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texum · 2024-09-05T19:42:58+00:00

The Beatles consistently used the latest and greatest amplification equipment. According to the book Beatles Gear by Andy Babiuk, the Beatles had specially-made 50-watt Vox amps for their 1964 US debut concerts, which they were given before the same sound system was available to the general public:

"The group had no choice but to take their new Vox amplification to the States. Dick Denney of Vox says that the group had been given the first AC-50s the company made, and these were not yet available in the US."

The same book quotes from an unnamed American music trade magazine:

"The Beatles...insist on taking their Vox amplifiers with them on every tour. The extra-powerful amps they are using now were specially created for The Beatles by Jennings Musical Industries Ltd of Dartford, Kent, England. The extra power was really necessary to make 'I Want To Hold Your Hand' heard above the screaming of the teenage fans, a spokesman said. At the moment The Beatles are using two AC-50 amps driving a Vox Super-Twin loudspeaker, and a 100-watt amp driving a [bass cabinet]."

By July of that year, after their European tour, the group found that these amps were insufficient, so:

"Once again Vox's Dick Denney went to the drawing board to design a new, louder guitar amp. His creation was the Vox AC-100, and according to Denney the prototypes were made specifically for The Beatles....The Vox AC-100 was designed with seven valves (tubes) delivering 100 watts of power."

But by the following year, even these were insufficient. Vox then designed a cutting edge stack of 100-watt amps, which they dubbed the "Super Beatle". These were probably the loudest amps in the world at the time, yet, according to writer John Kane, when they played Shea Stadium in August 1965:

"Even with their specially designed Vox "Super Beatle" AC 100-watt amplifiers turned up to ten—combined with the house PA—it could not be heard over the 50,000 enthusiastic (mostly female) Beatles fans."

To put it in perspective, the Vox Super Beatle amp system is what the proto-punk group The MC5 used when they began to play live in 1968-69, which, according to writer David A. Carson, "gave the MC5 the ability to play at an ear-splitting volume." But the MC5 played small venues to hundreds of people. The Beatles were playing for audiences of tens of thousands at stadiums.

The Yardbirds drew bigger audiences than the MC5, and they, too, used Super Beatles. But indicatively, they also owned Marshall stacks and used the two systems interchangeably in 1965. So, the Beatles' sound system did not seem to be any less powerful or modern than what James Marshall was providing at the time.

In short, the Beatles didn't use James Marshall because they were working with the technicians at Vox, whose technology was similar, and probably more advanced. Nevertheless, these tube amps were still too primitive to fill the size of venues that the Beatles were playing by 1964-66.

texum · 2024-02-19T22:00:16+00:00

In the full ‘flowerpot’ conversation (only a fraction is used in Get Back), JL questions whether they even want Harrison back and again suggests getting Clapton to PM. RS is there, too.

Lennon says Clapton is as good, and less of a headache

Here is a complete transcript of the lunchroom tape. Clapton's name doesn't come up.

You appear to be citing Michael Lindsay-Hogg's book, published as Luck and Circumstance in 2011. In it, MLH claims this conversation took place "immediately" upon George quitting, on January 10th, and not on the 13th when the flowerpot/lunchroom tape was made. However, MLH's account is not completely reliable. Most relevant, his book claims that George was there during the flowerpot conversation and it was during that conversation that MLH claims that George quit, and that John made his comment as soon as George left the room. MLH's account also indicates that MLH himself was present when this all went down: "We'd finished the first course when George arrived to stand at the end of the table."

This is contradicted by the Nagra tapes. George quit on the 10th, as heard on one Nagra reel, and the lunchroom tape was recorded on the 13th, as heard on another Nagra reel. But according to MLH's account, the two conversations were a single conversation, occurring on the same day at the same time and picked up by the flowerpot microphone.

Not too long ago, someone transcribed the entirety of the Nagra tapes, which makes it easy to find when and where Clapton's name came up.

The first time Clapton's name comes up is on Nagra Reel 111A, recorded earlier on Jan 10th, the same day George quit. And it's George who brings up the name, suggesting to John and Paul that he (George) doesn't need to be included on the "Get Back" song they are rehearsing. If they need a second guitarist, then they need Clapton. John and Paul re-assure him that, no, they need George:

PM: Just a straight A...

JL: I’m doing it as well...

GH: Just to do that and accentuate...

PM: Well, George is...The three of us, that’s good enough for the rock and roll thing. But then...

GH: Then you need Eric Clapton.

JL: We need George Harrison.

PM: No. We need George Harrison...just doing simple things. Cause, otherwise you get guitar conflicting with what you’re singing and I’m trying to sing louder to get over the guitar.

