FABI! GEAR! The George Harrison Interview

FABI! GEAR! The George Harrison Interview

FEATURES

J. Kordosh

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In a plush Warner Bros, office, Bill Holdship and I listened to George Harrison’s first album in over five years, Cloud Nine. “I wracked my brains for a title, trying to think of something that didn’t have one of the song titles in it, ” Harrison said later. (He didn’t succeed; the title song kicks off the album.) “It was called Fab for about half an hour, ” he added. Since the record was still being mastered, there were only a few cassette copies available, and those strictly for listening within the confines of Warner Bros., who distribute Harrison’s Dark Horse label.

Cloud Nine may well be Harrison’s best album since 1971 ’s All Things Must Pass, his first and most successful post-Beatles offering. It’s peppered with uptempo rockers (“Devil’s Radio, ” with a vocal line

made for Bob Dylan, “Fish On The Sand, ” and what appears to be the album’s first single, “Got My Mind Set On You”) and some pretty funny lyrics (“When We Was Fab” recalls a time “when income tax was all we had” as voices in the background chant “fab!” and “gear!”). In general, it’s not the kind of thing you might expect from George Harrison.

Since the mid-1970s, Harrison’s released only three albums, none of which sold particularly well or met with much critical praise. Harrison got involved with race car driving, gardening and filmmaking—his movie company, Handmade Films, has produced Withnail And I, Shanghai Surprise, Monty Python At The Hollywood Bowl and others—and Harrison may have easily been perceived as a dropout from the music business. But the new album—prompted, Harrison says,

by being in the right mood for material he’s been demoing all along, and by linking up with co-producer Jeff Lynne (of ELO fame)—should change that.

Throughout the interview, Harrison was very relaxed and good-humored, smoking French Gitanes cigarettes and drinking tea. Although much of what he says here—particularly about the Beatles being ripped off—might sound vindictive, it was delivered with a casual good-naturedness. In this month’s installment, Harrison talks about his new album and some of his overlooked work of the latter years, as well as the selling of the Beatles circa 1987.. .in particular, the Beatles’ suit against Capitol-EMI over the commercial use of original Beatles’ masters. In next month’s conclusion, he talks about the Beatles’ meeting with Elvis Presley (and his own second meeting, years later), the Beatles’ LSD experiences, impressions of Sean Penn and Madonna and life after death.

“So what kind of readers does CREEM have?” asked George Harrison. “It’s not just Ginger Baker, Jack Bruce and Eric Clapton, is it?” We hope not, but one never really knows.

Who are some of the players on the new album?

Well, on drums we’ve got Ringo and Jim Keltner, and Ray Cooper plays on one track—Ray being the percussion player who used to be with Elton John. He works for our company, Handmade Films. Ringo plays on about four tracks. Does he play on “When We Was Fab”?

Oh, yeah. I mean, before I wrote the song, or when I sat down to write it, I thought, “This one’s gonna start with Ringo going, ‘One, two, DUHtabumb, DUHtabump.’ ” That was the intro in my head; that was the tempo it was always going to be.

Did you ever think of adding laughter at the end of the song (which vaguely reprises the end of “Within You Without You”)?

No, but we had the little thing from the radio and the sitars (laughs). Isn’t that enough?

Who else is playing?

All the horn parts were played by Jim Horn. That’s his real name, Jim Horn. He played on all those old Duane Eddy things, and he actually did two with me in 1974 (Dark Horse and Extra Texture). He’s very well-known, one of the top sax players in the country. He’s brilliant. He made a few solo albums on Shelter Records back in the early ’70s and now he’s moved from L.A. to Nashville. A lot of musicians seem to have gone down there because there’s so much work.

Eric Clapton plays on four tracks; I’m sure you could hear him. Eric has the end solo on “That’s What It Takes,” he plays on “Devil’s Radio,” “Wreck Of The Hesperus,” and on the title track. And then Elton John plays electric piano on “Cloud Nine”—and he plays piano on “Devil’s Radio” and, I believe, “Wreck Of The Hesperus,” also. Just to complete the list of people who’s on it, Gary Wright plays keyboard, the piano, on a song called “Just For Today,” which is a song I wrote from an Alcoholics Anonymous brochure. You know that little leaflet they give out to drunkards, to say to try to live through this day, for today only? And he also plays on “When We Was Fab.” All the remaining stuff: bass is Jeff, keyboards, Oberheim, is Jeff, and guitars are me and

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Jeff. All the little twiddly parts that just crop up, like autoharps, is just me and Jeff, and we also do all the backing voice**.

