Beatles - Get Back new book

Yes - sorry. Wrong thread!

 

Super article with an I believe still unsung figure of the Get Back period:

Original 'Let It Be' Director Defends His Film: 'I Don't Care' That Ringo Hates It

 

"No Rain"? You're thinking of the other flying yellow critter:


#TheBirdsAndTheBees

 

Well Woodstock was half a million strong.

 

I thought this was a pretty amusing interview (tho at times Lindsay-Hogg sounds like a grumpy old man, and he is fairly old!). But the odd bit was when he was talking about how tough all the Beatles were and said that he'd be afraid to meet an angry Paul McCartney "in a dark alley." Absolutely I think all four Beatles were mentally tough, strong people. Verbally, I think all four could tear someone to shreds. But physically? I'm not sure I even see John as all that physically intimidating, let alone Paul. I just don't see it.

 

Actually John was known as a fighter in his younger days. What's that Yoda said to Luke?

 

I've read different things about him on that front, including that John was more likely to spark a fight and then run like hell. And that Paul was more likely to try to talk his way out of it and then run like hell.

But

 

I think you're exactly right with your take on this. And add to that, John and Paul are scrambling trying to come up with enough songs to perform, completely ignoring George [and his 14 songs] as a possible additional source... no wonder he walked out!

 

Remarkably, the original 1969/70 Get Back book - whether knowingly or otherwise - misattributes George's backlog of songs to John:

John: Anytime at all. You
suggest where: Pakistan, the
Moon, I'll still be there till
you don't let me down.
You'll be surprised at the
story that will come out of this,
I'll tell you what I'd
like to do. I've got so many
tunes, I've got my tunes for
the next ten years of albums.
I'd like to do an album of songs.
It would be nice mainly to get
all those songs out of the way.
And secondly to hear what
mine are like all together.
Any of us can do separate things
as well and that way it also
preserves the Beatles bit. All
these songs of mine I could
give to people who could do
them good, but I suddenly
realised, well . . . all that,
I'm going to do me for a bit. With all these tunes, I could
do them in a week at the most
—record them all, remix,
because they're all very simple.
I don't think they need much.
I mean with a Leslie, it's too
much, just one guitar.
(singing)
Because you're sweet and lovely, girl

I love you . . .

 

He almost beat Bob Wooler to death at Paul McCartney’s 21st birthday party, when Wooler joked about his and Epstein's relationship.

It almost derailed their career and had to be covered up and dealt with.

 

There have been a few "alternate histories" of the Beatles (the TV show Snodgrass, the novel Liverpool Fantasy), but never one where John is prosecuted for assault. One wonders where such a story would have gone. (The group carries on with Gerry Marsden as the new Fourth Beatle? Paul switches back to 6-string guitar and Klaus Voormann becomes the bassist?) The title Jailhouse Rock was already taken....

 

Been going through this slowly, (don't want it to end), but there are surprises on most every page.

Like on page 147

John : "I don't regret anything...ever, Not even Bob Wooler."

That's kind of chilling, considering he almost beat Bob to death in 1963.

Also the foreshadowing on page 150 of a song Paul will write castigating John later, perhaps taken from John's own words.

Paul: "It's a bit like what's wrong with Apple"

John: "Too many people (laughs)"


And I am fascinated by what John is referring to about a shared dream with Paul on page 162


John: "Very strong dream. We both dreamt about it...Amazing. Different dreams you know. I thought you must have been there. I mean, I was touching you"

George: "Was it sexually oriented?"

Paul: Oh, you know, John, don't worry about it.

John: "There is nothing to worry about"

 

It's such a great resource. I've finished it, but continue to read over bits and pieces. Didn't we discuss the dream convo a few pages back, or was that another thread? I'm getting all my Beatles threads mixed up; there's so many at the moment!

Yes, I got the 'too many people' reference as well. Funny isn't it? All the little coincidences. Or not. Paul may have remembered the comment, or picked up on it subconsciously.

Re: Bob Wooller, to give John the benefit of the doubt, he may just be referring to the process of learning from his mistakes - one would hope! Personally, I'm not for saying I've no regrets. I've plenty in my life, but I try hard to not dwell on them (not always succeeding I might add), so maybe that's what John meant?

On another note: I'd be interested in your thoughts - and anyone else's - on Jan 13th lunch time dialogue.

a moral to this song . I find the conversation between John and Paul to be incredibly direct, considering how much they usually like to dance around a topic. John tries to say that he is simply rabbit food for the others and Paul says no, you're the rabbit. Don't hold back Paul! Also John says he is aware of his capacity to manipulate people (namely George) from an early age and he has been trying to stop himself from being that way. When you listen to the audio, John sounds like he could do with talking this out - properly. As I'm listening, I can't help inwardly willing Paul to down tools and take John and Ringo for a drink to vent, or something. I think they could all have done with a venting session!

