The Beatles: The legendary band, in their own newly-heard words

Sat, 13 Apr, 2024 - 02:00

Peter Brown was best man at both Paul’s wedding to Linda, and John’s wedding to Yoko.

He is the Peter Brown in ‘The Ballad of John and Yoko’. His job was to “make the boys’ lives less chaotic”. Their passports were locked in his drawer. He had total access to the greatest band on earth at their peak.

He conducted these interviews, with writer Steven Gaines, in the “spirit of setting things straight” in late 1980, just weeks before Lennon’s death.

Almost all the major players talked to him: Paul, George, Ringo, Yoko, Allen Klein, Cynthia Lennon, and a great many of their key associates and friends.

So, was the record “set straight” when a version of this was first published as The Love You Make in 1983?

Well, as Paul and Linda ceremoniously burnt their copy, others described it as “nothing short of betrayal” and Beatles fans rechristened it as The Muck You Rake, I think we can conclude no, it wasn’t.

Reading now, these “unfiltered” interviews, it’s easy to understand that negative press. They veer towards tabloid unerringly.

The main interviewer, Gaines, cosies up to musical giants and relentlessly tries to drive the conversation in the direction of sex and drugs. At times it is comic, at times unforgivable.

Not that there aren’t moments of utter fascination.

We learn that manager Brian Epstein was “mesmerised” the first time he saw “bad boy” John Lennon in his leathers at the Cavern, that Linda was only Paul’s third “serious” girlfriend and that the band travelled internationally with the equivalent of “diplomatic pouches” — untouched by customs.

Poignantly, we learn that Jane Asher’s mum came to pick up her clothes when she split with Paul and that, by 1980, Cynthia, John’s ex, was running a B&B. When John was shot weeks later, Yoko asked her not to attend the funeral.

Magic Alex too is interviewed. His role in The Beatles’ world remains as mysterious as ever. Was he The Beatles’ Rasputin? His views on Linda and Yoko beggar belief. He makes Benny Hill look woke.

It is a picture of chaos: The Hell’s Angel’s Christmas party at Apple; the band being essentially “kidnapped” and terrified during their ill-fated trip to Manila; Brian Epstein being blackmailed; Mick Jagger time and time again failing to warn them about Klein.

The line between hippy aspiration and business fiasco is frequently traversed. Apple Records label manager Ron Kass wanted The Band to be Apple’s first real signing. This would have been a marquee signing for the fledgling label. But The Beatles vetoed it, Kass believes, through simple insecurity.

The man who comes out of all of this most poorly is Brian Epstein. Epstein’s role in The Beatles’ success is huge but he was exactly the right manager for them despite his business credentials, not because of them. He was, as is frequently shown, a very poor businessman.

Epstein negotiates a poor enough deal with the record label, a fact business shark Allen Klein will later use against him. He agrees a 90/10 spilt with merchandise firms as The Beatles take off but agrees to take the smaller percentage when the industry standard will soon be the reverse of that. This cost them millions.

With Dick James, the music publisher, he agrees a 50/50 split. James gets 50% and he, Paul, and John get 10%, 20%, and 20% respectively. Except American income is collected by another firm, also owned by James. That also takes 50%.

So, for each dollar earned say on ‘Yesterday’ in the USA, James gets 62.5c, and Paul gets 12.5c. ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’, indeed.

Yoko, by contrast, comes out well from all this, despite Gaines’s best attempts. She has nothing but good to say about everyone and, try and try as Gaines might to display her as “a hustler”, she is only ever guilty of one thing: She fell in love with John.

Gaines drives her relentlessly in the direction of any heroin use she had with John. During this, it emerges that Yoko had multiple miscarriages, including one at almost full term, a child they christened John Ono Lennon.

This does not elicit much sympathy as Gaines drives the interview once again towards drug use. It looked bad in 1983. It looks even worse now.

Lennon was dead within weeks of most of these interviews, and the spectre of that death looms large over the words spoken here.

You can’t help but wish Paul and George hadn’t spoken better of him when they had the chance.

This book is flawed, and Beatles’ fans will continue to dislike it. However, as the fascination with The Beatles grows and grows, to hear the thoughts of all the major players at that fascinating point in time, makes it an essential read.