What prompted “Devil’s Radio”?

I have to go past this little church to take my boy to school and they have a little billboard—just a little board outside the church—saying, “Gossip: The Devil’s Radio...Don’t Be A Broadcaster.” That’s all. So I thought, that’s good, that’s a song, and I wrote it going to one of the Eurythmics concerts. I sort of spent a bit of time with Dave Stewart, checking out his live show on—what was that tour called?—Revenge. The Revenge Tour was coming around England and I went to a couple of shows and I thought, “Yeah, I can do this. I can write these.” So I wrote a couple of rockers.

How come we heard Paul McCartney and Julian Lennon were also going to be on this album?

You know what was happening? Ringo made an album, or was making an album,

“EMI has a contract to put out and promote our records. They don’t have a contract saying ‘We can sell you to shoe manufacturers or l sausage manufacturers.’ ”

Paul was going in the studio and started making an album, but then he decided he didn’t want to do it—and I think that was going around, saying that we were all making an album. People thought that it meant we were all making an album together, but we were all making separate ones, although Ringo did play on mine. Do you think this album’s going to sell?

I hope so; I don’t know. Warner’s seemed really happy with it and, so far, the people I’ve met in interviews all seem to like it. Warner’s, I think, are just going to do the best sales thing that they normally do for an album they consider worthy of it. All I can do is my bit and hope they play it on the radio.

Do you think this 20th anniversary stuff...

I think that might help. It might help a lot, actually, inasmuch as radio stations might be interested, after all that stuff going on, to hear what’s happening now. Plus the fact that I’ve not made an album for a number of years. They do say absence makes the heart grow fonder; I don’t know if that’s true (laughs).

Did you go through a period where you were getting kind of bored or bitter? On “Blood From A Clone” (off 1981’s Somewhere In England album) ...

Yeah, fed up. I love “Blood From A Clone.”

It’s a great song, but I can never make out the lyrics after the “oom-pahpah/Frank Zappa” line.

“They say you like it, but knowing the market, it may not go well, it’s too laid back.. .You need some oom-pah-pah, nothing like Frank Zappa, and not new wave, they don’t play that crap.. .Try beating your head on a brick wall, hard like a stone.. .Don’t have time for the music, they want blood from a clone.” “Save The World” (from the same album) is, I think, a very funny song.

It is, isn’t it? I mean, it’s serious and funny at the same time.

Well, with that line in there where you’ve gotta save the whales.

Yeah, Greenpeace got their due.

But “Blood From A Clone,” being the first song on the album, just kind of jumped out at you.

Yeah, ’cause that was all this stuff they were telling me: “Well, we like it, but we don’t really hear a single.” And then other people were saying, “Now, look, radio stations are having all these polls done in the street to find out what constitutes a hit single and they’ve decided a hit single is a song of love gained or lost directed at 14-to-20-year-olds.” And I said, “Shit, what chance does that give me?” So anyway, I went in and wrote that song just to shed some of the frustrations. And there’s things in there like “There is no sense to it, pure pounds and pence to it.. .They’re so intense, too, makes me amazed.”

What about the line that seems to refer to the Beatles?

Yeah, I remember the line after it (pauses). Oh! “Where will it all lead us, I thought we had freed us from the mundane, seems I’m wrong again.”

So that was a reference to the Beatles?

No, just we generally, had freed ourselves from all this bullshit music and all bullshit, period. But I see I’m wrong again. Even more so today.

You said that (laughs).

Do you think that’s true?

There’s a big swatch of rubbish that’s very popular and then, within that, there’s always been some good stuff. But I don’t really listen much anymore; I never have. I’ve never had time—you’re either making your own music or you’re out listening to everybody else’s. But I catch it when I come through L.A. and I look at MTV (laughs) and it sounds like—I’ve just done this on an HBO interview and I don’t want to step out of line because, basically, I’m quite happy about everything and we all have our rights to be what we want to be. Gandhi said “Create and preserve the image of your choice,” so if you want to be Spinal Tap, then best of luck to you. But there’s a lot of Spinal Taps out there who obviously didn’t see the movie, and whoever he is, there’s this big, phantom guitar player with this big guitar who plays the guitar solo on every one of them records.

