McCartney/Harrison recording "I Me Mine", January 1970

So this pic was taken in April of 1970?

 

It’s really too bad, first of all that ..
A :Mal got killed

and then

B. A few dribs and drabs of his book/ diary have been seen,but no official book by him was ever published.
Although the little I’ve read from it seemed to be 0f the “George sent me out to buy him a tie “
sort of thing, so possibly not very enlightening.
Still, the stories he could have told ..

C. It’s a shame his wife had a squabble with Paul regarding discarded lyrics left in the studio that Mal had collected and saved.
Paul claimed they were still his property.
Even though Mal was divorced or at least separated from his wife, I’m pretty sure he wasn’t particularly well paid for his years of service so I’m sure his ex could have used the money from selling the lyrics.

 

I remember Paul talked about Mal's death in some interview. Sometimes in the mid 70's I think, right? some confusing incident where his girlfriwnd called the police on his and the police shot him iirc. Wonder if he was stoned or something, seems likely.

I didn't know bits of his diary or book were around. So nothing interesting in what has surfaced?.

Unfortunate about the lyrics conflict. Guess since Mal wasn't with his wife anymore, and maybe things hasn't ended amicably, Paul didn't feel he owed her any loyalty. Who knows. He surely wouldn't have sued Mal over that.

 

Seeing that the thread has veered on topic and off topic, here’s a pretty good summary of what happened to Mal.

The Day Beatles Assistant Mal Evans Was Killed by Police

 

Yes, that is what happened.

 

Or very late March 1970.

 

Found it! Sorry it took me longer than I thought it would.

 

Regarding Joe English and his interview I can see where he's coming from. Playing in a band as a sideman got old for me though I suppose you just do your job and if you don't care about the musical direction or input then it's fine for many people. I am far happier now as an equal partner. The other thing reminded me of my old company which was a startup. I was promised many things, but nothing on paper at the beginning. Sure enough, nothing was delivered (to quote Dylan). But what could Joe do? He was allowed to be in Paul McCartney's band! If he didn't want to toe the line, he could be easily replaced. He's not John Bonham!

On a far more professional level when I met Darryl Jones a few years ago I asked him if he had any input on the setlist with the Stones. He instantly said, "No" and smiled.

 

Somebody asked a few pages back upthread where this was from & speculated if it was Billboard or Cash Box magazine - it's from Cash Box, dated 18th April 1970,



The whole magazine is available to read for free on archive.org - sorry, but trying to link directly to it doesn't seem to work or show up on my PC, but hopefully this will work for someone,

 

Yes, he was a versatile musician, not just the anvil:

 

Was this taken at the same time? March 1970?

 

Gotta love Mal!

 

So his book should have been written, if he was keeping with the deadline.

Very strange situation.

 

The Mal Evans Diaries - Hooks and Harmony

 

Because that's when they changed their approach to recording, and Paul started overtaking John. On the early albums when they were were totally united, George was left to figure something out on his own, but as the two of them became more distinct it was mostly only on John's songs where he was able to do that. They were still a guitar band though, and on Revolver George still had a prominent presence with his 3 songs, adding lyrics to Eleanor Rigby, and working closely with John. It's not that I think Paul had a significant personality change where suddenly George had a problem with him. It's that by 1967 he had larger control of the overall vision, was doing a lot of cocaine, and was increasingly moving towards the piano ballad/show-tune sound. That's when both George and Ringo started feeling less necessary, and even George Martin was hurt during the making of She's Leaving Home because Paul didn't want to wait for him to record the strings. Not music related, but Leslie Cavendish also said that while they were filming Magical Mystery Tour, Paul only really consulted with John about ideas. People talk about George folding into his Indian music which sure was partly relevant, but it didn't stop him from playing guitar altogether. He was perfectly happy working on Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds, and pulled out a great performance on Fixing A Hole. It wasn't just him.

You could be right. As I say, I'm glad if he eventually became more open to that sort of thing. I believe Elvis Costello pushed him about that as well, and it made what they produced stronger. I've always been of the opinion that The Beatles were at their best together because they balanced out each other's flaws, and that goes as much for Paul as any of the others. In George's case it could've benefited him sometimes to have someone like Paul to help with arrangements. It would've been interesting to see what would've happened if they had continued passed Abbey Road because that was an album where they finally figured out how to merge their old method with new-found independence. George's guitar is prominent in Paul's songs again and it's great. There was a conversation during Get Back after George left where Paul made a lovely statement about allowing everyone to be who they are, and him having that realisation definitely helped later on.

I'm sure the lawsuit had an influence on them all to some extent, but George's reluctance to work with Paul again, and his reaction to the Anthology show it was a genuine concern with him. He brought Jeff Lynne in because he didn't want to go back to the dynamic of having no power against Paul, George Martin, and Geoff Emerick. I think it's more a case of him biting his tongue while in The Beatles, and finally being honest once he was no longer tied to them.

