The Beatles Appreciation Thread

[No spoken words]

I've been so derelict the last few years when it comes to being a productive member of this little internet community, but I spent a good chunk of my free time on this site for a long time and I still think of this place often, and fondly.

One of the threads I think of a lot is this one. It felt like the one place a lot of us came to and managed to keep positive, while infusing a lot of posts not just with opinions and such but also how the Beatles and their music made us feel, then and now. I cherished that, not gonna lie. As a person born just as the band ended things, their music is intertwined into my life and being in ways I don't even fully understand. - that might sound corny and I wish I had the vocabulary to better explain it, but it's true.

And, now, upon finishing Get Back, my first thought was to come here and see if any of you that are still here watched it and enjoyed it. Seems like, so far, the feedback is almost all positive.

It is rare to get such a raw and unfiltered look at a band, let alone one with mythological standing, not to mention from an era where cell phones and such were not present. What a treasure trove. I am sure I'd not have been quite as riveted if it were nine hours of footage from most other bands, but when you combine all the elements - their historical significance, the quality of their music, already knowing how it ends, comparing and contrasting it against another film made from the exact same sessions, their personalities, seeing songs we know and love created in real time, etc, for me I could have watched another few episodes of this and not gotten bored.

I could name a ton of moments that were either joyful or sad or eye opening or corrective or more, but I'll just comment on three, which is me just echoing others here: the flower pot scene is just astounding. I listened to it three times before moving on, and will likely go and listen again. For those of us that love music I don't know how much more impactful it gets as far as getting to hear such a conversation. Just wow. And, yes, seeing Get Back basically being birthed in real time was such a fucking pleasure. I am sure to those that make music such a scene is pretty familiar, but for it to be shown to laymen, and to have it be such a well known song done by icons, it was utterly mesmerizing and gave me a major jolt of joy and amazement. And seeing Yoko and Linda interacting was lovely - not to mention how many friends and family were just milling about even with just days to go. All that pressure towards the deadline and they're all cool with Linda's daughter running amok. That probably speaks to what the band were all about, but maybe I'm placing more significance on it than it warrants, don't know. I guess I'll mention a fourth which is the flip side of my last comment - seeing Peter Sellers wanting to get the fuck on out of there was pretty interesting. He caught them at a bad moment, to say the least.

Anyway, I hope you are all doing well and that you're having as good a holiday season as is possible under the circumstances. Even you, Laz.

GAF, sorry your pale hose didn't advance farther last month but the present and future look good, assuming the lockout doesn't last too long. I have nothing to say to phanan as it pertains to October baseball.

 

[joyfulgirl]

I've been so derelict the last few years when it comes to being a productive member of this little internet community, but I spent a good chunk of my free time on this site for a long time and I still think of this place often, and fondly.

Ditto. It's been so long since I've been in here that I somehow got locked out, having no idea what email address and password I had originally signed up with, so I had to get Sicy to help me back in (thanks, Sicy!).

But after watching, and then immediately re-watching, Get Back, I had to know what the old gang thought. It comes as no surprise to me that you all just get better and better at writing about music, and most everything I wanted to comment on has already been said better than I could have.

One thing I'll say is that I've spent a lifetime as mostly a George & John girl, but man, I've now veered hard into Paul's lane. I really felt for him trying to hold it all together, which meant sometimes being a pill, and I have massive newfound respect for him as a person and a godlike genius musician and songwriter. As Peter Jackson said, Paul was absolutely the Frodo of the Beatles. But I love each of them, with all their flaws and brilliance. I was really struck by the emotional intelligence and self-awareness they each displayed.

What a treat it's been spending this last week with the Beatles. I'll probably spend the rest of my life watching Get Back.

 

[lazarus]

I've been so derelict the last few years when it comes to being a productive member of this little internet community

 

[cobl04]

I might have to watch this thing.

 

[phanan]

I have nothing to say to phanan as it pertains to October baseball.

Yankees suck. Good to see you.

 

[MrPryck2U]

Welcome back, NSW and joyfulgirl! Get back to where you once belonged, indeed!

 

[HeartlandGirl]

Anyway, I hope you are all doing well and that you're having as good a holiday season as is possible under the circumstances.

Jumping into this thread to to you and joyful. Miss you both!

I've been creeping around this thread because there was a big discussion at our small Thanksgiving dinner about whether this documentary was too long and meandering and only meant for super fans. Currently, my significant other is watching it. I've tried on multiple occasions to get into the Beatles and failed. Neither of my parents listen to them, and their music just keeps passing me by.

