John Lennon- Paul Was Right About Allen Klein

And, if I'm not mistaken, Brian renegotiated that merchandising deal a couple of years later. With terms much more to the group's profit.

 

Yes, but it was never a good deal, and Brian was left chasing Seltaeb with lawsuits until the end. Suits that he bungled because he wouldn't fly to the U. S. and oversee the matter directly. But he was treading uncharted waters, like SixtiesGuy said. You can't dock him too much for missing that boat when he was focused on more traditional revenue.

 

And John didn't care enough about the Beatles to honor the band's long-standing veto rule (if 1 of them didn't want to do something, they didn't do it) and instead signed unilaterally with Klein. John showed his true colors at that time. And given that you're being a bit obtuse here, I'll state the obvious: That was long BEFORE Paul went to court and cleaned up the mess that John created, thereby saving all 4 of them control over their own work.

 

Post of the year!

 

Multi-track tape machines allow the engineer to bounce track to track on the same machine. Another machine is not necessary for bouncing.

 

I've always had the impression that Lennon put the kibosh on the Eastmans and was overzealous in his desire for Klein to run things because he did not want Paul's family running the show and also he did it as a bit of a "f--k you" to Paul over the way Lennon perceived Paul treated Yoko: "You're gonna diss my wife? Fine, I'll diss yer whole fookin' family!"

Indeed it did...and to be fair if Lennon and Harrison hadn't had such an anti-Paul (and, by extension, anti-Eastman) attitude the Eastmans would have done great things for The Beatles as well.

Klein and Yoko got along because Klein at least pretended to take Yoko seriously as an artist in her own right and not merely as an adjunct of Lennon. Klein's pro-Yoko attitude scored him mucho brownie points with Lennon, no question about it.

Sort of. All Jagger told Paul was "Klein's alright if you like that sort of thing"...it also didn't help matters that Klein was in the room when Mick and Paul had their meeting.

(At the moment I'm re-reading Peter Doggett's You Never Give Me Your Money -one of the finest Beatlebooks I've ever read- so this topic is rather timely!)

Absolutely. Peter Grant was a great manager, no question, but the man was a total thug (and so were the people he had working for him: Richard Cole, John Bindon, etc) and used strongarm tactics more than once to protect Zeppelin's interests (i.e. the Draconian methods he used to thwart bootleggers or those reporters who gave Zeppelin negative reviews etc). Then there's the infamous "Oakland Incident" in 1977 where Grant, Cole and Bindon nearly beat one of Bill Graham's employees to death- one of the more unsavoury incidents in rock and roll history. To give him his due Peter Grant never screwed over his clients like Allen Klein did, but in his way Grant was just as bad (if not worse) when it came to criminal behaviour.

 

I think Klein read Lennon very well: he must have done his research. He knew that John disliked 'men in suits' and patrician attitudes, so he pitched himself to John as a rough, tough creme puff from Brooklyn, with an accent (possibly put on especially) you could scour a sink with. 1969 Lennon must have been very impressed at the prospect of a business manager who talked his own language, who didn't bother to shave and effed and blinded like a navvy digging ditches near the Pier Head. His appearing to take Yoko seriously certainly helped, too..

But - post Beatles break-up - Klein had no qualms about telling Lennon his musical involvement with Yoko was damaging his career. By then, he had John by the short-hairs, though.

Albert Goldman's (extremely) controversial book is unusual in portraying Klein in a reasonably positive light - as the man who (finally) sorted out the Beatles' tangled finances and secured them an appropriate royalty rate. This is the only positive stuff I've read about Klein - does he have any other defenders?

 

Despite similarities - the tough-talking, the aggression (verbal in Klein's case, both verbal and physical in Grant's) and the attitude - Grant and Klein were polar opposites in terms of their relationship with the artists they represented. I don't think anyone who was ever represented by Grant had a bad word to say about him as a manager: he was scrupulously honest (he refused to sign contracts, insisting that 'his word' was good enough) and indisputably on the side of the artist. The only criticisms I've read - and they are very slight - stem from the fact that he seemed to lose his enthusiasm for the business after Bonham's death and Zep's dissolution, which is understandable.

