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In the first of what will be a series of shows originating from the White Album symposium held at Monmouth University in West Long Branch, New Jersey, I am presenting my opening remarks, followed by a brief Q&A. For those who couldn’t attend, it gives you a good flavor of how these events go down. Asked to present on the Kinfauns recordings, newly remastered and issued as part of the 50th anniversary White Album package, I opted to offer my take on what the recording of these songs meant to The Beatles, as a way of getting back to where they once belonged.
Special thanks to Ben Rowling for capturing this field recording and to Dr. Kenneth Womack for making the event possible.
Most impressive and captivating. Thank you!!!
Excellent lecture; looking forward to the additional ones from the Monmouth symposium. This event sounds like it was a hyper version of the Fest’s panel discussions, so I wish I could have attended myself.
John, it was amazing! A learning curve for some of us (like many an event, it is impossible to take in everything, as so much is going on at once), but I think that going forward, EVERYTHING needs to be recorded. Every talk I attended was fascinating, and you will hear the results of my labors on shows to come; field recordings as well as guests whom I connected with while there.
Wish I had been there! Great talk, Robert.
Fantastic — would have loved to have been there for this.
Question: Didn’t Ringo start “Don’t Pass Me By” in ’64? I remember back in ’82 hearing an interview where Ringo was asked if he’d tried writing any songs and Paul jumps in with a “Ringo’s writing a song called ‘Don’t Pass Me By’,” and then proceeds to recite the lyrics of the chorus to Ringo’s embarrassment — “Don’t pass me by, don’t make me cry, don’t make me blue, baby. It’s great!”
I really enjoyed this episode, Robert. One question I would have loved to have heard asked and answered is when exactly they made these recordings. Details have always seemed thin on the gound. Was it one day or perhaps two? I have a vague memory of hearing an anecdote somewhere that John came accompanied by a fan who’d turned up at Kenwood, and John had invited along (as we know he was prone to do on occassion) much to George’s irritation.
Do you have any insight from your research that might shed some light on any of this?
Hi Paul,
The day that Michael Herring, the fan who took pictures, showed up is believed to have been May 28, 1968. The White Album sessions began two days later, on May 30, with “Revolution 1.” It can therefore be surmised that if Paul wasn’t there on the 28th that work likely was done on the 27th – possibly even days before – but given that the formal sessions began on the 30th, the 28th may have been a day of finishing loose ends not tidied up on the 27th, giving a single day off (the 29th) to listen to their work and get a handle on what they wanted to record. All of this is just a guess: we know from Herring that Paul wasn’t there on the 28th (although the reason he’s given – that a messenger showed up with a note from the Eastmans saying that Paul had quit the band – was demonstrably false.)
That will likely remain the best reasoning as to these most imprecise dates.
Excellent talk, Robert, thank you very much! Nicely edited together with the clips too.
Good talk. But I’m confused by the omission of why the White album is a double. It is not related to the “artistic differences” between producer and band. The producer discovered the reason afterwards and is on record about it. Either Mr. Rodriguez knows all this and is choosing to disregard it- an entirely baffling approach to the subject. Or he doesn’t know why the White album is a double.
Very much enjoy the podcast.
You’re referring to The Beatles’ belief that delivering 2 records would fulfill the terms of their EMI contract faster? In the context of the creation of the demos at George’s house, I either must’ve assumed everyone knew that or else didn’t see it as directly relevant to whatever point I was making.
It’s been a few years and I really don’t remember!
Try it again
Yes there is so much that is illuminating here..I tend to rewind parts to study certain segments, I am on my third viewing of the whole doc…Again so much thanks to Peter Jackson , brilliantly done! One of the best parts to show how together the Beatles were is to watch them together in the “control room” at Saville row listening to playbacks..particularly the segment after the rooftop, they are ecstatic !
Have you prepared you list of additions for the extended cut (hopefully)? I listened in disbelief when Mr. Jackson said he would solicit editorial changes from SATB when/if an extended cut is created. It just proves that he is a true fan like us. Amazing.
So just how do we go about letting the powers that be at Disney that we Beatle People want an extended version?
When we next talk, I am going to see if he is aware of a direct pipeline to direct our communications. I am certain that there must be some means that is most effective.
I’m somewhat embarrassed to admit this but I had an interesting physical reaction to watching this documentary. I felt a deep frustration run through my body. Why? Well, I wasn’t seeing the Beatles succeed. Every time the band began a good version of a song, we got a message that it was the take on Let It Be (or something) and then it was immediately cut.
