"Making Plans For Nigel" (Colin Moulding) Copyright 1979 EMI Virgin Records Ltd
Keyboardist Barry Andrews was out and new guitarist Dave Gregory came onboard for XTC’s 3rd album, Drums And Wires, as the band’s sound palette expanded. Written & sung by bassist Colin Moulding, “Making Plans For Nigel” became XTC’s first big hit. This episode, we explore the production, performance and the origin of this XTC classic.
“Making Plans For Nigel” (Colin Moulding) Copyright 1979 EMI Virgin Records Ltd
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TRANSCRIPT:
Welcome, friends. There’s no thugs in our house, so come on in and join us here at the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast on the Pantheon Podcast Network. My name is Brad Page and each episode of this show, I pick a favorite song and we explore it together, discovering all the elements that go into making it a great song. We don’t get into music theory here, so don’t worry if you’re not a musician or technically inclined. All that’s required here is a desire to listen.
This time, we’re exploring a song from one of the most creative bands ever. This is “Making plans for Nigel” by XTC.
Guitarist Andy Partridge and bassist Colin Molding started working together in the early 70’s. Both were singers and songwriters. Along with drummer Terry Chambers, they played in various bands with various names. By 1976, keyboard player Barry Andrews joined the band, and they changed their name to XTC.
They released their first album, “White Music”, in January 1978. And then, less than a year later, they released their second album called “Go To” in October 78. Two months later, Barry Andrews quit. He would go on to work with Robert Fripp and form the band Shriekback. But XTC decided to go into a different direction. They recruited a guitarist, a guy named Dave Gregory, who they knew from back in their hometown of Swindon.
They set to work on their third album, “Drums and Wires”. “Drums and Wires” earned its name due to the increased focus on drums and guitar sounds. The album was produced by Steve Lillywhite and engineered by Hugh Padgam, who were both the architects behind the gated, reverb drum sound that would pretty much define the sound of the 1980s.
Andy Partridge was the primary songwriter in XTC. He wrote eight of the twelve songs on the album. The other four tracks were Colin Molding songs. “Making Plans For Nigel” was one of Colin’s.
By this time, Colin was getting a little tired of the more quirky, angular stuff the band had been doing. And with the addition of Dave Gregory on guitar, he was able to push the band in a more pop direction. Not necessarily more commercial, just more accessible.
The fact is the band had all kinds of influences and with Barry Andrews’ departure, they could explore and incorporate sounds and styles beyond just the punk and new wave approach.
When Colin first presented “Making Plans For Nigel” to the band, he was strumming it on a nylon string classical guitar, and that wasn’t going to cut it for XTC. Andy Partridge contributed a lot to the arrangement of the song, and he worked with drummer Terry Chambers on the drum part. Influenced by the sounds of Devo, Andy referred to it as an “upside down drum part”, where Terry was moving a conventional rhythm around to different drums on the drum set.
Colin is following the tom pattern on his bass. Dave Gregory is playing staccato spiky chords on his guitar, while Andy is playing a two-note riff over the top.
You can hear a slow flanging effect on the drums. Terry is playing an insistent pattern on the floor tom instead of the hi-hat or symbol, as a drummer would typically do. In fact, he’s playing the hi-hat along with the bass drum. And just before the rest of the band kicks in, one of the guitars sounds like it’s momentarily stepping on a wah-wah pedal.
Again, that’s Dave Gregory’s guitar playing chords panned somewhat to the left and Andy playing that two-note bit on the right. Here comes Colin’s vocal:
Andy has to inject some weirdness… he just can’t help himself. So he adds that odd little backing vocal part.
The lyrics tell the tale of a boy with overbearing parents who’ve already mapped out the path of his life. It’s a song about parental domination. Colin said he chose the name “Nigel” because he knew a few Nigels at school, and thought the name fit the song. But the lyrics are somewhat autobiographical. Colin’s dad did not approve of him being in a band and wanted Colin to cut his hair. Back in those days, you could get expelled from school for having long hair and sure enough, Colin was expelled for refusing to cut his hair.
The song isn’t really a depiction of Colin’s life, he just used that as a starting point. But Colin did say that there’s “a bit of Nigel in myself”. There’s probably a little Nigel in many of us.
And some more quirky backing vocals from Andy there. Doubled on guitar, I think.
Little bit of a guitar fill there from Andy.
There’s a voice whispering, we’re only making plans for Nigel behind the lead vocal. Check it out.
Colin imagined Nigel working in middle management, so he gave him a corporate job at British Steel, more or less at random. Turned out to be a good choice because a month after the album was released, 100,000 union steel workers went on strike.
The British Steel Company was upset enough by the song that they found four of their employees named Nigel and had them tell the press just how great it was to work for British steel. And, as usual, this kind of publicity only helped XTC to sell more records.
They used a keyboard to create that metallic, industrial crashing sound that, along with the unique drum pattern, give the song a mechanized production line feel that matches the corporate industry conformity of the lyrics.
Now we’ve reached the bridge; Andy adds his distinctive harmony vocals here.
Andy is going to add a background vocal here, singing the line “In his work” with kind of a howling delivery that makes you wonder just how happy Nigel really is with his work.
That last time, Andy sings “In his world”. And then they repeat the main verse.
Let’s focus in on the drum part, and listen again to the way Terry Chambers plays the floor tom like it was the hi hat and uses the hi hat for accents.
And there’s another short guitar break played by Andy.
They repeat the verse again, but with different harmonies that add a sense of urgency to it. this time.
Andy adds a new high pitched vocal to that part.
Lyrically, the song is never sung from Nigel’s perspective. The whole song is sung from the perspective of Nigel’s overbearing parents. Nigel never gets to share his thoughts or feelings in his own song.
Another reference to British Steel. Here, the song breaks as they repeat the word “Steel” with that heavy echo. I imagine this was influenced by the reggae dub sound.
The rhythm guitars get a little busier here at the end.
“Making Plans For Nigel” – XTC
When the record company heard “Making Plans For Nigel”, they wanted it to be the first single from the album, and it turned out to be their first big hit, at least in the UK.
XTC is often compared to the Beatles, and I think that’s an apt comparison, at least in the sense that there was a certain tension between the two primary songwriters; there was a constant evolution from album to album; that no two records are the same; and that they were always exploring new sounds and new approaches to making records. Their songs were always smart, always clever and they knew their way around to catchy melody.
The fact that XTC never got the attention they deserved, especially in America, is just one of those frustrating things about the music business. But it doesn’t change the fact that as far as I’m concerned, they made some of the greatest albums ever.
Thank you for listening to this edition of the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast. If you’d like to leave feedback or a review of the show, podchaser.com is probably the best place to do it. You can keep up to date with the show on our Facebook page, and you can find all of our previous episodes on our website, lovethatsongpodcast.com or just search for us on Google Podcasts, Amazon, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found.
And if you like the show, the best thing you can do to support us is to tell some friends about it– share it with other people. That helps the show to grow.
We are part of the Pantheon network of podcasts, where you can find a ton of other music related shows, so give some of those shows a listen. New episodes of this show are released on the first and the 15th of every month, so I’ll see you back here in about two weeks.
Until then, thanks again for listening to this episode on “Making Plans For Nigel” by XTC.
"This Time" (Dennis Schocket) Copyright 1998 Eleven Twenty Ate Music/ASCAP
Never heard of Starbelly? You should have. But it’s not your fault. There was a bit of a resurgence of “power pop” bands in the late-90’s/early 2000’s that generated a lot of GREAT albums, but for some inexplicable reason, not much commercial breakthrough (Fountains Of Wayne being one of the few exceptions). Starbelly’s debut album “Lemon Fresh” was simply brilliant, and it’s one of my favorite records. On this episode, we dive into “This Time“, the song that opens this album, along with a special guest to tell the story– Cliff Hillis, Starbelly guitarist & vocalist who played on this album.
“This Time” (Dennis Schocket) Copyright 1998 Eleven Twenty Ate Music/ASCAP
— This show is one of many great music-related podcasts on the Pantheon network. And remember to follow this show, so you never miss an episode.
"On The Airwaves" (Hans Rotenberry) Copyright 1994, 1999, 2000 Clut Guckle Music (SESAC)
When The Shazam tumbled out of Nashville in 1994, they should’ve landed as one of the biggest rock bands in America. Instead, they merely left us with 5 fantastic albums of hard-rocking power pop that lodged them on my list of all-time favorite bands. If you’ve never heard them before, here’s your chance to discover their greatness with a song called “On The Airwaves” – certified one of the Coolest Songs In The World.
“On The Airwaves” (Hans Rotenberry) Copyright 1994, 1999, 2000 Clut Guckle Music (SESAC)
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TRANSCRIPT:
Welcome to the “I’m in Love With That Song” podcast, where we use the wisdom of Solomon, the stamina of Atlas, the power of Zeus… but maybe not the speed of Mercury, to explore the magic and mysteries of music.
I’m Brad Page, your host here on the Pantheon Podcast network. Each episode, I pick a favorite song of mine and we delve into it together, discovering what makes it a great song. To date, we’ve explored well over 100 songs; this episode features a song that’s been on my to do list since day one. This is one of my favorite songs, from one of my favorite bands ever. You maybe never heard of this band before, and that’s okay, in fact, I envy you a bit because you get to discover this band for the first time. This is The Shazam with a song called “On The Airwaves”.
[Music]
Shazam was founded around 1994 by Hans Rotenberry. Hans fell in love with music at an early age. His first two favorite singles were Chuck Berry’s “Maybelline” and “Love Me Do” by the Beatles– off to a pretty good start, I think.
He’d been playing in bands as a guitarist and writing songs, but he was never able to find the right singer. So, probably out of frustration more than anything else, he decided to try singing these songs himself. So he went into the studio with drummer Scott Ballew and producer Brad Jones to record some demos. It worked out well enough that they decided to make it official and put a band together. Hans and Scott recruited a 16-year-old bass player named Mick Wilson, and The Shazam played their first gig on August 11, 1994.
They built an audience the old-fashioned way, by playing shows, including the big power pop festivals. And in 1997, they released their first self-titled album. There’s not a bad song on it. Here’s a track from that record. It’s called “Oh No”.
[Music]
In 1999, they released their second album, again produced by Brad Jones. It’s called “Godspeed The Shazam”. At this point, they weren’t sure if they’d ever get to make another record, so they really went for it on this album. It’s an all-out, go-for-broke effort. Another killer album. Check out this track, it’s called “Sunshine Tonight”.
[Music]
Around this time, they were joined by an unofficial fourth member, Jeremy Asbrock. Jeremy had been working with them as a recording engineer and he was a friend of the band, but he was also a great guitar player and he would join them on stage to fill out their sound.
The band headed to the UK for some pretty high-profile gigs, including a BBC event at Abbey Road, and opening for Paul Weller at Earl’s Court.
The record label was looking for some new material to release, something they could get out quick, capitalize on some of the success they were having and make a few bucks to offset the cost of that UK trip. The band didn’t have anything ready, but Hans had a handful of songs that he was working on for a solo album, which they quickly turned into Shazam songs. Hans also had the idea to record a cover version of the Beatles “Revolution Number 9”, which was kind of a dare, but the record company said OK. And so the Shazam did one of the most audacious things I’ve ever heard: their take on “Revolution Number 9”.
[Music]
So they took their version of “Revolution 9”, along with those repurposed solo songs and a couple of old Shazam leftovers that they re-recorded, and they put them together on a seven song EP that they called “Rev 9”, which was released in 2000.
