's Paul on piano and Ringo on drums. Okay. And then Paul overdubbed extra piano and Ringo overdubbed some extra drums. And Howlett says it's Ringo on piano and Paul on drums. So. So in doing, like a really close listen to the original stereo mix and then comparing it to the placement in the 2018 mix, the placements are actually nearly identical. And what's really clear is that on the basic track you have drums and piano. And then the next overdub is another piano. And the piano is playing exactly the same part as the first piano. Track one, Ringo on piano. Track two, Paul on drums. Next, the piano is doubled. So if Ringo is on piano, then Ringo doubled it himself. Then if Paul is on drums, then the next thing that was done that the drums were doubled was somebody doing a little on cowbell at the beginning. And then Just doing Sleigh Bells. And then there's a bunch of wiped things that they did. But the next things that were kept were a lead vocal, then a doubling of that, and then a violin. And also there was the intro piano, which seems to be tacked on to the beginning of the bass track. Because they're on the same track. So my theory here, and really the whole thing about this song is that Ringo wrote it on piano. Is it in C, C, F and G? So my belief is that Ringo is playing the piano. And they probably covered up his rather inept plonkiness by sticking it through a Leslie speaker. And it's the challenge. It's the Challon upright pian, that dinky sounding one, the Mrs. Mills piano. And it's put through a Leslie speaker. And then I think that they have just distorted it and made it sound really crazy. It's like they did exactly the same thing on George's lead guitar solo, the second solo on your blues. Because if you listen to that, it is a very ropey out. The minute he bends the strings, the guitar goes out of tune. So they stick a bunch of Leslie on it to cover up up the fact that it's really out of tune. Yeah, it is different. It's not exactly the same. I'll tell you why that is. That's because it was put through a Leslie for Don't Pass Me by. And it was put through an amp. It was put through a Fender amp for birthday. So that's why. So that's my thing. I think Ringo's on double piano. I think Paul is on double drums. Ringo is on percussion. And the beginning piano part. There was a few takes that. The little fumbling around kind of thing. It could be Paul, it could be Ringo. I think it's Ringo as well, because it was done a few times and they had a few goes to capture a take that was usable. I think the Paul would have actually worked something out. So I think it's Ringo diddling away dinky dinky doo. And then that finishes. And the bass part is on the same track. So for me, Howlett has really muddied the waters with that one. And Paul on overdub drums as well. Because if you listen to that second drum part in conjunction with the first, you can hear Paul following himself and leaving out his ropey rolls that he puts in some really clumsy falling down the stairs rolls that are going on there. That is not a Ringo drum track. It's two guys goofing around making what, to my mind is the sloppiest recording the Beatles ever made.
- [127:21]
Marcus Phelan
The second one's Ringo's that we're working on this very moment. Exactly. He composed it himself. He composed it himself in a fit of lethargy. And what do you think about it? I think it's the most wonderful thing I've ever heard since Nielsen's River Deep and Mountain dew.
- [127:37]
Andrew Shakespeare
The first three tracks worked on that extremely long version of Rev 1, and the tape loops for Revolution Line and Don't Pass Me By. If you listen to all of those sequentially, chronologically, it's a bit of a tough lesson, I find it's pretty hard.
- [127:53]
Robert Rodriguez
The magic's in the sequencing.
- [127:55]
Andrew Shakespeare
I actually put together a chronological playlist. So when I get to that bit, I go, oh, my God, I've got a long way to go. So you got Revolution 1, followed by Revolution 9, followed by Don't Pass Me By. That's how they kicked off the sessions. Oh, my goodness. I love Revolution Number Nine, but I think it's a lot of listening, you know, it's like 20 minutes of listening.
- [128:17]
Marcus Phelan
It.
- [128:43]
Andrew Shakespeare
So we can move on to the last one, if you like. Is that okay? So we come up to the last one. This is not guilty. And this is one that we have discussed this of months ago, the three of us actually, and did some research, but I've come to some conclusions only in this morning, in going through this. And what I've decided is that we got led up the garden path by a mystery, because I'm just going to read out the conclusion that I wrote here, because that kind of really says. At all I said that the only thing that makes us think that something was up with this, like the idea that maybe John wasn't on the keyboards or I'm not on the harpsichord, was because there's a strange count in on the 2018 box set. So you hear a take 102 or something, you hear that coming from the control room, and then somebody counts in 1, 2, 3, 4. The issue is, is that whoever's counting in, it's not a beetle and it's not George Martin, it's not their voices. So we don't know who is doing that. All the evidence leads to the fact that John does in fact play the harpsichord. He played electric piano on the first day and is heard on those takes and saying that even though they don't, he doesn't think they're getting anywhere, he's happy to keep going. And then he's caught on tape the following day when he switched to Harpsichords saying the same sort of things. So how. It quotes John as saying after take 46, at 5 8, I don't mind if we keep doing it, but I don't think it's going anywhere. And then after take 69, John says, how was that? I think that's the best so far. So I don't know who's doing the accountant. It's a mystery. We know it's not Chris Thomas because Robert, you reached out to Chris and asked him.
