The Craftsmanship of Abbey Road

The substack you take is equal to the substack you make.

Following Paul McCartney’s closing of the 50th Anniversary broadcast of Saturday Night Live, my wife wanted to listen to The Beatles the following day.
“Early, middle, or late?” I asked.
“What did McCartney sing last night?” she asked.
“Ah, ‘Golden Slumbers’ from Abbey Road, side two,” I said.

I reached for my vinyl copy. In my collection are the original 1969 release and its 2009 remixed and remastered counterpart. I went for the latter. I must say, I’ve worn out my first copy. In fact, I don’t play The Beatles on my turntable much anymore, having played them over-and-over when I was a teenager. The music, a pleasant earworm, burned itself into my brain granting me the chance to call it up in my head on demand. Abbey Road, the pen-ultimate release in the band’s discography, isn’t my favorite. I prefer Revolver. So, I was due for another listen to Abbey Road, this time under Giles Martin’s careful remix.

“Come Together”s bass line initiates one of music history’s most meticulously crafted albums. This is no ordinary collection of songs. The opening track, a funky rap by John Lennon, is an ear-catching statement because this record is different from all the rest. Abbey Road is a gumbo of Beatles tracks featuring a groove or as we say in jazz circles, music that’s in the pocket. It was amazing to hear the songs again after Macca’s appearance on television, which I’ll discuss in context, but first my revisit with the album.

As most people know, Abbey Road was the name of the EMI studios where The Beatles made their sound. It was home and when the cold January roof-top concert, at Apple's offices, ended in 1969, it looked like the band was done. By the spring, George Martin their producer, took control, calling them back into the studio to record. It was going to be a high-mark in technical achievement. EMI invested in eight-track reel-to-reel tape machines, a solid-state transistor mixing desk in stereo, the band’s first.

Yet, hearing the songs again in my living room, I noticed something new. After “Come Together” and “Something”, “Oh, Darling” hit me as a tribute to Fats Domino. It still kicks because of McCartney’s intention to sing as raw as possible. He wanted to sound desperate and he does on the line, “When you told me, you didn’t need me anymore, well, you know, I nearly broke down and cried.” His Little Richard “ooos” and the song’s cheeky oh yeah ending, sounds terrific. The band loved Little Richard, and Fats Domino so in this sense, Abbey Road is a homage to the artists who got them into music in the first place. But it’s hiding in plain sight. The arpeggiated guitar during the chorus pushes the intensity to the extreme. Beneath, the unassuming background falsetto oos and ahs. Gorgeous!

Conversely, Ringo’s song is a country tune, like the one found on Rubber Soul. “Octopus’s Garden” would have been a great B-side to “Yellow Submarine”. It’s a charming little ditty, perfect for kids. I love the child-like responses “happy and they’re safe” etc. The honky-tonk piano sound puts the tune in a dusty old bar somewhere near the Arizona border. Ringo’s new record tries to capture that feeling from 1969, but it sounds to me like it’s stuck in the mud.

“I Want You”, the Lennon love song to Yoko, could’ve been covered by Cream. (Clapton, Baker and Bruce would have ripped this one.) For The Beatles, it’s still a heavy recording, up there with “Helter Skelter.” The power chords from Billy Preston on the electric organ adds some high-fuelled thrust leading to the chorus, “She’s so heavy, heavy, HEAVY!” Geoff Emerick captured Lennon, McCartney, and Harrison perfectly, adding weight to the word, a nice three-part harmony which I’ll never tire of hearing. Preston gets a few more musical licks in when he can, but I would have loved to have heard him wind out during the last three minutes of the track. He’s in there, but not as a featured soloist. Pity. After seeing him take part in the Get Back Sessions, I’ve always wondered where The Beatles would have gone if they had invited him to join the band. Preston’s appearance softened the edginess in the studio, giving the band’s sound a dose of soul.

Flipping the disc, we turn the corner, much like the band. (It’s the beginning of their final musical statement.) It’s The Beatles with strings: “Here Comes The Sun,” one of the steadiest grooves in the group’s vernacular. The hand claps, piccolo, and penny whistle pop on the remix. The song harkens me to Rubber Soul, only with more production values. By the end, it doesn’t sound like The Beatles, more like Crosby, Stills, and Nash. Remember, George Harrison was in San Francisco in late 1968, hanging with the flower children, returning to “the winter of discontent” as he called it, in January 1969. “Here Comes The Sun” and “Something” established a benchmark for Harrison’s distinctive musical style. Everything he recorded after that has a little “Sun” in it.

Then the suite, starting with “Because,” a tribute to Brian Wilson if you like. With the exquisite harmonies of The Beach Boys in mind, “Because” truly launches what we’ve known as Abbey Road’s second side. The music is sumptuous. The ear-popping guitar chords ring bright and clear. A great Macca composition, one that alludes to the hovering presence of Allen Klein, “You Never Give Me Your Money” starts subtly, building with nuance before exploding into a rock and roll finale featuring a Fats-sounding chorus, “out of college...money spent...see no future...pay no rent...” The magical segue with the children’s nursery rhyme into “Sun King” creates the feel of a sun-filled desert, permeated with relentless heat. This track comes closest to Sgt. Pepper ... “Everybody’s laughing ... everybody’s happy...” (That’s because everybody’s high, hence the Spanish, Italian, Portuguese gibberish.)

One of the song fragments tossed into the musical salad of side two, “Polythene Pam” boasts a killer Latin groove. Maybe they borrowed the feel for “Pam”, from Chicago’s “I’m A Man” on their debut album released in April, 1969. We’ll never know.

“She Came in Through the Bathroom Window” follows up. While I enjoy the original, Joe Cocker’s gritty version is my favorite. His feel for the blues brings a different meaning to the words and the story. In McCartney’s version, the story seems lighter; a cute alliteration. Cocker’s version sounds like an illicit affair in which he was caught off guard.

In “Golden Slumbers,” a song calling for The Beatles to let go of their grievances and perhaps sleep it off, McCartney’s skill at poetic idealism is evident. But it’s not one of my favorite songs because it’s too sentimental for me. (Same for “The Long and Winding Road.”) I prefer a little humour in my love songs, like the ones Frank Zappa wrote for his album, Ruben and The Jets. (Zappa, btw, liked Abbey Road.) Nevertheless, Macca delivers and George Martin, by adding a string ensemble, creates an unforgettable power ballad that would become an FM radio hit in the Seventies. The recapitulation with a heavy brass section, of “Money” blends well with McCartney’s anthem, “Carry That Weight.”

Paul’s hoarse voice was evident when he and his band performed the Slumbers suite at SNL 50, closing with “The End.” He can almost reach the higher notes in the song, but needs help from his younger band mates. (The audience fills in the rest, anyway.) What struck me about his TV performance on SNL50 is that his new band can’t play it their way. They are compelled to play Beatles music, or at least the “Golden Slumbers” suite, as written, including the drum solo. Abe Laboriel, Jr. couldn’t do his own solo, he had to reproduce Ringo’s, which isn’t that interesting. The three guitar solos offered some new variations, but each player had to stay in their lane. It’s music that is so entrenched in our collective unconscious that we can’t hear it with any variation from the original. I guess that would shatter the dream. Nevertheless, McCartney seems happy to play it note for note, even at 82 years-of-age.

At least he didn’t close the show with “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer.”