Leslie is actually a he. He started as The Beatles' hairdresser, became a friend of Paul's, and eventually opened a salon for Apple. He was in Magical Mystery Tour too. A random person to get that kind of quote from I know, but seeing as he got pretty close to Paul, he observed some Beatles sessions, and I figure he's reliable since he doesn't have an axe to grind. I thought the same thing! That's what brought me to the conclusion there was more to Ringo leaving than the story he tells.

 

And Yoko on "Blindfold"...

 

Ringo didn't author any of the songs on the soundtrack. Whoops never mind-yes credited on Dig It.

 

who is on bass? That is not Klaus. I know he is on the song.

 

I thought that Klein was trying to get Paul to kiss his ring. Silly me!

 

B.P. Fallon.

 

I've never heard this before.

 

Paul:
"I did cocaine for about a year around the time of Sgt. Pepper. ... Coke and maybe some grass to balance it out. I was never completely crazy with cocaine. I'd been introduced to it and at first it seemed okay, like anything that's new and stimulating. When you start working your way through it, you start thinking: 'Mmm, this is not so cool an idea,' especially when you start getting those terrible comedowns."

"[I was] attracted to the ritualistic end of it. I was particularly amused by rolling up a pound note. There was a lot of symbolism in that: sniffing it through money! ... [Later] I thought, this is not clever, for two reasons. Number one, you didn’t stay high. The plunge after it was this melancholy plunge which I was not used to. The other reason was just a physical thing with the scraunching ’round the back of the neck, when it would get down the back of your nose, and it would all go dead!'

"I went to America just after Pepper came out, and I was thinking of stopping it. And everyone there was taking it, all these music business people, and I thought: No."

 

You make some great points about the change in their approach to recording, the change in Paul’s songs, and his cocaine use at the time. It makes perfect sense that George and Ringo would feel less necessary, especially on Paul songs, by that time, since he could just play the parts himself and quite a few times he would. This is actually strongly related to them not touring anymore. Paul himself was of the opinion they needed to play live for band cohesion, and came up with the no overdubs Get Back idea.

And doing a lot of cocaine surely has an influence on the way you behave, maybe it makes you a bit more blunt or careless. I would think though, while apparently Paul was uncharacteristically using cocaine before the others, that John, George and Ringo were using it soon too.

I do think the change in Paul’s music style and in the recording approach they were using, are a different issue to Paul being controlling of how his songs were to be played. That he was doing afaik from way before, and probably from always.

I remember George Martin mentioning feeling hurt over Paul using someone else for the She’s leaving home string arrangement. I have to say though, I find people always seem to be quite sensitive or to be very willing to complain about any kind of perceived slight on Paul’s part, and it doesn’t seem to be the same the other way around. Like, Paul hasn’t exactly complained a lot about the other Beatles pressuring him, quite heavily it seems, to do LSD. Or about them trying to force him to sign with Klein or to postpone the McCartney albums. John would say the most hurtful things and yet it seems one hears a whole lot less about it too…

Agree about George’s reason for wanting Lynne there.

George wassn't just biting his tongue. He was still in the band, and didn't want it to end.
I think later events can greatly influence our memories of things. Consider Paul's comments about the Let It Be footage. When the movie came out Beatles relations were at an all time low.

I actually don’t think George was quite so reluctant to work with Paul as one would think. There are two quotes by him that I can think of this idea comes from: his “I wouldn’t want to be with Paul in a group again” (an outright mean spirited thing to say imo) from 1974ish and his answer in the late 80’s about Paul apparently saying he’d like to write a song with him “he’s known me for 30 years and now he wants to write with me?”, which just seems like him being upset Paul didn’t want to write with him before.

Then there are quotes where he said otherwise, like in that quote posted somewhere on this thread, where he says him and Ringo are the most in favour of it (The Beatles reuniting).

Consider that in the 70’s Paul was with Wings. He wasn’t playing with other musicians. Then in the 80’s Paul appeared on When we Fab and George was supposed to play on I think Wonderlast. Then there was the issue with George and Ringo’s silly lawsuit which soured things again. The Anthology didn’t come too long after that.

 

What’s the story with those pics anyway. Are they supposed to show The Beatles signing with Klein? Paul didn’t sign.

 

It was the signing by the Beatles of a new contract with EMI/Capitol, which Klein renegotiated. It was NOT a contract per se between the Beatles and Klein. Later that day, though, John told the others that he was leaving the band.

Details here:
https://www.beatlesbible.com/1969/09/20/john-lennon-reveals-he-is-leaving-the-beatles/