George Harrison: Search & Destroy

Search (roughly in order): "Here Comes the Sun", "My Sweet Lord" (shameless 'He's so Fine' steal, but still a great song), "If I Needed Someone", "Love You To", "Within You Without You", "Something", "Blue Jay Way" (pssssychedelic man!!!), "While My Guitar Gently Weeps", "All Those Years Ago", "I Want to Tell You", "For You Blue"

Destroy: "Think for Yourself", "Savoy Truffle" I could live without, "Long Long Long" doesn't ring a bell...

Harrison overdid the slide, I think - he made it his own, but it occluded his other styles (cf. early Beatles guitar solos). That wasn't quite what I had in mind re. personal sound.

ALL THINGS MUST PASS: key record? One or two rich and strange things on there: 'I Dig Love' (multiple drummers?) and especially the extraordinary (and never-mentioned) 'Awaiting On You All'.

Search:
'Long, Long, Long' (it doesn't ring a bell, it rings a glass)
'Here Comes The Sun' (those opening bars still cheer me up everytime I hear them)
'Old Brown Shoe' (why do I love that 'I want a short haired girl who sometimes wears it twice as long' line so much?)
'Something' (though Frank Sinatra went a bit over the top in his praise)
'I Want To Tell You'
'Think for Yourself'
'While My Guitar Gently Weeps'
'Within You Without You'
'The Inner Light'
'Blue Jay Way'
'Love You To'
'I Me Mine'
Lots of 'All Things Must Pass', (esp 'Isn't It A Pity', 'My Sweet Lord', 'I'd Have You Anytime', 'Wah Wah', 'Awaiting On You All' and the title track)

Destroy:
'Piggies'
'Taxman' (sorry, I know it's a great riff, but I can't listen to it without thinking 'you greedy bastard')
'Only A Northern Song'
'It's All Too Much'
the third disc of 'All Things Must Pass'
Probably everything he released after that.

I still think 'Something' is fabulous, though Q is right about the occasional lyrical lapse; version on the Anthology is astounding.

He's the coolest Beatle in Yellow Submarine, what with the standing on mountain peaks and the perpetually wind-swept hair.

Search: The Green Party. Destroy: The Natural Law Party.

OK, I know my two "search" objects have nothing to do with Harrison (he *did* bankroll the NLP, didn't he?). But details, details ...

Seriously: search "Long Long Long" (his best song ever IMO), "Only A Northern Song" (I'm sorry, Nick: even *I* love that one!) and "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" even though, as MacDonald sagely notes, its song structure is pure proto-AOR. But destroy a lot of the rest, and destroy his ethos above all: it's the Sham 69 of hippiedom, the ugly meme that discredits all the good stuff.

I find it life-affirming. Forgetting about the third disc (everyone else does... and rightly so because it sucks eggs), those first two are an ocean of melody.

He would never do anything as good after that album and he never really seemed to care to top it. His ego just kind of disappeared after that (excepting that dopey, calculated hit single in the 80's when his mood probably changed for a time). He seemed happy to be a quiet, religious man knocking out innoucous pop rock records.

There's some good stuff there, though. Tracks like "Blow Away" and "Sue You Sue Me Blues". And his Lennon tribute (after asassination), "All Those Years Ago" is beautiful, I think. The lyrics are kinda cornball, but the melody has a lovely, shy sort of quality, I think.

As for the Beatles work, I find "Something" overrated easy listening pop, but "Blue Jay Way" is fucked up in a really nice, gurgly way. And I agree with the pro-"Long Long Long" camp. It might be my favorite Beatles track. It's very candlelit and ghostly.

I like George Harrison. A lot.

When the "My Sweet Lord" case was finally settled, somehow George Harrison not only got to keep the rights to his song, but was ALSO awarded the rights to "He's So Fine". He now owns the song that he was accused of ripping off.

I've no idea how that happened, but it's true.

I quite like what Oliver K has to say about ATMP, though I can't seriously rate it over the Beatles. But it has some remarkable moments, like I (we) keep saying.

Yes, those 'Something' lyrics are bad. But I think we all agree that pop != just lyrics (though lyrics may, sometimes, be important) - so for me the song is still a great.

Harrison as guitarist before he went weepy / wah-wah: Classic? (The latter style becomes too all-encompassing.)

What about the LP (eponymous?) with the song 'Faster' on it? I loved that song as a kid.

RC: I agree, NLP: terrible dud. But I wouldn't want to write off 60s- 70s Harrison's achievements just cos of that involvement (92?). Where do the Greens come in - was he funding them too, at some stage?

Relevant connection: Handmade Films. Classic element?

I don't *think* Harrison has ever had anything to do with the Green Party. I kind of specified that it wasn't related to the subject of this thread and therefore, arguably, against the rules.

http://www.8trackheaven.com/Images/georgeharrisonelectronicsound.jpg

Classic tune no one's mentioned: Cheer Down.

Destroy: every album b/w Dark Horse and Cloud Nine.

Never mentioned: his production work on Ringo's ace "It Don't Come Easy" and co-writing the fantastic "Photograph"; also, his solo on Belinda Carlisle's "Leave A Light On."

Verdict: With some all-too-obvous exceptions, the man needs collaboraters.

Oh, and as for G.Harrison's lyrics...

(From Love you to)
"I'll make luv to you..
If you want me toooo"

Dawn: Knock yourself out, why don't you...

F that!

George wrote "Something" when he was only 25 years old! It and "Here Comes the Sun": 2 of the greatest Beatles tunes ever, period.

Give Me Love

(but, yeah, I like "This Song" a lot too.)

"If Not for You" is another great one off that album. His voice was perfectly suited to sing those lyrics.

My fave track off ATMP though is I Live for You, another great melody.

I've been reading a few George interviews recently. I really like the turn of phrase he had and his gently cynical perspective.

and no one else on Earth has that sweet sound he got on the slide roundabout 1969.

and no one else on Earth has that sweet sound he got on the slide roundabout 1969 onwards.

The only other one of his I have is Living In The Material World which is one of those records that almost mechanically alternates between tracks that make you want to put it on and tracks that make you keep flipping past in the bin. "Don't Let Me Wait Too Long" is probably the best thing on there, would have slid in to ATMP very very nicely. And of course "Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth)" which is short on lyrics but is lovely and head-sticky, and I like his vocal on it, so hey.

One night I randomly caught the drag-racing-themed video clip for the later "Faster" on VH1 Classic. That's probably worth hearing at least once - the "Faster than a bullet from a gun!" line is really cool, unfortunately the song overall is really aimless and dull. I fear that probably describes a lot of the 70s and 80s Harrison, which is why I haven't really delved much further, and this thread isn't giving me much inspiration to. Surely ILX has at least one rabid defender of Extra Texture?

Oh, and as for his Beatles work: his own compositions are about an even mix of very good ("Taxman," "Something," "Savoy Truffle") and embarassingly bad ("I Need You," "Piggies"). His guitar playing on the other hand is consistently essential, and fun to listen for because you can hear it getting better and better with each successive album. Get to Revolver and he pretty much epitomizes what I think rock guitarists should play like and sound like. Not such a fan of the slide stuff later on but it has its moments.

Unheralded greatness: George as backing vocalist! He's the Michael Anthony of the 60s, the absolutely essential ingredient in so many songs I don't know how to pick an example. "I'm Down" is probably the best use of him as the straight man. His lead vocals are sometimes awkward, sometimes so perfect you can't imagine the song without them - see "Don't Bother Me," "Love You To." Also check "Roll Over Beethoven" as it appears on Live At The Hollywood Bowl, where he has McCartney putting some enthusiasm into backing him up, it's great.

In short - I think the conventional wisdom is right. One great album (near excellent), inconsistent as a songwriter outside of that, but very consistently perfect as guitarist and team-member where-ever he appears.

omg I love love love this song

Thank you, Tim! Don't know if it's because of the horns, acoustic 12 string, sad lyrics or what, but this song has always been my favorite from ATMP.

xpost: kyle, I think this was not George (Martin's) shining moment. I like the slow tremelo Harrison used here, but it seems to be overplayed with at the console. wtf do I know? I do enjoy the song though.

For point of comparison, check out "Another Girl," where he tears it up on the same kind of call-and-response gap. "For I have got" BRANDOWN DA DOWN DOWN... etc. Now obviously "I Need You" is a different sort of song but it just feels as if so little energy was brought to bear on it. In George's defense, I would suspect that this was more for lack of interest from the other Beatles/George Martin than from himself...

Title song from Dark Horse LP
"You" from Extra Texture
whole 33 1/3 LP
whole s/t LP from 1979
"Blood from a Clone" and "All Those Years Ago" and "Teardrops" from Somewhere in England LP (and I wish they'd put out those four tracks that got edited out when the record company had him rework the album - "Lay His Head" and those)
whole Gone Troppo LP

but "love you to" is one of the songs that absolutely spoils revolver for me. the lyric "make love all day long/make love singing songs" makes me laugh uproariously!

Actually, Tim, I believe "Yes It Is" also employs a volume pedal. And I'm pretty sure "Love You To" does as well.

Nice to see the fantastic "What Is Life" get so much love here.

yeah - that lyric's obviously ridiculous when you can get the whole thing over in 20 minutes maximum, including foreplay, right?

My guess is that George was already becoming well-immersed in Indian art and traditions by this time. In Indian art you can indeed see conjoined couples singing to each other. And the Kama Sutra, of course...

Not mentioned so far: Search: his lead playing on a lot of the Hamburg album, really tough jagged lines, like he's using a razor blade instead of a pick, the best he ever sounded.

That lyric reminds me of those mid-late 90s sex instruction shows that were suddenly everywhere on UK TV, with presenters like Toyah Wilcox (no, really) saying things like:

"Why not try singing to your partner when you make love?

It used to popular in indian culture - we're trying to bring it back."

The Trypes did a really good version of this. In typical Feelies format, the lyrics kind of blend into the rest of the song.

"Love You To" > "Within You Without You"

No love for "don't bother me"?

Ouch.

For a short time I had a cassette of his "Dark Horse Years" greatest hits, until the tape got screwed up at the very beginning of a long Greyhound ride. Some great stuff on there - "Gone Troppo," "Crackerbox Palace," "Here Comes The Moon," "Blow Away." Could really do without the 'thoughtful' stuff, especially the 'all your money doesn't make you happy' trip on "Cheer Down." But some really nice material - wish it had had "Faster" on it but hey.