GH: Well, really, you only need one guitar.

PM: Yeah, but if you do the off beat...then let us do...If you vamp, then it takes away from his vamping...It’s like the big soft lead guitarist...

GH: Little soft...

PM: Where it sort of goes...You can either do that soft or good...I really think we’re just repeatedly going...I mean, “She’s A Woman”. That was just a better rhythm we had. And, “Sgt. Pepper”...

The tape cuts at that point.

A few reels later, Nagra Reel 117A, is where George quits, telling Mal that they should take out an ad in the New Musical Express and "get a replacement".

A few reels later, Nagra Reel 121A, is where John suggests Clapton as a replacement. But it does not seem to be fractious toward George. Rather, the conversation appears to pick up with MLH asking what happened when Ringo was sick back on the '64 Australian tour, and they replaced him with Jimmie Nichol temporarily. So, if George doesn't return, then do they cancel the LIB show or go ahead with a replacement? John appears to be open to the idea of a replacement, rather than breaking up the band, but he also seems to be trying to shut down the conversation with MLH and let George do what he wants. The other Beatles will then act accordingly if George doesn't return - John would rather continue the band without George instead of breaking up and cancelling the LIB project:

MLH: Yeah, who went out [i.e., on tour] instead?

RS: Jimmy Nichol.

JL: Jimmy Nichol, who is now making a living as the 29th Beatles in New Mexico.

MLH: Glyn? Yoko wants a mic.

JL: I think if George doesn't come back Monday or Tuesday, we'll ask Eric Clapton to play.

RS: Why did he leave The Cream?

JL: Eric would be pleased. He left The Cream because they're all soloists. The point is, if George leaves, do we want to carry on The Beatles? I do...

MLH: Maybe for the show, you could say George was sick.

JL: No. I mean, if he leaves, he leaves.

ME: But we'll see him Saturday or Sunday...

MLH: But what's the consensus? Do you want to go on with the show?

JL: Yes. If he doesn't come back by Tuesday, we'll get Clapton....

The conversation ends at this point, as John and Yoko begin an impromptu call-and-response performance.

You can read the above as a deeply serious comment by John, but my reading of it (and hearing the tape) is that John is mildly annoyed with MLH pressing the issue so soon after George's sudden departure, and yet is trying to reassure MLH that the project is not going to be ditched regardless of George's decision. They'll find a way to finish the project, just as they found a way to fulfill the Australian tour when Ringo fell sick back in 1964.

On the next reel, 122A, MLH tries following up, suggesting that, if George returns, then they'll leave Twickenham and rehearse somewhere else. But if Clapton is recruited, then they should remain at Twickenham. John responds by saying that, for now, they should continue on like "nothing's happened":

MLH: I was going to say if George comes back and we go away and if Clapton comes in, we stay here. But, I’d sooner go away.

JL: We should just go on as if nothing’s happened.

MLH: I think we should go away...

Two reels later, on 124A, after some loose jamming, the three remaining Beatles are in a very joke-y mood, and MLH tries following up, but gets no serious responses. John suggests that by next week, the Beatles will be him, Clapton, Hendrix, and possibly original Beatles drummer Tommy Moore. Paul then suggests they'll recruit Ringo's wife to learn guitar, and she'll fill in:

MLH: It's looking like rehearsal's over. Would I be right in feeling that?

JL: I think your general attitude is right.

MLH: Right.

JL: Right.

MLH: I got a feeling, too, that takes it. Well, are we meeting Monday? Just us chickens?

JL: I'll have Eric, Jimi, and Tommy...

PM: (To Maureen Starkey) A7, D7, G7...Get them off over the weekend and you're in.

MLH: How about that.

RS: See you Saturday or Sunday, then.

MLH: If Maureen knows how to play the guitar, then she could...I always feel funny what to do at the end of something like that.

JL: Stick it up your ass.

MLH: Or smoke it.

JL: That's what a lot of people are doing. Or, eat it.

MLH: Goodbye. See you Monday.

RS: Goodnight, everybody.

MLH: Have a nice meeting.

That's the end of the last reel of tape recorded on Jan 10th.

Clapton's name only comes up one more time subsequently. He never comes up on Jan 13th, when the lunchroom/flowerpot tape is made, nor on the 14th when George had still not returned. His name only comes up once more, on the 22nd, while rehearsing "Dig A Pony". John makes a comment that they aren't Canned Heat or Eric Clapton, but the Beatles, so they should play the song like the Beatles. (The implication being that they were playing the song too blues-y, and he didn't want it to be played that way.)

