Was it George Martin or McCartney during 1967-1969?

Close?
But no cigar.

 

Of course not. Cigar? Ram? Nah...more like a big spliff, probably

 

Clown question, bro.

 

Martin was a key part of their success. Their solo careers are all the proof you need.

 

Well Pauls solo career was highly successful and lasted a lot longer than his time with GM.

 

I guess I always grew up thinking that while with The Beatles Paul could write songs but fleshing out arrangements and figuring out what to do with them was something he needed GM for. Now I don't think that was true, perhaps Paul was a producer in his own right much earlier than I thought.

 

Thanks for the laugh!

 

George Martin was a necessary and respected outside voice in the group which probably helped settle some artistic differences, particularly in the final years.

If you look at the two albums in which he played a smaller or no part at all (White Album and Let it Be) the impression is his input was sorely missed.

 

Besides, McCartney explicitly aimed for his albums not to sound too Beatly during the 70s, so he was really not going for the Abbey Road sound back then.

 

George Martin wasn't around for most of the early (Feb-May 1969) 'Abbey Road' sessions either...

His first session back as producer appears to be the April session for 'The Ballad Of John And Yoko', but he then still only contributed sporadically until July. So when exactly did Paul ask him to 'come back'? Before TBOJ&Y or after?

 

There is no evidence of THAT! ;-)

 

Where would She's Leaving Home be without George Martin's beautiful score?

 

I do think Martin was extremely valuable to the Beatles sound, and I think that's not in question.

But in recent years, I've become more of a, what, "Martin-skeptic" sounds too extreme. Let's not go there: it seems plain that Martin made an excellent producer for the Beatles and an excellent collaborator for McCartney in particular... until eventually he wasn't anymore. Let's say in recent years I've been moderating my estimation of Martin's added-value to the Beatles' post-Rubber Soul sound.

Data point: it's hard to see that Martin did anything else as well as he did his work with the Beatles (plus his occasional work on solo McCartney). I'm not saying George Martin's work with America or Little River Band or Cheap Trick or the various Beatle-associates was incompetent, but there's not a lot of genius on display there either.

I do of course like his work on No More Lonely Nights and Beautiful Night (two very Martin-y sounding productions with solo Paul): but do these represent Martin's magic transforming a Paul song? Or was it that Paul had a Martin-y sound in mind and brought him in specifically to do what Paul wanted him to do? Hard to say! We'll give Martin the credit, but I'll also note, for my own tastes, that Martin's work outside his collaborations with Beatles/McCartney are only occasionally wonderful (Sister Golden Hair!) and are more often unremarkable and occasionally tasteless (some gauche moves on that 1994 Gershwin comp!).

 

It would be pretty much exactly the same, because he didn't score it (Mike Leander did).

 

(I know)

 

I know Emerick is full of crap on some of his "memories", but I kind of believe him on this one. I don't believe John or George had anything to do with George Martin after the Beatles. Even the anthology, which seemed like it should have had Martin involvement went to Jeff Lynne, after Harrison insisted on it. So I think Harrison looked at G. Martin as being uninterested in his music and too much in Paul's camp, Lennon was off with Yoko and his drugs and probably didn't really listen to anyone other than Yoko, and to offer an opinion on the OP's original question, I think McCartney politely listened to Martin and then did what he wanted.

 

My guess:

After the Get Back/Let It Be sessions ended in January 1969, the Fabs didn't know what to do with the results. Presumably, the Glyn Johns-compiled LP would have been released by the middle of 1969, but it kept getting delayed and rejected over and over. But the Beatles still did what they always did---that is, record music. So from February to May 1969, they did venture into the studio every now and then to record stuff. BUT there was no BIG project in mind. They likely still thought the Get Back/Let It Be album was the next BIG project, so they didn't really have another LP yet in mind. By late May/early June, my guess is that they all realized that the Get Back/Let It Be project was going to be delayed by a real long time and only then did they decide to make another LP, to be Abbey Road. So in my opinion, Paul likely spoke to George Martin in late May/June about recording a new LP during July and August like they did in the old days.

 

Exactly; all 4 produced good work without Martin's involvement, but they released most of their greatest work with him.

For instance, look at Paul's work with Martin; you have The Beatles catalogue, Ram, Live And Let Die, Tug Of War/Pop sessions, No More Lonely Nights and Flaming Pie. Now, I love most of Paul's work, but a huge percentage of his best work was made with Martin producing, and that cannot only be down to coincidence.

In a way, especially in the studio, the McCartney/Martin partnership was almost as important as the Lennon/McCartney partnership, and not only with Paul's work. Just look at what Martin and Paul contributed to John's studio masterpieces like 'I Am The Walrus' and 'Strawberry Fields'.

 

So Martin produced the 'TBOJ&Y' session, where Paul and John worked with Ringo and George?

 

The closest The Beatles came to "acknowledging" George Martin's contributions was in the Magical Mystery Tour booklet. "AWAY IN THE SKY, beyond the clouds, live 4 or 5 Magicians. ..." It's not much of an acknowledgement, but I took the "5th Magician" to be George Martin (aka "The 5th Beatle").

 

I always thought the 5th magician was Mal Evans, who appears in the Magical Mystery Tour film as one of the magicians:

 

Yes, that's probably correct.

But the way George Martin tells it (repeatedly) is that after Get Back/Let It Be, he thought 'that's the end' and didn't (want to) work with them again, until Paul asked him back as producer later in the year. Yet he produced TBOJ&Y and (half of) 'Old Brown Shoe' (Chris Thomas was producer at the second session) in April.

So either Paul asked him to return before TBOJ&Y session, or (more likely) George Martin has just forgotten that he did in fact produce them between GB/LIB and July 1969.

 

Martin did orchestrated arrangements for White Album, didn't he? None of the four could write or read music, so they still needed Martin for that area.

 

Even genius benefits from an objective ear, even if it's just the presence of same

 

Is that a telescope in front of George, or is he just pleased to see someone?