"Crackerbox Palace" may have been the first music video I've ever seen...I recall George popping out of a pram which was being pushed by a woman with John Lennon glasses...

I still own that Dark Horse tape; it's all you need own from the era. "Cheer Down" is terrific -- god, the guy needed collaborators.

"Blow Away" would make a solo Beatles CD-R comp.

Proof that McCartney wasn't a control freak is that mewling, turgid pomposity like "While My Guitar Noisily and Repititiously Whines" and "Something"(genius lyric - "I don't kno-o- ow, I-I-I don't know") was allowed on their albums.

"Something" has been recorded in, what is it?, 300-400 different versions or Something. So I guess there must be Something to it....

So, if there is any song that summarizes George Harrison solo it's "That Is All."

On the Living In the Material World, it's this histrionic atrocity with one of the man's worst vocals ever (and that's saying something). Witness:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTb0SurR2p4

Thankfully, I got to know the song as the lead track on Harry Nilsson's 1976 ...That's the Way It Is record, which reveals the song to be one of the best, most lovely things George ever wrote. Witness:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9jmq_8oTLI

http://thisiheard.blogspot.com/2009/12/george-harrison-dream-away-1982.html

i like that harrison vocal
xpost

this is weird

http://www.youtube.com/user/pizzatimeplayer

But destroy a lot of the rest, and destroy his ethos above all: it's the Sham 69 of hippiedom, the ugly meme that discredits all the good stuff.

― Robin Carmody, Friday, August 31, 2001 12:00 AM (9 years ago)

wonder what the hell this was supposed to mean.

I think it was an accusation that there was too much dogma in his lyrics.

Does Robin post here anymore? He was all over ILM in its early days -- and he has a nice British name.

A musician friend and I discussed George on Saturday; he was even more violent in his dismissal. "The guy's almost as bad a crank as Lou Reed, except he had the fortune never to record Berlin.

I remember when a friend played me "It's Johnny's Birthday." I thought they were singing "This song is worthless." I agreed.

― Matos-Webster Dictionary (M Matos), Saturday, August 19, 2006 9:

lol

Remove Living in the Material World and Somewhere in England from his discography and I don't think anyone ever makes that accusation, Alfred.

A musician friend and I discussed George on Saturday; he was even more violent in his dismissal. "The guy's almost as bad a crank as Lou Reed, except he had the fortune never to record Berlin.

I thought George came off really well in the Anthology series - maybe a bit dismissive of The Beatles legacy, but he seemed to really have good humor about it.

He had moments of Cranky Old Dad that mitigated Ringo and Paul's sentimentality -- gestures and remarks you imagine John would have made -- but I always remember this moment when the three are jamming on stools and Paul, obviously having a ball, says, "Another one?" and George aims the briefest of evil scowls at him, as if he's thinking, "It's not 1969, motherfucker."

Download zip file of "Beware of Abkco", solo demos for "All Things Must Pass." Love this, could even bring some of the haters around:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=YLWVTLIV

I watched the Concert for Bangladesh recently & was pretty shocked at how thin George's voice was. I like his Beatles songs from "If I Needed Someone" on (though not before that), but haven't ever gotten into anything post-Beatles (not for lack of trying, esp. with All Things Must Pass). But that live set, yeesh; George's vocals sound like hard work & that's no fun to hear, especially when the singing is so cringeworthy otherwise. It's a drag, isn't it?

That's exactly my problem with most of his solo albums: he can't sing worth a damn, which makes his homilies a chore to sit through, and he's not resourceful enough a producer to arrange his songs in a way that mitigates the preaching.

Remove Living in the Material World and Somewhere in England from his discography . .

The former has two of my favorite George songs, "Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth)" and "Don't Let Me Wait Too Long."

he can't sing worth a damn

Given his multitracked backing vocals all over "All Things Must Pass," some of which are pretty dense and complex, this is madness.

You just made my point though: the vocals were multitracked and produced by Phil Spector. George needs help.

There's a gulf of difference between "can't sing worth a damn" and "requires a producer's guidance."

When I hear him mangle the line "you made me such a big star" on the Bangladesh "Wah Wah", I'm inclined to say "can't sing worth a damn".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDCP4UeXgw8

Phil, I only mentioned those two albums because I think they might have the heaviest concentration of the type of lyrics that were being criticized. No one's ever going to say they can't take Gone Troppo because it's too heavy-handed.

And Alfred, as ever, I disagree with your producer stance. Phil Spector is one thing, but I really like the sound of the Dark Horse-era albums. And there are collaborators on those records - all the people who play on them.

What's the name of that Harrisong playing at the very end of the Time Bandits movie?

"Dream Away" - one of his greatest!

yeeesss!

Well, it's like "All things must pass", I quite like the first third, but the second gets very "more of the same" but more heavydraggy.

(The "jam" album I don't mind, actually!)

Well, I do mind the jam album. A lot. Then again I got a whole lotta love for most of what comes before it. On ATMP.

Wonderwall is one very decent soundtrack too.

Yeah, I'd call it the very definition of "overlooked"

Alfred's constant dismissals of George reminiscent of famous talent scout putdown of Fred Astaire

He had moments of Cranky Old Dad that mitigated Ringo and Paul's sentimentality -- gestures and remarks you imagine John would have made -- but I always remember this moment when the three are jamming on stools and Paul, obviously having a ball, says, "Another one?" and George aims the briefest of evil scowls at him, as if he's thinking, "It's not 1969, motherfucker."

It seems like George took the opportunity of the Anthology to assert himself and stand up to Paul's condescension. He insisted on Jeff Lynne to produce, shut things down when a third Threetles song wasn't working out, and vetoed "Carnival Of Light" on Anthology 2 (that last one rankles, though).

According to Peter Doggett's indispensable You Never Give Me Your Money, George only did the Anthology because he was nearly bankrupt from his film company and a shady business manager or two.

George is my favorite Beatle

Bangladesh album is a mess though, I'm not gonna defend that. Dylan's version of Maggie's Farm from that is pretty fun tho

tho

Jim Keltner and Ringo doubling their drum parts during the Bangladesh Concert is one of the alternately most pointless/entertaining things about ti

When I hear him mangle the line "you made me such a big star" on the Bangladesh "Wah Wah", I'm inclined to say "can't sing worth a damn".

I've honestly never seen Bangladesh straight through, just snippets here and there (must rectify) but damn if that youtube didn't give me chills. I didn't hear that line (or any of his singing on that song) as mangled; I think he sounds ragged but right.

yeah it's not like he Amy Winehouse'd it or anything

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2wrte1ijlY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ng511CKPt3w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9D9JuiJNizw

George stuff I like from the seventies:

"Blow Away" (who needs Macca when you've got this chorus?)
"This Song" (not very funny, but he sounds like he's enjoying himself over this 'ere beat)
"Don't Let Me Wait Too Long" (a God song about being real horny; one of the few times he understood Al Green)

I've honestly never seen Bangladesh straight through, just snippets here and there (must rectify) but damn if that youtube didn't give me chills. I didn't hear that line (or any of his singing on that song) as mangled; I think he sounds ragged but right.

Also, he seems pretty at-ease and comfortable for a guy who hadn't been on a concert stage in five years.

George is maybe the best thing about this tune (apart from the lyrics)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQwWp98IuGE

His dual slide guitar solo on "Day After Day" is great, too.

I've always had a soft spot for this drunken hootenanny of a b-side:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lum7Pow-vTA

If I haven't already mentioned it upthread, Simply Shady from Dark Horse is one of those snake charmer melodies he did so beautifully, though never better than Beware of Darkness

Martin Scorsese documentary airing on HBO in October:

http://www.georgeharrison.com/#/news/archive/201107/george-harrison-documentary-and-book-announced

Trailer for the movie.

The Worst of George Harrison.

Pete Prown? I thought that was a 'fakey' name, but it seems not

Wonderwall is one very decent soundtrack too.
― t**t, Wednesday, June 29, 2011 10:33 AM (1 year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yeah, I'd call it the very definition of "overlooked"
― Mark G, Wednesday, June 29, 2011 10:38 AM (1 year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

OTM. So good.

some of the wonderwall stuff really invent the "wes anderson" vibe, particularly mark devo's stuff on the rushmore soundtrack

I don't know what's being particularly identified as "slick and overproduced" about the 1979 self-titled album or why a song like "Love Comes to Everyone" is singled out as an "overt stab at polished LA pop." That album sounds a lot like the production on the other albums from that period to me. Not exactly the same, but nothing radically different.

I also think it's too easy to make assumptions based on his personality that lead to claims about how "alienated by the current pop scene" he was. "Blood from a Clone" strikes me as far less serious than the writer makes it out to be (he says it's "supposedly his savage commentary on the state of popular music") and actually remarkable for how of its time it sounds, at least in Harrison's own way. It's an easy rival of "Coming Up" for eccentric older guy new wave with some cool funky bass.

"Wake Up My Love" from Gone Troppo is another one. The synthesizers on that are like something you'd hear in an Italo tune.

I like "Love Comes to Everyone" and disagree with how he tosses "dated" to signify something he doesn't like. He could've criticized him in other ways.

Just listening to the iTunes clips of the '06 Living in the Material World and it is awfully good sounding.

Living in the Material World remaster, I meant to say.

Harrison was the third-best songwriter in the Beatles, sort of like Uruguay ranks third in a list of who has the most nuclear devices after the USA and Russia. Proof that McCartney wasn't a control freak is that mewling, turgid pomposity like "While My Guitar Noisily and Repititiously Whines" and "Something"(genius lyric - "I don't kno-o- ow, I-I-I don't know") was allowed on their albums.

― dave q, Thursday, August 30, 2001 8:00 PM (11 years ago)

even after these all years i feel compelled to say Fuck you dave q, fuck yoooooouuuu

:)

the self-titled is a gorgeous album. such a strong run of simple, beautiful songs on there. it stands up bloody well.

I just learned "Think For Yourself" on guitar. It's crazy! It's not a song from 1965, it's like something off Nevermind. There some proto-Devo in this as well.

The good things that we can have if we close our eyes it's a beautiful world

Wonder what it would sound like if he saved it for ATMP.