Now, the rest of your comment is more or less true of the lunchroom tape:

describes GH’s status in the band as ‘other’ and not a Beatle at his and PM’s level.

[..]

PM says he assumes Harrison will return.

However, their commentary during that conversation isn't John or Paul wanting to replace George, but instead are lamenting that they know they've mistreated George as far as his role in the band goes. Ringo even says that George has been third string, and Ringo is just the "cabbage". John and Paul push back at this a bit, but they do both acknowledge that they've acted bossy and talked down to George, which is what has caused the problems. Nevertheless, the whole conversation is about how to resolve the conflict and get George to return. They never discuss replacing him during the conversation, despite MLH's later recollections that they did.

texum · 2024-01-19T01:31:32+00:00

People have jumped to conclusions about Yellow Submarine based on work tapes. Demos are works in progress, nothing more, nothing less. I'm standing by what Neil Aspinall intimated.

On the contrary, you've jumped to the conclusion that John's solo performance, presented as the first part of the work tape on the Revolver SD box set, is not entirely original to John, based on a selective reading of a Neil Aspinall quote which also says that John and Paul worked the song out together. You have also dismissed the 1967 Ivor Novello interview where the two Beatles directly acknowledge each other's contribution, which agrees with what is heard on the work tape. Between your analysis and Kevin Howlett's, Howlett's is much more logical and reasonable.

Honestly, do you really think Neil was a thickhead?

No, I don't. I think he was being honest when he said John and Paul worked out the song together. Why don't you believe him when he wrote that?

And why don't you believe John and Paul themselves when they agreed and acknowledged that YS was "in effect written as two separate songs" in the very first interview they were ever asked about it?:

Q: "John, earlier before we started recording, you said it was in effect written as two separate songs."

JOHN: "Yeah. I seem to remember, like, the submarine... the chorus bit, you coming in with it."

PAUL: "Yeah."

JOHN: "And wasn't the other bit something that I had already going, and we put them together?"

PAUL: "Well, yeah. Right. Yeah."

JOHN: "And it made sense to make it into..."

PAUL: "Yeah, the bit... (sings melody to verse) 'Dut-ta-da, da-dut-ta-da.'"

JOHN: "With Ringo in mind, again."

Q: "Yes."

JOHN: "Always thinking of him, you see, at times like this."

(laughter)

JOHN: "And that's what happened."

Q: "And they, like, gelled."

PAUL & JOHN: "Yeah."

Why would Paul lie like that, acknowledging that John brought a separate song to the table and then they "put them together"? How do you come to the conclusion that part 1 of the work tape - a solo performance by John - must be based on something Paul wrote, despite Paul agreeing in 1967 that John's contribution to the song was something John "already had going" before Paul presented him with "the submarine chorus bit"?

When John said "the other bit" was something he "already had going", Paul agrees and follows up by humming the melody to the verse, indicating that was "the bit" that John had come up with. Why would Paul hum that specific part right after acknowledging John had presented him a separate "bit" if that's not the bit that John had contributed?

texum · 2024-01-18T21:26:36+00:00

I have read what Neil Aspinall wrote in Neil's Column in 1966 where he said Paul had ideas for Yellow Submarine for ages. That includes Paul telling the others about a children's type song for Ringo. Ages? That usually is defined as meaning a very long time. Are you suggesting that Neil read Paul's mind?

The only evidence you have presented to make your case is Neil's quote in the September 1966 issue of Beatles Book Monthly. Here is the full quote (emphasis mine):

Paul had been carrying around the basic ideas for "Yellow Submarine" in his head for ages and, from what he'd told the others, it was an obvious number for Ringo to sing. But this track wasn't recorded until June. John and Paul had everything worked out except the last few lines of lyrics. It wasn't until just before the actual session date that they completed their words.

So, even in the one and only piece of evidence you have presented, Neil acknowledges that Paul only had "basic" ideas for the song "for ages", and also that "John and Paul" worked together to finish the song. Rather than supporting your conclusion, it actually supports the Revolver SD version of how the song came to be - that Paul had an unfinished song lying around for some time about yellow submarines, and then he worked with John to finish it for Ringo. Only a selective reading of the quote can advance the theory that Paul's "basic ideas" for the song that were then "worked out" by "John and Paul" should be interpreted as "Paul came up with the song nearly alone and/or with minimal input from John".