But like joyful said, the people here write so well about music that I've enjoyed reading this thread and seeing the appreciation others have for this band and this documentary.

And while we've got so many people here, I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season too.

 

[joyfulgirl]

Welcome back, NSW and joyfulgirl! Get back to where you once belonged, indeed!

Jumping into this thread to to you and joyful. Miss you both!

I've been creeping around this thread because there was a big discussion at our small Thanksgiving dinner about whether this documentary was too long and meandering and only meant for super fans.

Hey, you! And here I am hoping for the 18hr director's cut that Peter Jackson mentioned he's considering. There are definitely some slow parts for the casual fan, but I was mostly rapt throughout. When re-watching it, I did realize how much I had tuned out whenever the suits were talking.

Some moments I enjoyed that came to mind this morning:

Ringo loving sitting next to Paul at the piano
George helping Ringo with Octopus's Garden
Ringo everything, actually. Such a sweet presence.
George's sartorial selections
Everything about Two of Us
Maureen's bobbing head
The row of feet tapping in the playback room
Linda and Yoko talking
Mal dancing with Heather
Mal's face when told to get a hammer and anvil
Commonwealth
Paul's commitment to dramatic readings of news stories about them
Every second of John's silliness

 

[lazarus]

One thing that is fascinating to me, and it's not exactly a total revelation but more of an underlining, is that despite how dispassionate/disinterested John was during the recording/rehearsal sessions, seeming to take none of it very seriously and cracking jokes at every turn, when it was time to perform his songs live, the man fucking BROUGHT IT. In 1980 he dismissed Dig A Pony as "another piece of garbage", but what a spirited rendition of it we got. It's telling that the versions of that song and One After 909 which made it onto the eventual album were those live ones, and I suspect that had he not garbled the lyrics on a verse in the first take of Don't Let Me Down, they might have used that one as well (Let It Be...Naked uses a track made by combining both live takes). He seems nearly possessed when he's up there, just a rock and roll guy through and through. It's odd to use a term like "professional" with such an idiosyncratic person, but when you put in the time these guys did in the Hamburg clubs, it becomes part of your blood.

Two things started to choke me up in the second half of Part 3: Paul and John ballroom dancing in the studio, and later, the band and their families and the crew listening to the playback of the rooftop recordings, and knowing they had done something special.

Also, another thing that isn't new, but should be restated: Billy Preston played on 10 of the 14 tracks (incl. Don't Let Me Down and Old Brown Shoe) from these sessions. He's a legitimate member of the band on this album, plain and simple. Especially as he was not a hired gun playing pre-arranged parts; they were letting him join in and add what he wanted to these songs. When you consider that he also played organ on Something and I Want You (She's So Heavy), arguably Abbey Road's greatest tracks, his impact on late-period Beatles is undeniable.

 

[GirlsAloudFan]

GAF, sorry your pale hose didn't advance farther last month but the present and future look good, assuming the lockout doesn't last too long. I have nothing to say to phanan as it pertains to October baseball.

Can't wait for next season. But we need a right fielder (Conforto? Castellanos?) and another rotation arm.

Nice win for your Steelers last night.

 

[the tourist]

I just finished Get Back. I wonder what would have happened if George had gotten even times with his songs as Paul and John. Might not have ended the way it did.

 

[lazarus]

He didn't deserve an equal amount.

But had he been allowed to release a solo album on his own as he had suggested to John, he would have been happy to keep going with the band.

 

[the tourist]

He didn't deserve an equal amount.

I very much disagree with this statement. All Things Must Pass had a lot of really incredible material. I’d take a good portion of that album over anything on Let It Be and stack it directly up against anything McCartney or Lennon put out for a couple years.

 

[LemonMelon]

I can imagine a really moody Let It Be that incorporates All Things Must Pass material:

Get Back
Two of Us
Across the Universe
I Dig a Pony
Don't Let Me Down
Let It Be
I've Got a Feeling
All Things Must Pass
The Long and Winding Road
Isn't It a Pity

 

[LemonMelon]

I love John's contributions to this era, as fucked up as he may have been at the time. I Dig a Pony and Don't Let Me Down have such a wonderfully ragged, pained, yearning quality to them that reminds me a lot of what Derek and the Dominoes put out in 1970. I guess that's just what being dopesick and lovesick sounds like when you're a musical genius.