Then we got to see them do Two Of Us as ventriloquists for what felt like an eternity. A few months before, I heard that wonderful version of The One after 909 with Billy Preston on an acoustic piano. I love that version, glissandos and all. I want to SEE that version now. And I want to see the whole thing.
Jackson seemed to be favoring funny bits and not good, solid performances. He was TELLING us but not SHOWING us when they succeeded. I felt each day should have had one or two complete performances. I’ve been listening to these records for 40 years. Now I want to see what I’ve been hearing. But no, you can’t. Cut. Now watch the ventriloquists!
Understand, you cannot make a solid video clip from this entire movie, except for the rooftop performances.
Yes, I loved this movie. I’m grateful for it. But it is a mixed review from me. I honestly had this bad physical reaction.
A longer film from Jackson would be too unwieldly. What we need is a DVD with extras that are organized usefully. Imagine a section where you can see a list of songs to play in full, ones that include all the versions we know from Let It Be and Glynn John’s mixes and wonderful things like the acoustic piano 909. Imagine all that organized by day, just like in the film. You could watch his film and supplement your viewing yourself.
Imagine another section of the DVD with songs that are near misses but interesting, and another section on important conversations and other matters of interest that didn’t make the film. If all this is organized by day, it allows the viewers to manage the film as they want. And it would make me a less frustrated Beatle fan.
I do admire what Jackson has done but it seems to me he favors showing us how much fun they had rather than how good a band they were. The goal of this project was getting the track down in one take on tape. That is what they are asking Glynn about. That goal we do not see. This is unfair to the Beatles’ legacy.
If Jackson needs a reason to invest in a substantial DVD version, for me, this is the pitch. “I didn’t include any full songs besides the rooftop. This is Disney’s chance to own these songs. Fifty music videos from the Beatles!”
I agree, Matt, and I felt the same thing. I just completed watching the original 1970 Let it Be movie and it includes most, if not all, of the versions of the songs that appeared on the album. It’s less a documentary than Jackson’s version, but more of the songs. It drove me crazy that we were only allowed to see full versions of songs when they were goofing around like the ventriloquism or the funny accents (outside of the rooftop).
There was so much effort put into showing how ‘fun’ they were but, really, when you watch the original, it wasn’t as bleak as we were told by the publicists. They were having some fun and the original movie shows that without resorting to the plain goofball stuff.
Thanks for agreeing. Oddly there seems to be very few of us out there. I only hear slight whispers about this critique and no yodeling across the mountain tops.
I agree with Matt – I love this docuseries and everything that surrounds it (such as these podcasts) but I found it so annoying when the group would start a song and then it would move on after only a minute; I’m aware that Jackson did not want to duplicate anything from Let It Be (where possible) but we could have heard the Twickenham versions of Two of Us and Get Back (when they were in embryonic form) in full and alternate versions of For You Blue, Two Of Us, Let It Be and The Long & Winding Road from the Apple Studio sessions. Certainly, if the docuseries is issued as a Blu Ray, and good extra would be full song takes from the sessions. Still very grateful for what we got but I would love to be able to watch the complete version that Peter Jackson has on his Ipad !!!
Having just watched the YouTube video covering the mystery February 1969 sessions, I have seen a copy of an Invoice for a session on 22/02/69 at Trident for the recording of “I Want You”; it states “Time : 8pm – 5am” which would match the entry in Glyn Johns’ February “diary” that Peter Jackson sowed us on that video. Earlier the same day, I think it states “APPLE 3pm” on Glyn’s “diary”. In terms of the pictures that were discussed, I agree with Jackson that they were taken at Apple and not Trident. That’s not to say that they went over to Trident to continue recording. As for the picture of Glyn Johns at Apple in February, which was again shown to the camera by Jackson, I did wonder if this was Nicky Hopkins (the session pianist who was mentioned during Beatle discussions in January 1969; it wouldn’t be the first time that I have heard people mix up Glyn and Nicky (see Lennon’s “Gimme Some Truth” video to see Nicky in full flow).
Robert,
I am a bit confused….in your conversations with Peter Jackson he said that he had at least 2-3 hours of extra footage that he wanted to include in the DVD extras.
I have just found out they plan to release the DVD without extra footage…why?
Surely you can get the option – eg White Album when they did a reissue – you could get it with the Esher Demos or without it…you could pay more and get more if you wanted.
What the hell is happening with Disney? So far I have been happy with them, as they didn’t interfere, but this is pure stupidity. Nothing less than 100% stupidity.