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At the suggestion of Executive Producer Rick Wey, Richard and Robert discuss “the Kinfauns Tapes” (or “the Esher Demos”): 27 new songs composed by John, Paul and George mostly in Rishikesh, India during the Maharishi’s Transcendental Meditation retreat in early 1968 and taped at George’s home in advance of the studio sessions. Hear how these tunes evolved before their recording and release on the the group’s self-titled double-album. Songs include “Revolution,” “Honey Pie” and “Sour Milk Sea.”
Find Robert’s books here.
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I’ll never understand your mutual dislike of “Piggies”. That may very well be my favorite song on the White Album.
Ian MacDonald doesn’t like it either:
“Among more recent Beatles biographers, Ian MacDonald views “Piggies” as a “bludgeoning satire on straight society”, dismissing it as “dreadful” and “an embarrassing blot on [Harrison’s] discography”.”
Says Wikipedia. Yoiks!
One thing clear in these demos, John had the oddest sense of time.
In Liverpool last year watching Pattie being interviewed. He was asking her about India and when they came back the did demos at her house. ”I’m not sure if I remember that’ ”Well yes they did great demos for the White album” ‘Why, have you heard them?’ ”Yes we all have heard them” ‘Where??’
”Well they were officially released on Anthology” ‘Oh I didnt know that! I would love to hear them!’ ‘Ok after this we will go out to a stall and get a copy!’
Just goes to show if you want to know anything about The Beatles, dont ask a Beatle. Or their wives!
cheers Keith
‘He’ being Mark Lewishon
Fantastic show, but once again cheapened by tedious digs at Paul and Yoko. Get over it, guys. Rise above it.
I have to wonder why there was such a drive to double their vocals on these recordings. In a few cases it sounds like they couldn’t even hear the original guide vocals. (And wasn’t John a big fan of NOT doubling his own voice, hence the ADT invention story?)
I can’t believe you guys are clueless about Glass Onion – it is what John thought an eye looked like. He mentions that in an interview – somewhere…
Source please
A “glass onion” is “a large hand blown glass bottle used aboard ships to hold wine or brandy.” The shape of such a bottle necessarily implies that “looking through” one would distort your perception…
Why don’t we do it in the road was inspired by Francie Schwartz, she used to give Paul blow jobs in Primrose Hill Park at night.
A glass onion refers to the conspiracy theorists who were peeling away many layers with nothing tangible to be seen. The precedent for the Beatles recording separately was not set during the recording of the White Album, but had been established much earlier with the recording of Yesterday. The barb about Yoko not being maternal is particularly nasty considering what she went through with Kyoko and having to bring up Sean without a father and the line ‘the deeper you go, the higher you fly’ refers to meditation. The monkey is supposed to be Yoko. The idea that Lennon talking about his Liverpool roots in India is odd when you consider that he also mentions Strawberry Fields also misses the mark. That aside I discovered this podcast today and enjoyed it immensely. Look forward to the next edition. Peace.
It is about monkeys in Rishikesh according to McCartney.
Thank you for sparing us “What’s the New Mary Jane”.
I will never understand why Lennon was enthused about such a pile of rot (and I say that as a fan of Revolution 9), even talking about it years after as a potential single for the Plastic Ono Band.
I love this episode!
BTW Rick Wey makes such great drawings of The Beatles and connecting to original photos, but I have to say Paul looks a lot like Sasha Baron Cohen in this drawing. 🙂
An all time favourite episode.
Given that the sessions are dominated by the acoustic guitar, mention could have been made of Donovan’s finger picking technique taught to John in India and used on Julia and Dear Prudence among other tracks.
Great episode!
Here’s a Ringo quote on The Ballad of John & Yoko found on beatlesbible.com that lists the Anthology book as its source: “The Ballad Of John And Yoko only had Paul – of the other Beatles – on it but that was OK. Why Don’t We Do It In The Road? was just Paul and me, and it went out as a Beatle track too. We had no problems with that. There’s good drums on The Ballad Of John And Yoko, too.”
IIRC Everybody’s got something to hide except me and my monkey is inspired by the maharishi’s platitudes. I think John obviously could relate to the words, but the song also conveys that he thought the statements were crazy and hilarious. In fact I think he said as much in an interview. What a great track 🙂