The 2021 mix of Let It Be is great, by the way. Seems like the album is slightly different every time I hear it. [emoji23]

 

[phanan]

I very much disagree with this statement. All Things Must Pass had a lot of really incredible material. I’d take a good portion of that album over anything on Let It Be and stack it directly up against anything McCartney or Lennon put out for a couple years.

If they continued as they were, then yes, Harrison had such a backlog that he could have contributed heavily to future albums through the 70's.

But if they had approached the alternating solo album/Beatles album theory, I don't think he would have been at the same level. Once you get past his second real solo album (I don't count the experimental ones from the 60's), the quality of his output gets very scattered.

 

[the tourist]

If they continued as they were, then yes, Harrison had such a backlog that he could have contributed heavily to future albums through the 70's.



But if they had approached the alternating solo album/Beatles album theory, I don't think he would have been at the same level. Once you get past his second real solo album (I don't count the experimental ones from the 60's), the quality of his output gets very scattered.

But by that time, so had the quality of Lennon and McCartney’s records. I wonder what, say, 1970-1973 might’ve looked like with 4 Beatles albums with 4-5 each from Lennon, McCartney, and Harrison (and maybe one each from Ringo).

 

[phanan]

Yeah, can't agree there. McCartney produced Band On The Run and Venus And Mars, two of his stronger albums. And while Lennon's subsequent albums weren't on the same level as Plastic Ono Band or Imagine, they are way ahead of Dark Horse and Extra Texture.

It certainly is fascinating to think about what could have been. Say they took a break in early 1970 while Let It Be was released, they do their solo albums, and then come back together at the end of the year for a new Beatles project. Obviously some songs that end up on their follow-up solo albums would go there instead (along with assorted standalone singles), like Imagine, Another Day, It Don't Come Easy, Gimme Some Truth, etc. And maybe Harrison doesn't do a double album if he knows a Beatles one is to follow, so he shapes his solo record a certain way but keeps certain songs, such as What Is Life, for the Beatles.

Or they agree to Lennon's suggestion of four apiece along with whatever Ringo can muster up, as you mentioned, and don't even do solo albums. The 1970 record alone would be tremendous with Instant Karma, Maybe I'm Amazed, etc.

The possibilities are fun to run through.

 

[cobl04]

Every conversation about this that happens on this forum or elsewhere makes me like John less and Paul and George more

 

[LemonMelon]

An hour into Get Back. Don't Let Me Down and I've Got A Feeling were the shit from day 1. George definitely seems like a little brother trying to vain to get his ideas through.

 

[MrPryck2U]

RIP JL. 1940-1980.

 

[DaveC]

holy shit the way debbie dealt with those cops was masterful.

i'm convinced that michael lindsay-hogg was resentful and held a huge grudge against the beatles for not agreeing to his stupid ideas for the "tv show", and that he cherry picked and went out of his way to cast the beatles in the worst possible light when he made the let it be film. all these hours of happy joyous fun footage and he managed to make it all look miserable and depressing and it cast a very poor light for half a century on many people who didn't deserve it. fuck that guy.

 

[DaveC]

One thing that is fascinating to me, and it's not exactly a total revelation but more of an underlining, is that despite how dispassionate/disinterested John was during the recording/rehearsal sessions, seeming to take none of it very seriously and cracking jokes at every turn, when it was time to perform his songs live, the man fucking BROUGHT IT. In 1980 he dismissed Dig A Pony as "another piece of garbage", but what a spirited rendition of it we got. It's telling that the versions of that song and One After 909 which made it onto the eventual album were those live ones, and I suspect that had he not garbled the lyrics on a verse in the first take of Don't Let Me Down, they might have used that one as well (Let It Be...Naked uses a track made by combining both live takes). He seems nearly possessed when he's up there, just a rock and roll guy through and through. It's odd to use a term like "professional" with such an idiosyncratic person, but when you put in the time these guys did in the Hamburg clubs, it becomes part of your blood.

this. it was like a light switch flipped on the instant they started playing these songs where they knew the public could hear them. it's amazing how ragged they still sounded on almost every song just a day or two before the performance, and then how much they fucking NAILED IT as soon as they walked onto that rooftop.

my jaw was on the floor when paul and john started doing the different parts during the last verse of i've got a feeling - correct me if i'm wrong but i'm 99% sure we didn't see them doing it that way at any point before the roof, and it was so smooth and natural like they'd been rehearsing that for months.

i absolutely loved this whole thing. i'll be watching the 18-hour director's cut of this film as soon as it's available for sure.