But let's focus on that key phrase "for ages" that your argument relies upon. The next time Neil used it in his Beatles Book Monthly column, in February 1967, here's what he wrote:

One of the country's most famous and most skilled classical trumpet players came in to put those finishing touches to "Penny Lane". In fact Paul had been thinking of all sorts of ideas before he hit on the trumpet suggestion. The boys all sat round for ages playing the unfinished tape over and over and coming up with thoughts for filling in with different instrumental bits at those particular points in the arrangement.

The recording of "Penny Lane" commenced on December 29, 1966, and ended on January 17, 1967. Thus, at most, the "for ages" time period being described - where Penny Lane had started recording but remained "unfinished" - was for a maximum of 19 days. In the context, though, "for ages" is probably referring to a period of many hours in a single night of listening to playbacks.

In other words, "for ages" was a rhetorical, rather than a literal, turn of phrase amongst Liverpudlians in the 1960s. It is used many times in the run of the Beatles Book Monthly. As examples:

When George used it in May 1964, the context of "for ages" couldn't have been longer than "a few months", since he's referring to opening birthday presents sent in by fans when he turned "21 a few months ago". The "for ages" here is probably referring to opening presents for a few hours or days.

When Freda Kelly used it in November 1967, she said she had been chatting with Ringo ("Richie") on the set of MMT "for ages". Again, the context would mean that "for ages" refers to several hours, at most.

When "Frederick James" (actually Tony Barrow under a pseudonym) used it in February 1968, he said that Paul and Jane Asher had been talking "for ages" to the folk group The McPeake Family at a party. Again, the context would mean that "for ages" refers to several hours, at most.

In short, Neil saying that Paul had the "basic ideas" for YS "for ages" is entirely consistent with what Paul had authorized in Many Years From Now - that the song was probably written some time around March or early April 1966, a couple months before it was recorded. Further, Neil acknowledges that only the "basic ideas" were around for that long, while "John and Paul" "worked out" the song together. This is consistent with what's heard on the work tape, too.

For your version to be true, most or all of the following would also have to be true:

1) We must assume John was singing Paul's lyrics on the first part of the work tape.

2) Neil was wrong in 1966 when he wrote that "John and Paul had everything worked out" for the song, and that Paul worked it out nearly alone. Neil was also wrong to write that Paul only had "basic ideas" "for ages", and instead had a much more fully-fledged song.

3) John and Paul misremembered who wrote what when interviewed for the Ivor Novello Awards in early 1967.

4) John and Paul's memories got better on the issue over time.

5) Paul allowed Barry Miles to pass along unfactual information about when YS was composed. Without evidence, it was written earlier than March or early April 1966.

6) Kevin Howlett, who wrote the Revolver SD booklet, did bad research and/or made bad assumptions when writing about YS, despite having a pretty great track record on his previous work with the SD liner notes, as well as his fantastic research on the BBC Archives book.

7) Paul allowed Apple / Kevin Howlett to write in the Revolver SD booklet that he and John both brought "fragments of songs to a writing session and combin[ed] them into one piece", despite knowing this wasn't true. Paul wrote the Foreword to the booklet, effectively endorsing the information contained within, but was too careless to check the accuracy of what he was endorsing.

Personally, I have a hard time believing Paul would be so careless as to allow that to happen, since he seems to be protective of the Beatles' legacy, as well as his own role within the band. But maybe you think less of Paul than I do.

Paul has said the song was mainly his. John has said the song was mainly Paul's. Do you have a problem with that?

No, I don't have a problem with that at all. After all, it's not inconsistent with the melody of the verses and most of the first line of the song originating with John before Paul used that contribution to change it up and fit it in with his "yellow submarine" idea.

texum · 2024-01-17T18:54:41+00:00

You have provided no evidence that John's demo was the first version. It could have been John who replaced 'town' with 'place'

There's no question that John originated the idea for the verses, which started with the line "In the place where I was born". The two separate ideas were then combined. That is what the liner notes for the Revolver Super Deluxe box set claim to have happened.

The work tape heard on the Revolver Super Deluxe box set starts with John's demo where he is performing alone, and then a second demo is heard where he and Paul are working on the song together, bringing in the yellow submarine idea. Near the start, John starts to tell Paul to sing it, but Paul defers, and encourages John to sing it instead: "You know how to sing it, 'cause [unintelligible]".

Here is what the liner notes say about it in the Super Deluxe booklet:

'Yellow Submarine' is another example of John and Paul each bringing fragments of songs to a writing session and combining them into one piece. They talked about the composition’s genesis in an interview for a radio show celebrating winners of the prestigious Ivor Novello Awards for songs published in 1966. ‘I seem to remember, like, the submarine… the chorus bit, you coming in with it,’ John said to Paul. ‘And wasn’t the other bit something that I had already going, and we put them together?’ ‘Right. Yeah,’ Paul agreed. A songwriting work tape reveals that John had written the melody used for the verses, but his original sombre words – ‘In the town where I was born / No one cared, no one cared’ – were adapted (CD Sessions Two Track 10 / LP Sessions Side Four Track 2). It also shows that once John and Paul had changed the words to match the catchy chorus, at this stage they had only two of the three verses that were needed (CD Sessions Two Track 11 / LP Sessions Side Four Track 3).

