Lennon As McCartney

Here's some rare outtakes of John Lennon taking vocals on some Paul McCartney led songs

I've Got A Feeling

And who knows what Paul is thinking on this one...

Oh! Darling

(thanks to Martin Quibell for links)

Coming Soon!

February is February Album Writing Month so I'll be taking time out to write lots of songs, but NEVER FEAR! I'll be posting a longer Ticket To Write post EVERY BLOOMING DAY during Feb.!

11:18 Dig A Pony

Dig A Pony is a song of two halves. The chorus is a lover's plea for help along the same lines as I Want You (She's So Heavy) whereas the verses are sub par Dylanesque gibberish that doesn't even try to reach for the heights of I Am The Walrus. It's all lazy free association wordplay (Rolling Stones = roll a stoney) and arbitrary rhymes (celebrate/penetrate/radiate/imitate) which tread the same ground as George's outbreak of rhyme fever on While My Guitar Gently Weeps (alerted/diverted/perverted/squirted), only less successfully.

The music is not much better. The beat plods and the verse chord progression is angular and ugly. Beginning on the root chord (actually the same alternating A to D/A that drives I've Got A Feeling) we have

A       A       A      A
F#m  F#m
Bm    G       G
Bm    G       E      E


The G is out of key (a bVII) and Lennon employs his usual method of subtracting (Ticket 37) and adding (Ticket 52) bars at will - thus giving us a 4 bar phrase, then 2, then 3 and finishing on a 4 bar one.

A few clever touches, but I don't think there's a single idea in this song that John hasn't used to better effect somewhere else. It's not even the only song with 'Dig' in the title for crying out loud!

And on that rather underwhelming note – we have finished our fourth album! So before we dive into the White Album (which personally I'm looking forward to immensely) you can expect a couple of 'concluding thoughts' type posts, an index of all the Let It Be posts and a review of three Paul McCartney biographies!!!!!

11:17 I've Got A Feeling

Everybody had a good time????*

I've Got A Feeling is a pleasant enough song that punches a little above it's weight and appears slightly better than it really is.

Part of that is down to the feeling that this is a return to the Lennon/McCartney duets of old. Many Beatles tracks prior to Help have a shared lead vocal making it almost impossible for transcribers to discern who is singing melody and who is harmonising.

The reality is that this is another patchwork song like A Day In The Life, only in reverse - Lennon supplies missing 'bridge' for Paul. So despite appearances there is little emotional connection between the two and this is as much a true duet as Free As A Bird.

That said the song works because luckily the two parts fit together perfectly. They have the same chord sequence (though my guess is that Lennon's melody sat nicely on Paul's chords rather than both having come up with the same (admittedly simple) chord progression. The overlapping of parts isn't on a level with Paul's brilliant descant on Help (they both start on the 'and' after the one here) but John's low 'regular' line sits nicely under Paul's high meandering one. Paul's parts are all about 'I' but John's are about 'Everybody'. And John's wit shines against Paul's slightly lazy and vague lyrical offering. (He spends far more time telling us he has a feeling than what the feeling 'is').

There are a few nice lyrical moments in Paul's verse (please believe me/if you leave me) and bridge (wandering around/wondering how) but the latter get lost in the screaming, where as John's hair down/socks up/foot down gives a strong sense of shape to his part.

Predictably enough for blues screamer the melody uses lots of b3rd and b7ths, with Lennon's part employing the major pentatonic. There's some cool nods to the blues in the distorted chromatically descending 7th chords (0:29) that reminds me of Led Zeppelin channelling Robert Johnson on Celebration Day.

Perhaps the most interesting song tip to take away is how the band places the title in the verses.

This is the title,
The title one more time,
Oh yeah, oh yeah.
This is the title,
The title with a rhyme,
Oh no, oh no, oh no, yeah, yeah.
This is the title, yeah.

In the second verse McCartney develops the idea with less repetition


The second verse,
Is nothing like the first,
oh yeah, oh yeah.
A straight repeat,
Might even make it worse,
oh no, oh no, yeah, yeah.
This is the title, yeah.

But then the third verse (after the bridge) returns to the original scheme.

Maybe that's something you can take away.

*Andy Warhol - incase you were wondering. You're welcome.