He should have rerecorded all his Beatles songs instead of the "Apple Jam."

I could listen to the first four seconds of Think For Yourself over and over.

Everything on Spotify, including Electronic Sound and Wonderwall. Albums with bonus tracks.

Nice!

Wonderwall really is a treat. Electronic Sounds is.... less entertaining.

His catalogue is now on Apple Music as well.

Lotta stuff grayed out as unavailable on his overview page, but I started clicking on it and it played anyway.

Wonderwall is so great. The move is fun too. And I love this nearly lost Harrison-produced masterwork:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVRmdrM0Mmg

Finally grabbed a cheapie Gone Troppo, after all these years of wondering. Man is it a silly, inessential sort of record. So many songs that just feel like "I'm a musician, I suppose writing songs is what I do, right?" in the most canonical rocker-at-40 sort of way. And yet kind of lovable for precisely that reason? Still, there are these flashes of joy in the playing and singing here and there, amid the sea of forgettable and nearly-hookless songs, so I don't think this will be my last time putting it on. I think the thing I liked the most (besides the title track and "Wake Up My Love," which I already knew) was the instrumental (?) track somewhere on Side One.

Well, for starters, I might actually think "Dream Away" is the best song he ever wrote. But the record in general is lovable in my opinion - some really good songwriting and a nice production/sound. I like all of Side One. "That's the Way It Goes" is probably the best of the kind of mellow, non-"Dream Away," non-instrumentsl, non-early-'60s-cover tunes he wrote for the album (and there's a really nice version of it on Concert for George). "Mystical One" is probably my second favorite of those, or the title track, if that qualifies.

Might be my favorite of the Dark Horse albums. That one or 33 1/3.

Start up the cement mixer.

I find 33 1/3 to be one of his best post-All Things Must Pass records, and Gone Troppo to be thoroughly awful - the very definition of a contractual obligation record. There's some good moments on most of Harrison's solo records, but my god did he sound like he was phoning it in at times.

I haven't heard it, but noticed that "Circles" was written (or started) in 1968. Kind of amazing that in the early 80s he still had Beatles-era songs to pick from to fill out his records.

Yeah there's a beatles demo of circles.

Yup, it's on the White Album demos you'll find floating around the internet somewhere.

Isn't McCartney II also a "silly, inessential" record? I like Gone Troppo as much as I like McCartney II.

I usually found one standout on all the later albums, like Simply Shady on Dark Horse

Yeah, 'Simply Shady' is a good Harrisong, sadly marred by the weak vocal like the entire album.

That OPP Dark Horse comp from 1989 creates the impression that those albums are stronger than they are; nevertheless, I still like "That's The Way It Goes" though. "Wake Up My Love" stinks of I-need-a-hit-what's-this-synth desperation.

Yeah I'm loathe to assign motives to artists, but from the sound of the records, it doesn't seem like he had much respect for new wave at all, cf Paul

what's-this-synth desperation

I think you're projecting. He made a Moog album before the Beatles broke up. He's credited as playing synthesizer on "Dear One" and "Crackerbox Palace," Billy Preston as playing one on "Beautiful Girl," and both Preston and Gary Wright credited as playing them on "See Yourself," all on 33 1/3. Steve Winwood and Neil Larsen are credited as playing Moogs on the self-titled album from '79. Five people are credited as playing synthesizers on the Somewhere in England album: Harrison, Larsen, Gary Brooker, Al Kooper, and Mike Moran. Moran may have been the big synth guy on Gone Troppo, too, though Harrison and Preston are also credited with playing them.

What's this post desperation

What's that supposed to mean? Looks like an anti-intellectual gesture to me. And a denial of your silly characterization.

Here Comes the Sun got synth all over it

I'm just messing with you, Tim. I'm aware that Harrison's used synths before, but "Wake Up My Love" sounds like a desperate attempt to be current, a limp "Gloria" (Laura Branigan, not Van Morrison).

I could believe that there was maybe some kind of record company push to get a more "contemporary" sound, rather than Harrison not having an interest in synths as such. It's an okay song IMO but definitely a one-riff deal without a lot to say. To be fair, he scored a huge hit on a similar formula with "Got My Mind Set On You" so who knows. Listening to the album through again, louder this time, to see if anything else jumps out at me.

http://orig09.deviantart.net/aead/f/2011/191/7/d/droppo___321_by_futuredami-d3lkztm.png

Droppo
Gone Droppo
Droppo
It's time you know I gone Droppo
Oh!

I could believe that there was maybe some kind of record company push to get a more "contemporary" sound

Warners initially rejected Somewhere in England, so it wouldn't be surprising if they kept the pressure on for this one. Equally unsurprising for Harrison to be all, "You want contemporary? Here ya go, some cheesy synths! Have fun trying to promote my lack of effort!"

It was also apparently the inspiration for this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxxhb34_iGg

lol

Yeah, idk, I feel okay about calling this inessential - and unfortunately in the bad way. I love a lot of inessential McCartney records but George just doesn't have the tune-finding knack or range of oddball arrangements to make otherwise hookless (if amiable and well-intentioned) songs interesting or easy on the ear. Most of this just goes by without me noticing at all. Several times he seems to hope that if he repeats the chorus enough it'll become memorable or powerful. It works on "Dream Away" but not the others I fear. YMMV though!

I love a lot of inessential McCartney records but George just doesn't have the tune-finding knack or range of oddball arrangements to make otherwise hookless (if amiable and well-intentioned) songs interesting or easy on the ear.

Yeah, that's the key difference between them. McCartney can just whip up a delightful (if utterly inconsequential) tune like it's nothing, but George seemed to treat songwriting like a chore.

Similarly with their approaches to the guitar: McCartney could tear off a blinding solo without breaking a sweat, while George would labor for hours over creating The Perfect Solo (in the case of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," he spent eight hours trying to get a "weeping" backwards guitar effect only to say, "Nuts to this, I'll just get Eric Clapton.")

Well, tbh I can dig spending a working day trying to figure out the sound/form of a guitar solo! But yeah in general George doesn't strike me as someone that just thinks of great new songs every day; often it feels more like he has something he wants to say and is looking for a song to do it in. Which is also fine! Just that when he doesn't have something he wants to say you start to wonder why he's even in the studio. Whereas McCartney is clearly in love with the idea of being a rock musician, making albums and recording things, often to the point where he annoys the shit out of his collaborators (including, notably, George, though of course there are other issues between them). My impression of George's solo career benefits enormously from that first big, excellent record, significantly formed as everyone knows out of songs slowly accumulated on the backburner over a half-decade span. I don't mean this as a slam; some people's talents and way of approaching music just don't align with the very specific and arbitrary task of cranking out an LP every year.

he spent eight hours trying to get a "weeping" backwards guitar effect

I find this endearing myself but then I am also a Kevin Shields fan

You guys, I'm listening to "Crackerbox Palace" right now and the arrangement on this is so freaking amazing.

I won't keep arguing the point about "Wake Up My Love" other than to say that I don't recall reading anything about continued record label pressure after Somewhere in England or about it being a reaction. I don't think it's a stretch to say that it's in the vein of things like "Crackerbox Palace."

Several times he seems to hope that if he repeats the chorus enough it'll become memorable or powerful.

Totally otm. Just count how many times he repeats the chorus of Blow Away next time you hear it. George was pretty economical when hitting those three-minute quotas.

But yeah in general George doesn't strike me as someone that just thinks of great new songs every day; often it feels more like he has something he wants to say and is looking for a song to do it in. Which is also fine! Just that when he doesn't have something he wants to say you start to wonder why he's even in the studio.

George's not regarding his career as a job is one of his most charming qualities. The periods when he released unfocused, indifferent albums were brief (1974-1975 and 1981-1982 really). Forced to think of record making as a career, he wilted, as one might when the sullenness that served as a muse stopped rewarding the audience's attention, and the Indian philosophy that brought him peace couldn't inspire many good songs. In my youth George was my favorite Beatle because he was stifled, unappreciated, whatever; I adore Cloud Nine and the Wilburys records, especially since they validate the claim made by Tom Petty and others that George was a riot to be around; that it took the presence of Paul and Beatle chatter to provoke the sour, rather nasty guy beneath the surface (Cubans call this sort of person pesado).

When it came to collaborations, however, George deserves credit: as producer and enabler for Ringo’s best singles and Badfinger’s “Day By Day” and "Sour Milk Sea"; as player of solos as scabrous as his wit on John Lennon’s “How Do You Sleep.” With the exception of his great friend Bob Dylan, the sixties never produced a less sentimental relic(“in Beatles lore alone, he’s something of a relief,” Bill Wyman wrote in 2011).

Yeah, George was wonderful, even if he'd accomplished nothing else, for his refusal to play along with 60s mythos, Beatles mythos, all that stuff. His Anthology segments made a big impression on me as a teen and maybe helped inoculate me against the too-earnest love of everything Sixties to which teens like myself are otherwise susceptible. On Haight-Ashbury: "...it was a bunch of spotty kids getting high." On LSD itself: "I put it under a microscope and it just looked like little rope and I said I'm not putting that in my brain anymore." On the adrenaline rush of Beatlemania: "We couldn't really do much."

You guys ever hear this? I never knew this had been put out as a Wonderwall bonus track:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N65kPFtxDis

it was ona Beatles single so yes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a82-7ozS_MI

Watching this video cold, you'd think George had always been the leader. Ringo and Paul defer to him at the table.

Οὖτις, - alternate take, no vocals

oh right

although apart from all the talking at the beginning it sure sounds like the released take sans vocals

It does. It just struck me listening to it that it's a cool composition.

hahaha George references the Buddy Rich tapes!

My list of his best.

right on

Fish On The Sand!! **high five**

Extremely underrated track.

Not bad

Fish On The Sand!! **high five**

Extremely underrated track.

― and this section is called boner (Phil D.)

the first side of Cloud Nine really

Hmm. In the words of Shakespeare, "To listen to a lesser Harrison LP or to cheese grate my nipples off? That is the question."

"Handle me with care"?

Beware of Darkness is the song that haunted me, ever since I borrowed the triple album off my friend G as a teenager and taped my favourites. There is something about that wailing guitar as the flat 3rd kicks in, and George's almost whispered vocal, the sudden joy of "dancing down the sidewalk"; you forget the sermons then.

oh and "take kurr, bewurr"

One thing I will say about Harrison's songwriting is that he certainly could put together interesting - sometimes unorthodox - chord progressions that, when they worked, they really worked.