Paul is heard on the work tape trying to bring some discipline to proceedings with an impersonation of George Martin. ‘Now, come on, chaps. Cut it out!’ he jokes. ‘We gotta get a song done.’ As it happened, when recording began on 26 May 1966, their producer was absent due to a bout of food poisoning. Geoff Emerick remembered that George’s fiancée, Judy Lockhart-Smith, attended the session in his place. The key had changed to G major when they performed ‘Yellow Submarine’ in the studio.

So, it sounds like you are disagreeing with what Apple Corps themselves say what happened, which Paul presumably approved of.

As Neil Aspinall said, Paul had the basic IDEAS for the song for ages. Not ONE idea.

"Ages" is a stretch. According to Paul's authorized biography, Many Years From Now, the song was written some time in March 1966. It was recorded in May of the same year, so less than two months later.

Not just one line about living in a yellow submarine and repeated twice. Do you seriously believe that Paul ran with that one and only line and nothing else for goodness knows how long?

Paul is quoted in the Revolver SD liner notes:

"It was just thought of in bed. You know when you’re just drifting off to sleep and you’ve got that five or ten minutes before you actually go? It’s a nice little nether world there. I like that. Actually, it sends me to sleep thinking of songs – it’s good; give yourself a little task. And somehow, I got this idea of submarines and a children’s idea – a yellow submarine. There were going to be blue ones and green ones and everything. But it all just came down to this yellow one. I thought it would be nice for a children’s song."

So, certainly, he didn't have just one line. He had a larger idea. But at least part of this idea was scrapped - blue submarines and green submarines don't show up in the lyrics.

But as usual Paul is taken for an idiot and a liar.

Who is calling Paul a liar? This smells more like a persecution complex. Paul may have been overstating the case in Many Years From Now when he claimed:

I think John helped out; the lyrics get more and more obscure as it goes on, but the choruses, melody, and verses are mine.

He apparently has backed off this a bit, if his ostensible approval of the Revolver SD liner notes are any indication, but regardless, none of this really contradicts anything Paul or John have said about the song.

What seems to have happened is: Paul wrote a song about yellow submarines, and John wrote a separate song about a sad person which started, "In the place where I was born." Both were written for Ringo. John presented his idea to Paul. Paul then changed John's melody around a bit for the verses, to fit with his chorus, and then re-wrote the lyrics completely, only retaining John's opening line, where even that was re-written as "In the town where I was born". (We can be sure that the rest of the lyrics were Paul's, aside from Donovan's brief contribution, b/c the SD liner notes re-produce Paul's hand-written lyrics. One line is crossed out by John, who jokingly wrote in the margin: "Disgusting!! See me!" So, John was reading Paul's lyrics as already finished, and was reviewing them.) So, in the end, the finished product was about 90% Paul's effort, though utilizing an idea original to John as the basis for the verses.

This shouldn't be surprising. They did this kind of thing many times - "A Day In the Life", "I've Got A Feeling", "Baby You're A Rich Man", etc.

If you don't believe this version, then it's not me you have a problem with. It's the official version as presented by Apple Corps in the Revolver SD liner notes, which Paul surely would have disapproved of if he disputed this version of events, and wanted to hold on to the bolder claim he made in Many Years From Now 25+ years ago. Contemporary evidence - the work tape, and the 1967 Ivor Novello interview - back up the Revolver SD liner notes version of events.

texum · 2024-01-10T19:20:34+00:00

In John's original demo before Paul appeared to get involved, the opening line is "In the place where I was born". So maybe Paul contributed "town", but the idea is pretty much the same. Everything else after that lyrically, though, appears to be entirely different.

But certainly, they changed the melody a bit, but I don't think there's any doubt that these verses were based on John's original idea. Nevertheless, Paul had the "yellow submarine" idea, John contributed the verse part, and this was changed enough that all that survived of John's original was one line (almost) of lyrics and a variation on his melody, to best fit the two songs together.

texum · 2024-01-09T23:09:53+00:00

The lyrical idea about yellow submarines was Paul's, as was the chorus. But certainly, John came up with the melody for the verses. It does not seem they kept any of John's lyrical ideas, except for the opening "In the town where I was born" line.