Now, one of those leftovers was a demo from 1995 that they had never finished. They polished it off and used it as the opening track for the “Rev 9” EP. Little Steven, on his radio show “Underground Garage”, would choose this song as one of the coolest songs in the world. In fact, years later, when Little Steven would release a series of CD’s that collected all of the coolest songs in the world, for Volume One, song number one, he chose this song: “On The Airwaves”.
[Music]
“On The Airwaves” was performed by Scott Ballew on drums, Mick Wilson on bass (playing an 8-string bass, actually), and Hans Rotenberry on lead vocals and guitars. He also played a Theremin and a bunch of other sound effects, as we’ll hear. The song was produced by Brad Jones.
The song begins with what I think is one of the greatest opening riffs of all time. It’s a big sounding, epic introduction that just demands attention, and that rattling tambourine is a nice addition. Let’s play through the intro. After two times around on the riff, Scott does a drum fill and Mick’s bass follows the guitar.
Then we hear the first of those sound effects at the end of that last chord. Hans is going to pluck at that single guitar string to hold the tension before letting loose with the title of the song, and they break into the main riff.
[Music]
Speaker C: Essentially, that’s a 4-note part. But there’s so much going on, it sounds massive. First, let’s hear the bass guitar. Mick is playing an 8-string Hamer bass through a Big Muff fuzz pedal.
Then there’s an overdubbed guitar part in the left channel on the final mix. I believe this was played on a Hamer Standard, through either a Vox AC 30 amp or a Peavey Classic 30. There’s also a Big Muff pedal on this guitar, too. And then there’s a bunch of overdubbed instruments playing that same riff. There’s a couple of Theremins, a Mellotron on the saxophone setting, a vocoder, and a bunch of guitars run through various effects.
[Music]
It makes for one glorious cacophony of sound waves blasting out in all directions.
The Shazam never made a video for the song, but if they did, Hans envisioned them in some post-apocalyptic world, driving across the wasteland, broadcasting their message to all the last surviving misfits.
Here comes the first verse. There’s a slight pause, and then Hans comes in with the vocals. Sounds like he’s doubled his vocals here. Scott is doing some great drumming all through this song. Let’s go back and listen to his drums, especially those tasty little fills.
[Music]
We hear a couple of guitar parts there. There’s a rhythm guitar part. Let’s hear that. And then there’s a second guitar playing this part:
[Music]
And for good measure, let’s hear what the bass is doing there. You can really hear that he’s playing an 8-string bass here. Let’s go back and hear that altogether.
[Music]
Here’s the second verse, and I love this verse.
“Radio of the deevolution, what do you say? The lunatics, the hit parade, Don’t listen, Mayday Mayday Talking about the only thing we know, on the airwaves .
Let’s listen to that vocal track first.
[Music]
I love that. Now, underneath that, there’s still all of these crazy sound effects going on. The theremin, mellotron, radio static, manipulated tape echo… There’s even a piano part which you’ll hear towards the end. Let’s listen to all of that.
[Music]
I can picture them barreling across the post-apocalyptic wasteland, broadcasting this out. Let’s go back to the final mix and hear it all together and see what you can pick out in the background now that you know it’s there.
[Music]
That brings us to the bridge, which begins with a pretty heavy riff.
So let’s explore this next part. First, I just want to listen to Scott Ballew’s drums, because he’s playing great during this part. And there’s more of those radio effects going on, including some nonsense vocals, very low in the background. Let’s hear a bit of that.
[Music]
And let’s pick it up when the vocals come in.
“Late at night we’re singing tunes from deep inside our basement rooms, lurking on our secret frequency and in the dark red meters glow a message to the freaks”
And now there’s a nice little piano part under that, and from there, it builds back up for the final refrain
[Music]Notice the tambourine here. There’s the sound of a classic tape echo here. Probably an Echoplex, manipulating it by hand, slowing the tape down to get that descending echo. And let’s listen to what the bass is doing here at the end. You can really hear that 8-string in full effect.
[Music]
Play that back all the way through, with what I assume is a little bit of vocoder at the end.
After the “Rev 9” EP, The Shazam released another full length album called “Tomorrow The World” in 2002. That’s a great album…in fact, that may be my favorite Shazam album.
After that, Mick Wilson left the band and they recruited a new bass player, Mike Vargo, and Jeremy Asbrock finally joined the band as an official full-time member. They released one more album, “Meteor”, in 2009. That album was produced by Mack, a legendary producer who worked with Queen and ELO, just to name a few.
But unfortunately, things just came to an end, as they often do. I wish I understood why some artists catch on and others don’t. In my opinion, The Shazam were one of the best bands to come along in the last 30 years. Seriously, I would stack them up against any band that’s made a record in the last 30 years. They should have sold a million records and played stadiums, but it just didn’t happen.
The good thing, though, is that this music is still out there. You can find these CDs, you can stream all of these songs –and I want you to do it. Go find The Shazam. You will love this music, I promise.
Bassist Mick Wilson more or less retired from the music biz, though he does still play around. His replacement, Mike Vargo, is still playing and he’s actually got a pretty successful career going, including playing Paul McCartney in a McCartney tribute project.
Sadly, drummer Scott Ballew took his own life in April 2019.
I want to thank both Jeremy Asbrock and Hans Rotenberry for helping me with this episode. Hans was especially generous with his time. Jeremy has earned a great reputation as a hired gun guitarist and he’s just launched a new band called Rock City Machine Company. Check them out.
And Hans, he put out an album with Brad Jones in 2010 called “Mountain Jack”. It’s a great record. And as we speak, he’s compiling material for a deluxe reissue of the “Godspeed The Shazam” album. And when that’s available, I’d love to have him on the show. Maybe we can do a track by track or something. That’d be fun.
Anyway, thanks to both Jeremy and Hans for sharing their stories with me, and I thank you for listening. I’ll be back in two weeks with another new episode. If you’d like to get caught up on all of our previous shows, you’ll find them all on our website, lovethatsongpodcast.com, or listen to the show on your favorite podcast app. We’re on Amazon, we’re on Apple, we’re on Google Podcast, we’re on Spotify and Pandora and iHeartRadio… you name it, we’re on there.
Remember to support the artists that you love, like I love The Shazam, by buying their music, and you can support this show by just telling people about it. Won’t cost you a thing, and it really helps spreading the word. I’ll see you soon. Thanks for listening to this episode on The Shazam and “On The Airwaves”.
"Christmas With You" (Michael Wagner & Sheila Swift) Copyright 2018
Join me and my special guest Mike Wagner to celebrate the holidays with his song “Christmas With You”, as performed by Sheila Swift. It’s time for some end-of-year thank-you’s as well. Happy Holidays!
“Christmas With You” (Michael Wagner & Sheila Swift) Copyright 2018
"Tell Me" (Suzanna Hoffs/Vicki Peterson) Copyright 1984 Illegal Songs Inc/Banglophile Music
The “Paisley Underground” scene birthed a lot of great bands in the ’80’s, but few went on to be as commercially successful as the Bangles. That success came with a price, as they were pulled away from the British Invasion and Power Pop sound that inspired them. But their first full-length album, All Over The Place, is one of the best records of the era. Before they were swayed by Prince or walked like Egyptians, they were one of the most promising successors to the sound of 60’s jangle pop.
What is it about songs that capture your imagination or make a lasting impact on you? How is it that a song can somehow capture an entire experience, or express a complex idea much better than mere words? I don’t know that we’ll ever be able to answer those questions here, but we do try to understand what it takes to put a great song together; the performances, the arrangements, the production, and just maybe get a little insight into those bigger questions. This is the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast. I’m your host, Brad Page, and today’s song is “Tell Me” by The Bangles.
[Music]
To some people, The Bangles were just that other girl band from LA. But to me, they were one of the best bands to come out of LA in the 1980’s, boy or girl. They came together in 1981 after Susannah Hoffs and the Peterson sisters, Vicki and Debbie, met through the Musicians Wanted classified ads in the weekly Recycler newspaper. They bonded immediately over their love for The Beatles and 60’s rock in general.
They first gigged around LA as The Colors before changing their name to The Bangs. With their jangly guitars and those rich harmony vocals, they fit right into the growing scene in LA rooted in the sounds of 60’s garage bands and the British Invasion, what would later be known as the “Paisley Underground” sound. They recorded their first single in 1981 called “Getting Out of Hand”.
[Music]
That single caught the ear of Miles Copeland, who signed them to his Faulty Products label, which was eventually folded into IRS Records. With Susanna Hoffs and Vicki Peterson, both on guitars and vocals, Debbie Peterson on drums and vocals and Annette Zelenskis on bass, the band set about recording a five song EP in 1982. Just as they were about to release the EP, they discovered there was another band called The Bangs, so at the last minute, they changed their name to The Bangles.
Shortly after the EP was released, Annette left to start her own project, Blood On The Saddle. She was replaced by the former Susan Thomas, who, using the stage name Mickey Steele, was a founding member of The Runaways. When she joined The Bangles, she changed her name yet again to Michael Steele.
In 1984, they released their first full length album, called “All Over the Place” on Columbia Records. For my money, this is one of the best albums of the entire 1980’s. Every song is a gem, and each song shows a different side of the band. I could have picked any song on this album to feature, it’s that good. But on this episode, we’re going to listen to one of the most rockin’ songs on the album.
“Tell Me” was written by Susanna Hoffs and Vicki Peterson. It features Susanna on rhythm guitar, Vicki on lead guitar, Debbie Peterson on drums and Michael Steele on bass. Both Susanna and Vicky handled the lead vocals together with Debbie on backing vocals. The album was produced by David Khan.
“Tell Me” was one of the earliest songs Susanna and Vicki wrote together dating back to 1982. And you can hear its roots in that garage band sound of their early club days in the best possible way. It may sound like a simple garage rock tune, but there’s some nice work here.
The song kicks off with a classic jangly guitar intro. Then a snare drum fill launches the riff. Vicki is playing the riff on electric, and it sounds like Susanna’s playing rhythm on an acoustic guitar. Here’s just the guitars.
Now, let’s let that play through to the first verse, and notice how the guitar riff drops out to make room for the vocal. Straight away, you can hear how well Susanna and Vicki’s voices blend together. Debbie’s voice adds to the harmony here. The second verse comes right on the heels of the first.
Vicki s playing a crunchy guitar part that slides between two chords. Simple but effective.
Here’s the chorus.
This is a great example of how the Bangles arranged their vocal harmonies.
Then Michael Steele gets a moment to shine with a cool bass part.
Here’s a guitar playing a single chord over the top. It’s a very clean tone with a tremolo effect that gives it a real shimmering sound. Then Vicki gets in a short surf guitar influenced solo.
Notice how the drums just never let up. Debbie is pounding them through the whole track. Listen to the bass during the chorus, too. It’s another great part.
And on the third verse, they break between the lines for Michael to take the lead.
“Tell Me” by The Bangles.
Short and sweet, all of two minutes and 15 seconds. Sometimes that’s all you need to make your point. In just over two minutes, you got a taste of everything this band has to offer; the blended vocals and harmonies, the garage punk energy melodic guitar riffing, and then each band member gets to show their stuff.
I think The Bangles were a league above the other bands they got lumped in with, both vocally and as musicians. They got forced into a much too slick commercial box during the 1980s, and by ‘89, they split. But they came back in 2003 with an album that was a return to form—“Doll Revolution”, and they followed that up with “Sweethearts of the Sun” in 2011. Both albums are worth checking out.
Though Michael Steele would leave the band again, their original bass player, Annette Zelenskis, returned for their most recent incarnation. The Bangles never made a bad album, but I still think this one, “All Over The Place”, is the one to beat.
Thank you for joining me on the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast. New episodes of this show are released on the 1st and the 15th of every month, so we’ll be back soon. Until then, you can catch up on all our previous episodes on our website, lovethatsongpodcast.com.