 

Yeah, an amazing conversation.

Paul admits he's conniving, John admits he has always been headstrong and controlling, since grammar school.

John says that if he or Paul were to carry on with anybody else, it would still kind of be The Beatles, but that doesn't go for Ringo.

Then John says something that foreshadows the end:

JOHN: —that I am sort of at it again. And that’s why I’ve had to fight for the last three years. And I’ve done it – the other way. Just – rather than allow myself to connive, I thought, “Stop it now. Stop it.”

 

Yeah, poor Ringo! Sat there, listening to John saying basically, you're not the Beatles. Us two are the Beatles.

And John says he has been this way since Dovedale which was his primary school. So from his point of view, he has been manipulative since he was a child. Like, to have that perception of yourself going back all that way...well, it may well have been true. But to have that go unaddressed...no wonder his mental health suffered as an adult.

And yes, then his personal fight to not be manipulative, and telling himself whenever he felt he was getting that way, to stop it. I felt so sorry for him hearing him say all that. Nowadays, there'd be help for him. Was there not help for people's mental health back then? At all? Surely therapists existed? That's one thing I've never really been able to get my head around as a Gen Xer. John obviously knew he needed help, hence primal scream therapy, but why Janov, who did more harm than good? Were there not...respectable psychologists or therapists around in the 1960s?

 

The flip side, is without John being that headstrong, The Beatles would have probably never existed.

Whatever they became, they were in the beginning, his band, built on and around his strong, offbeat, and flamboyant personality.

That's what drew Paul, and George to him, and eventually the whole wide world.

 

There were plenty of respectable sound men and managers around also, but he went with Magic Alex and Allen Klein, so there's that.

 

SATB is a terrific podcast. One observation, after a few years of listening, is that the host (Robert Rodriguez) has come around much more to Paul’s side of things. I think when you start deep diving, Nagra reels, day to day studio records, etc. you can’t help but, become (at least a little) more sympathetic to Paul’s side. It’s not revisionism to be open minded when new information becomes available. Historians constantly have to reevaluate their positions based on new information. Documents become declassified, new bits of information are discovered etc. Some fans are way too entrenched in their positions. The Beatles story is still unfolding. Enjoy the ride.

 

I take your point, but as far as managers go, that was a case of not being able to find anyone who'd take them on. They did try. One of the reasons Lee Eastman was brought in was because they were in a situation where they had to attend to the finances to meet the deadlines, and they still didn't have anyone who'd agree to do the job. So Paul turned to Eastman. Edit: of course, and then 'enter Klein'...

 

If hearing the podcast and reading the book, makes me appreciate what George Martin was to the group, the Lewisohn book did the same for my appreciation of Brian Epstein as their manager.

Most music managers were awful at that time, and were only interested in draining whatever income they could from their flash in the pan clients.

But Epstein was a revelation. He loved, them, looked up to them, and without him you could argue they don't become "The Beatles", because its at his insistence that they start writing originals again, and play them at the Decca audition, after John and Paul had slacken off in that area.

I was amazed when it came time for him to do contracts with them, he had thought that the standard music contract so predatory, that he had a lawyer go looking for more equitable contracts, and found them in the way Hollywood contracts under age stars.

I had always thought before that they were "The Beatles" and that any competent manager could have taken them to the top, but they could be quite assholes and burned a lot of bridges before they met him.

They laughed at him when he told them he was going to "make them bigger than Elvis", and within a very short period of time, he was proven correct.

I think they were rudderless without him, and now open to the all the sharks around who wanted a piece of them.

 

I ordered a set from Chuck last year. He signed them and shipped within 24 hours, FedEx I believe. The way he packed them there was no way they could get damaged. Great set!

 

I find fascinating that John and Paul at once seem controlling and desperately vulnerable almost at the same time.

And yes, mental health care into the 60s, 70s and even 80s seems to have been pretty pathological and subpar.

In the UK, the first large scale closures of mental asylums didn't begin until 1986, and ran as late as 2010:

Case study 1: Deinstitutionalisation in UK mental health services

 

I broadly agree, but I also think Brian's similar inexperience could cause him to make some poor business choices too, like with giving charge of Seltaeb to Nicky Byrne who took 90% of the profits, and put Brian through hell with countersuits (all told, the Beatles lost around $100,000,000).

 

Yeah, he made some horrible choices, not knowing the business well. Totally unprepared on what to ask for moneywise on the soundtracks, and had no idea they usually payed a higher royalty rate.

The most egregious was when they resigned with EMI in 65 or 66. He could have asked for the world, and EMI was prepared to give it, but instead accepted the same royalty rate they had when they were signed as nobodies.

 

Just so I'm following along, UK primary and grammar school are equivalent to US elementary and middle school?