"Love comes to everyone" is smooth love

"Here comes the moon" is also great, surprised not mentioned yet?

"Love comes to everyone" is smooth love

― calstars, Friday, October 13, 201

The way he sings the verse-to-melody release in this trance-like lockstep is comforting

<3 Good album!

There's some good stuff on those Harrison records amongst the phoning-it-in dullness.

otm

used to own a tape of "Extra Texture" and had some good times listening to it even if the album is a blur

'You' and 'This Guitar (Can't Keep From Crying)' are good, even with the chipmunk vocals on the former and the self-referential title of the latter. Tasty Moog bass, though. The rest of the album is a snoozefest, though.

The former Beatle members reference their former band so much in their solo careers it's almost embarrassing.

Always felt that the Dark Horse albums were a big uptick from the last few Apple records. Much better sound and I don't think there are many sub-par songs on 33 1/3 or the self-titled album. Somewhere in England is a little less successful maybe but he comes back nicely with Gone Troppo.

These days All Things Must Pass, Thirty Three & 1/3 and a compilation of the highlights of the rest is all I need.

"Soft Touch" is another really good one on that album that maybe doesn't get mentioned much.

The former Beatle members reference their former band so much in their solo careers it's almost embarrassing.

― more Allegro-like (Turrican)

if i'd been in the beatles i'd sure as hell never let anybody forget it.

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/memoryalpha/images/1/12/I_am_not_Spock.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20090427182556&path-prefix=en

was there ever a solo beatles tracks poll?

Like anyone would have forgotten it. It's like Billy Corgan telling everyone that he did most of the playing on Smashing Pumpkins records, like yeah we already know and we get it.

if billy corgan talked more about how he did most of the playing on the smashing pumpkins records and less about chemtrails i'd like him better

was there ever a solo beatles tracks poll?

― niels, Sunday, October 15, 2017 9:32 AM (ten hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I think there was one scheduled on the ballot poll waiting list, I've no idea where we're up to with that now, though

Like anyone would have forgotten it. It's like Billy Corgan telling everyone that he did most of the playing on Smashing Pumpkins records, like yeah we already know and we get it.

its not like they had a choice when every fan journalist and tv show host asks them when the Beatles are getting back together on a daily basis

it would have been easy as fuck for John and George and Ringo to go on tour and do their Beatles stuff every night, cash in on that. John and George pretty much stopped playing out entirely. Ringo was off hanging w T-Rex. i dont exactly see them wallowing in nostalgia on the contrary it was a bit of an albatross

It's obvious that the Beatles believed their own myth and their own hype. All of them. Including Ringo, and especially Lennon.

its not like they had a choice when every fan journalist and tv show host asks them when the Beatles are getting back together on a daily basis

― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Sunday, October 15, 2017 6:56 PM (eleven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

and this has what to do with their songwriting, exactly?

Lennon's beliefs and feelings about the Beatles and associated hype seemed to change weekly, but he at least professed to think a large segment of their work was crap rushed out to meet deadlines.

Though that may have been prompted by a feeling that the only way to get out from under the Beatles thing post-breakup was to tarnish the myth as much as possible.

god knows what he'd make of his mid 70s period if he were alive today.

When he wrote "I don't believe in Beatles", he was contributing to the myth. You don't even write a line like that unless you believe your own hype. He knew what he was doing.

I feel like a key part of Lennon's story is that much of the time he didn't know what he was doing and was trying to not be miserable. I mean, the myth was already there, and it was pretty much impossible for someone as self-obsessed as Lennon not to engage with it.

As Adam Bruneau pointed out, every interview any of them did after 1970 was “When are you getting back together?” and “Remember when you were on Ed Sullivan?” And I think it’s safe to say no fewer than 95% of their interactions with fans (or hell, even close friends) were/are about their Beatle years. So yeah, it has to do with their songwriting because that’s what their lives were.

As for Lennon believing his own hype, kids brought massive LENNON SAVES banners to some of their 1966 shows, the Klan threatened a terror attack, records were burned, and later, murders were committed based on non-existent secret messages on the white album. Hype (an insufficient term) like that isn’t exactly easy to dismiss (and it’s not as if he didn’t try, saying, “It’s just a rock ‘n’ roll band breaking up, it’s not the end of the world”).

(x-post)

Indeed!

Moving on to the others: McCartney, as amazing as it seems now, initially tried as hard as he could to make a break from the Beatles thing. Yes, there's the songs about Lennon on Ram and Wild Life and a little Beatle hangover on McCartney, but from 1972 up until Tug of War there's not much Beatle-referencing stuff there, unless you count the odd Beatles track played at Wings shows.

It may have been Lennon's death, but I'd say from Tug of War onwards the Beatle references came back in McCartney's work - slowly at first with 'Here Today', the re-recordings on Broad Street and stuff like the 'My Brave Face' and 'This One' videos, before totally kicking into fucking overdrive from Flaming Pie onwards...

So yeah, it has to do with their songwriting because that’s what their lives were.

No it doesn't, though. The two aren't related at all. Just because you get asked a question in an interview, it doesn't automatically mean you must write about it. If they were that keen to move on and create something distinct, they wouldn't have bothered being so self-referential.

Even Harrison, bless him, as wounded as he was from the Beatle years (which enabled him to form supergroups, put out a wad of spotty records and let him get away with not being bothered about touring) couldn't resist throwing the Beatles references about!

There's references galore on almost all of his albums.

Just because you get asked a question in an interview, it doesn't automatically mean you must write about it. If they were that keen to move on and create something distinct, they wouldn't have bothered being so self-referential.

I don't know if I'd ever watched that 1980-era footage of John and Yoko walking around Central Park until a few years ago or so, but sure enough, as soon as someone recognizes him, it's the Beatles question and it's ten years later.

Except it wasn’t a question in an interview; it was many questions in every interview, of which there were many, in addition to every fan they happened to encounter.

It still doesn't mean you have to write about it! McCartney actually didn't for a very long time, and he would have kept the Beatles going forever if he could have done. Harrison was all "I'm having a better time playing with Dylan and hanging out with Clapton" etc. etc. yet he could be as bad as Lennon for slipping Beatles references into his work.

What are those songs apart from "Living in the Material World?"

(And obviously "When We Was Fab" much much later)

"All Those Years Ago" I suppose

If the Stones had split up after Exile on Main Street you can bet people would have been asking them when they're getting back together constantly too. Plenty of bands have had to endure that. There's still, incredibly, people asking Paul Weller if The Jam are ever gonna reform. Don't see him writing songs about that. Will The Smiths reform? Don't know, but don't see Morrissey writing songs about it.

'Isn't It a Pity?', 'Run of the Mill', 'Sue Me, Sue You Blues', 'Living in the Material World', 'This Guitar (Can't Keep From Crying)', 'Here Comes the Moon', 'All Those Years Ago', 'When We Was Fab' ... I could go on...

'Wah-Wah', there's another...

If the Stones had split up after /Exile on Main Street/ you can bet people would have been asking them when they're getting back together constantly too. Plenty of bands have had to endure that. There's still, incredibly, people asking Paul Weller if The Jam are ever gonna reform. Don't see him writing songs about that. Will The Smiths reform? Don't know, but don't see Morrissey writing songs about it.

I didn't know "Isn't It a Pity" and "Run of the Mill" were so specifically about Beatle relationships. It actually puts a little more meat into "Run of the Mill" for me, personally. But those are great songs anyway. "Wah-Wah" too.

iirc, “Isn’t It A Pity” dates from the Revolver sessions. George possibly rewrote some lines in 1970.

I don’t believe the Jam nor the Smiths had an equivalent effect on popular culture that the Beatles did. Nor were the fan bases of either band a fraction of that of the Beatles.
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Sunday, October 15, 2017 8:26 PM (fifty minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

We're not talking about, measuring or comparing a bands effect on popular culture. We're talking about people being asked a question in an interview and the effect of this on their songwriting.

xxpost:

At least on Dark Horse he had Clapton making off with wife and falling off the wagon to think about - even if the former only got onto the LP in the form of new lyrics on 'Bye Bye Love' ... He should have waited until his throat had healed, though. I'd have far more time for that record if I could put up with the singing.

Originally I think we were talking more generally about the reasons why the ex-Beatles would choose to write on Beatle-related themes and addressing your criticism of that.

Yes, that too!

We're not talking about, measuring or comparing a bands effect on popular culture. We're talking about people being asked a question in an interview and the effect of this on their songwriting.

there have been other musicians before and since the beatles who had the same kind of enormous social impact, but i don't know of any of them who made that impact as part of a collective entity. it doesn't make a lot of sense to ask michael jackson if michael jackson is ever going to get back together, and as tremendously famous as the beatles were individually, they were and always will be dwarfed by "The Beatles". it's not the sort of thing one can "move on" from, any more than someone can "move on" from being the american president.

Imagine if Bob Dylan had broken up.

Yeah he might have had someone going through his trash or something...

There's that great passage in Chronicles where he talks about once seeing a magazine cover that featured some multi-headed monster with, I think, his head and Kennedy's and, I don't know, Castro or something. That's what he had to deal with.

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/ec/08/af/ec08af640eb373a03c2b7e9459b371e7--malcolm-x-fidel-castro.jpg

Ha wow!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Are_We_Not_Men%3F_We_Are_Devo!#Artwork

"The manager of the company's art department, Rick Serini, recommended an artist who could airbrush and alter the face of the picture, while lead singer Mark Mothersbaugh offered a picture he'd procured from a local newspaper that morphed the faces of U.S. presidents John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford. These ideas were later morphed with the original "Chi Chi" Rodriguez image to create the cover art of the album.[9]"

We weren’t talking about that until you brought up the Jam and the Smiths. The frequency and rabidness with which Weller and Morrissey were asked about reuniting is likely significantly less than that of any member of the Beatles.

The frequency and rabidness doesn't matter - what matters is they still get asked, which was a response to Tim's post about Lennon getting asked 10 years after The Beatles broke up.

The Beatles were thought, by a sizable number of their fans, to have The Answer, if not An Answer to the seismic cultural shifts of the ‘60s.