Let us know what’s on your mind. You can find us on Facebook; just search for the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast.
We are happy to be part of the Pantheon Podcast Network, so be sure to check out some of the other great shows that are part of the Pantheon family. That’s it for this episode. I will see you soon… For now, I leave you with “Tell Me” by the Bangles.
"I Need To Know" (Tom Petty) Copyright 1977 Almo Music Corp (ASCAP)
At the time they released their 2nd album in 1978, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers were a struggling band hoping to break through. They had plenty to prove, and there was still a punky edge to their sound– clearly evident on the first single from the album, “I Need To Know”. At a tight two-minute-and-twenty-six-seconds, there’s no fat on this track– just a great song, a taste of the brilliant music to come.
“I Need To Know” (Tom Petty) Copyright 1977 Almo Music Corp (ASCAP)
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TRANSCRIPT:
This is the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast, and I’m your host, Brad Page. Each episode here on the Pantheon Podcast Network, we take a song and explore it together, listening to all the elements, the arrangements, the performance and the production that makes it a great song. Musical experience or knowledge is not necessary here, we don’t get into things like music theory. We’re just going to put our ears to work and see or hear what we discover.
All the way back in episode number two of this show, our second episode ever, we listened to Tom Petty and a song from his third album called “Even the Losers”, one of my all-time favorite songs. It’s been over a hundred episodes since then, so I think it’s time we revisit Tom Petty. On this edition of the podcast, we’re taking a deep dive into a song from his second album. This is a song called “I Need To Know”.
[Music]
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers worked their way up through the ranks, starting out in Gainesville, FL, eventually landing in Los Angeles with a record deal with Shelter Records. They released their first album in November 1976, and though the album featured the single “Breakdown”, which would become one of Petty’s most iconic songs, at that time, neither the single or the album got much attention at all. Here in 1976, this was a band still struggling to make it, even though they had a record out.
However, things were looking a little brighter over in the UK. They were getting some airplay there, and so the band headed to England for a tour as the opening act for Nils Lofgren. They appeared on Top of the Pops and the old Grey Whistle Test TV shows. Not bad for their first time out. But when they got back to America, they were still nobodies here.
ABC Records, which distributed Shelter, had pretty much given up on the album in the States. It had been out for eight months and it didn’t seem like it was going anywhere. They only sold 12,000 copies. But one of ABC’s promotion guys, a guy by the name of John Scott, heard the record and liked it, and figured he could do something with it. He had no budget and not much support from the label, but he believed in this record, in this band and he worked his ass off.
Slowly but surely, “Breakdown” was added to radio playlists across the country. A year and a half after it was first released– a lifetime ago in the pop music world—“Breakdown” hit the top 40.
[Music]
Then, the band were thinking about their next album. There’s a cliché, that also happens to be true: that an artist has their whole life to write their first album, and then six months to come up with their second.
Many bands burn through all their best material on their first album, then are immediately thrown out on the road to tour to promote that album, and then sent back into the studio to record their second album.
Not much time to write a bunch of good songs for that record, but for the Heartbreakers, luckily, magically, the songs for the second album came together pretty fast. There were a couple of tunes the band had found time to develop while they were on the road. “I Need To Know” was one of them.
“I Need To Know” was written by Tom Petty. It was released as the first single from the second album, called “You’re Gonna Get It”. The album was produced by Denny Cordell, Noah Shark and Tom Petty, and features Tom Petty on guitar and lead vocals, Stan Lynch on drums, Ron Blair on bass, Benmont Tench on keyboards, and Mike Campbell on lead guitar.
The song begins powerfully with all the instruments coming in at once. There are two guitar parts, I assume one’s played by Tom Petty and one by Mike Campbell. One is panned left, the other panned right.
That is just a great rock and roll guitar tone. Love it. The piano played by Benmont Tench is more or less panned straight up the middle. It’s lower in the mix, but he’s really rocking out here on this intro.
If you’re more familiar with Petty’s later material and that sort of sardonic, laid-back vocal style of his, it’s easy to forget just how in-your-face and punky his vocals used to be. Let’s listen to those vocals.
You can hear there’s some echo on his vocal there. One of my favorite elements of the arrangement of the song is next on the chorus, where the backing vocals repeat the title. After he sings the line, they are reinforcing his feelings and backing him up. It adds to the intensity of the song, increasing that sense of anxiety.
Let’s hear the chorus with the whole band.
Here’s the second verse, and let’s listen into the bass and drums this time around.
There’s a great scream coming up here that leads into the guitar solo. Let’s hear that scream.
And here’s the guitar solo by Mike Campbell. Let’s go back to the chorus one more time, with just the vocals and the keyboards. Because Benmont Tench is playing a really great part. Along with the piano, he’s also overdubbed an organ.
Now also if you listen closely to the last chorus, you can hear they’ve overdubbed a guitar playing these spiky little guitar stabs. They’re very low in the mix at first.
Those guitar stabs are a little more prominent this time.
“I Need To Know” by Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers
“You’re Gonna Get It’, the second album from The Heartbreakers is kind of an overlooked album, coming after their debut album, which also had one of their biggest hits, “Breakdown”, and right before the “Damn The Torpedoes” album, arguably their masterpiece. It’s easy for this record to kind of get lost, but I think it’s a great album.
And we may never have gotten this record, or the great music that followed, if it weren’t for the behind-the-scenes people like John Scott, that promotions guy, who wouldn’t give up on this little rock and roll band.
Nobody makes it on their own. Every artist has people out of the limelight that put their heart and soul into supporting that artist. So, here’s a toast to people like John Scott, the people that no one ever hears about, but without them, we wouldn’t have gotten many of the great songs that we love. And of course, let’s pay tribute to Tom Petty himself, who died too early in 2017. He left behind a legacy of great songs, but I know he still had a lot more great music left in him. It was a huge loss.
Well, thanks as always, for being a part of this edition of the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast. Share with us some of your favorite Tom Petty songs or memories. Post them on our Facebook page, or on Podchaser, or wherever it is that you listen to the show.
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Thanks for listening to this show on Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers “I Need To Know”
Cheap Trick is one of the great American bands. The new book, This Band Has No Past: How Cheap Trick Became Cheap Trick by Brian Kramp details their history from the very beginning up to their breakthrough album, Cheap Trick At Budokan. It’s an incredible story of hard work & dedication. On this edition of the podcast, Brian joins me to discuss 5 songs that reveal how unique and special Cheap Trick was in their early years. If you only know this band from their hits, this episode is a good introduction to what makes Cheap Trick Cheap Trick.
Besides being an author, Brian Kramp is the host of the “Rock And/Or Roll” podcast, one of my all-time favorite podcasts– an absolute must-listen for every music junkie. Check it out.
TRANSCRIPT:
‘Elo, Kiddies! Welcome to the “I’m in Love With That Song” podcast on the Pantheon Podcast Network. I’m your host, Brad Page Age, and I’ve got something really special lined up for you this time.
Brian Cramp is the host of the “Rock And/Or Roll” Podcast, one of my all-time favorite podcasts. And after a long hiatus, “Rock And/Or Roll” is back with brand new episodes. So I’m very excited about that. But in even bigger news, Brian has a new book out. It’s called “This Band Has No Past – How Cheap Trick Became Cheap Trick”. In this book, he tells the story of one of America’s greatest bands, from their very beginnings right up to their breakthrough album, “Cheap Trick at Budokan”.
The book is exhaustively researched and covers every detail. It was a very entertaining read, so I couldn’t be happier to have Brian join me on this episode to take a look at the early years of Cheap Trick. For the uninitiated. That’s guitarist and primary songwriter Rick Nielsen, vocalist extraordinaire Robin Zander, the master of the 12-string bass Tom Petersson, and the incredible drummer, Bun E. Carlos.
Brian’s picked five songs as examples of why Cheap Trick is such a great band. And these songs are a great place to start if you’re just getting into Cheap Trick. So, we’re going to talk about these songs, talk about the band, and of course, talk about Brian’s new book. So here’s our conversation about how Cheap Trick became Cheap Trick.
[Music]
BRAD: Well, Brian Cramp, welcome to the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast. I’m a huge fan of the “Rock And/Or Roll” podcast, so I’m really happy to have you on the show. And I’m excited to introduce people to the new book, “This Band Has No Past – How Cheap Trick Became Cheap Trick”. The book will be available September 6, right
BRIAN: As of now, that’s the plan, yeah.
BRAD: September 6, 2022. But people can preorder it now, which I highly encourage people to do right now– go do it right now.
So, to get started, I know the book is, like, over 300 pages, and covers the earliest history of the band in great detail. So I know this is tough to ask, but if you could just give us a broad summary of where Cheap Trick came from and how the band came to be.
BRIAN: Yeah, that’s what the book really gets into. What I found interesting in telling the story is the collision that happened of the baby boom generation, and the British Invasion and the Beatles, and the British Invasion. And that’s exactly where Cheap Trick comes from.
All of them were teenagers, they loved the British Invasion and they all joined bands. So in the mid to late 60’s, all four members of Cheap Trick had their own band. They were all in different bands, but all in the Rockford area.
But the thing is, everybody was in a band. I have a statistic in the book that by 1967, I think it’s two thirds of males under the age of 23 were in a band. I mean, it’s an insane number, but that’s because at that time, what else did they have to do? They barely even had television. But there was nothing else. There were records, instruments… there’s so many distractions for young people these days, but back then, the internet, video games, all of that rolled into one was a guitar and an amp. That’s what they had.
BRAD: Yeah.
BRIAN: And eventually, the book almost becomes kind of like a day-to-day telling of how they formed, how they built this catalog of songs played almost every night of the week, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, even in bars, almost all of them in Illinois and Wisconsin. They made plenty of treks to Michigan, Iowa, Minneapolis, stuff like that, and a few trips outside of that Midwest. But almost everything they did from like ‘73 to through ‘76 was in Illinois and Wisconsin. But it was every night, and just 1 bar after another.
BRAD: Well, one of the things they always say about the Beatles is that they weren’t really that great of a band until they went to Hamburg and played every night for 8 hours a night. And nothing will hone you as a band, both as an individual musician and as a unit, as that kind of level of playing together, and these guys put in that many hours and then some.
It’s interesting how Rick Nielsen, I think is, when you think of 70’s guitar icons, he’s definitely one of those guys that comes to mind. But he started his career as a keyboard player.
BRIAN: Yeah, well, he played guitar before that. He would go back and forth in the early versions of his band, The Grim Reapers. The Grim Reapers and Toast And Jam kind of merged at one point, when they decided they wanted to write their own songs. And there was this guitar player named Craig Myers, who everybody I’ve talked to says he was just a genius, a virtuoso. So, yeah, Rick kind of became the keyboard player. He would play guitar once in a while, but like on the record. Yeah, they made one record for Epic, and he played guitar on the album
BRAD: The Fuse album, right?
BRIAN: Yeah, they were called the Grim Reapers and the record label made them change their name. So, Rick had this band, the Grim Reapers, going back to 1965, but when they joined forces with the guys from Toast And Jam, it was a completely different band. But they still used the Grim Reapers name, just because that was the name with the most notoriety for getting bookings. It was a completely different band called The Grim Reapers, basically.
BRAD: And the Grim Reapers have a connection to Otis Redding and the infamous plane crash, right?