 

[namkcuR]

I was away for Thanksgiving, so I didn't get around to watching this until this past week. I can't think of another example of a band allowing this much access while working on album. It's fascinating to see these guys at work. It's also interesting to see how tedious it can be. How many times did they play Get Back or Don't Let Me Down or whatever throughout the course of the series? But that's what making an album is, I guess. I will say that because of the length and repetitive nature of certain parts of it, this is probably for die-hards only; even my dad, who grew up with the Beatles in the 60s and has been a big fan all his life, said he found a good deal of it boring. I get where that POV is coming from, but I still think, slow parts and all, it's an incredible window into probably the most important band of all time. Some observations:

1. For fifty years there's been a perception of Paul as domineering, controlling etc during the late period of the band, and while he does come off as controlling in parts of this, I'm not sure he really had a choice. The band was meandering, especially in the early part of the sessions at Twickenham. If Paul wasn't pushing the thing along, it just wouldn't have gotten done at all.

There's a part where Paul says that he's "scared of being the boss and I have been for, like, a couple of years", like he's practically begging for someone to step up and act like a boss if they don't want him to be the boss. He wants someone to help him steer the ship.

The thing is, the only one in the band who could've stood up to McCartney more aggressively and taken some of that control from him to balance things out was Lennon, and between the intensity of his relationship with Yoko and being under the influence of heroin, it seems like he just didn't quite care enough to help steer the ship.

There's a scene where the band are having a meeting at Twickenham(the one where John makes the "space between us" joke) where Paul is desperately trying to have a serious conversation about the direction of the project and what it's gonna be and John is just making one joke after another and not taking anything seriously.

George appears to have a desire to step up, but it seems McCartney doesn't fully trust George's ability to steer the ship.

Ringo has never steered a ship before and has little desire to.

2. With regards to George, it's a shame his contributions weren't developed more in these sessions. It's been said before in this discussion, but one could easily see a scenario where One After 909, Dig It(since it's more of a jam than a song), and Across The Universe(make it a Past Masters track since it was from the White Album sessions) are replaced with All Things Must Pass, Isn't It A Pity, and Old Brown Shoe. He even had the beginnings of Something too, that could've been worked on more.

Early on at Twickenham, when George tried to share I Me Mine, the reception was mostly jokes from John and apathy from Paul. And then Paul tries to micro-manage George to death on his parts in Paul's songs. Hard to blame George for walking out.

3. There's a brief moment when they're working on "Get Back" at Twickenham where John starts singing it, and it made me want to hear a full version of the song with John on lead vocals.

4. I was struck by the multi-instrumentalism they all had. Obviously I knew that Paul played piano and drummed a bit, but I didn't know he also played guitar(he doesn't usually do that in his live performances, right?); likewise, I don't think I ever made the connection that John is playing the bass on TLAWR - that was really cool to see - or that he could play some piano and drums. They were all so talented.

5. I was also struck by how young they all are. I mean, they're all 25-29 here, but I felt like they all looked and behaved older than that. They'd seen so much life already. They were all more mature and 'adult' than I was at that age(i.e. 10 years ago). To think they did everything they did together before the age of 30.

6. Ringo seems like such a good dude...not taking anything away from the others, but Ringo just gives off such positive and gentle vibes, and he's dependable too. When George walked out and everything was up in the air, he was the first to show up the next morning. He seemed to have the least ego of any of them - while Paul and John are the warring alphas, and George is desperately trying to be accepted as a third alpha, Ringo is perfectly content with where he is in the pecking order and just wants to be a team player. I've seen other people saying similar things, so I think he came off really well in this.

7. I had no idea the rooftop concert came so close to not happening. I mean, the band is in a room somewhere in the building still debating whether or not to do it as the equipment is being set up on the roof? Wild stuff. The fact that they couldn't all get on the some page about it until the very last moment speaks to the dysfunction in the band and, as has been said, the fact that they so thoroughly nailed the performance despite said dysfunction speaks to just how fucking good they were.

8. The band was incredibly prolific with their writing during this period

They wrote the entirety of Let It Be(minus One After 909 and Across The Universe) during these sessions.

They also seem to have had the essence during these sessions of 12 of the 17 tracks that ended up on Abbey Road(this didn't really click for me until I saw them rehearsing Something/Maxwell/Darling/Octopus/I Want You/Mustard/Pam/Bathroom Window/Slumbers/Weight/End/Majesty in the doc - seeing these songs come to life was one of the highlights). I realize some of these started during the India trip/White Album sessions, but still. Further, according to wiki, You Never Give Me Your Money was written just two months after the Get Back sessions.