This is all irrelevant unless The Beatles believed this themselves.

Weller and Morrissey may well have been similarly regarded by fans of theirs in their times, but questions put to them in interviews, and by fans/fanatics, did not have the same weight of “you changed our generation!” behind them.

With Weller and Morrissey it was more "you speak for our generation" rather than "you changed our generation" - this distinction is notable. The Sex Pistols changed their generation. This is all irrelevant though.

Again, this is not a matter of a single interviewer asking a single question in a single interview. The Beatles had (have) to endure a gauntlet of hectoring for decades, on a scale no other performers have had to endure. More likely than not, as artists tend to reflect the lives they’ve led through their work, this will come out in their music, consciously and otherwise.

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Sunday, October 15, 2017 9:46 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Again, it's irrelevant - they didn't need to write about it - and again, McCartney didn't for a very long time even though he may have spoken about The Beatles often in interviews - until he finally gave in. Music and interviews are different things, and I don't believe any Beatles reference in their solo careers is anything other than conscious.

I think it's more that they all had colossal egos and believed their own hype and myth, in some ways contributing to their own myth by self-mythologising.

Dark Horse is underrated. It's patchy, but it's also got some real gems

I see no need to make that criticism in general about them. Sometimes, they seem humble to me, actually. Always totally willing to grant some kind of Joseph Campbell-type relevance to the Beatles "myth" rather than just criticize it as hype.

"Also" totally willing, etc.

I think it's more that they all had colossal egos and believed their own hype and myth, in some ways contributing to their own myth by self-mythologising.

― more Allegro-like (Turrican)

look they _made_ their own myth. what, you think they sold records just by writing good songs? if the beatles had been humble we would never have heard of them.

I've got a big ol soft spot for Dark Horse, bad singing and all. Pretty easily my second fave album of his. I will say my vinyl version on my shit speakers sounds way better than the remastered one on Spotify

Shame this didn't make ATMP. Top 5 George track for me:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=N2rFr0DyQcg

since "the nurse"i've been convinced she's an artist i ought to get into it but neglected to do so. what a mistake, she's the best

look they _made_ their own myth. what, you think they sold records just by writing good songs? if the beatles had been humble we would never have heard of them.

― bob lefse (rushomancy), Monday, October 16, 2017 3:41 AM (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

No they didn't! Others made the myth for them any they bought into it and eventually began fuelling it.

They initially sold records by yes, writing good songs, but also looking the part (they were well packaged), being there at the right time and being helped along by the hype of their management team and others.

yeah, the Beatles contributed to their own mythology, being that they were in the Beatles and didn't just stop making music altogether. i don't really understand Turrican's point here, they should have written good songs but not referenced that thing they did for 1/3rd of their lives, seems like a dumb demand to make

like wow they consciously wrote about their own lives, oh no, what bastards

I'm not saying they shouldn't have done, I'm saying they did it to an embarrassing degree. There is a difference there.

Although The Beatles never played a gig where they decided to knock live goldfish into the audience out of champagne glasses, so I suppose there is that.

of course they did -- what else inspired George's "Fish on the Sand"?!

I'm not saying they shouldn't have done, I'm saying they did it to an embarrassing degree. There is a difference there.

― more Allegro-like (Turrican)

so the standard here is, what, turrican is embarrassed by the degree to which they wrote about their own lives?

If they were merely writing about their own lives, that would be fine... if they had still been in The Beatles. The tone of the solo Beatles when they get all self-referential isn't "this is what I did today", it's the sound of people believing their own hype.

Then again, when they tried to write about being young when they were past the Beatles' stage, it wasn't all convincing.

e.g. "Back seat of my car", I love the song, but .. really?

As far as the audience was concerned, they were still in the Beatles, in the sense that no one would let them forget it, and no one would let them rest without begging them to reunite, with the veiled subtext of "save us!"

To the extent that the Beatles themselves bought into it, they went back and forth. George lamented that the only peace they got on tour was when they went to the can; but when Vox came up with the Super Beatle amps for that tour, his response was, "'Super Beatle'?! What's more super than being a Beatle?"

In the Anthology he said, "They gave their screams, but we gave our nervous systems"; but while viewing footage of screaming throngs, he turned to the director and said, "If U2 thinks they're a big and popular band, then they should sit through this shit and they can see how popular a real band can be."

The fact that they wrote about the Beatles in their solo work as much as they did was, in part, a way of processing what the fuck they'd all been through. Paul's comparatively scant Beatle-referencing output could likely be put down to the fact that he angrily and dickishly initiated the breakup (publicly, at least) -- to put out songs in 1970-75 along the lines of "gee, I miss the fellas, and boy, we were great!" would be a dick move.

As far as the audience was concerned, they were still in the Beatles, in the sense that no one would let them forget it, and no one would let them rest without begging them to reunite, with the veiled subtext of "save us!"

That's the audience's problem rather than the band's problem. Unless you're saying that they were in some way pandering to their audience, in which case I agree.

While of course also giving themselves self-congratulatory pats on the back in song at the same time.

U2 have probably played bigger gigs and given more value for money at their gigs than The Beatles ever did post-Hamburg. Just that audiences have learned to stfu because, let's face it, those screaming crowds look idiotic now.

They looked idiotic then too tbf

Those songs on ATMP don't seem like self-congratulatory pats on the back to me. What are we talking about, "Early 1970?" "I'm the Greatest?" The "How Do You Sleep"/"Some People Never Know" back and forth?

That's because they're not. The self-congratulatory pats on the back came later, particularly when McCartney got in on the act. Before that it was merely just self-referential myth-making.

This brings me nicely to...

Paul's comparatively scant Beatle-referencing output could likely be put down to the fact that he angrily and dickishly initiated the breakup (publicly, at least) -- to put out songs in 1970-75 along the lines of "gee, I miss the fellas, and boy, we were great!" would be a dick move.

Or it could be that he genuinely wanted to move on and make music on his own terms. Which he did, and the fact that he continued to score hit after hit showed he was onto something.

this whole discussion is insane but man....... hating on "back seat of my car" ???? bonkers

He wasn't hating on it - he said he loves the song, but finds the lyric unconvincing.

I think we should all be embarrased about how much we love THE BEATLES

Yeah, whoa!

The idea that Paul has to have his relationship w/ girlfriend, while hiding from her dad. That's mmmm probably not where he was at, at that time.

'Hi Hi Hi' was probably more where he was at!

Pretty sure Morrissey has written songs about the Smiths and the break-up/aftermath of the Smiths (a bigger solo Moz fan will have to help me out here...)

Do 'The Smiths', 'Johnny', 'Andy' or 'Mike' appear in the lyrics?

Yeah if I'd been in the Beatles I doubt I would've even noticed really

Wonder if Pete Best ever thinks about it.

Destroy the 1981 comeback..

Do 'The Smiths', 'Johnny', 'Andy' or 'Mike' appear in the lyrics?

1979’s superior eponymous effort (its single “Blow Away” is a beguiling little gem that’s the equal of any McCartney)

love that entire album

Let's rap and tap at Crackerbox Palace

Sounds so much like Jerry Garcia on "Pisces Fish"

I've never listened to all of Gone Troppo before. What a weird album, not sure if its good. Some ELO-isms creeping in but also a lot of other left-field production choices.

also, this is fucking bizarre
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzKjMpP4-gg

33 1/3 is not a bad album.

def a step up from Extra Texture and Dark Hoarse

there's a lovely tribute to Smokey that vocally he almost pulls off

dude really milked diminished chords for everything he could

there's a lovely tribute to Smokey that vocally he almost pulls off

dude really milked diminished chords for everything he could

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XdvDeI-neI

33 1/3 is one of his better albums, yes.

on the whole his solo releases after All Things are an exercise in frustration; every album has at least one good song, most of them have a handful of really good songs, and an equal or greater proportion of shit.

On Gone Troppo I liked the Time Bandits song and Circles is alright for a Beatles leftover.

Most people will stick up for one after ATMP; I will for Living in the Material World and Cloud Nine (which doesn't have bad songs if you consider "Got My Mind..." an annoyance instead of shit).

every album has at least one good song, most of them have a handful of really good songs,

yeah when i was on a Harrison kick last year i *think* Extra Texture is the one i decided was the worst but "You" is still awesome

that's such, to quote him, a "grotty" album. His coke album, apparently, but it sounds as if he were on quaaludes.

"You" is still awesome

yes!! And yet I still kinda wish it was Ronnie Spector singing it instead of George, it really strains his range. But what a killer riff.

I feel like this is the case with a lot of the better material scattered across his solo albums - often they're marred by poor production choices. Lynne really was a corrective in this respect.

I dunno -- that SNL sax in "You" is an irritant. I'd rather George imitate the sax.

My favorite cover songs of George and John tunes.

Lynne really was a corrective in this respect.

I disagree. The four Dark Horse albums that precede Cloud Nine are all nice sounding. Also disagree that there's a lot of substandard stuff on them, but I suppose I am a fan. They're about a wash for me, probably 33 1/3, the '79 album, and Gone Troppo all about equal, with Somewhere in England a notch below.

And Gone Troppo is the nicest sounding of the bunch.

Start the cement mixer!

Start the cement mixer!

― timellison

put-ti put-ti

there's a lovely tribute to Smokey that vocally he almost pulls off

― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn)

i mean soul in a bowl is great but now i'm imagining george singing "piss slave", badly

i'm just not sure he was vocally assertive enough for the song

re: covers - robert wyatt's "love" and, funnily enough, "weird" al yankovic's completely straight "what is life" are particular loves of mine

oh, and i do enjoy the bush tetras' "cold turkey" as well

the one thing about a lot of his solo albums that bugs me is that his voice sounds too high. this is particularly true on Extra Texture; maybe it's the coke, but it also just sounds like he sped up the tape a lot of the time.

"the '79 album" this is my second favorite solo albums of his. I think it's mostly completely marvelous. I even like "here comes the moon moon the moon the moon the moooooon"

"Your Love is Forever"! "Blow Away"!

I even like "here comes the moon moon the moon the moon the moooooon"

no need for shame, this is a v pretty song

I dunno -- that SNL sax in "You"...

"pretty" is exactly the word i'd used for "here comes the moon" - have been a fan since first listen.