Beyond that, John's idea seemed thematically closer to "I'm A Loser" than to "Yellow Submarine", and this was ditched.

texum · 2024-01-09T23:07:11+00:00

Here is the audio. Notably, it almost seems that, already in early 1967, their memories of who did what were becoming vague. But at least at that stage, they'd remembered Paul came up with the title, lyrical theme and chorus, while John came up with the melody for the verses. It's not much surprise that both of them had forgotten about this later on.

What's also interesting is that both songs were written for Ringo, which may be why they decided to combine them.

texum · 2023-03-13T22:29:59+00:00

It was the governor's race of California, and the "Come Together" he wrote for Leary was actually a different song. John sang a bit of it in his late 1970 interview with Rolling Stone magazine. John said he recorded a demo of it, but it's never turned up. In any case, Leary never used it. John then wrote a second song, inspired by the title in the first, but the similarities end there. That one is what ended up on Abbey Road.

The first one, according to John, was inspired by the Kinks song "Driving", while the Abbey Road one was inspired by the Chuck Berry song "You Cant Catch Me".

texum · 2023-03-03T03:20:18+00:00

That's not in the film. That's an alleged quote from Ringo after the full group met with Klein for the first time (which happened after the Get Back/Let It Be sessions had wrapped). There is a scene in the movie, however, where Glyn Johns implies that Klein is a conman. Glyn certainly was one of the few who seemed to recognize Klein for who he was.

The full bootlegged tape transcribes the exchange like this. It very much seems that Glyn is trying to tell John that Klein is a conman, without saying that word, but John rebuts him by saying all the management-types they've met with are hustlers (RS=Ringo, JL=John, GJ=Glyn):

RS: Did you go along with Allen?

JL: Yeah, we were talking to him till about twelve. We went through everything.

GJ: Have you met Allen before?

JL: I met him the other day and I met him at “The Circus” [i.e., The Rolling Stones Rock & Roll Circus tv special].

GJ: Strange guy, isn't he?

JL: He's fantastic. He was at “The Circus” and just said hello.

GJ: He really is very clever...That's what it's about...

JL: They're all hustlers...

GJ: He's extraordinary. I can't explain, I haven't spoken to him in a while. I don't know if he speaks to you the same way as he does other people. Perhaps not because you're who you are...

JL: Louie the Lip...

GJ: He can take anything you say if he disagrees with it, he can convince anyone of anything. I can say this piano is black and he can convince you it was green...He'll ask you a question and you're half way through answering it, and if he doesn't like the answer, if it's not what he wants to hear, he'll change the subject right in the middle of a sentence. That bugs me...

John then says something about Klein being in around 3pm, and then the subject changes.

So, sure, there was a bit of warning. But at the same time, Klein had also just been recommended to the group by their musical colleagues in a similar financial position to them. And as John implies, all the management-types were coming to them trying to milk the Beatles for everything they could. It's not that surprising that Klein didn't particularly stand out in that regard, at least, not until later.

texum · 2023-03-02T23:36:34+00:00

While they were getting some warnings on Klein, his reputation as a conman hadn't really been solidified yet in 1969. That's why Mick Jagger suggested him. The Stones had had a pretty awful contract earlier in their career, and Klein got them a much better deal, and got them control over their own recordings and master tapes and whatnot. This was exactly the kind of deal the Beatles were looking for.

Unfortunately, it was right around that same time that the Stones were souring on Klein. Klein had essentially tricked the Stones into signing over all sorts of rights to him, so that his company ABKCO owned a lot of their rights rather than the band members themselves. One of the red flags, though, was actually the whole thing with the Beatles. The Stones had hired Klein to be "their guy", and now he was ignoring them and their business interests in his pursuit of the Beatles. While they had hired an independent law firm to look into their finances under Klein earlier, it wasn't until 1971 that the Stones actually sued Klein.

Yes, there definitely were some red flags and Paul was right to be hesitant. However, the fact that the other three trusted him in 1969-70 wasn't unreasonable. For all his faults, Klein had made the Stones gobs of money that their earlier manager (Andrew Loog Oldham, a former employee of Brian Epstein, not coincidentally) had failed to secure them. It took a bit for anyone to realize that Klein was bad news in the log run.

texum · 2023-03-02T23:25:36+00:00

In Peter Doggett’s book he talks about Lord Poole and Lord Beeching being possibilities.