BRIAN: Yeah, they were the opening band for that show. And also, it’s important to mention Ken Adamany, who became Cheap Trick’s manager and was a huge part of writing this book, a lot of my information comes from him and I mean, he’s become a friend. He told me he considers me a friend, which was insane. Yeah, Ken Adamany owned the club, The Factory, where Otis was supposed to be playing. And Ken Adamany was booking bands since the late 50’s. He had his own band called The Night Trains, which is interesting, because he eventually ended up playing with Steve Miller and Boz Skaggs, who were going to the University of Wisconsin in Madison. And Ken kind of went from playing in his own band to eventually just becoming a guy who booked concerts and promoted concerts. And then he started managing some of his bands, and eventually his entire career became Cheap Trick for a while, pretty much. But, yeah, he owned The Factory, booked Otis Redding; The Grim Reapers, yeah, they were supposed to open. This was not the band that I was just talking about with Craig Myers and Tom Peterson, this was the earlier version of the Grim Reapers. So, the only guy from Cheap Trick in that band was Rick Nielsen. But, yeah, they were supposed to open, and then Otis’s plane crashed into Lake Minona, which is really just 5, 10-minute drive from where I am right now. Yeah.
BRAD: All right, so I had asked you to pick five songs that would kind of be like a primer for the first period of Cheap Trick. And so, let’s dig into some of those songs. The first one that you wanted to talk about was a song called “Downed”.
[Music]
BRIAN: It’s hard to know when Rick wrote this song. It’s about a period when he thought about moving to Australia in, like, 1971.
BRAD: Yeah, that’s like one of the first lines of the song, right? He references in Australia.
BRIAN: Yeah. There’s even a newspaper article when the second version of Fuse that had Stewkey and Tom Mooney from Nazz in the band, when that band broke up, the newspaper said that all the guys were going to different places; Rick is going to Australia, Tom Peterson was going to Germany, Tom Mooney back to California, and Stewkey to Texas. That’s what it said in this newspaper article. And Rick has explained later that one of the reasons he didn’t go was because he couldn’t bring his dog [laughs].
[Music]
BRIAN: I’ve seen him kind of imply, too, that he wrote this song at that time. But the thing is, this song was never played with Sick Man of Europe, the band that he had in ‘71 to ’73, and it was never played in the earliest years of Cheap Trick. So, it’s weird if he would have had this song and then they never played it, so I’m not sure when it, but it is one of the earliest Cheap Trick songs.
BRAD: Well, that’s interesting, too, that it’s one of their earliest songs, but it’s not on their first record. It’s on the second album.
BRIAN: Yeah, most of the songs on the second album they had for the first album, including “I Want You To Want Me”.
BRAD: Me which is so incredible, because the classic thing that everybody says about bands, they have a lifetime to accumulate the songs on their first album and then after that, they’re kind of spent. The sophomore slump and all of that. But here’s a band that had such an incredible catalog of songs that they were able to draw on that for not just their second album, but their third, and even beyond that, which is pretty incredible.
BRIAN: Well, Jack Douglas picked about 20 songs for them to record during the sessions for their first album. And three of those songs were “I Want You To Want Me”, “Surrender” and “Dream Police”. And then none of them were on the album.
BRAD: Well, “Downed”, the intro of the song is great. It’s this descending melody, really strong melody, reminiscent of, like, “Dear Prudence”, but there’s a million songs that do that. It’s got the Cheap Trick patented harmony vocals in there, and then it kicks in with that really heavy riff. And to me, it just encapsulates everything that’s great about the Cheap Trick sound in that one song. You’ve got it all: you get the melody, you got the heaviness, it’s all there. It’s just a super strong track.
BRIAN: Yeah, it really is. It’s a brilliant piece of work.
[Music]
BRAD: The second song that you picked is a song that brings us back to that first album, which there’s some history to this song, “The Ballad of TV Violence”. Why don’t you tell us the story of this track?
[Music]
BRIAN: Yeah, this is another one. One of the earliest Cheap Trick songs, definitely one of like the first ten. This song, I think, is a perfect example of what was so different about Cheap Trick. If you picture a song like this in 1975, if you really listen to the song, and then ask yourself , “who the hell would write this?” It’s a very different song. It’s a very unique, brilliant song, I think, but it’s really odd in a lot of ways, because the song is about Richard Speck, a mass murderer, and you’ve got Robin Zander kind of playing that role. By the end, he’s just screaming. Just screaming like a maniac.
[Music]
BRIAN: It’s an insane song. I mean, there’s a concert they played, on Mother’s Day in a park in Rockford in 1975. And they play this song. And you’re just thinking, “This song is insane. And they’re playing it to a bunch of families in the park.” There’s an article in the newspaper about all the families out for this nice spring day. It’s Mother’s Day. And then the band is playing this song
BRAD: This song about a mass murderer. And the original title of the song was “The Ballad of Richard Speck” or something, right?
BRIAN: Yeah. Richard Speck was a spree killer in Chicago, in I think the late 50’s that happened.
BRAD: Yeah. He murdered a bunch of nurses, right?
BRIAN: Yeah. I think he murdered eight young women just in one night. This insane crime. Yeah.
BRAD: It’s a horrific story.
Speaker C: Yes. And since it was in Chicago, it was virtually like a local event for Cheap Trick, you know?
BRAD: So “The Ballad of TV Violence”, it’s got a great stomping riff to it. I love how the guitar kind of follows the vocal. It’s like you said, Robin is just shredding his voice at the end of the song. I imagine this must have been the last session of the day, because I can’t imagine going back and singing anything else after he finishes this take. It’s intense.
[Music]
BRAD: Well, another song off the first record that you picked is a song called “He’s A Whore”. What’s the story behind this one?
BRIAN: This song came after the last two songs we talked about, at least by a little bit, but they had it by ‘75. And I mean, this is kind of the quintessential Cheap Trick song, really, especially the early version of Cheap Trick. And you think about a song like this in 1975, it’s almost a punk song. It’s just a perfect example of how unique and original Rick Nielsen’s songwriting was at the time. Rick Nielsen’s songwriting is probably more influential than we even realize. You know, the bands like Kiss and even Cheap Trick, a lot of the people they influenced are not considered, by elitist or pretentious people or whatever, they’re not considered top-tier bands, or important bands, or whatever. But if you look at all these people that started bands in the ‘80’s and even the ‘90’s, tons of them were influenced by Cheap Trick. And Rick Nielsen was, his songwriting style was very individual and unique. The way he played guitar and the way he wrote songs, he really developed his own style. And I think this song is a perfect example. Nobody else would have written this song.
[Music]
BRIAN: I think it’s just a brilliant song. But it’s so Cheap Trick. It really kind of sums it up about what was unique and special about the early years of Cheap Trick, I think.
BRAD: Yeah, it’s a classic Robin Zander vocal. And, I mean, he still sounds like that today, which is incredible. Then you’ve got Rick’s backing vocals, which are again, it’s a trademark Cheap Trick sound, those backing vocals that he does.
[Music]
BRAD: The song clocks in at 2 minutes and 43 seconds. I mean, there’s not a second wasted in this song. And that’s, that’s a Cheap Trick thing, too. I mean, all of these songs we’re talking about today, but just in general, their songs are always tight. You know, “Downed” is just over four minutes; “Ballad Of TV Violence” clocks in at over five minutes. But that’s about as long as a Cheap Trick song ever really gets.
[Music]
BRIAN: And a really interesting thing I have in the book is, Ken Adamany had told me a story about how Rick Nielsen, when he would write some lyrics, he would call Ken Adamany’s office, he was the manager of Cheap Trick, and he would dictate the lyrics over the phone to Ken’s secretary, who would take them down in shorthand and then she would type them up. So, then Rick had his lyrics typed, you know, and so Ken Adamany still has this piece of yellow paper from a legal pad, says “He’s A Whore” at the top, and then it’s a bunch of shorthand symbols. And the picture of that is in the book. It’s pretty amazing.
BRAD: Shorthand. Talk about a lost art, right?
BRIAN: It’s hilarious, too, because it’s all these shorthand symbols and you get town towards the bottom and you just see the word “gigolo”, because there’s no shorthand symbol for ‘gigolo”.
BRAD: That’s great. All right, so the fourth track on your list jumps ahead to the third album, a song called “Auf Wiedersehen”. It’s the first song we’ve talked about that wasn’t entirely written by Rick Nielsen; this one, Rick and bass player Tom Petersson share writing credit. But what’s the history of “Auf Wiedersehen”?
BRIAN: Well, they had it for the first album. They had this song, was written in ‘76. It seems like the original title of it was “Kamikaze”. There’s at least one article where the author refers to it as that. That might have been the original title. But again, this is a perfect example of how unique and interesting Rick Neilsen’s songwriting was, especially for the time; it’s another song that’s completely insane. I do a podcast with Ken Mills called “Cheap Talk” where Ken has laughed multiple times on the podcast about when I brought up the concept of you go see Cheap Trick at like a state fair, and by the end of the show, Rob Zander is just screaming suicide over and over at the top of his lungs. It’s a perfect example of early Cheap Trick and how out there it was. But also, it’s a great song. It’s such a cool song, the riffs are amazing.
[Music]
BRAD: Yeah, you’re right, it’s a great riff. Great riff. It’s another pretty tight song, this one’s 3 minutes and 41 seconds long. You can clearly hear Tom Petersson’s 12-string bass at the beginning of it, which is kind of another element of their sound. Not that many people are playing– still today, not that many people play the 12-string bass. Kind of an integral part of their sound in a lot of ways. And Robin’s voice, this is his classic punky voice.
[Music]
BRAD: In your book, you point out what a great mimic Robin was as just as a singer. He really is a guy who could sing anything.
BRIAN: Yeah. And it’s interesting, because when Robin first joined Cheap Trick, when he was like, 20, 21 years old, I don’t think he knew exactly what he was capable of. And I think he learned as he went. He mostly sang, like, folk music, and he was playing for years. He would play Neil Young. Bee Gees, early Bee Gees, Crosby Stills and Nash, he was doing a lot of stuff.
BRAD: Yeah, he was mostly performing as a duo with another guitar player, right? They were primarily acoustic kind of stuff.
BRIAN: Right. Yeah, he did that for years. And he had never really been in a rock band. He had a couple of flirtations with it. But if you hear the really earliest recordings that are available of Robin with Cheap Trick, you can tell that he really developed his vocals, and I think actually learned what he was capable of. You know, eventually Rick Nielsen just starts using Robin’s voice as another instrument. That’s another facet of Rick Nielsen’s songwriting is, he only could write some of the songs he wrote because he knew Robin could sing it.
BRAD: Yeah, there’s so many influences in there. You mentioned it right at the top that all of these guys were big fans of The Beatles and the British Invasion. So, you’ve got The Beatles influence and The Who and all of that. But there’s just elements of everything in his songwriting, and the fact that he had a singer who could pull off whatever he gave him, like whether it was a Beatles pop melody or just an all-out screamer, or something that had that kind of punky edge to it. He could write whatever he wanted and Robin could sing it.
BRIAN: Yep. Yeah, that was very important because it gave Rick Nielsen the freedom to just kind of go wild with his songwriting and run the gamut, from nice and sweet and syrupy to completely over the top insane screaming at the top of your lungs.
BRAD: And that brings us to the last song that you had on your list, which is “On Top of the World”, which is one of my favorite Cheap Trick songs. It’s got everything. It’s got that Peter Gunn style guitar riff at the top. Then it goes into that brilliant chorus that is super catchy. The verses have these very… it’s not a three-chord blues type of riff, there’s a lot of chords in there. It’s very kind of Beatlesque. There’s the piano in there, I assume that’s Rick playing the piano on the track? And then at the end, you have almost this ELO-style, Beatlesque bit at the end. I mean, once again, all the elements of what make Cheap Trick great are in this track.