Interesting tidbit I just leaned—sax courtesy of Jim Horn of Wrecking Crew fame, who also supplied flute on Canned Heat’s Goin Up the Country.

learned

I’m realizing that I’m still not over that terrible Scorsese documentary. One of the few I can remember that left me thinking less of its subject.

Listening again to BRAINWASHED. I'm fond of this record. 'Looking For My Life' a favourite.

I like that record a lot. I tend to stop before it gets to the title track, but everything else on it is lovely.

That's definitely one of his better records. All Things Must Pass is hands down my favorite by a huge margin (sans the "jam" disc, which George originally intended as a free 'bonus' rather than an actual part of the album proper), but Living in the Material World, the self-titled 1979 album and Cloud Nine aren't bad albums, and I'd put Brainwashed on par with those three.

"Any Road" is especially good, he's had that since the late '80s and even played it in his last TV performance several years before he passed away. "P2 Vatican Blues (Last Saturday Night" and the gorgeous instrumental "Marwa Blues" are two more highlights - I think those three tracks are the ones I'd return to the most, but the rest ain't bad. I haven't listened to them in years but I still remember bits from "Pisces Fish," "Stuck Inside a Cloud" and I think a few others. ("Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea" is a charming cover, I've seen the video it came from quite a few times.)

Once a year I get to come on here and say "I reviewed that."

I reviewed that.

http://www.villagevoice.com/2002/12/31/shiva-shiva-yall/

Clem, that's a lovely review. I especially liked your pointing out how unusual and protean Harrison's guitar was, soaking up Hawaiian as well as Indian influences.

and, yes, Cloud Nine, birdistheword, is one of the most assured of Beatles solo albums.

Thanks, Alfred.

The strongest memory I have of that album--more Harrison's death, actually--is that, on the news, it was the very first break in non-stop 9/11 coverage. I remember checking the national news that night, and one or two networks led with 9/11, and the other(s) let with Harrison's death.

I recently discovered this 1987 interview with Harrison:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1wkRVUlCzM

Pretty funny spot around the 7-minute mark when the interviewer mentions that Lennon was quoted as saying young George idolized him. George's response is kind of hilarious.

He's lying, of course, but the lack of sentimentality endears me to him.

and of course he's right about Lennon -- the bit from the 1980 Lennon interview exposes the power relationship. George is course correct about his own contributions to John songs.

LOL, re: that interview that was an excellent response. (And more than the others, Lennon was very vocal about every little contribution he made to everyone else's songs - there's a book that tried to break down the contributions of each member to each song, and the author said figuring out Lennon's required far less guesswork because he was more prone to bringing them up in great detail.)

I loved George's blunt sense of humor as well. You see that next to his sentimental side in that interview alone. He's often like that with John's death, and I think he can be because of his spirituality (i.e. his belief on what will happen to everyone after death).

Another example of that humor:
https://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/01/arts/no-3-beatle-reunion-george-harrison-says.html

And I always loved how he talked about John and Paul during the Beatles' HOF induction (both absent for very different reasons).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NO-HK_csGwk

I like George’s smile, it was slightly mischievous but warm

“Be here now” and “the day the world gets round” are good stuff

"Crackerbox Palace" at CVS yesterday, "This is Love" at Publix this morning. WHAT ARE YOU TELLING ME

Without you, there's no point to this song.

Quite a bit of his music is enjoyable in small doses, like when you hear a minute of it in the background. I noticed this in the Scorsese doc - there were a few Living in the Material World songs that were beautiful when they scored a few scenes, but when I tried listening to the album, the same tracks in their entirety came off as boring and monotonous.

I need you is some weak shit

i've warmed on it a little since my comments (probably like ten years upthread) about its droopiness, but it's probably my least favorite beatles number by him.

listened to Sgt. Pepper's last night for the first time in an age and really adored WYWY. as a teen i just took its message as generic "spirituality" or "mysticism" but paying attention as an adult, it really is deep/heavy/trippy stuff to try to get over to a hundred million teenagers, good job george imo.

he and George Martin outdid themselves with that string arrangementt.

*arrangemen

ack

i've warmed on it a little since my comments (probably like ten years upthread) about its droopiness, but it's probably my least favorite beatles number by him.

"You Like Me Too Much" is hopeless as well.

It sounds like half the backing track is missing.

"I Need You" sounds like he just starting figuring out how to use the volume pedal two minutes before recording and said, "That's good enough." The song is decent, unlike "You Like Me Too Much", which is a weak song weakly arranged.

Both songs feel (to me) very much like he's trying to write a Lennon/McCartney number. Can easily hear Paul crooning out the "I didn't realize, as I looked in your eyes" part of "I Need You." Maybe "You Like Me Too Much" would work better with John belting it out, throw some extra creepy resentment vibes in there etc.

read that as "extra crispy"

Pelican waffle, extra crispy, order up

They were all baked, they were on a tight schedule trying to make a film they weren't too invested in, and they didn't take George's songs too seriously anyway, so it'd be surprising if those two songs didn't sound half-assed and rushed-through. Obviously, some sorta switch got flipped for Rubber Soul, since "Think For Yourself" and "If I Needed Someone" -- and the arrangements/performances thereof -- are miles better than his Help! songs.

"Don't Bother Me," his first, has grown on me simply because it's an excellent snapshot of George's prickly personality. You don't really get a clearer picture of that in their music until Rubber Soul, which came out two years later but feels much longer than that given how much music they made and how quickly they progressed.

But you are right about Rubber Soul - musically he takes a big step forward on that album, even if the most appealing thing about the better song is the riff he lifted from the Byrds ("Bells of Rhymney"). I think George mentioned this in the Anthology doc, how he didn't want his songs on the LP's to be, "oh, we're getting to his 'slot' now."

Few songwriters came with as confident and fully formed a sensibility as Harrison.

i've warmed on it a little since my comments (probably like ten years upthread) about its droopiness, but it's probably my least favorite beatles number by him.

listened to Sgt. Pepper's last night for the first time in an age and really adored WYWY. as a teen i just took its message as generic "spirituality" or "mysticism" but paying attention as an adult, it really is deep/heavy/trippy stuff to try to get over to a hundred million teenagers, good job george imo.

he and George Martin outdid themselves with that string arrangementt.

i've warmed on it a little since my comments (probably like ten years upthread) about its droopiness, but it's probably my least favorite beatles number by him.

listened to Sgt. Pepper's last night for the first time in an age and really adored WYWY. as a teen i just took its message as generic "spirituality" or "mysticism" but paying attention as an adult, it really is deep/heavy/trippy stuff to try to get over to a hundred million teenagers, good job george imo.

"Stuck Inside a Cloud" is a song by George Harrison and is the seventh track to his posthumous album Brainwashed. It was released to radio stations in the United States and the United Kingdom in 2002, peaking at number 27 on Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart in the US in 2003.

Harrison's favourite number was seven, and his favourite track on any of his albums was always the seventh.[citation needed] Dhani Harrison chose "Stuck Inside a Cloud" as his personal favourite track from his father's Brainwashed album, and thus gave it the "honour" of being the seventh track. Dhani Harrison explains in detail his late father's system for picking the sequence of songs on his albums on the Brainwashed DVD bundled with the bonus edition.

a few things. first, "stuck inside a cloud" rules. the chorus is one of harrison's best. secondly, the 7th song on ATMP is Behind That Locked Door, and the 7th song on Dark Horse is "Dark Horse", which RULES[no citation needed]. Third, here's the playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3NNStvmcjQqeqmj7xqbELq?si=230718535e7f4442

fourth, what is the "7th song" situation with All Things Must Pass? Clearly, Behind That Locked Door. but it's a 3xLP set. so is the 7th song of the second LP ("Art of Dying") also a "7th song"? (There is no 7th song on the third LP, which has 5 songs)

The seventh song on Cloud Nine is "Devil's Radio," which also rules:

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

Interesting that, in the LP era, he would have mostly been stranding his favourite songs somewhere in the middle of Side 2, not the best place to attract attention.

La Times has an interview with wife and son ( but it’s paywalled)

I won't let him down
Got to do what I can
I can't let him drown
He's a far east man

I remember reading that about "Stuck Inside a Cloud" when Brainwashed came out. I think it's a pretty great album overall - maybe excepting the title track - but that song is something special.

xp I wonder if not attracting attention is part of what he was going for. Putting his favorite songs in a spot where people can discover them slowly.

Besides the first two vinyl slabs of All Things Must Pass, compilations (or rather a homemade compilation) is the way to go with Harrison's solo career IMHO, but Brainwashed is definitely one of his best and most consistent albums. The instrumental and the first two tracks have always been my favorites - wonderful examples of his distinctive guitar playing.

FWIW, the lead-off track (they made a nice video for it) - it's also one of the last songs he played in public thanks to that VH1 appearance in 1997 with Ravi Shankar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8fFdc-karA

Also track #2:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7awp7tIxAU

And this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5HEeNRJFMg

"Dhani Harrison: 'Marwa is, uh, uh... It's just a name of a raga in an Indian raga. Say you if you have... you could have... you could have a raga in the key of Dhani if you wanted to. Y'know, you could have a raga in a key of sa, um, or rag something or rag charakeshi. Um, it's just rag marwa was a, a raga that, uh, is an ancient Indian raga and, um... On some level that I'm not sure if I even understand this Marwa Blues contains the same notes in the chord that can pose, uh raga marwa.' Jeff Lynne: 'It was a big challenge because, uh, George had played probably four or five lead guitars, lead slides and things on it and, uh, they're all great. And, it was our... our job to find which was the real tune.' Dhani Harrison: 'Yeah, that was a bit confusing, 'cause he'd always do a live mix on the fly, you see, and he knew where all his favorite bits were, um, out of all these four or five guitar tracks. So whenever we heard it, we only heard a small bit of what was actually there then when we came to do the mixing of it, we had everything and the tune kind of disappeared into five guitars all going on top of each other and we had to like...' Jeff Lynne: 'So it was like a treasure hunt.' Dhani Harrison: 'Yeah, Jeff managed to find the tune and then it was alright from there.'"
Jeff Lynne and Dhani Harrison (November 19, 2002 - All Things Considered NPR radio show)

"There were 4 (guitar) takes and of that 2 weren't usable. So it was a sort of, the real essence of the song lay in one track and there were accompany harmonies from two other tracks. It wasn't a composite, it was a take."
Dhani Harrison (November 19, 2002 - MSN Webchat)

It enrages me when he's still called an average or okay guitarist. Besides an identifiable sonic stamp, I can't think of a guitarist whose slide was so cosmopolitan in the ease with which it integrated Hawaiian, raga, and blues styles.

