The next album was a big production. He had two of its best songs and one of those was his first A-side. It was a lavish business and probably felt good because final. I'm making that up but what he did after that is instructive. He went on the road, not with The Beatles but with friends and just played music again. He hung around musicians and felt like getting them all together and so he did. If anything out of any of the four of them said solo outpouring it was this, a mammoth six sides of vinyl with everything in those notebooks plus the other thing the old outfit never seemed to do, jam.
And if Phil Spector had annoyed Paul with the heavenly choirs on Long and Winding Road he had spliced a tight and better-lengthed I Me Mine and George had always been a fan of the big Philly Sound, anyway. And so it was that Phil and his eighty tambourines, three drummers and eighty-six piece orchestra got the gig of dambuster to George's pent up creations.
I'd Have You Anytime doesn't sound Beatley at all. A slow wafting love song that sounded ... grown up. The big massed acoustic strum starts My Sweet Lord which takes a well judged verse and a bit before getting fatter and deeper with a call and response vocal of genuine exultation. Also on this track, a hit single (and future lawsuit), was the sweet Stratocaster silding that would become the artist's signature for the rest of his career. A crunchy electric riff gives way to an infinity piece band. A buried vocal has yet the strength that Harrison found at the top of his range. Wah Wah does use the effect of its title but also refers to a headache and a certain moptop that bandmate John would also refer to the following year in less bright and poppy terms. The arrangement is a big mess like so many of the tracks here but this one at least chucks a few surprise 7th chords in for texture and extra fun. the Version One version of Isn't it a Pity has the pumping vamp that would feed many a future track from George and John. It's a straight read with that kind of rising progression that every singer songwriter was learning how to use for a whole career. It might also bring later Pink Floyd to mind. The orchestration sounds like Phil Spector rather than George Martin and you understand that this late Beatles style song has been taken to a deliberately different shop.
A cheeky descending fuzz guitar figure sounds twice before the Phil Spector Cosmos Orchestra comes in with the catering. That said, What is Life is a well fashioned pop number with a searching lyric characteristic of Harrison since Rubber Soul. If Not For You is a Dylan cover but one done from a personal acquaintance with the author. He's not trying to impress Mr Caustic by sounding like him or doing the Turtles/Byrds quanglewangle. It's presented in a restrained, laid back arrangement which actually does sound like a band. Harrison's vocal is full throated and melodious. A delightful breather of a track. Behind that Locked Door shows Harrison in a convincing country mood, adding side swiping chord changes that would have had him run out of Nashville after one verse. But it's a lovely effort, flowing on well from the intimacy of the Dylan song.
Let it Down begins in a canyon of sound but settles into a gentle phasey groove, Harrison cooing into pleasant 9ths. Run of the Mill passes by without incident more than a mention of Dylan's influence. Beware of Darkness lifts with tasteful interplay between acoustic and electric, a dramatic chord progression and expressive vocal. One of Harrison's best, this was allowed to keep to a plain atmosphere and only benefits from the restraint. Apple Scruffs does sound like it was meant to impress Dylan with Bob's aimless harp wailing and a whimsical tune and lyric about hangers on. Don't care about it.
Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp (Let it Roll) starts with an ethereal muffled guitar descent through a minor progression bolstered by meaty piano and solid drums. Harrison seems to be telling a story here but the ambience with its frequent quiet fairytale breaks give it a mystery courted at the time by the likes of Genesis and the proggers. A lovely oddity. Awaiting on You All is such a botched wall of sound effort that it ends up sounding like a late '60s Tang commercial. Not for me.
All things Must Pass rounds off the old side three. A beautiful philosophical ballad rejected by the Beatles (though they did try it). The minor change in the chorus as the languid title phrase sounds. It's very tempting to imagine this treated by the other three and George Martin. It would sound like side one of Abbey Road with less of the cliches of Spector's orchestration. Surprisingly, it ends hard where you might expect a long fade. This is the one moment where you can hear a kind of bitterness in his approach to the new circumstances. It's there in the otherness of the arrangement. To me he's saying, well, you lot didn't want it. Still, an indestructible piece.
By the side four things are filling out under the listener's exhaustion. I Dig Love begins with a kind of horror movie chromatic descent/ascent with a vocal that intones the title tirelessly before giving into the refuge of a kind of blues progression for the chorus (with the same words). But then there's Art of Dying, launching with a few big wah wah squeals before it takes off into a Bond anthem on good Hamburg seagoing speed. He had this number around the time of Revolver but you probably shouldn't know that until after you hear it or you'll start wishing it had been done then instead of here where it gets buried under the sods and turf of Spectorvision. That really is a pity. Then it fades. Then Isn't it a Pity (version Two) starts. It's a starker approach with echoey guitar and percussion falling around the vocal which convinces better for being more restrained. It does go on, though. Hear Me Lord bursts in with a minor key progression. The prayer of the lyric is delivered in a sincere voice. Again, the sheer density of the piece keeps itself at arm's length. This track is entirely in step with its time but reminds me of too much that came after it where a grinding minor key blues with earnest vocal preached or beseeched and left me cold as a tuckshop doughnut. Sorry, not for me.
But that ends the songs of the first two discs. Then the reality of the three disc magnitude deflates into perspective as you gradually understand that a full extra disc is really only going to be like Hear Me Lord but without vocals. Endless vamps and sax solos, organ outings here and there. Johnny's Birthday interrupts for a brief naff joke before we fall arse backwards into another jam. At least they did admit that's what they were. Anyway, more music for parties in movies where zonked out girls say things like "oh, get with it, you square." I Remember Jeep begins with a surprise visit by the synthesiser that lent such colour to Abbey Road as it rises in a high white tide before fading into a perky, directionless twelve bar workout. Thanks for the Pepperoni (a title that dares you to think it won't be a pointless instrumental) begins with a Chuck Berry fuzzy intro and speeds to nowehere for another five minutes and that's it.
But for all the waste of vinyl of the last disc the good thing I can say about All Things Must Pass is that it really does sound like someone so happy to be free that he can't wait until the real songs are over tgo get out the beer and beach towels and head for the sand. As with the other's first post-Beatles records it's a strange business trying to think of how they would have sounded to fans at the time. Abbey Road was a grand effort, taking them to the peak of the massive sound they had been climbing towards but then Let It Be sounded like it was recorded in a bike shed.
Ringo produced some outstanding singles but his albums embarrassed the other three. Paul made a record at home and chucked at least one bona fide classic from the studio which he didn't release as a single. John was about to get raw and shouty and very basic but also very pro. But here was the quiet one blasting out from under the tablecloth with a massive show of strength, joy and genuine if odd religious light. No one's album is perfect but no one expected this two fisted red hot go at that very thing. You might have wondered if George hadn't been the stifled one, the spark below the louder flames. Just for a while, at least.