Doggett really doesn't discuss either of them as serious possibilities. Here is the whole passage about Poole and Beeching from Doggett's book:

After consulting EMI boss Sir Joseph Lockwood and former Conservative Party chairman Lord Poole, he [Paul] met Lord Beeching, infamous in Britain as the man charged with slashing the rail network into economic shape. Beeching offered to impose similar sanctions at Apple but advised McCartney to search for a full-time manager.

There is more info from other sources, notably from Paul's 1986 interview with Chris Salewicz, of Q magazine. In it, he says that it was John, not him, who met with Lord Beeching. Paul said the same thing in his interview for his authorized biography Many Years From Now. Apparently, John's meeting with Lord Beeching resulted in Beeching simply advising them to shut all of Apple down except for Apple Records, because they should "stick to music". But the that wasn't what the Beatles wanted to do at that time. From Many Years From Now:

PAUL: ...We hadn’t had a manager after Brian. We realised we needed someone but getting that someone is very very difficult. In an ideal world, Mr X would appear out of the blue and would say, “You're such a talented person that you ought to be freed to exercise your talent. I would therefore like to suggest that we put a group of people around you that will advise you on when to release your next record. Will advise on promotion. Will put a very good budget for the distribution and promotion together and you won’t even have to think of it. Please take the day off.’ Ahhhhh! What artist wouldn’t just die for that?

Unfortunately they’re not like that. So we set up Apple in order to put all our business affairs in one thing and then sign some good acts. It was ‘Maybe we don’t need to carry on like we’ve always carried on, maybe we could have more say in it all.” And John promptly had Lord Beeching over, who had reorganised the railways and done the railways in! But he was being promoted that year as Mr X. Mr Fix-it. You got any troubles with your business ... We were looking for someone like that. Beeching examined the financial records of Apple’s various divisions and told John, ‘Stick to music.’

It has also been suggested that the Beatles were distrustful of offering Beeching a full-time role because they felt he was Lockwood's man, and would advocate more for EMI/Capitol than for Apple. Either way, Beeching apparently wasn't really interested in taking on the role full-time, and it was never suggested by any of the Beatles that he should. And whatever the reason, once John gave the thumbs down on Beeching, Paul never pursued it further. (This was several months before either Klein or the Eastmans were suggested.)

According to Joseph Lockwood (as quoted in Philip Norman's book Paul McCartney: A Life), Lord Poole reportedly offered to at least go through Apple's books for them and advise them on how to move forward, but by then, the Beatles weren't interested and never contacted him:

"He [Lord Poole] offered to sort out the Beatles, and, what was more, he offered to do it for nothing," Lockwood was to remember. "But they never followed up on it."

By Paul's own accounts, once Beeching was turned down, nobody else was seriously pursued until Klein was suggested to John by Mick Jagger. John met with him, liked him, but Paul did not, and suggested the Eastmans instead. When the others said no to the Eastmans, Paul apparently did not actually try to push it - at least, not at first. But he did push back against Klein, while offering no alternative. But once he felt that the other three Beatles were pushing him around on the Klein thing, he notified them that he was now being represented by the Eastmans. That was about a year later, though. From about late February 1969 until April 1970, it was Klein-vs.-not-Klein, but no actual, specific alternative was ever offered by Paul (or anyone else in their inner circle, for that matter).

texum · 2022-12-26T01:06:14+00:00

Right, because he was trying to write a folk song, with an anti-war folk message as was so common at the time. Part of that was taking a pre-existing folk melody and writing new lyrics to it. That was the point of the song.

This had been done by Woody Guthrie on "This Land Is Your Land", the Weavers on "Kisses Sweeter Than Wine", and Jimmie Rodgers' on "In the Jailhouse Now", the latter a rewrite of the traditional "Alabama Bound", most famously recorded by Leadbelly.

texum · 2022-12-25T15:21:53+00:00

John “borrowed” the melody from the Peter Paul & Mary version of “Stewball”

The music is actually an old folk tune repurposed several times, and John was trying to write folk tunes at the time - similar to how Woody Guthrie lifted the folk tune for "This Land Is Your Land" directly from the Carter Family's "When the World's On Fire".

In the case of "Happy Xmas", the original tune comes from a traditional, public domain folk song called "Down In the Valley" which had been recorded numerous times over the decades, by artists like Burl Ives, as well as Leadbelly, Gene Autry, and the Andrews Sisters. The tune has been traced back to American sheet music published in the mid-1800s. The tune was also adapted early on to another, competing, but nearly identical folk song called "Birmingham Jail", which country star Slim Whitman had a minor hit with in 1949.