His guitar solos are usually the worst moments on 1963 Beatles records, though.

well, yeah

I would never trash Harrison's solos on the 1963 records - they could be pretty awesome too (see "I Saw Her Standing There"). At their best, they were a pretty distinctive fusion of his influences while taking the a step further, stuff that would make Carl Perkins proud.

When Harrison died, Sound Opinions (back when it was a two hour show on WXRT) did a whole show on him and brought in two guitarists who kind of showed why Harrison was so underrated as a guitarist, using examples throughout the Beatles career to make their point. He was incredibly innovative and evolving just as fast as the rest of the band. Wish I still had my cassette of that show, but it was lost ages ago.

I think Harrison gets knocked because he's not like most guitar virtuosos - he's really a composer's guitarist. His brilliance doesn't come in a live setting, it's purely in the studio. Almost all of his work is tied to careful planning and an enormous amount of discipline in getting it right. I think Tim Riley argued that he could seem inert in that way because he'll often play the same exact solo in concert rather than come up with something new.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxwAB3SECtc

I will not hear of anyone disparaging his solo in "Don't Bother Me."

From LA Times article on latest release of the box

The extra year proved beneficial for Dhani Harrison, George’s son, who guided the project — along with his frequent collaborator Paul Hicks — of remixing and unearthing unheard materials for the “mega” anniversary set. Manufacturing and shipping delays affected the vinyl edition, which includes eight LPs. The younger Harrison, 43, also oversaw the artwork and liner notes, featuring a trove of quotes, photos and scrapbook materials, and even the design of replica figurines of his father and the reclining gnomes from the original album cover.

Dhani and Hicks spent two years plumbing and remixing all 18 reels from the summer 1970 sessions at Abbey Road. Thanks to modern technology, the new mixes of classics like “My Sweet Lord” and “Isn’t It a Pity” spotlight formerly buried instruments and elevate Harrison’s voice above the famous “wall of sound” created by the late producer Phil Spector.

Olivia, who represents Harrison in Beatles business at Apple Corps Limited, was wary about that at first, “but actually they were right,” she said, citing her husband’s stated belief — from his introduction to the 30th-anniversary remastering — that these songs “can continue to outlive the style in which they were recorded.”

“There were things that were smothered in there,” she admitted. “He said, ‘I’d like to liberate some of the songs from the big production. That seemed appropriate at the time.’ So I think Paul and Dhani have been very balanced in how they’ve liberated some of them. You still have the power behind it, but I think George is more present — and very intimate. Much more intimate than it was before. You feel a connection with him.”

Dhani’s ears perked up at discoveries such as the synthesizers in “Isn’t It a Pity,” which were previously inaudible “just due to the clarity and the reverb and the digital compression on the remaster from 2001,” he said. “I thought there were tracks that we just had muted, but they were in there. The sonic soup in the middle was fogging it up. And then, suddenly, once you hear it you can’t unhear it. It was like rediscovering it again. It was kind of the same feeling I had when they did the remaster of ‘Sgt. Pepper’s.’”

More LA times — Some of the alternate songs and outtakes from the sessions have been leaked over the years, but are now available in radically higher quality. There’s a slower version of “Isn’t It a Pity” that Dhani called a “heartbreaker,” and what sounds to him like “an Allman Brothers version of ‘Run of the Mill.’” Early iterations of “Cosmic Empire” and “Down to the River (Rocking Chair Jam),” which wouldn’t appear on official records until many years later, were first captured in 1970. A “party disc” includes Harrison jamming with his musicians and doing punny versions of his serious lyrics.

“A lot of the laughing and the outtakes and the little bits of noise between the tapes, I’d never heard before,” said Dhani. “And that’s just priceless. It gives you shivers when you hear someone talking and it just sounds like they’re in the other room.

George Harrison, shyly strumming and harmonizing behind the competitive wattage of John Lennon and Paul McCartney, had been tending to a whole garden of his songs from 1966 through ’69. Many were auditioned and workshopped as Beatles songs but didn’t make the cut, and Harrison gave away the rejected “My Sweet Lord” and “All Things Must Pass” to his friend Billy Preston. “Isn’t It a Pity” was written in 1966 and almost made it onto the “Revolver” and “Let It Be” albums, but instead sat in darkness.

When the Beatles split up, the 27-year-old Harrison went to Woodstock, N.Y., and jammed with The Band and Bob Dylan in May 1970. Then he took that energy and his merry band of friends — including Preston, Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton and the group that would become Derek and the Dominos — into Studio Three at Abbey Road and poured his heart out.

“All Things Must Pass” went to No. 1 on the Billboard album chart after it came out in November 1970, and was nominated for album of the year at the Grammys. It outsold all of his fellow Beatles’ solo albums.

Didn't know it was nominated for an AOY Grammy - looked it up and he was apparently the first Beatle to get that (followed by Paul's Band on the Run, then the only winner, John's Double Fantasy, then several others...also Star Wars was nominated for AOY? Yeesh.)

solo Beatle that is

^^^ in the voice of Foghorn Leghorn

lmao

on one hand, "isn't it a pity" as i know it would not have fit in well with the sound of Revolver, imo. otoh, i'm sure with that 1966 beatles magic it would have been transformed into something absolutely perfect for the album

Embarrassingly* it’s only in the last 3 or 4 months that I’ve given any serious time to ATMP. It’s wonderful - I think it’s my favorite solo beatle record now (though Ram runs it really really close).

Convenient for me that the new box is now dropping with all the accompanying press and discussion.

*especially embarrassing because even as a child George was my “favorite beatle”. I guess I kind of blame My Sweet Lord which I’ve never liked (though I see now that it does have its place in the village of this album).

“The Uber Edition comes in a wooden crate, going all the way for George devotees: it’s got a wooden bookmark made from a fallen oak tree in his garden. It also has replicas of the gnomes from the album cover.”

alright, George Devotees: reveal yourselves!

I like seeing Brainwashed get some attention on this thread. I listened to it a ton when it first came out, when I must have been eighteen or nineteen, and I've never seen it mentioned that much, so I always sort of wondered if it was actually as good as I thought or if it's just one of those sentimental favorites. I really think it holds up and I'm glad to see that I'm not alone in that.

“The Uber Edition comes in a wooden crate, going all the way for George devotees: it’s got a wooden bookmark made from a fallen oak tree in his garden. It also has replicas of the gnomes from the album cover.”

I've seen photos from people who bought this. It really is like a piece of furniture - the crate could double as a foot stool or even a coffee table for one. $1000 price tag aside, if it wasn't rare and I had one as a gift, I'd probably use it as furniture just to put the space to use.

i guess all it takes is 1000 wealthy beatles fans to make that a $1M idea

Just like how it's packed! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbhtLPot3tg

I guess it makes sense - it's expensive and hard to produce, so it would be a pain to have to manufacture another as a replacement.

*Just look at how it's packed! (I gotta proof read before I hit post)

never proof read! post in freedom!

that crate is fucking amazing though!

Jake Gyllehaal's in it, unwashed.

oh man I wish George would have finished this one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ty_1U08_jjg

How I ranked his Beatles song.

Ron woods version of Far East man is better than Harrison’s

You’re insane, Blue Jay Way is godhead

I have to agree with Alfred, it's dreadfully dull.

Also posted in another thread, archivist Ron Furmanek was asked to remix the Magical Mystery Tour soundtrack (sound as well as music) around 1988 for home video release. George Martin was present for the final mix sessions, and when Furmanek played him the backing tracks to "Blue Jay Way," Martin laughed and said "this is rubbish! Did we release this??"

I also agree with the majority on "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" - flat out great. But the rest of the Beatles don't get enough credit - never mind Clapton, just listen to everything they add to George's ghostly demo. It really gives you a sense of what they all gained from working collectively, and what was sorely missed when they split apart.

WMGGW is mediocre shit

*some mediocre shit

Bobby Whitlock doesn't like it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soM5B6q39Ls

Ron woods version of Far East man is better than Harrison’s

Bobby Whitlock doesn't like it.

I haven't compared the remix to the original mix directly, but it's kind of surprising if the remix is actually more muddy. I'm generally skeptical of revisionist mixes anyway so I wasn't looking forward to the new mix - I only wanted the demos and outtakes. Remixing live albums can be successful (like the recordings used for the Band's Rock of Ages/Live at the Academy, the recordings used for the Rolling Stones' Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out), but that's rarely the case with studio albums, not unless it's a simple three-track reduction. There are exceptions like the seven original cuts Richard Hell was able to remix for last year's Destiny Street Remixed, but they're a tiny minority.

And WMGGW is still awesome. :P

I'm still listening through that video because it's a long rant, but it's pretty dickish. They're talking about the Über set (which they got as a gift), and as pointed out elsewhere, that giant set was done more as a memento or gift to friends and colleagues. It's fine if they don't like the mix, it's a frequent complaint for people to criticize new mixes, but it was also a gift sent to them by the Harrison family, and they're going out of their way to post long YouTube videos trashing it and insulting the people who gave it to them. They even allude to what's apparently irritation by the Harrisons at prior videos they posted insulting or criticizing them. That's pretty fucked up.

He (and his wife) come across like some bitter, graceless cranks.

Oh shit, I just skimmed through with the audio muted. Definitely did not want t hear anyone talk for an hour straight though

Couldn’t watch more than a minute or so. Recently read him complaining about something like too many out-of-tune guitar overdubs from Duane Allman on Derek and the Dominos. He did stick up for Rita Coolidge’s claim to a coda co-writing credit on “Layla” though.

There are exceptions like the seven original cuts Richard Hell was able to remix for last year's Destiny Street Remixed, but they're a tiny minority.

The 1995 The Who Sell Out remix was reasonably well done, but not dramatically different from the original. Other ‘90s Who remixes are either indistinguishable from the originals (most of Who’s Next), miss the mark (Quadrophenia), or take too many liberties (Who Are You).

The Replacements’ Dead Man’s Pop is astoundingly great, though the original mix of Don’t Tell A Soul wasn’t exactly a high bar to clear.