[Music]
BRIAN: So this is the only song I picked that they didn’t have in the early years. This is one that was actually written probably right before “Heaven Tonight”. They had never even played this song live before they recorded the album. But to me, this is one of the most incredible songs of all time, by anyone. And I think it’s really a quintessential example of exactly how brilliant Rick Nielsen was and exactly how great this band was. The arrangement of this song is stunning. I don’t know how anyone could not be impressed by a song like this. This is one of the best examples, I think, of the capabilities of Rick and the band. It’s an amazing, incredible song.
[Music]
BRIAN: The arrangement and the melodies and the instrumentation and the musicians playing it, everything about it is pretty stunning. Yeah, I thought it was a good way to round it out and maybe the best example, just in terms of songwriting and arrangement, it’s one of the best examples you’re going to find of the brilliance of Rick and Cheap Trick.
BRAD: Yeah, and I think it points in the direction that the band would follow. You’ve got a guy who can write a song like this and of course, a guy who can sing it, but also a band who can execute on all these different parts and changes. It’s kind of like a little mini tour de force of what makes Cheap Trick such a great and unique band. It’s, it’s a great song.
[Music]
BRIAN: Yeah, exactly. Both Jack Douglas and Tom Werman, who have worked with a lot of bands, both basically say Cheap Trick are the favorite band they ever worked with, the best band they ever worked with, the tightest band. They took the least amount of time in the studio. They would just hammer everything out, play it perfectly, because they had been doing it for so long by that point. And they were at the top of their game. But also, they were very creative and unique. Rick Nielsen always injects an element of kind of sloppiness or just wackiness into everything, which I think in some ways, is one of the reasons, maybe, that people don’t realize quite how talented and skilled he was, because he never took himself seriously and never really let anybody else take him seriously, either.
BRAD: Right.
BRIAN: But if you look past that, a song like this makes it so obvious how talented they were.
BRAD: So the book is called “This Band Has No Past”. Obviously, you’ve got to love a band to devote that much time and energy into writing a book about them like this. How did you first get into Cheap Trick?
BRIAN: Well, they were always around when I was growing up. But when I was a kid, everything for me was about heavy metal. So, I knew Cheap Trick, I had a couple of their records ‘cause I would buy records at my local record store for a buck. And so, in my first, like, 50 records I had, I had “In Color” and “Dream Police” in there or something. But they were not one of my favorite bands when I was growing up, it wasn’t until I got to college and it was really the revelation of the first album, which I had no idea about until I was in college and started just collecting records like a maniac. And when I heard the first Cheap Trick album, that was kind of the realization of, wait a minute, this is the same band? That album probably my favorite album of all time. It’s very different from anything else in Cheap Trick’s catalog. And it blew me away at the time. And then I got “One On One”, it’s another of my favorite Cheap Trick albums that I just had no idea about when I was growing up. Once I started getting their entire catalog, and learning more about them, they just became my favorite when I was in college. Of course, Kiss was my favorite band growing up.
BRAD: Yeah, me too.
BRIAN: That’s another thing: I went to college in Madison, where Cheap Trick were complete legends. That was like their home away from home. They were from Rockford, but Madison was where Ken Adamany, their manager, was based. They had a huge fan base there. I don’t know, it just went from there. But yeah, I became kind of obsessed.
BRAD: And what inspired you to write the book?
BRIAN: When I started the podcast– which was one of the smartest things I ever did– I met a lot of people; one of my earliest episodes, I had Greg Renoff on, and this is when he was just working on “Van Halen Rising”. I guess that was part of my inspiration. My original idea was to pitch a “33 1/3” book about the first album; that’s that I first started working on. And I started interviewing people, including some people from the record label. And then I talked to this guy named Jim Charney, who was part of signing the band to Epic, worked for Epic at the time. Turns out Jim Charney had been friends with Ken Adamany since the late ‘60’s. And he’s like, “I could put you in touch with Ken”. And for me, Ken Adamany was like this mythic figure. You know, anybody who was a fan of Cheap Thick just knows about Ken Adamany. But by the time I became a fan, that was kind of around the time they broke ties with Ken. So, Jim Charney puts me in touch with Ken Adamany, and then Ken Adamany gets involved. And that’s when I started to realize that might I have to expand the scope of this thing. And then I was supposed to go meet with Ken, and when the meeting finally happened, he got Bun E. Carlos to come. So, then I had this, like, three-and-a-half hour meeting with Ken Adamany and Bun E. Carlos, and it’s like “OK, OK… Now this is really turning into something.” So, this has been like five years in the making.
BRAD: What were the biggest things you learned writing the book?
BRIAN: I guess I learned that with a project like this, there’s a long period of time where you might not, would never even say it out loud or admit it to someone, but you’re not sure you can actually accomplish what you’re trying to accomplish. And at some point you get over the hump and then it’s a downward slope. And that’s an amazing moment when you realize, “I actually am going to pull this off. I actually can do this.” It’s an insane process to get from a blank page to a 400-page book. So I guess one lesson is, you can do it. I wasn’t anybody, but I just tried. So, if you want to do something like this and you think that you can do it, even if you feel like nobody else thinks you can, there’s no harm in trying, so…
BRAD: Well, we mentioned a few times throughout this episode, you host a podcast called “Rock And/O Roll”, you’ve been doing it for years and that’s how you and I first connected. And you’ve recently relaunched the podcast, which I am totally psyched about. So, just drop a few hints or tidbits about what you’ve got coming up on your podcast.
BRIAN: Well, I. Have a whole bunch of interviews in the can with guys from the history of power pop from the 70’s & 80’s, that’s one thing that’s coming up, and probably a series about Colonel Tom Parker, Elvis’s con-man grifter manager. And then episodes here and there that’ll be similar to what I used to do.
BRAD: That’s awesome. I’m particularly looking forward to those power pop interviews, that’ll be great. I said it before, and I will never stop giving you credit for it, it was you and a handful of shows like yours that inspired me to start this podcast. This show would not have ever existed without you, so I thank you so much for that. And I thank you so much for coming on the show today. Brian Cramp, the podcast is “Rock And/Or Roll”. It’s available again on your favorite podcast service. The book is called “This Band Has No Past – How Cheap Trick Became Cheap Trick” It’ll be available September 6, 2022, published by Jawbone Press, right? That’s the publisher?
BRIAN: Yeah, they’re a publisher out of the UK. Do you have their Todd Rundgren book?
BRAD: Mm-hmm.
BRIAN: I figured.
BRAD: Yep. Yep. Yeah. So, Jawbone Press. You can order it from Amazon today. You can get it from your local bookstore. Brian, so good to talk to you. Thank you so much for coming on the show.
BRIAN: All right, thanks, Brad.
BRAD: And thanks to everyone for listening to this episode on Cheap Trick. They’re an amazing band with a really rich, deep catalog. I hope this episode gave you a taste of what the band has to offer and inspires you to check out more of their records. You’ll be glad you did.
Brian’s podcast “Rock And/Or Roll” is part of the Pantheon Podcast Network, right alongside this show and dozens of other music related shows. So please check out “Rock And/Or Roll” and some of the other shows on the Pantheon Network of podcasts.
The “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast will be back in a couple of weeks with a brand new episode, so stay tuned for that. In the meantime, follow us on Facebook and check out our previous episodes on our website, lovethatsongpodcast.com, as well as anywhere you can find podcasts.
Thanks again for listening to this episode on Cheap Trick. Farewell, sayonara, auf wiedersehen, so long.
"Real Man" (Todd Rundgren) Copyright 1975 Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp and Humanoid Music
Todd Rundgren never became a household name, but he has legions of fans around the world. I’m one of ’em. What has always drawn me to Todd, then and now, is not just his way with a tune and a willingness to do anything musically– it’s his search for something deeper, more meaningful, than your typical pop song. This is a prime example of melding melody and message, producing pop with purpose. What does it mean to be a “real man”? Todd answered that question in 1975.
“Real Man” (Todd Rundgren) Copyright 1975 Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp and Humanoid Music
— This is one of the many great podcasts on the Pantheon Podcast network, the place to be for music-obsessed listeners like you & me!
John Lennon & Paul McCartney Copyright 1968 Northern Songs Copyright 1968 Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
It’s nearly impossible to pick the “best” Beatles song, but by nearly every measurement– sales, chart success, cultural impact– it’s hard to beat “Hey Jude”. Author James Campion‘s new book, Take A Sad Song, is an in-depth look at the history and legacy of “Hey Jude”. He joins us on this episode for a deep dive into this legendary, iconic song. A true classic.
John Lennon & Paul McCartney Copyright 1968 Northern Songs Copyright 1968 Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
If you enjoyed this episode, please check out these other Beatles-related episodes:
Time for another edition of the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast, right here on the Pantheon Podcast Network. I’m your host, Brad Page, and on this episode, I’m joined by author James Campion. He has a new book out called “Take A Sad Song” that’s an in-depth analysis of the Beatles song “Hey Jude”. So I invited James onto the show to talk about this song and this book. This is one of the longest shows we’ve ever done, but if any song warrants this kind of attention, it’s this one. So, without any further ado, here’s my conversation with James Campion on “Hey Jude”.
Brad Page: Well, James Campion, welcome to the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast. You’ve got a new book out called “Take A Sad Song” that’s an in-depth look at the Beatles song “Hey Jude”. You really take a look at this song from every possible angle. I thought the book was a fascinating read.
And the main thing we do here on this podcast is to take a deep dive into an individual song, just to try to understand what makes it work, why it’s such a great song. And I truly do love this song. But to be honest, I’ve been almost too intimidated to cover this song on this show. It just seems almost too… too big, like, I’d just be biting off more than I could chew. So that was almost too much for me to handle. So, when I heard about your book, I really had to invite you on the show to talk about this song, so we could do it together. I feel like I need your expertise here to tackle this amazing song. So let’s get into it.
I assume most Beatles fans know the history of the song, but for those that don’t know the story, maybe you can just give us the background, tell us the origin story of the song, how it came to be written.
James Campion: Many people know this, that originally the song, or the melody that Paul had in his head was, “Hey Jules”. And the way the story goes is, Paul is 26 years old; he’s on top of the world, really. Biggest man in the world. He’s the most eligible bachelor in the world. He just meets Linda, for all intents and purposes. A couple of months earlier, he’s driving out to comfort Cynthia Lennon and Julian Lennon, wife, soon to be ex-wife, and son of John Lennon, who has just met the woman he will live with until his death in 1980. Yoko Ono. All of this is happening within weeks of each other in 1968.
And what rock star on top of the world is going out to drive an hour out of his way to comfort the ex-wife of his partner and best friend since he was 15 years old? And then to write a song and to have this song to sing to Julian? And although Julian for years had no idea the song was about him, and when John first heard the song after Paul wrote it, he’s like, “wow, this song’s about me meeting Yoko”. And Paul’s kind of like, “Well, I wrote it. It’s kind of like me meeting Linda”. But the origins of the song in that little melody, because Paul McCartney is a melody machine, he wrote the song driving with his Astron Martin up to visit Julian. And it’s a fascinating story, just on the origin of the song itself.
Brad Page: Yeah, absolutely. A few facts about the song: It was released August 6, 1968, almost 54 years ago. It was number one in 18 countries, stayed on the top of the US charts at number one for nine weeks. It was the Beatles biggest selling song of 1968. Really their biggest hit ever. Right?
James Campion: In America. Yeah. It’s nine weeks and at number one 19 weeks overall. Internationally, I think it was number one in more countries than any other Beatles song, which is fascinating in itself, Brad, because we’re talking about 1968, and part of the reason why I loved working on this book and researching it; ‘68 is such a seminal moment in American and international history, but it is a very significant moment in the history of the Beatles, because for the first time in their career, since 1962, they were going up, up, up and up, and they just kind of hung out in the middle there. After ‘67, they weren’t going up anymore. They were just kind of part of the pop pantheon. But “Hey Jude”, of course, is the exception to that.
