Wild The Solo Beatles: 1969 - 1980

1. Auflage 2026
ISBN: 978-1-78952-612-7
Verlag: Sonicbond Publishing
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 128 Seiten

Reihe: On Track

As a band, The Beatles released over 200 songs in the eight years between 1962 and 1970. After they split, each commenced a solo career to varying degrees of commercial and critical success, and all four achieved number one solo singles in the US between 1970 and 1974. Their albums included great, half-forgotten songs such as 'Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth)', 'My Love', 'Photograph' and 'Whatever Gets You Thru the Night'. Three of the four also had UK number one solo singles between 1970 and 1980 in the UK, with only Ringo missing out.
Between them, Lennon (and Ono), McCartney (and Wings), Harrison and Starr had twenty-two top ten albums in the US and twenty-five in the UK between 1969 and 1980. They were nothing if not productive. But only the most committed fans listens today to Ringo's Rotogravure (Starr), Thirty-three and a Third (Harrison), Some Time in New York City (Lennon) or Wild Life (McCartney). It is surely time to re-evaluate all the Beatles early solo work. This book examines every solo Beatles album from 1969 to 1980, track by track. It includes the classics, the lost gems, the turkeys, the collaborations, the back-biting, the hits and the misses.

Andrew Wild is a Beatles collector and experienced writer with eight books to his name. His comprehensive study of every song recorded and performed by the Beatles between 1957 and 1970 was published by Sonicbond in 2019. He lives in Rainow, Cheshire.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Wild, Andrew

Leseproben

Chapter 2

1970: Stay Away from My Door

With The Beatles still together in name only as 1970 began – their last new song, ‘I Me Mine’, was recorded on 3 January – each member’s formal solo career started to take shape. Both Paul and Ringo started recording albums in the final weeks of 1969, and the individual Beatles’ solo careers kicked off in spring 1970 with Sentimental Journey (March 1970) and McCartney (April 1970), continuing with All Things Must Pass (November 1970) and John Lennon / Plastic Ono Band (December 1970). The Beatles’ last album, Let It Be, appeared in May 1970. It had mostly been recorded during fractious sessions in January 1969. McCartney, disappointed at what he felt was the desecration of his work on Let It Be, left The Beatles in April 1970. He filed for the dissolution of their contractual partnership at the end of the year – the legal disputes continued for many years.

Well, I get on well with Ringo and John and I try my best to get on well with Paul.

George Harrison, 1 May 1970

John - ‘Instant Karma! (We All Shine On)’ (Lennon) b/w ‘Who Has Seen the Wind’ (Ono)

Personnel:

John Lennon: lead vocals, acoustic guitar, piano, backing vocals

George Harrison: electric guitar, piano, backing vocals

Klaus Voormann: bass, electric piano, backing vocals

Alan White: drums, piano, backing vocals

Billy Preston: Hammond organ, backing vocals

Yoko Ono: backing vocals

Mal Evans: chimes, handclaps, backing vocals

Allen Klein and revellers from London’s Hatchett Club: backing vocals.

Produced at EMI Studios, Abbey Road, London, 27 January 1970 by Phil Spector.

Released by Plastic Ono Band. UK release date: 6 February 1970. US release date: 20 February 1970.

Highest chart places: UK: 5, USA: 3.

A landmark session: Phil Spector’s first Beatles–related production. And an instant classic. Famously written and recorded in a single day and released within ten days, ‘Instant Karma!’, as with Lennon’s best work in the 1970s, is simple and direct, with an anthemic quality. Lennon pulled together a pick-up band of real quality: George Harrison (electric guitar), old friend Klaus Voormann (bass), Billy Preston (organ) and future Yes drummer Alan White. They recorded ten takes of the backing track – John on acoustic guitar – then Lennon, Harrison, White and Voormann added pianos and long-time aide Mal Evans overdubbed tubular bells. Feeling that more voices were needed, Preston and Evans went to sent to a nearby nightclub to find willing singers. ‘Instant Karma!’ was the first ex-Beatles solo single to sell a million copies in the US. Lennon and Harrison were impressed enough with Spector to invite him to re–mix the Let it Be album and to produce their solo albums later that year.

Ringo - Sentimental Journey

Personnel:

Ringo Starr: vocals

The George Martin Orchestra.

Produced at EMI Studios (Abbey Road), London, 27 October 1969, 28 November 1969, 9-12, 18, 24 February 1970; Wessex Sound Studios, London, 6-7 November 1969; Trident Studios, London, 14 November 1969; A&M Studios, Hollywood, 26 December 1969, 25 February 1970; Olympic Sound Studios, London, 14 January 1970; De Lane Lea Studios, London, 3 February 1970; Morgan Sound Studios, London, 5-6 March 1970 by George Martin.

Released by Ringo Starr. UK release date: 27 March 1970. US release date: 24 April 1970.

Highest chart places: UK: 7, USA: 22.