Paul, John, and George also all had a handful of future solo tracks going as well; Paul had Teddy Boy, Another Day, and Backseat Of My Car; John had Jealous Guy, Gimme Some Truth, and the very beginnings of Imagine; and George had All Things Must Pass, Isn't It A Pity, and Let It Down(though the latter isn't seen in the doc, I don't think).

If we stretch back to India/White Album sessions in 1968, Paul wrote Junk and Every Night back then, and John wrote Oh My Love, Oh Yoko, and Look At Me(as well as Across The Universe).

So we can say between April of 1968 and April of 1969, they wrote the entirety of the White Album+Hey Jude+Across The Universe+other outtakes, the entirety of Let It Be, most of Abbey Road, and 3-5 future classic solo tracks each. Just seems like an unbelievably fruitful time.

I even had the thought: if Ringo hadn't had to leave to do his film(which was the reason for the deadline), I wonder if the band wouldn't have just kept going and eventually released all of the Let it Be and Abbey Road material together as a double album, like the White Album.

9. It was good to see the band laughing and in good spirits, particularly after they moved to Apple. It's often thought that they hated each other at the end, but whatever frustrations they had, they still basically cared for each other a great deal, I think. It's comforting in particular to see McCartney and Lennon getting on well at the end and performing so well together, and to come away thinking they were basically always tight minus a bad year or two right after the band split - McCartney being pissed about Spector's involvement with LIB, Lennon being pissed about McCartney announcing the break-up in his album sleeve, the back-and-forth with "Too Many People" and "How Do You Sleep", etc.

It's a great doc, a fascinating, priceless snapshot of these legendary artists at work. I don't know that I'd watch it front-to-back again - it's very long - but I'd certainly watch certain parts of it at a time - the flower pot conversation, the rooftop concert, the interactions of Linda/Yoko/Patti Boyd/Maureen with the band, all of these songs coming to life and in raw form from Get Back to Don't Let Me Down to TLAWR to Ringo and George coming up with Octopus's Garden to all the other Abbey Road material to the future solo material, etc.

It's essential viewing for any diehard.

 

[joyfulgirl]

^^Appreciate all of that. And I pretty much agree with all of it.

I still can't get over how much it changed my perception of Paul. I agree with all you said, but I also think that even as he pushed them all to be better, he clearly was more interested in his own material. It must be tough being a genius and knowing your instincts are probably usually right while also not wanting to appear bossy. There was a moment where John and one of the others were working on something and John said something like "I don't know about the syncopation, leave that to Paul." I think they really relied on his arrangement skills even as they sometimes resented it.

Ultimately I found Paul and his process the most interesting to watch. Even on the rooftop where they were all fantastic, my eyes kept being drawn to Paul. He's so free and comfortable in his skin and in his body. I love his dancey groove.

About them appearing older than they were, that was literally one of my first observations. I texted a friend during pt 1 that I was watching the Beatles in their late 20s acting like they were 40.

I really felt for George. The band's tepid response to I Me Mine was heartbreaking. George had to leave to shine, and I'm glad he found companions and collaborators with the Wilburys. He seemed so much happier after the Beatles.

Though John's heroin use was well-documented during that period, I found it hard to believe he was using during these sessions, except perhaps in pt 1. Then again, I don't know how heroin makes a person behave. He seemed really there when it mattered, after pt 1. But there was a moment, very easy to miss, in pt 2 where he takes something out of his pocket, then sees the camera on him, looks guilty, and puts it back in his pocket. I thought he was about to take something and decided best not to do that on camera. But god, he was funny—and brilliant.

I wish more people would watch and comment. Looking at you, cobl.

Here's a teaser ... I mean, this young guy (part of the film crew, I think?) cannot believe this is happening to him:

 

[lazarus]

1. For fifty years there's been a perception of Paul as domineering, controlling etc during the late period of the band, and while he does come off as controlling in parts of this, I'm not sure he really had a choice.

Yes but right below you pointed this out

Early on at Twickenham, when George tried to share I Me Mine, the reception was mostly jokes from John and apathy from Paul. And then Paul tries to micro-manage George to death on his parts in Paul's songs. Hard to blame George for walking out.

Telling George to do his solos differently at this point in the band's run was definitely going too far. Or let's say there was a more diplomatic way to handle it.

There's a scene where the band are having a meeting at Twickenham(the one where John makes the "space between us" joke) where Paul is desperately trying to have a serious conversation about the direction of the project and what it's gonna be and John is just making one joke after another and not taking anything seriously.