Brad Page: It was the first single on Apple Records, which that’s pretty significant. I mean, what a way to launch your record label! Unfortunately, it was kind of all downhill from there in a lot of ways. But, man, just as a Double-A side single, it’s totally killer.
James Campion: Yeah. “Hey Jude” and “Revolution”, of course. And again, the yin and the yang of the Beatles, the John and the Paul. But also, you mentioned it again, I tried to write about this in the first chapter, all the things that it’s the first of, and it is still to this day– the largest selling debut single for a record label. And why wouldn’t it be, right? The Beatles just were already on top of the world.
Brad Page: And it’s also, I believe, the longest in terms of actual song length of any number one pop single. Is that still true today?
Speaker A: That isn’t technically. So, as you know, in the last couple of months, Taylor Swift re-released her Red album. And, one of the songs on there, and the name escapes me, I’m sorry, the title was the ten minute longer version of that song. And that came in at number one. Before that, “American Pie” technically is longer. And that was released in 197—’71, ‘72. However, as you might remember, Brad, they split that song up. Side A was three and a half minutes or something, and Side B was four minutes. So, it wasn’t a side, a single. They fit all seven minutes and 11 seconds of “Hey Jude” on the a side of that a-b single. So up until a couple of months ago, when Taylor Swift swooped in with a ten-minute song that made it to number one, yes, “Hey Jude” was the longest running number one song ever.
They went to a different studio, not Abbey Road. They went to Trident Studios in London and recorded it on the only eight-track player recorder in London. It’s really a sonic marvel. And some of the greatest engineers and of course, George Martin produced and engineered this thing to get it to be the wonderful record. Because it’s not only a great song, it’s not only written by a great songwriter, it’s not only played by an excellent and one of the greatest bands, but it’s a great record– because there is a distinction between how good a song is or how good a record sounds. You know what I mean?
Brad Page: Right, right, yeah. Trident would later become one of the most famous recording studios in the world, but at that time, I believe they were practically a brand new studio. Right?
James Camption: They were.
Brad Page: Yeah, yeah. They were breaking them in. And as you point out in the book, the piano that McCartney plays on this track was like the house piano there at Trident. It would later go on to be performed by Rick Wakeman on Bowie’s “Life On Mars”. I believe Queen recorded “Bohemian Rhapsody” on the same piano. Is that correct?
Speaker A: That is correct, yeah.
Brad Page: So, well, let’s get into the song. The song famously opens with just Paul’s vocal and piano. In fact, the very first note that we hear is just Paul’s voice. No reverb, just really dry, which I think that just makes it really intimate. It’s like he’s right in your ear. Talking right in your singing, right in your ear.
Brad Page: On that second line, where he sings the word “bad”, he actually drops that. It’s like the lowest note that he sings, I believe, in the song. And I absolutely think that’s not a coincidence; entirely intentional, that the words he chooses to use when he sings that lowest note tend to be, like, the bummer words of the song.
James Campion: Right, right. And you hit it right on the head. Think about this: this is 1968. This is AM radio. Because that’s where you played all the big hits and the sound effects and the booming DJ’s and all the traffic reports and the sports news and the car rumbling down the street that you’re listening to this, this song, you know? And here comes Paul, completely cold, out of the blue. Literally. And he sings the title and the melody of the song. I interviewed dozens of songwriters for the book: Musicologists, psychologists, sociologists, Beatle biographers, writers, music journalists… Almost every person, too, that I interviewed said, think about when you ask someone, how does “Hey Jude” go? What do you say? “Hey Jude, don’t make it bad”. There it is. There’s the song. He’s telling you the title, he’s telling you where he’s going. It’s amazing artistry, amazing craftsmanship. And by the way, The Beatles did that better than anyone. And I went through The Beatles catalog, and you probably know this as well, Brad, how many great Beatles songs start with just their voices telling you the title?
Brad Page: Right!
James Campion: “Help”. “Nowhere Man”, “She Loves You”. I mean, there’s at least 15. And it comes right out, “Hey Jude”, he’s telling you it all right now. It’s brilliant. And getting to the second part, you were saying about the song going down and up? Some of the musicologists I interviewed said this makes it a classic lassic ballad in the American, in the great American songbook– or in the case of Paul, the great British songbook, in the sense where you have the lilting of the voice go up and back down again, up and back down again. And the words seem to reflect that.
Brad Page: Yeah, I love the way, “don’t make it bad”, and then “take a sad song”, and he goes up. He’s literally taking a bad moment or a bad feeling and making it better as he’s singing those actual words.
Brad Page: And then he hits the word remember, and then there’s a pause.
Brad Page: That’s so conversational I think, in the way that it’s like… I mean, if I say to my kids, “remember to take out the trash”, that’s one thing; If you say, “Remember– take out the trash”. That pause in there. To me, that whether it’s intentional or not, it hits you in a very specific way.
James Campion: Again, all the musicologists that I spoke to, and some of the songwriters I spoke to, pointed out that very point. Remember, this song is written in the second person. He is talking to someone. I think a lot of listeners hear him kind of talking to them like, “buck up, it’s going to be great.” But he’s talking to someone we know; he’s talking to Jules. If we look back, but he’s talking to the thematic Jude. And by doing that, he’s bringing you in slowly. And the way George Martin arranged this, along with The Beatles, where each instrument, an acoustic guitar comes in, the tambourine, and the height and those beautiful fills by Ringo, it’s just an incredible way of arranging this conversation that Paul is having with you.
Brad Page: And then you get the line “let her into your heart, then you can start to make it better.” So you get that internal rhyme there, which is just classic old school songwriting.
Brad Page: And like you said, he’s having a conversation, relatively specifically between two men. It doesn’t exclude a conversation with a woman; but this comes up in your book, right?
James Campion: I want to give credit where credit’s due. The great Beatle musicologist and author Tim Riley, who gave me hours of his time, had this incredible light bulb go off. And Tim said, there is definitely a line to be drawn between “She Loves You” and “Hey Jude”. And “She’s Loves You”, it’s two young men, a young man telling another young man, “hey, you better get on this because she really loves you, and you’re blowing it. Okay?” And then, “Hey Jude”, here he is, a little older, a little wiser, and he’s saying the same thing to someone. “You found her, now go and get her.” “Don’t hold back. If you’re cold, you’re only making your world colder.” This is Paul’s way of communicating again. And I love the fact that we have that lineage in the way The Beatles communicate.
Brad Page: Yeah. I mean, there have been songs of two guys sort of fighting over a girl; you know, that sort of, “well, if you don’t take her, I’m gonna.” “If you don’t treat her right, I’m gonna take her”. Neither of those songs are that. [Referring to “She Loves You” and “Hey Jude”.] Both of these songs are one friend encouraging another friend to make a move, you know, to think positive.
That’s fairly unique, I think, in sort of the macho rock and roll culture, right?
James Campion: Totally unique. And one of the things that I used to love when I was a kid is when he says, you know, “it can’t be bad”. He’s saying, “she loves you and it can’t be bad.” Now, I believe that because Paul and John both lost their mothers at a very young age. Paul, over the years, because he has lived into his seventies, he’s said many times that they got each other through. That’s the bond that they had. And I really do believe that that sentiment, that empathy that those guys put in those songs is real.
Brad Page: The acoustic guitar comes in on the stereo version. That’s in the left channel. I believe the drums are also in the, primarily in the left channel. And there’s an overdubbed tambourine. Now, there’s an interesting history of the stereo mix, right? That the stereo mix– correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe the stereo mix wasn’t done until, like, a year later or something?
James Campion: Yeah. When they were doing the Alan Klein “Hey Jude” record, which is just a bunch of singles that didn’t come out in America on a record. But interestingly enough, when they did the mono mix of “Hey Jude”, they did it from the original stereo acetate. It’s very odd– they did a stereo mix, but they didn’t do a true mono mix. They had to do a mono mix from the stereo, two tracks. And then that later was made a true… not “true”, but you know what they used to say, “fake stereo”, but, right, there was no official studio stereo version or mix of that until, like, 1970, almost when The Beatles were broken up. Oh, and by the way, the stereo version, the one you hear in the “Number Ones” album, the one you hear on the “Hey Jude” album, the one you hear today on Spotify, is not seven minutes and 11 seconds. So, in case anybody, and I’m sure people are going to come out of the woodwork when they read my book, this thing isn’t seven minutes. It’s seven minutes and 8 seconds, or seven minutes and 9 seconds. Because the stereo version they did, to get rid of the hiss, they just faded at that extra 2 seconds. And let’s face it, they’re singing “na na” for four minutes. Nobody felt they would ever notice this. But you know, uh, we’re nuts.
Brad Page: Of course! Yeah, hardcore Beatle fans are going to notice every bit of minutiae, but for the average listener…
And so, then on that second verse, you get the line, “don’t be afraid”. And again, when he says the word “afraid”, another kind of, if you will, negative word, like “bad”, he drops his voice down on that.
James Campion: Right?
Brad Page: Then there’s that line, “The minute you let her under your skin”… the songwriters in your book talk about it; usually, when you talk about somebody getting “under your skin”, it’s a negative, it’s an irritant. Right here, he’s encouraging it. He’s telling you to open up, to be vulnerable, to let that person in. You’re open to that potential irritation. But there’s a benefit there, too. There’s a positive to that. I just think it’s a really interesting turn of phrase.
James Campion: Yeah. And that’s, you know, my good friend and a gentleman I’m working on a book with currently, Adam Duritz, lead singer and main songwriter for Counting Crows. He was nice enough to give me some time for the book, and he really nailed it for me. He’s such an emotional singer and songwriter that it makes sense he would come up with this. He said, you know, Paul is writing from such a vulnerable point, and he’s saying, if you really want to love and be loved, you gotta be willing to be hurt.
Brad Page: Yes.
James Campion: You gotta let go and just lay it out there, man. Otherwise, you’re just cheating yourself and the person you love.
Brad Page: Yeah, yeah.
Brad Page: At that point, the backing vocals come in. I’m pretty sure that that’s the three of them, right? John, George, and Paul overdub, doing the, at that point, it’s the “Ah” right, the “ooh’s”. But they harmonize on the word “better”. It’s one of the few times where the backing vocals are actually hitting a word.
Brad Page: I think there’s an extra measure in there, isn’t there like a 9th measure?
James Campion: Yes, there is.
Brad Page: Yeah. There’s just that little extra measure there that kind of gives Ringo a chance to do a bit more of a fill. One of those classic Ringo drum fills with the tea towels on him.
James Campion: Right.
Brad Page: That real muffled drum sound that so classic Ringo. And he hits the ride cymbal, which is kind of an interesting choice there. That’s usually more of a chorus kind of thing, right? But he goes right for that there. And it’s so obvious in the mix. It really jumps out. That ride cymbal in the mix.
James Campion: And again, credit where credit’s due: Rob Sheffield, the great pop culture writer and music writer for Rolling Stone magazine, another guy who gave me hours of his time over and over again. He kept saying, “Ringo is the best on this song”. This song is not a song if not for Ringo. Ringo gives it all on this. Listen to Ringo here. This is a band song because Ringo’s making it a band song. He’s not letting you think that this is a singer songwriter. This isn’t Paul’s lament. This is a Beatles song. Yeah.
Brad Page: Just one of the most unique drummers. There’s a sound that you can, you know, it’s Ringo. There’s also the bass guitar comes in there, which is overdubbed by McCartney. Sometimes on Beatle tracks, the most flashy performance is the bass part. But this song, he’s really, he really holds back. It’s just very… it’s basic, and keeps the focus on the vocal and the piano part. But it’s not your typical McCartney. Sometimes the bass parts steal the show on some of the Beatles tracks, you know… not here.