But I wonder if I were in the Beatles if I wouldn’t feel guilty for...

Having created that? We never created that. Elvis and Chuck Berry and Eddie Cochran never felt guilty about creating Beatles. No, it’s OK, it’s just that the problem isn’t in the music, it’s in our consciousness. That’s the fault, because whatever is out there is a reflection of our own consciousness. And it just means that the money-making side of things seems to have its consciousness aimed at a market of 10-to-18-year-olds.

Don’t you think that, in America, it’s getting to be a chilling thing?

I think it’s the same all over. It’s just that there’s more of it in America because it’s a bigger country, i was watching that movie about the birth of the Beaties, that Dick Clark movie...

Dick Clark? Not him again. I’ll tell you, I don’t know what Americans think of him, but from the Beatles’ point of view, Dick

“If you want to be Spinal Tap, then best of luck to you. But there’s a lot of Spinal Taps out there. ”

Clark—I don’t know what he ever did with his own talent. Y’know, all he does is send you letters: “Can I have a clip of you doing this? Can I have a clip of you doing that? I’m making another movie about you and the history of this and that, and you’re in it and I’ll give you two dollars if you’ll let me have it in.” You get to the point of saying, “Fuck off, Dick, think of your own ideas, you’re not getting any more of our shit. Just make your own films and rip off other people.” Y’know, he’s a twat.

It would appear rock ’n’ roll’s done more for him than he’s done for rock ’n’ roll.

Absolutely. I mean, who is he? And you see these albums coming out with all these great rock ’n’ roll hits on them and his face on the sleeve? I’d be embarrassed if I was him.

He’s sort of a conglomerate unto himself.

Him and Ecj Sullivan. Ed Sullivan’s been dead about 19 years but he’s still out there making Ed Sullivan Productions. “Please, can we have another clip of you doing this? We’ll pay you two dollars.” You know, piss off.

Don t you guys have control...

We do. We have control over it, and sometimes you’ll get a decent program. The BBC in England put out a program called Rock ’N’ Roll Years, a weekly thing of 30 minutes, and it was done very tastefully. They take old newsreel footage, some performances—one week it’s 1957, then the next week’s ’58, ’59, right through the ’60s. They’re up into the ’70s now, but it’s done really neat. You see all the things that happened in a nutshell; it’s all compressed... lots of historical things and newsreel footage, and there’s no commentary on it. There’s some talk if it’s a newsreel bit—it’s just snippets of these things and, in 30 minutes, it gives you a real feel for what happened in that year.

Now that’s a nice, intelligent thing, and when they ask “Can we have a clip of you doing such-and-such?” you’re inclined to say yes. But when you get all these other people who are just like vultures, who amass video clips of all these other people and sell them around the world, it’s greed and it’s not artistic. It’s just big business. But we get requests all the time; it’s non-stop.

How can you possibly oversee all that?

That’s what Apple is still in the business of: dealing with lawyers and trying to stop people from doing this, doing that and doing the other—or trying to license people to do it properly if they’ve got the decency to ask.

What about the “Revolution” commercial?

Well, that—that’s something that is a problem, inasmuch as they, whoever wanted it.. .see, you’ve got these people who own copyrights of things. How they obtained them is a different business. Talking personally about the songs I wrote when I was very young, this guy came up to me and said, “Well, you’ve got to have your music published.” I go, “What’s that?” “So that when it goes out you can get some money for it. So, here, why don’t you sign this form and I’ll publish your music for you.” They forget to say, “And, incidentally, I’m gonna steal your song and I will own it for the rest of my life, and you don’t own that song even though you just wrote it.”

I was more fortunate than John and Paul because I only wrote a few songs in the early days, compared to them. Did you ever see the Rutles? Well, there was a thing in there where it says, “Dick Jaws, an out-of-work publisher of no fixed ability, signed them up for the rest of their lives.” And it cuts to him saying, “Lucky, really.” So that’s what happened. Fortunately, when that first agreement expired with me, Neil Aspenall, who was our friend and went to school with Paul and I, and who still runs Apple, said, “Hey, I don’t think you should sign with these people.” I was in the Himalayas at the time and I thought, OK, and I just formed my own publishing company. So since then I own my own songs, whereas John and Paul’s went on, and this guy Dick Jaws sold them to Lew Greed and Lew Greed sold them to someone else, and then Paul was trying to get ’em back, and then Paul’s good friend Michael Jackson went and bought them.