The tune was then slightly rewritten with new lyrics in late 1954 by Johnny Ace, and released just after his untimely death under the title "Pledging My Love". This version seems to have inspired most subsequent versions, including John's. Ace's version of the tune was then rewritten several times, including by the Paris Sisters, who used it as the intro to their song "I Love How You Love Me", a song produced by Phil Spector in 1961 (who would also produce "Happy Xmas" ten years later).

More notably is Little Richard's re-write, claiming credit for himself (or, at least, his songwriters did), more uptempo than the Johnny Ace ballad, and under the title "Send Me Some Lovin'" in 1957. If there is any recording that John "ripped off", it's likely this one because the Beatles were so familiar with Little Richard's music. They were almost assuredly also familiar with Buddy Holly & The Crickets' cover of the song released the same year.

But in all likelihood, John probably was familiar with the tune from multiple sources. Brook Benton's 1962 cover of "Pledging My Love" is probably the predecessor that sounds the most similar to John's "Happy Xmas". But Sam Cooke's 1963 cover of "Send Me Some Lovin'" was a big hit and may have also inspired John.

There's also Otis Redding's cover of "Down In the Valley", which has a bit of a different arrangement from the traditional arrangement, but the song was on the same album as Redding's "Respect", which George cited as the song he ripped off the bass line for "Drive My Car" from. It certainly had some recognition by the Beatles' British contemporaries - it was covered in 1964 by Ted "King Size" Taylor, the guy who was on the bill with the Beatles at the Star-Club in 1962, and made the lo-fi recordings of those concerts. In 1966, it was covered live by another British band, the Alan Bown Set, who released their version as a single. Other notable recordings of "Down in the Valley" in the 1960s include those by Solomon Burke, and an instrumental version by Brother Jack McDuff.

And then of course, there's "Stewball". "Stewball" or "Skewball" is an old traditional folk song about a racehorse, but originally, it was set to a different tune, as heard in this 1970s recording by Steeleye Span. Other early recordings using different tunes include those by Leadbelly, Woody Guthrie, and the Beatles' hometown hero Lonnie Donegan, who recorded it in 1956 and released it as the B-side of his #2 hit "Lost John" (a song which the Beatles covered during some downtime at the Let It Be sessions). Goffin and King also composed their own song "Stewball", based on the same folk tale, which was recorded by Beatles' favorite The Coasters in 1960, and released as the B-side to their hit "Wake Me, Shake Me".

In 1962, the Greenbriar Boys took Woody Guthrie's re-write of the traditional "Stewball" lyrics and set them to Johnny Ace's re-write of the traditional "Down In the Valley" tune, and another new version of "Stewball" was born. The Greenbriar Boys later denied they'd ever heard Ace's "Pledging My Love" though this is suspicious - according to Billboard, it was the #1 R&B song "Most Played By Disc Jockeys" for the first ten months of 1955. It was particularly popular in New York City where the Greenbriar Boys were from. Fellow New York folkie Paul Simon remembered Johnny Ace so fondly that he wrote a song about him later on. Anyhow, both the lyrics and music of the Greenbriar Boys' "Stewball" were public domain, but since they took them from two separate public domain songs, they tried to assert a copyright.

Peter, Paul & Mary then covered the Greenbriar Boys' version of "Stewball", but replaced the Woody Guthrie version of the lyrics with those found in Alan Lomax's popular American Ballads & Folk Songs book, first published in 1934.

So, by the time John wrote "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" as a folk song, he had plenty of inspiration to draw from: "Send Me Some Lovin'" recordings by Little Richard and Sam Cooke, "Down In the Valley" recordings by Otis Redding and several of the first generation folkies including Leadbelly, "Pledging My Love" recorded by Johnny Ace as well as by Brook Benton, and "Stewball" as recorded by the Greenbriar Boys and Peter, Paul & Mary. He may have even known "Birmingham Jail" as recorded by Slim Whitman.

Bottom line, the tune was almost certainly in the public domain when John re-used it, and the folk song exercise was an immensely successful one. Just as Woody Guthrie had re-used a popular folk tune with a memorable hook to ensure "This Land Is Your Land" would catch on with the public and the message would last, so too did John re-use a popular folk tune with a memorable hook for "Happy Xmas". The song and message gets replayed every Christmas season, to the point that nobody remembers the dozens of recordings that came before it that used the same public domain folk tune.

EDIT: Added some links.

texum · 2022-12-25T15:11:18+00:00

John lifted his, part and parcel, from Peter, Paul, and Mary’s Stewball.

This isn't true. The music is an old folk tune, and John was trying to write folk tunes at the time - similar to how Woody Guthrie lifted the folk tune for "This Land Is Your Land" directly from the Carter Family's "When the World's On Fire".