James Campion: Yeah. And again, I have to give credit to the musicologists that I interviewed for the book, pointing out that Paul is writing the bass line on the piano. This is a piano bass line. He’s a bass player, but he’s adding that bass player aesthetic to the piano. And I write extensively, and I learned much about how much the piano meant to Paul as a child, getting over his mother’s death. His father used to play the piano, really engaging him into playing. The family all hung around the piano that sings songs. When he was a child, he really, to the point where Paul actually, in his twenties, when he was already a famous Beatle, took piano lessons. So he’s adding all those different elements into this bass line. And interestingly enough, when they did the live to tape version of it for the David Frost show– that famous clip, you could see it on YouTube– you see George is playing sort of a bassy guitar.
Brad Page: Yeah, the Fender VI. The Fender Bass VI, which is a six-string bass guitar.
James Campion: Yes. And just such a great subtle, you pointed out, a subtle way because Paul does, and thank goodness, add so much with his bass in all the songs and all The Beatles songs. But here, you’re right, he pulls up, he lets that piano, that left hand, really tell the story of music, right?
Brad Page: And he’s just following that. He’s not really embellishing much on the bass part, which, again, it’s fairly unique for him. I think of all his many talents, I think the one that he doesn’t, that he doesn’t give himself enough credit for is as a bass player. He’s my favorite bass player of all time.
At that point we get to the bridge, which is a descending chord progression. I always felt that when he’s saying, “don’t carry the world on your shoulders”, the chords are descending down, and to me, that kind of feels like you’re literally taking that weight off as the chords slowly descend there.
James Campion: The Beatles used that to great effect on dozens of songs. And Paul is utilizing, and we haven’t gotten into it, and if you want to, we can, Brad; you know, the origins of two melodies that Paul had ingrained into his system. Everyone takes something and then it incorporates it, whether it’s, you know, Bach, in the case of Brian Wilson in the Beach Boys, or the Mozart pieces that were used for Stevie Wonder; Paul is using two things. And I won’t get too deeply into it. I talk about it in the book, but in that bridge, there is a little bit of The Drifters’ “Save The Last dance For Me”.
James Campion: And it was Walter Everett who pointed that out to me, and we listened to it, and it’s there. There is echoes, there are fingerprints there of the music that made Paul want to pick up an instrument, that doo-wop sound, that late fifties, early sixties. It’s really amazing how he was able to combine sort of a gospel, African-American, southern feel in with a classically structured ballad.
Brad Page: In the book, you also talk about sort of a classic Irish piece of church music that you think was influential.
James Campion: If you listen to the first notes of John Nicholson’s, Ireland’s 1917 liturgical piece called “Te Deum”. But Paul goes in a palatable, more pop, more romantic way by lifting the melody, whereas the Te Deum, it’s much more solemn, written for like an organ, where Paul, but again, he’s taking these things. And in essence, and it was pointed out to me by Professor Devers and Professor Everett that Paul sang in the Liverpool Angelical Choir in 1950. So he was born in 42, so he had been, what, eight? So Paul is singing these songs. It has to be absorbing into him. And the fact that he’s writing this sense of comfort for another person, whether it’s Julian losing his dad and his family is breaking up, or he’s trying to implore John or himself or a friend to go after that woman of his dreams, the one that will complete him. To go back to something, uh, dare I say, religious or spiritual, really does speak to how important this song was for Paul. And nobody is suggesting that Paul ripped off or stole or was taking a homage to something. I truly believe these things were subconscious, and I doubt if he has, Paul now, he’d even remember that. But I think it’s in there purposely. I think the subconscious sometimes speaks to us when we’re being creative. And Paul is giving us the density of this early liturgical piece and saying, this is, again, a very important song I’m writing here. Yeah.
Brad Page: And I mean, let’s face it, in western music, at least, you’ve only got eight notes; There’s only so many combinations. I mean, sometimes it feels limitless, but it’s all in the little tweaks and spins you put on them. But they’re absolutely, no one’s going to invent a new note that no one’s ever heard before.
James Campion: And especially in pop music, let’s face it, this is pop music, certainly popular music, and it’s now considered a classic in the sense of rock class. But again, that’s what The Beatles did so well, didn’t they? You know, they changed it up. They did break molds.
Brad Page: And the second part of the bridge, the backing vocals change from “Ah” to “Ooh”.
And you mentioned it before that this is where the song sort of takes a break. He does that little “na, na, na”.
Brad Page: And you can actually hear George playing some electric guitar behind that, which actually echoes that little melody. So the few times George actually pops, his guitar pops out of the mix there. But in the book, you describe that little break, little piano break there as almost like a moment of Zen. I love that. It is a place to take a breath almost, and subconsciously reassess or something.
James Campion: Yeah. And it also foreshadows the na-na’s at the end. Yes, Brad, again, this is the combination of that magical thing that Paul talks about dreaming “Yesterday” and writing about it, but also his tactical, the structural things that The Beatles did so well. I talked about earlier about having the name of the song sung right off the bat to get people, jumps out of the radio. Here’s the song, here’s the melody. Everything you need to know is right here. What Paul’s doing there, I think, is he’s letting us breathe, as you mentioned, and I said a moment of Zen, because he’s going back to that “Hey Jude”. And it gets back to those two notes from the liturgical piece from 1917. Again, he’s letting you take a break there. And it’s amazing when there’s silence in a song like that. And it’s very quick, but when there’s silence in a song like that, it’s on purpose. But it also is something that we, subconsciously, we don’t get. But it’s there and it’s so important, man, it does reset the song.
Brad Page: And again, we got the line “don’t let me down”, and he hits a low note on “down”, about the lowest note in the song, and then we get lifted up again. And the way he sings that line, “you have found her”– the way he hits the word “her” there…
Speaker A: He uses different phrasing. I do spend some time, and did talk to vocalists and songwriters, about Paul’s phrasing here. Paul could have gone this way or that way, but he doesn’t. He changes it up for you. So even though it’s what seems like a pretty provincial ballad, is not because of the way he’s singing it. And you mentioned earlier about how he goes down on some of these words, which are significant. I also find it very significant that the first time he goes up high and, probably the highest point of his singing until he hits that real high note before the na-nas, is when he says, “take a sad song”, like he goes there. So the “sad song” is really the underlying theme of the song. There’s the sad song. And of course, I extrapolate that out in my book. 1968 was a pretty sad year with assassinations and war and riots. And he’s saying, we are in the midst of a sad song here. And I think it was Howard Sunes, one of his biographers told me, when Paul goes to the song, when he goes to music to describe an emotion, he’s not screwing around. That’s a big deal to Paul McCartney. So again, I hate to keep bringing this back to the fact that this seemed like a really important thing for Paul, but I really do think so. I think he really knew he was onto something here and he was trying to communicate some important elements and themes.
Brad Page: Yeah, yeah. There’s an interesting part where there’s an overdubbed voice, or maybe it’s a leftover voice that says, “let it out and let it in, Hey Jude”, kind of between the regular verses.
James Campion: I love that.
Brad Page: I love that too. That doesn’t happen anywhere else in the song. It happens here in sort of the third verse. And again, I always look at those things as just another creative way of giving you something new, that every time something cycles around, you’re just not repeating the first verse again. You’re building on that, you’re adding new elements. It keeps your ear interested and it makes the song exciting. It makes it something new in there that you didn’t hear before.
James Campion: You’re right. No, musically too. And that little part you’re talking about, “let it out, let it in, Hey Jude, begin”, you know, that whole bit, one of the things that was pointed out to me in his brilliant book, “The Recording Sessions”, Mark Lewison, who is the number one Beatle historian in the world, who was kind enough to send me back a couple of emails to sort of keep me on track. He lists out in that book all the parts in which, when Paul recorded it with the band, before he did the lead vocal, he recorded what they would call a guide vocal, which, you know, Brad, and they left a lot of that in that. You could hear that in there.
Brad Page: So you’ve got that there and then you’ve got John and Paul singing harmony and it’s just always so great.
James Campion: Yeah.
Brad Page: When the two of them sing together, there’s just really nothing like it. When they sing, “remember to let her into your heart” together, it’s just beautiful. John typically sings below Paul, but when you get to that line, “then you can start”, John goes high.
Brad Page: He goes over Paul. And that’s, that does not happen very much in The Beatles catalog.
James Campion: In fact, according to Tim Riley, never. That’s the only time that John went above him in a song, to his recollection. And this is a guy who’s written about every Beatles song several times. Now, I didn’t go that in depth, but I did quote him on that. Maybe somebody will go in and try to find another spot where John, now, there’s some times where John and Paul both go up—“It Won’t Be Long”, yeah, that kind of thing. And of course, “She Loves You”. And some of the high notes, they both sing, but yes, on a harmony, a single two- part harmony, John going up there and his voice sort of cracking, and it’s just the two of them singing… Oh, my God, it just breaks my heart every time, because I know what this song meant to John. “I thought this song was about go get Yoko”, and he was so in love with Yoko, you know, and it changed his life. It did. It changed his life. It changed everyone’s lives in the 1960’s. It changed the Beatles. So, to hear him singing that with Paul there, there’s just way more for us Beatles fans.
Brad Page: It’s just a beautiful, beautiful moment in the song. I just, I love that part. And then you get the next verse where you get the “let it out and let it in” the second time. He says that, which you actually talk about that line a few times in the book; you know, there’s just a lot said in “let it out and let it in”, just by itself, says a lot.
James Campion: It means nothing and it means everything. It really comes down to that. If you’re a poet or you’re a songwriter, or you’re someone who likes to deconstruct music the way I like to do it, and you do it on the show, that thing is just rings all the bells. I think it was Kylie Lotz, who goes by the name of “Petal” in her professional career– wonderful singer songwriter, young woman– just really nailed it when she said, it’s breathing, isn’t it? It’s just breathing.
Brad Page: The “Ooh’s” return in the harmony, and you get that line, “You’re waiting for someone to perform with”, which just is such a specific phrase that you know, so much of the rest of the song, I think anyone could apply it to their own personal feelings, but I’m not sure most people are looking for a partner to “perform with”, however you want to take that. But it’s just an interesting phrase to put in there that literally applies to the future of both John and Paul, Right” Because they both end up performing for the rest of their careers, as long as their partners are alive, with their significant other.
James Campion: Right.
Brad Page: But at that time, they weren’t. That line literally predicts the future.
James Campion: There’s no way that Paul didn’t know that when he wrote that. That’s what he’s saying now, did he think he was going to be in a band called Wings with Linda? No. Did John think? I think John did. I think John knew from the very beginning, because he did all those tape loops with her. He worked on the tape loop “Revolution Nine” with Yoko. She sings on “Bungalow Bill” with him. That line about, that is a very odd line for a love song. You find someone to perform with. Not perform sexually or…
Brad Page: No, it’s not a sexual thing at all.
James Campion: No. You’re going to go off and do this thing together. And this is a song about, you know, “you could do this”. You could do it. I’m right here with you. You don’t have to do it alone. So it’s pretty cool.
Brad Page: There’s another little George Harrison guitar fill that pops out there. Then you get the line– this is the line that always strikes me—“Don’t you know that it’s just you, Hey, Jude, you’ll do”. And that just touches me in a way that’s, it’s difficult for me to kind of really put that into words. But, you know– and I know Bruce Springsteen often gets a lot of crap for that line in Thunder Road where like, “eh, you’re not a beauty, but you’re all right”. And you could maybe say that here, that’s like, “you’ll do”. Well, that’s not like, you know, that’s not saying “you’re great”, “you’re awesome”… it’s “you’ll do”. But there’s something about that that’s just saying, it’s not hyperbole, it’s just like, “you’re good enough. You can do this”. “Don’t you know that it’s just you, you’ll do”, it moves me every time. And the way he sings “and don’t you know that it’s just you”, it’s probably his most soulful, most bluesy vocal effect, on the whole song.