The first solo album by any of The Beatles that included actual songs, Ringo’s Sentimental Journey is a vanity project album of pop and jazz standards, recorded to please his mother. Arranged by some of the very best musicians money could buy – Elmer Bernstein, Quincy Jones, Oliver Nelson, Chico O’Farrell, Johnny Dankworth (and Paul contributed the arrangement for ‘Stardust’) – there is a great deal of craft on Sentimental Journey.

I did the first album, which was Sentimental Journey, because we all know I didn’t know what to do. And I decided I gotta get off me ass and get a job. So I thought ‘I’ll go in and do all these standards,’ you know, because I always liked them anyway – and it’s me, right? So it’s part of me. I’m not one of those people who won’t admit to their past and their musical influences. So I thought, ‘That’s what I’ll do.’

Ringo Starr, Innerview, August 1977

But Starr is no Frank Sinatra – his lead vocal contributions to The Beatles’ albums were written or selected to make the most of his limited range and on this material his talents as a singer are sorely exposed. Sentimental Journey remains a curio for die-hards: I doubt anyone has listened to it end-to-end since 1970. The front cover shows The Empress pub in the Dingle, not too far from Ringo’s place of birth.

‘Sentimental Journey’ (Green / Brown / Homer)

Richard Perry’s arrangement of a Doris Day song. Tinkling piano and burbling clarinet don’t disguise the lifelessness of the delivery. Perry would work extensively with Starr in the years to come.

‘Night and Day’ (Porter)

The first track recorded for the project, on 27 October 1969. Ringo gets under the skin of this Cole Porter song, written for the 1932 musical Gay Divorce and beautifully arranged for Sentimental Journey by Cuban composer, arranger and conductor, Chico O’Farrell. The short, punchy saxophone solo is sublime.

‘Whispering Grass (Don’t Tell the Trees)’ (Fisher / Fisher)

A war-time song recorded by the Ink Spots annd written by German-born songwriter Fred Fisher, who also wrote ‘Your Feet’s Too Big’, peformed by The Beatles in Hamburg. British listeners will no doubt be familiar with the “comic” version by actors Windsor Davies and Don Estelle from the sitcom It Ain’t Half Hot Mum which was a number one for three weeks in 1975.

‘Bye Bye Blackbird’ (Dixon / Henderson)

Maurice Gibb of the Bee Gees arranged this up-tempo take of the popular standard. Ringo’s vocal is mostly double-tracked. Paul McCartney recorded the song for his Kisses on the Bottom album in 2012.

‘I’m a Fool to Care’ (Daffan)

Klaus Voormann’s arrangement of this song is smooth and pleasing, but Ringo’s performance is sluggish and uninspiring. It says much about this album when the best parts are the instrumental breaks.

‘Stardust’ (Carmichael / Parish)

Ringo’s lack of vocal chops is exposed in Paul McCartney’s lovely, skipping arrangement of a Hoagy Carmichael song from 1929.

‘Blue, Turning Grey Over You’ (Razaf / Waller)

A Fats Waller song dating back to 1929. Oliver Nelson’s superb big band arrangement doesn’t hide Ringo’s almost-inert vocal – double-tracked to thicken the sound.

‘Love Is a Many Splendored Thing’ (Fain / Webster)

Quincy Jones’ lush arrangement – recorded in Hollywood, 26 December 1969 – almost buries Ringo’s vocals in layered choral vocals, giving us, coincidentally, one of the best songs on the album.

‘Dream’ (Mercer)

Perhaps, of all the arrangers present on Sentimental Journey, it’s George Martin who knew Ringo best. ‘Dream’ has Ringo close-miked and singing softly against a luxurious horn arrangement. It ain’t rock & roll, but it’s quite charming.

‘You Always Hurt the One You Love’ (Roberts / Fisher)

A bouncy pop standard with a delicious saxophone solo. Ringo, bless him, is totally out of his depth.

‘Have I Told You Lately That I Love You?’ (Wiseman)

An up-tempo and fun version of a song recorded by Bing Crosby in 1949, and later by Elvis Presley, Eddie Cochran and hundreds of others.

‘Let the Rest of the World Go By’ (Ball / Brennan)

With the best will in the world, it’s impossible to be kind about this recording. As usual the arrangement is beautiful, if much more MOR than others on the album, but Ringo’s vocal, despite its sincerity, is a disaster.

Paul - McCartney

Personnel:

Paul McCartney: vocals, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bass, drums, piano, organ, percussion, wine glasses, mellotron, xylophone

Linda McCartney: harmony vocals.

Produced at the McCartneys’ home in St John’s Wood, London, between December 1969 and February 1970; Morgan Studios, London, February 1970; EMI Studios, Abbey Road, London, February-March 1970 by Paul McCartney.

Released by Paul McCartney. UK release date: 17 April 1970. US release date: 20 April 1970.

Highest chart places: UK: 2, USA, 1.

McCartney is as self-indulgent as Two Virgins or Life with...