 

Looks right about the time he did the Rock n Roll clips for Old Grey Whistle Test, and a year or so after he recorded Steel And Glass

 

Klein's "rough, tough" image was what appealed to George and Ringo as well.

Now that I did not know- I was always under the impression that Klein always accepted Johnandyoko as a package deal. IMO Lennon's delving into radical American politics was ultimately more damaging to his career than collaborating with Yoko was...I wonder what, if anything, Allen had to say about John's political views?

No question, as a manager who did his job -protecting his artists' interests and making a lot of money for them- they don't come any better than Peter Grant. Indeed, Zeppelin never said a bad word about him, probably because they never had any reason to.

 

I think it's relevant to remember that Klein or Eastman were not the only choices. Let's look at what actually happened that is known and can be verified.

From John himself:

I had to present a case to them, and Allen had to talk to them himself. And of course, I promoted him in the fashion in which you will see me promoting or talking about something. I was enthusiastic about him and I was relieved because I had met a lot of people including Lord Beeching who was one of the top people in Britain and all that. Paul had told me, "Go and see Lord Beeching" so I went. I mean I'm a good boy, man, and I saw Lord Beeching and he was no help at all. I mean, he was all right. Paul was in America getting Eastman and I was interviewing all these so-called top people, and they were animals.

So we know that although John claims Paul was getting Eastman and Lee Eastman was proposed that Paul had suggested John interview other candidates for Manager and that John did so. In addition to Lord Beeching we also know that they spoke to Lord Poole.

Paul got the Eastman's to deal with NEMs as a one off situation he did propose they manage Apple but when the other Beatles said no, he accepted that immediately and they were never proposed as Manager again.

John then signed with Klein at the Dorchester hotel on January 28th and the George and Ringo signed with him the day after putting the kibosh on any other options that they were in discussions with because although they signed on the basis that Klein was there personal manager it made having any other manager for their business affairs effectively unworkable.

On Feb 3rd the Beatles met John Eastman, Lee Eastman was not present and had never met the Beatles, and it was agreed that Allen Klein would be the Business Manager of Apple and the Eastman's would be legal counsel and a press release was then sent out.

Klein withheld all the paperwork required to do the job and also made false accusations against the Eastman's and McCartney so on April 18th John, George and Ringo sacked the Eastmans.

The Eastmans were never proposed as Managers for Apple again after Feb 3rd 1969.

Allen Klein claimed that McCartney's issue was he wanted his family as Manager that's where the idea that Paul was pushing for the Eastman's originated from. It is Klein's version of events but let's consider.

As at Feb 3 1969 the Eastman's were not family and Paul and Linda were not planning to marry and there relationship had been quite short to that point. The Eastman's were well regarded in a somewhat niche field i.e as entertainment lawyers but even more appealing to McCartney was the knowledge that none of the people they managed were under contract or paid fixed percentages at all. The Eastman's worked on a fee basis. Paul proposed them once and then because of circumstances it was never appropriate to propose them again, and after they were fired they didn't want to act for the Beatles. Paul didn't suggest they manage the Beatles after that he knew it was a non-starter all round but when he came under increasing pressure to have Klein as his manager his response was you can have Klein for you I am having the Eastman's for me.

Therefore the idea that the other Beatles went for Klein because they didn't want the Eastmans is just a nonsense plain and simple. That wasn't their only choice. They chose Klein because they chose Klein. Paul never tried to force the Eastman's on The other Beatles. They tried to force Klein on Paul.

 

Lennon's meeting with Richard Beeching has long fascinated me: it's hard to imagine long-haired, heroin-addicted 1968 version John in the same room as the staid and portly Beeching. I can imagine the meeting was short and the upshot was, Beeching advised John to 'stick to making records', which suggests he - at least -didn't take the meeting very seriously.

But had Beeching, or any other 'serious' business figure come on board, I think the results at Apple would have been much the same, i.e., mass redundancies. Benching is known in Britain for closing a load of regional railway stations that weren't making profits (although his suggestion that the transport shortfall should be made up by an enhanced bus service was ignored by the government that commissioned him - so, basically, he was a government fall guy).