Yes to this last

The Who is a good case because they more or less remixed their entire catalog at one point or another. The Live at Leeds recordings have been mixed several times with varying results, but the last time (which is available only as a download as a hi-res file) gets it right. The crackling noises were only on the bass track, so the only way to get rid of it is to process Entwistle's bass track through a modern day digital de-clicker and make a new mix. Beyond that, I actually like the Who Sell Out remix you mention - it's not just a remix, incorporating the bonus material does everything Dave Marsh claims and brings the original concept to complete and satisfying fruition. Beyond that, I think the rest of their remixes are completely disposable - the three you mentioned, but also the new mixes of My Generation, Tommy, The Who by Numbers, Face Dances, etc...not worth it at all.

Dead Man's Pop is really good, especially with the outtakes that I wish they put on the album. But the alternate mix of Pleased to Meet Me (which to be fair wasn't a new mix, just an alternate set of vintage mixes) was for collectors only.

I have never heard of Bobby Whitlock in my life but based on this video alone, the man is a f'n moron. Not to disparage stroke survivors but he seems like he's had a stroke that has removed his facilities and rendered him partially brain dead. I wouldn't trust his review of a waffle house.

What about a Yelp review of the Waffle House

Just googled him and seems he played on this record and with Clapton so perhaps he's just a drug casualty. Maybe he's right, maybe he's wrong. He does sound like he's not fully capable mentally.

I didn't want to mention it, but yeah, it does look like he's had a stroke, damage from past drugs or both. Whitlock did do a lot of great stuff 50 years ago, especially on Layla, but it's pretty sad he's resurfaced shitting all over something that isn't worth shitting over.

To be clear, I love the album (at least the album proper, not the jams), but it's just a reissue. The remix may be dubious, but there's like a million albums getting anniversary remixes now.

What about the deep, previously unreleased cuts?

Beyond that, I actually like the Who Sell Out remix you mention - it's not just a remix, incorporating the bonus material does everything Dave Marsh claims and brings the original concept to complete and satisfying fruition.

I do like that remix, but I was never of the opinion that the concept on the original was abandoned: the album mirrored the shift (in the US, anyway) from hyperactive AM to “heavy” and reflective FM.

The new mix sounded really nice when I was listening to it yesterday, not drastically different but I think “Isn’t it a Pity” sounded a lot clearer. And I liked the devotional songs that didn’t make the album, “Om Hare Om” is a cool tune!

For some reason I've adored this self-produced throwaway recorded for the excellent Best of Dark Horse comp. Happy birthday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJB7cl5Ww8E

Hadn’t heard “Poor Little Girl” before. Not bad. Kinda catchy chorus

I’m fairly certain this thread would’ve stalled ca. 2009 were it not for Alfred.

Um….

What about the deep, previously unreleased cuts?

I finally got around to the set last week, and I think the two discs of demos are great - I wish they got their own standalone release. The disc of outtakes felt pretty disposable. It's funny to hear "Isn't It Shitty" done as a joke to the tune of "Isn't It a Pity," but otherwise there is close to nothing on there I'd want to revisit. The one exception is probably the acoustic "Woman Don't You Cry for Me" but you already get a great version of that on Early Takes, Vol. 1 (what happened to "volume 2"???). To be fair it's much longer on the ATMP super deluxe set, so I guess it has that going for it.

Haha.

Man, do I like Cloud Ninem

Alfred has some kind of love/hate relationship with George.

No longer!

I can't resist him.

Just realized via the “end of the line” video that GH is kind of the lead on that

This is pretty:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6s3v-XLfa0

Dig those white teeth

cloud nine has hooks galore. “Fish in the sand”, “this is love”

"Fish" is one of his best.

hooky chorus but the production and instrumentation sound hasn't aged too well

sounds fine to me but I've no problem with Lynne's production, and thanks to Harrison's mitigating influence it's less burdensome.

George Harrison was rather unimpressed with the new releases in December 1965: "Take it off, it's crap," "It's crap. Take it off," "That's enough," "I don't like it," and the succinct, "Rubbish." pic.twitter.com/WLhKHdtwaH

— John F. Lyons (@JohnFLyons2) April 26, 2022

Are you sure that wasn't an outtake from A Hard Day's Night?

when wasn't George "rather unimpressed"

He never dropped that attitude. Even when the guy stabbed him he had something dismissive to say.

He said, "...That's enough. I don't like it".

To be fair, those records in question WERE crap, and he liked a few things like the one by the Zombies. (Plus his responses turned out to be much longer.)

George during this era was the band's resident American R&B expert.

Thought he said “I don’t think he was here to audition for The Traveling Wilburies.”

"good if it's English, mediocre if it's American", oof brutal

George during this era was the band's resident American R&B expert.

― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, April 26, 2022 10:13 AM (fifteen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Yep. I believe he was the one who pushed most for them to try recording at Stax, and he had the idea for the "Respect"-like unison guitar & bass line in "Drive My Car" (and ended up playing bass on it).

A couple years earlier when he visited his sister in southern Illinois, he bought records by Bobby "Blue" Bland, Booker T. & the MGs, and James Ray, the latter of which had "Got My Mind Set On You."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/local/wp/2014/02/11/they-were-the-first-really-loud-european-band-i-ever-heard/

Yep. I believe he was the one who pushed most for them to try recording at Stax

His brief guitar solo at the end of "Got to Get You Into My Life" is one of his greatest moments on record. Exemplary of his taste and what he may have learned from Cropper - he's otherwise quiet for the rest of the track.

^The longest version of the story of Norbert Putnam, Tommy Roe and The Beatles I have seen so far. (xp)

Thirty Three & ⅓ was his best album since ATMP.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DzisXpZM7c

yeah it's really good. I like it as much as the s/t that followed it; and dare I say that those three are his best albums.

Beautiful Girl dates back to the same backlog of songs that was used to fill up ATMP.

I'd claim Cloud Nine bests the s/t.

What was George doing between cloud nine and brainwashed? The former was a huge album and then he was basically done til the latter was released (posthumously of course.)

Wilburys, Japanese tour, legal battles, dealing with Paul 'n' Beatle shit, hanging out.

Oh yeah wilburys, of course…surprised I guess he didn’t knock out another solo album or two in that time.

I don't think he cared much. He had plenty of dough and had a strong enough sense of self.

Yeah, I don't get the sense that he enjoyed the process enough to continuously do it. Working with Lynne and the Wilburys helped a lot and made those sessions enjoyable, but even the second Wilburys album (Vol. 3) was much less fun to do, especially for Dylan. The only reason he did the tour was because it was short and Clapton talked him into it, but it was never going to more than a one-time deal.

Hare hare, George!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yJLqVN6eJM

Stachewave

Would've been 80 years old today! Wish we could see all of them at this age.

Like

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/george-harrison-living-in-amaterial-world-1234737644/

Fantastic album - his quietude as rewarding as it ever was. Even the funny stuff (Sue Me Sue You Blues) works, which can't be said so much for e.g. Extra Texture.

Talk about a forgotbuster: #1 for weeks in the summer of 1973, not spoken of much ever since. Unavailability on CD until the early '90s didn't help.

Cover looks modern, out of time with 1973

Yeah, the cover is pretty good - it's now the logo for his foundation too.

Talk about a forgotbuster: #1 for weeks in the summer of 1973

People were still on a Beatles high, especially in the US — hell, Ringo had more top 10 singles through 1975 than John and George combined, and only two fewer than Paul. Any Major Release by any of them was cause for excitement in the moment: “Are they getting back together? Are there hidden clues in this record suggesting they might get back together? Will any of them tour? Oh wait…hm, this record is kind of boring, actually…”

This was also when the Beatles blue record came out, heavy on George songs; it wouldn't be too long before he was being treated a lot worse in the press than he was used to.

"don't let him rate too long," the press declared.

Not even Material World always had the best reviews. What I can never get my head around was Dark Horse then going on to miss the UK top 50 entirely, after two conseuctive mega albums (three including Bangladesh). That's insane for a Beatle.

His 1974 tour is generally held to be a disaster, with his voice shot and his persona at his most spiritually hectoring. That can't have helped.

The live clips aren't bad at all, and I sorta admire how he forced his audience to listen to Ravi Shankar.

The tour was US-only, besides which I think a lot of the tour went without an issue IIRC.

(US and Canada*)

I’ve been obsessed with “Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth)” for about the last week – I literally haven’t been able to get it out of my head for more than an hour or so at a time.

Ha - I had that phase a few months ago.

It’s a little surprising because I wouldn’t call myself a giant fan of Harrison’s—there’s a persistently sour feeling I find hard to dismiss—and while I suppose I’ve known this song forever I’ve never really thought much about it one way or another.

But there’s something undeniable about the circular chord sequence, modulations and slide guitar harmonies that collectively feel like they could go on forever. And now, I’m realizing at least two songs I wrote 25 years ago were influenced by it? Strange.

Got really into All Things Must Pass again this week for some reason, particularly enjoying the Art of Dying which would have been an ace Beatles track, though the released version is obviously amazing too (wish Clapton would tone it down a little though). Have been poking around at other solo Beatles things I'd not given attention to in years, including Ringo's Rotogravure, which I had on vinyl as a kid (and liked! because I didn't know any better), and remembered that Harrison's track on that record was by far the standout:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXg45wYBCcg

Harrison wrote this back during the ATMP era (or earlier? dunno) and recorded it for the album, but apparently never came up with a satisfactory take. All I've been able to find is this:

https://soundcloud.com/harrisonstories/george-harrison-whenever-ill

A real lost opportunity with this one.

I think not intended for ATMP:

https://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/george-harrison-legal-action-against-ringo-over-ill-still-love-you.1100437/

ah, didn't see that. it's weird there is so little documented truthful information about this song; when harrison recorded, whether there was or was not some lawsuit. it's kind of rare in beatles quarters for something to remain a total mystery like this.

Happy birthday, bro!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VI4xzwvaTWU

Been listening to some of the albums I never loved. I think, even when it's not my favorite stuff, he didn't really indulge in just creating filler. Like on Extra Texture, I feel like I kinda get what he was going after with those songs and that there always seems to be some degree of musicality to the compositions that I find interesting at least.

Somewhere in England sounding pretty good to me lately.