This is actually one of my favorite moments in the whole doc. For those who didn't catch it, Paul says "We were talking..." and John knows this happens to be the beginning of George's Within You Without You and immediately finishes the line with "...about the space between us?" The fact that they're discussing George quitting and it's one of his songs that John references is just such a perfect example of his quick wit. It didn't really help the situation but I couldn't help but smile at how on point the interjection was.

 

[gump]

I'm coming late to this as I didn’t have a chance to watch the series until this weekend. This was so good, I kind of got emotional when it ended. We might neve ever get a similar look at such a significant band (let alone the greatest band of all time) at such a pivotal time. It was thrilling. I'm not sure what Peter Jackson and co. did to make this film look as good as it did, but it was awesome to get such pristine footage of the band. I don’t have much to add beyond what others have already said, but some general thoughts:

1. For all their inability to communicate properly with words at this point, their musical understanding remained unparalleled. From those moments when one of them starts with a riff or underdeveloped musical idea and the others just seamlessly join in (Get Back being the best example), to the dozens and dozens of time when John or Paul just basically start playing an old cover and they all just jump in. It’s quite astonishing to see it happening as it does. Paul and John, in particular, have such a deep musical understanding with each other, they can convey entire sentences with one quick look.

2. A related point: their repertoire is just incredible. It seems as though they can easily play through hundreds of songs on the spot. Laz alluded to how their Hamburg days made them truly professionals, and it’s absolutely true.

3. I was surprised that how many moments of pure joy there were in these sessions. All the old covers. The jokes. The humorous renditions of many of their songs. John and Paul singing Two of Us without opening their mouth. George is the only one who is generally more reserved here, but you can see him enjoying himself several times.

4. It’s so hard not to get into “what ifs” after watching this. The series has this underlying undertone of a Greek tragedy almost: small decisions that take them to the ending we know, but that could have been avoided in an alternate reality. One of these “what ifs” for me is the insane schedule they had at that time. Like, at one point they say that “it has been more than 6 months since we released a single”. LOL. They would have benefitted from Bono’s counsel. I know that the recording industry was quite different then, but they basically just needed more time, I think - solo albums would have helped, but it’s just too intense to spend that much time with other people. They couldn’t recharge between albums.

5. The exasperating character for me was not Paul, contrary to my expectations. He was annoying at times, and lacked the desire or ability to communicate better with George, but you can see it comes from a good place, and that he truly cared about the band. I think joyful is on point when she said that it’s hard to be a musical genius and know that you generally have the right instinct… But the true villain here was Lindsay-Hogg. What an utterly awful, casually racists dude (“we’ll fill that arena with 2,000 Arabs”). The greatest band in the world is disintegrating in front of you and all you can think about is about your stupid idea of taking them to a coliseum in Tripoli, or what kind of film they will make? And then he comes up with THAT film? Fuck that guy.

6. This series is worth it for the Get Back inception scene alone. It gave me chills, really. I can’t say it better than the New Yorker review, so here it goes:

“The now legendary sequence in which Paul, playing full chords on his bass guitar—a difficult thing to do—composes “Get Back” in less than four minutes is still perhaps a bit misunderstood. Paul does it, but he does it for the group. He starts with a keening minor-key wail, interesting in itself, then finds the familiar chord pattern of the song. But Ringo and George are the necessary audience. “It’s good. It’s . . . you know. Musically and that, it’s great,” a till-then bored-seeming George mutters—and, on his Telecaster, instantly answers with a sharp, Steve Cropper-style upstroke riff, one that might well have found a home in the finished song. Ringo starts clapping out the rhythm. Then John walks in, late, and, without saying a single word, immediately finds—as a rhythm guitarist should—the right A dominant-seventh chord on his Epiphone electric and casually starts filling out his part. It’s a movie moment, of the kind that used to happen in forties musicals, when the big band on the sleeper car suddenly finds the song. But here, it just happens. That’s a band.”

Really great stuff. It made me wish to have more of this types of films. Imagine getting something like this for the Achtung Baby sessions.

A question for the Beatles specialists here: what’s the best Beatles book to read? I have seen conflicting suggestions, and would appreciate some ideas to remain in this world a bit longer.

 

[GirlsAloudFan]

Revolution in the Head is the first Beatles book that comes to mind for recommendation. It's excellent. I had a hard time putting it down.

 

[lazarus]

To be fair, you also have a hard time putting down every monthly issue of Hustler.

 

[Hewson]

To be fair, you also have a hard time putting down every monthly issue of Hustler.

And Teen Vogue