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So these people who think they own the rights never had anything to do with the promotion of them or the writing of them or the recording of them, but obtained them because of all this devious stuff that happened in the past. (Here Harrison makes what is sometimes termed “a familiar gesture. ”) That’s what happened, so they think they own all our songs. EMI and Capitol thinks they own all our songs on record and, according to contracts, maybe they do. But they have a contract to put out our records and promote our records—they don’t have a contract saying “We can sell you to shoe manufacturers or we can sell you to sausage manufacturers.” And if we don’t do anything about it, every Beaties song in the world is going to be a TV commercial. A lot of people, I think, are offended by that.

They are! Even Time magazine said it took some schmuck five minutes to turn him into a jingle writer.

Through the years, it seems, all this stuff has seeped into society and they tend to look upon it as public domain. It’s the same with that Beatlemania stuff— we had to try and stop people from doing these things in order to establish, “Look, we’re here, we’re humans, we exist, and there’s laws of names and likeness.” They’re doing it all over the place: I see adverts in England now, it’s for a bank—Westminster Bank—and they’ve got a big photograph of James Dean. Even David Putnam, the English film producer—he heads up Columbia Films now, in the States—even he said to his secretary, “Hey, find out who the James Dean lookalike is.” It’s, like, take a picture of James Dean because he’s dead and he can’t answer, but there’s James Dean’s family, his estate—they should own the rights to how he looks. Same with Marilyn Monroe, or whoever, it doesn’t matter that they’re dead. But they’re doing it to us and we’re not even dead yet. It’s like the Beatles were the most rippedoff people of all time, and, as for the record company, they should be ashamed of themselves—it’s one thing to treat

some artist who’s here today and gone tomorrow with your crummy little royalty rate and treat ’em like trash, but a band like us who survived twenty-some odd years, sold a billion records for them at the lowest royalty rate you’ve ever heard of, and then still steal from you?! I’d be ashamed, I couldn’t do it. And to have to argue and fight with them and say, give us a break, man, you’re lucky to have anything. But if this thing with Capitol comes to court they’ll be lucky to end up owning the masters. There’s a good chance we’ll get back all our masters and everything. And the Beatles have never been greedy; we’ve never received huge royalties like some people now. You know, you get over a dollar fifty, at least, for an album. We get one old penny. One old English penny per album.

Right now?

Right now. And even with that, there’s hundreds of thousands of albums mysteriously missing that they gave to pension funds run by the Mafia. It’s very dirty. So that’s what it’s all about, that suit against Capitol. It’s like, give us a break, we’re humans too. We created all this stuff and they were very fortunate to be a part of it inasmuch as distributing our records and making a profit on it.

It’s hard to imagine a band giving more to music than the Beatles did.

I know. It’s disgusting, it’s immoral— and if that’s how they treat people they’re supposed to be in business with, that must be how they treat everybody. It’s immoral, that’s all there is to it, and ultimately they’ll all get it. I don’t mean from us, now, but somewhere down the line, in this

life or the next life.

Do you believe in reincarnation?

Absolutely. And half of those people are going to reincarnate getting one cent out of every CD they sell and sell more records than everybody and not receive any of the money. Be treated like lice.

If you put this in the interview, you can say I’m smiling about it, I’m not letting it depress me. But all this stuff that you read in the papers about Nike and Capitol, that’s what’s been going on for years. They’ve all taken advantage of it because after the Beatles split up everybody was sort of not talking to each other, so they all came in, grabbing and plundering as much as they could. But now this is going to be pursued to the end, and even if we all die in the process, our children and our children’s children will be after Bhaskar Menon (Chairman and CEO of EMI Music Worldwide) and Capitol until he realizes he’s just being a dong.

Do you think you’ll win?

There’s no way we can lose. Because if you just put all the cards on the table and see what we’ve got and what they’ve got, I think a blind man on a galloping horse would say that Capitol isn’t being fair. It’s just the balance: the law of nature demands that all things be equal, and this isn’t equal.

(‘‘I saved you the big attack on everybody, ” Harrison went on to note, and indeed he did. Next month—in addition to the topics mentioned in the intro—he talks of Bob Dylan, his own bass playing and how the Beatles saved themselves from nervous breakdowns. See you then.)

"The Beatles were the most ripped-off people of all time...”

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