   

The Best Of Let It Be (pt.8) - Don't Let Me Down And I've Got A Feeling

Don't Let Me Down

PM - A studio version recorded Jan 28th 1969 which was released as the B-side to Get Back. Mixed by Glyn Johns. Lennon's guitar is panned left, Harrison's Hendrix/Mayfield style lead is right, and Preston's electric piano is centre.

Paul is really screaming his head off at points and John makes a cheeky self reference at 3:22 (“can you dig it”). It sounds like Lennon's vocals on the first verse are doubled tracked, though it could possibly be Paul syncing up perfectly with John. You can hear Lennon say something just after this section (at 1:43) which may support the 'punched-in overdub' theory. The vocals are really poorly recorded, with lots of noise (2:11, 2:25, 3:06) and the pitch of the whole track is slightly flat.

LIBN – An edit of the two rooftop versions recorded on Jan 30th 1969 (they recorded a second take because Lennon forgot the lyrics). The positioning of the piano and Lennon's guitar is reversed (piano L, guitar C). Slightly sharper than concert pitch and slightly faster than the studio version (16 seconds) and there are fewer vocal pops.

I've Got A Feeling

LIB – Studio recording. The rhythm guitar and piano are in the left speaker. Unusually the right speaker fades in, and the initial total silence making the guitar sound very small. There is Lennon-style slap back echo on McCartney's vocals. Most of the instruments sound ragged or out of tune, especially the bass. The vocals are centre till the final 'overlapping' section where McCartney moves left and Lennon, right. At the end of the song there is an edit piece taken from the rooftop gig consisting of a floor tom roll, bass noise, Lennon (singing) “Oh my soul... (speaking) so hard” and then applause.

LIBN - A composite of two takes from the rooftop concert on 30 Jan. The rhythm guitar is left, piano and bass are centre. Both vocals are without slap back echo and remain centre throughout. Lennon's comment and the applause are removed.

A3 – Rehearsal take recorded at Apple Studios on 24 Jan 1969. The piano part seems to be a work in-progress (you can hear Lennon telling Billy Preston to play E at 1:13) and the ascending guitar riff after the chorus is missing (it possibly it hadn't been created yet). The whole performance is more laid back, Lennon's vocals are clearer but full of ad-libs and mistakes

I've got a feeling (yes you have!)
That keeps me on my toes (on your what?)


Everybody had a hard year
Everybody got their feet up
Everybody let their hair down
Everybody put their socks up

The track breaks down before the final doubled vocal section with Lennon saying “I cocked it up trying to get loud...not bad though”.



The LIBN version of Don't Let Me Down is much clearer than the PM version, and pushing the piano out on the left is a big part of that. It's hard to believe Glyn Johns thought the quality of the vocal recording on the PM version was worth releasing. At least LIBN has the excuse of being a genuine live recording on a roof.


I've Got A Feeling's rehearsal take is OK by Anthology standards, which isn't saying much. As with most of LIBN, the production is sonically clearer than LIB but the standout here is the band, the performance is far better and McCartney absolutely on FIRE as a vocalist.

Best versions

Don't Let Me Down - LIBN
I've Got A Feeling – LIBN

  

Under The Influence: Chris Ballew (The Presidents Of The United States Of America)

[My biggest songwriting influence is] The Beatles. Totally. I grew up with the Beatles. From the time I was two until I was about 14 or 15, I didn't even know there was another band in the world besides the Beatles. I'd save up my allowance every month and go get another record for $4.97 at Budget Tapes and Records. I got them all and cycled around in them for about 10 years. Nothing [else]. Until I got into Nazareth and Blue Oyster Cult. I went right from the Beatles to schlock rock.

The Presidents are noted for including mashed up Beatles quotes and parodies into their live sets

Originally [Feather Pluckin'] was just an excuse to play with a phase shifter. Then it became kind of a Beatles thing as it progressed. Actually, we were playing around with that in our practice space, and somebody started singing “I've Got A Feeling” over it.

The quote from I've Got A Feeling appeared on the original Pop Llama version of the first album but was edited out of the Columbia rerelease. In live performances the quote has mutated into

All the froggies had a good time 
All the chickies got their toes wet 
All the monkeys got a drumset to share

Quotes: Guitar World May 1996