- [130:28]
Robert Rodriguez
I did, yes, because we were speculating about the harpsichord playing and I like, well, I'll just ask him because we know he plays on Piggies and we know that that was tracked after George Martin left him in charge of the sessions. But this one, Not Guilty, was tracked earlier in the sessions in August, I believe. So I reached out to him and he said, no, I don't know who's playing harpscourt, because I wasn't there.
- [130:48]
Andrew Shakespeare
Yeah. And John managed Hey Bulldog.
- [130:51]
Robert Rodriguez
Yeah, and Obladida Blah Dah.
- [130:53]
Andrew Shakespeare
And John actually managed a bunch of very competent electric keyboards on the Help album. He was actually the keyboardist for 1965. It appears really quite amazing, really, when you think about it. Well, all I can Say is with 102 takes, he had a lot of practice. There you go. So we have Kevin Howlett to thank for that. That's great. When he quotes directly from the tape, it's giving us the kind of information that we actually really want and need, which is great. Instead of making statements about things where we have actually no idea why it's being said. Well, in Gaols or Caverns says, I wish they would for the research. I listened to all those Nagger reels and I remember spending about a month in my car because I couldn't play them at home. I would have been thrown out of the house, but I listened for a solid month listening to take after take of, like, the two songs in particular, Maxwell Silverhammer and the Longer Mining Road. My God. The thing is, is that listening to those tapes was invaluable because what it really let me know is that. That most of those sessions were about kind of repetition and tedium. They weren't about arguments and they weren't about fantastic takes and great times either, you know, so it may be boring to go through everything that's there, but that's how we get the knowledge. And I wish somebody would really annotate everything so that we have the knowledge and we can sort out the masterpieces. We can know how masterpieces were created. That's My whole thing, I want to know how these things for creative. I'm just another kind of amateur sleuth out there really. There's thousands of us.
- [132:27]
Robert Rodriguez
Before we leave this song, didn't we have a question about the bass on it? I'm not guilty.
- [132:31]
Andrew Shakespeare
Well, Marcus, I have a theory about that.
- [132:35]
Robert Rodriguez
Just haven't meshed with the backing track.
- [132:37]
Andrew Shakespeare
I have a theory about the bass. And it comes back to the she Said, she said thing when Paul plays bass. Like if you think, say from Revolver onwards, when Paul plays bass on the basic track without doing an overdub, his approach is extremely different and far more simple and a bit more random than it is when he constructs and perfects a part which he then grafts on. So in this one of the instances on the White Album where he's playing on the basic track and playing something relatively basic, I don't think it's particularly complicated. And like with she Said, people go, that just doesn't sound like Paul on bass. It must be George. I think there's two reasons why that song got left out. One is because, you know, it is a bit of a lyrical pop at John and Paul in India or whatever. So that's kind of obvious. And the second thing is I actually think it's a really listless performance. I think it's just a bit of a plotter. I don't think George plays some very noisy guitar on there, which is quite uncharacteristic for him to make that much of a racket. But if you listen to the rest of it, the drums and the harps are called in the bass. It's all a bit random plotty. And I don't think there's really a lot of conviction in their performance at all. Compare that to Savoy Truffle or While My Guitar Gently Weeps like Savoy Truffles have got a terrific energy about it. Even Piggies. It may be comparatively slight, but there's conviction in the performance. I really don't think there's much conviction in anything except the guitars and Not Guilty. That's the way I feel about it. But overall I like the melody, I like the chords a lot. I think that somebody could do a really wonderful, up tempo, spirited performance of this song. I just don't think the Beatles did. And in the end George turned it into an Easy listening late 70s classic on a self titled with Gary Wright dearly departed recently on keyboards. And it just sounds so la. It's incredible, you know, it's nice, it's just not very exciting that's all.
- [134:40]
Robert Rodriguez
It was so jarring to hear the Beatles one after getting acclimated to the solo jazz light LA version. It's like oh this is the mystery song. And then all of a sudden hear the Beatles with this dark sound to it and harpsichord and these brutal sounding guitars. Very 1968.
- [134:57]
Andrew Shakespeare
And I really did like that video did Marcus showing that guitar line. It's great. I like it, it's wonderful. It could have been a good Beatles song. It could have been a good Beatles song. But I actually think the recording of it is the least of George's five recorded songs for that album. That's how I feel about about as a recording and performance. I think the other four songs are stronger even the much maligned piggies and I think that's quite unfairly maligned. The string arrangement, the harps chord is just gorgeous. I can't stand the live in Japan version though. It's just silly. Well it's very bland and boring.
- [135:30]
Marcus Phelan
Take 10021234.
- [136:40]
Robert Rodriguez
Something about the Beatles Created and hosted by Robert Rodriguez executive producer Rick Way Title song performed by the.
- [136:49]
Andrew Shakespeare
Corgis.
- [136:51]
Robert Rodriguez
Something about the Beatles is an evergreen podcast.
- [137:05]
Andrew Shakespeare
Do you think that's enough? Got enough though. Do you think I'm getting cramped?
- [137:09]
Robert Rodriguez
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Andrew Shakespeare
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Robert Rodriguez
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No, it's not. It's just weather.
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Robert Rodriguez
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Marcus Phelan
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Andrew Shakespeare
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Marcus Phelan
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