 

yes saw this recently, i am assuming the date is mid/late 1973 ? Looking at the VT my guess this was from ITV's weekend world which was presented originally by Peter Jay ( shown at the start ) on a Sunday lunchtime ( it was the Andrew Marr show of its day ).

it dovetails really nicely with Paul's Radio 4 interview last week at Maida Vale, he talks about Klein and how he would do a runner to the farm in Scotland just as a way of getting away from all the cr*p which John Mentions also here ( which Paul knew must have been really irritating to the others concerned - as you can see from John here ).

Nonetheless Paul was right, he usually was ( as somebody who is also usually right about things i know how irritating that can be too lol ) and John admits it. What is also nice is that he confirms that he was now in regular contact with Paul and from the Bob Harris interview two years later how good relations were between the two by then.

If anybody is unfamiliar i recommend checking both the Bob Harris OGWT interview and BBC i player for Paul's interview last week as very nice companion pieces.

 

i think this is largely true, however I do think it downplays the Eastman Paul relationship, clearly by late 68 Paul and Linda were a serious item and the boys would have known that and accordingly reticence to having an Eastman in charge of things would have been VERY understandable indeed. However the prime factor was that they picked Klein because they wanted him, however i do feel that the Eastman option was a non starter mainly because the thought him too close to Paul, but i agree thats not the reason they went for Klein just a reason why they would never have gone for that Kodak moment even if they had not already picked Klein.

 

I know that (and did that quite often myself when I had a four track cassette recorder back in the day), but according to the Complete Recording Sessions book bouncing always took place between two machines at the band's Abbey Road Studio sessions.

Its possible they didn't yet have that single machine bounce capability back then (or found it too impractical as it probably would have been with a four track machine - less so with an 8 track).

Emitt Rhodes recorded his debut solo album at home on an early 60s vintage 4-track machine he bought second-hand from a studio that was upgrading to newer gear. He said he had to trial record everything before doing his proper recording to work out his "bounces" ahead of time, since only certain tracks had "bounce capability".

Also using two machines allowed them to change their minds and undo/redo the bounce (and subsequent overdubs) - and since they saved all the tapes it allows them now to sync all the tapes digitally and do a proper remix involving all the unbounced (and therefore "non tape generation loss") tracks.

 

NO i think its earlier, just pre lost weekend as the poster says mid/late 73, however i agree it isn't clear from Lennon's look, however after the lost weekend he did not appear in the media so much with yoko, pre lost weekend they came as a package as one conjoined person like in this interview.

He refers to serving notice to Klein in " February " prior to his contract expiry which was March 73 i believe, so I think the February reference also dates this interview to mid late 73 just prior the lost weekend.

 

April 6, 1973 - broadcast 2 days later.

 

My recollection from watching late-night TV back then is that Schneider and Cavett saw their roles very differently. They ran talk shows - where actual discussions were had - and sought to explore culture and politics, not merely play to the audience for laughs. As Lou Reed said, 'Those were different times.'

 

Yeah, buts it's a good-natured, light-hearted kind of self-centered and whiny! It's a funny lyric, ending up with "it's good to have the both of you back".

And "saving up your money for a rainy day"? Really???

 

Just watched the Bob Harris interview--great, great stuff. Thanks for the recommendation. It was exhilarating to see John so happy and full of life. It was also very sad to be reminded so forcibly of what we lost.

John, Paul, George, Ringo. Truly a band of brothers.

 

That's approximately the time I'm talking about...actually a little earlier...either way, after the "weekend".

 

I'm confused... we are talking about the date of the interview in the OP clip, right? It's from ITV's 'Weekend World', April 1973.

 

I agree that the lyrics are fairly jovial - they're not heavily "poor me!" like they could've been.

As I noted, I don't mind the lyrics - I just can't defend them strongly, either!

 

Exactly.

I don't think the other 3 are bad guys for not going with the Eastmans. As much as I feel they were the superior choice, the politics made it just not possible.

What I find fault in are the guys who went with Klein when the evidence was pretty overwhelming that he was a bad dude.

The fact that he tried to go after Harrisongs shows what could have happened if he was able to really become intertwined in Apple.

Didn't he scam the Stones out of their masters or something?

 

Yes, he did make it clear. He only hired Eastman as his private manager when all other alternatives had been tried. One third party suggestion of Paul's was Lord Beeching, who Paul asked John to meet with regards to seeing whether he would manage the group. Unfortunately Beeching declined the offer.