James Campion: Yeah, I mean, his vocals, again, magnificent here. Uh, yes, I think this is the tightrope that he walks in this song. He’s saying, “I’m going to be there for you. I’m rooting for you”. But he also says, “you got this, you got this”. This is completely different than “All You Need Is Love”. But in a way, he’s telling Jude or Jules or you or me, you know, “you got this”. You got this. You don’t need a lot of mumbo jumbo. You don’t need the Maharishi. You don’t need a big steeple. You don’t need a ton of cash. You know, you could do this and whatever you want to apply to it. I think that’s what he’s saying.
Brad Page: Yeah, exactly. And then you get the line, “the movement you need is on your shoulder”. The most enigmatic line in the song.
James Campion: Yeah. When I saw him in ‘89, when he sang it, it gave me the chills, too. And then I find out later on that he told Bob Costas, Bob asked him, “do you ever think about the audience when you’re playing a song or singing to them?” And he’s like, “No, no. It’s just like being an actor. You’re doing lines, you’re trying to get through it, you’re in the song. You like to interact with the musicians on stage, but when I sing that line, I think of John.” And when you think of “the movement you need is on your shoulder”, which is such, as you said, perfectly enigmatic, could mean everything. And again, nothing. But John, of course, loved it. Paul just put it in there. He just had that in there. He even told John, “this is just a filler.” And he goes, “no, no, no, it’s the best line in the song”. And he respected John so much for it. And I think it was, again, Tim Riley, who told me, think about the ego and the it ownership, that John had a lot of those songs. If he did, when he did the Playboy interviews right before he died, he went through every Beatles song and he would say, “I helped him with this line. He helped me with that line”. “I kept Paul from going to Saccharine here, we did this”, he always said over. And even during their dark times, when they were fighting with each other publicly, he always said, “’Hey Jude’, that’s Paul, Paul’s baby. Probably his best song.” So to have that line in there, and him to blow Lennon away with it, and Lennon insisting he keeps it in there, and that Paul plays it 30, 40 years later and it still thinks of John on stage. Just absolutely beautiful.
James Campion: I love the fact that it’s on your shoulder. It comes right after you’ll do. It’s about you. You can do this.
Brad Page: Right? Right. You can move mountains. You can do it. The song is so full of those little moments that are just uplifting to your soul.
There’s another pause for that short little “na na na”, which he adds a yeah, at the end, which I would normally think that would just be like an ad lib, but it’s actually doubled. And then you get the last verse, the “Hey Jude”, where he has that melisma on the voice, where you’re not just hitting a note, but you’re scatting around it. McCartney was so great at that. “Hey Jude” harmonies on that verse by John.
Brad Page: And then– and this is something that I feel foolish, because, again, one of my favorite songs, I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve listened to this song… Never heard it till I read your book. But after they sing under your skin, John in the background says…
James Campion: Yeah, you can’t unhear that. Yeah. And it’s, and many people had a theory, and I throw them all in there, but I stick with the one that because Paul changed “heart” to “skin”, John was doing the harmony, and he blows the line, and then he just says, #@!&
And then when they were mixing it, I just wondered, why would they leave it in there? According to Jeff Emmerich, who was cleaning up the mix of it, John just came up to him and said, leave it in there. Leave it in there. No one will hear it. And if they do, it’ll be a little bauble for everybody. And, you know, biggest single in the history of Rhe Beatles, the biggest band on the planet, has the F-word in it, right?
Brad Page: That’s so great. And leave it to John to say, just leave it in there. But that would be my take on it, too. I think if you listen closely, it’s tough to tell, even when you isolate just the vocals, but I think you’re right that the previous verses “let her into your heart”, here he sings “let her under your skin”. And you can almost hear there, John start to sing “into” instead of “under”, and then, like, catches himself, and then lets the F-word fly because he blows the line.
Brad Page: It’s just funny. And again, when you think of The Beatles, how many people have played their songs backwards and forwards and inside out, looking for crazy stuff, backwards masking and whatnot? And this is right there, and nobody ever points that out, but it’s just great.
Then we get to really kind of the climax of the song, where they repeat the word “better”, climbing in pitch each time. There’s a classic Ringo drum fill. Under that little pause, Ringo hits a single hit on the hi hat. And then we are off into the second part of the song, which is a whole different animal. But I always hear– and I almost hate to put it this way, because I don’t mean it to be in a sexual way at all, but that “better, better” and then when he screams, yeah, it’s orgasmic.
James Campion: Oh, uh, no question.
Brad Page: You know, “orgasmic” just in the sense of release; build, climax, release. And it’s so emotional.
Brad Page: And that launches you into that second half of the song, that is longer than the beginning. I believe the first part of the song, where we are up until now is about three minutes. The remaining part of the song is four minutes, roughly, right?
James Campion: Yeah, it’s four minutes plus of just “na na’s”. So, we’re less than halfway through the actual record, but the song structure is over now. And now you have the “double amen”, or “plagal cadence” in the parlance of music, where you repeat that line over and over again. The famous, famous, nobody can forget it, everyone loves to sing along with it part. But before we leave the scream, I defy you to find, you could probably find equal, but is there one that’s better when someone goes up and up and up and he just exploded. And now he’s leaving that other part behind. He’s done talking to you, and now he’s making you feel like you’re part of something. He’s making Jude feel like, “don’t worry, you’re not alone here”. And that’s when the na na’s come in, and that’s where I feel he’s using gospel cords. He’s using gospel phrasing. He starts to do the melisma to get us there. The blues tropes.
Brad Page: Yeah. And as you just kind of pointed out, at this point, the song shifts from being very personal and intimate to being a communal experience. The first part is kind of like about you and making you feel better. Then you get to this part and it’s like, “You know what? We’re all together in this. We all have to figure this out, all have to work together if we’re going to survive, get through this together. We got to do it together.”
James Campion: Yeah. And of course, you know, that’s the sixties edict that The Beatles helped build.
Brad Page: You’ve reached a point in the song where you’ve transcended what you can say with actual words, and now you’re just chanting. He’s already said everything he could say to you in those first couple of verses now. It’s just the uplift of. It’s just like pure, unfiltered joy almost.
James Campion: And again, the “na na’s” break the barriers of language. I’m reminded of Paul playing it at the Kremlin, and I mentioned it in the beginning of the book, and I’m reminded of the thousands and thousands of young Russian kids singing “na, na, na”. And no matter where you go, you could sing that.
Brad Page: An interesting thing you also point out in the book is that, during this final section, the coda, if you listen closely in the right channel, you can hear some of those previous ad-libs from the initial run through. It’s still there buried in the mix.
I believe it repeats 18 times. Do I have that right? Is that the number?
James Campion: Yeah.
Brad Page: The number of “na na na’s”?
Speaker A: Yeah, it’s right around there. It’s fun to play with that and figure out how many, and I break it all down in the book. I can’t remember all of them right now. And George Martin said for years, music is mathematics. It’s magical math, but in the end, it’s math.
Brad Page: You just get this continual build here through the coda, where the second time around they add hand claps. I think it’s the fourth time around, the orchestra comes in, and then that’s where Paul comes in with that famous “Judy, Judy, Judy”. The 6th time around, I think the brass gets a little louder and he does that, you know, “you can make it, you’re not going to break it” ad lib in there. That’s great. The 7th time around, just riffing on the verse lines. “Hey, Jude, don’t make it bad. Take a sad song. Make it better.”
Brad Page: Around the 10th time, the fade starts to begin, so you get this really long fade that just takes forever. The 11th time, I think you can hear him say, “don’t go back, Jude”. And then the second to last time, Paul’s voice comes up a little bit in the mix for one last little screaming ad lib in there. And then that song just rides out. Just what a communal experience again, you get from that, that whole end section. It’s just, I find it so emotional.
James Campion: Yeah, well, I think I titled the last chapter “Comfort and Unity”. He got the comfort part. “Hey, Jude, you could do this, buddy”. And then, we’re all doing it together. No one should ever sleep on the fact that, again, as Rob Sheffield so beautifully said, this is a band song all the way through. And I think somewhere around the fifth or 6th, they just stop trying to play the song, and they’re just into that whole plagal cadence. Like that the band is a groovin’, there’s a part where they just groove. They’re not doing staccato punches on the acoustic guitar. They’re just flowing, and the bass is going, and Ringo is just doing his thing, and it’s a full… and Paul is really banging on the piano, so it’s a full, full band song on the way out. As you just pointed out beautifully, each section builds on another, and it never makes it boring. Ever makes it boring.
Brad Page: I my book, it’s just one of the greatest songs ever written and ever recorded. It’s a perfect song, I think.
James Campion: Yep. I agree.
Brad Page: So your book, called “Take A Sad Song”, what inspired you to write a whole book about this one song?
James Campion: Well, when I was a kid, as I said earlier, it affected me greatly. I just saw, I came up with this idea in late 2019, but then my father got sick and passed right before the pandemic. And then the pandemic hit. And I was home and I had the time and I said, this song seems to speak to that. To this. We’re all alone, but we’re kind of together. We’re going through this thing. We’re going to try to survive this thing. And it seemed to work in 1968, because when all that craziness was happening during the summer, and then, of course, after the election, it just seemed to be ‘68 again. Everybody’s saying, well, this is the worst year since ‘68. And it just, I felt like I was in it, you know, it just spoke to me. So “Hey Jude” is my favorite Beatles song, period. And once I started looking up different things about it and all the stuff we talked about on this podcast, and also, I thought it would be really cool to just break down one song to figure out why songs work, not just this song, but why songs affect us. And that’s why I talked to a psychology professor and a sociology professor in musicology, and history and songwriters and biographers and music journalists. I just kept asking them, why? Why do we still care about these songs, this song particular? And I think I got the answer in the book. And it really buoyed my spirits during the pandemic, and I hope it does when people read it, because that’s what I meant to do, is make them understand why music affects us.
Brad Page: It’s a remarkable piece of work, and I really enjoyed your book. It was such a great insight into this song. It was just a great read. I loved every minute. It was a pleasure reading the book. It’s been a total pleasure having you on the show to talk about this fantastic song. So, thank you for writing the book, and thank you for joining me on the show.
James Campion: Brad, thank you. You do some great work here. I really enjoy listening to your breaking down songs. I think you’re doing some, you’re doing a service to all of us who love music. Thank you. Coming from you, I really appreciate that. And, um, I hope people get out of it as much as I enjoyed putting it together. It really was a lot of fun, and it made me love the song more, made me love Paul more, and it certainly made me understand and love The Beatles more.
Brad Page: James Campion, thank you so much for joining me on this episode. It’s been great. Thank you.
James Campion: Thank you, Brad.
Brad Page: And thanks to everyone for listening. I hope you enjoyed this show. James Campion is the author of a number of great books, including “Accidentally Like A Martyr”, which is a series of essays on Warren Zevon, and “Shout It Out Loud”, the story of how Kiss made the “Destroyer” album, which was a big help to me when I put together my previous Kiss episodes. This new book is called “Take A Sad Song: The emotional currency of ‘Hey Jude’”, and it’s available online and in bookstores today. Please check it out, you won’t regret it. And please join me here again in two weeks for another new episode. On behalf of everyone on the Pantheon Podcast network, I thank you for listening. Now go take a sad song and make it better.
"In the Meantime/Some Other Time" (Mike Gibbins, Joey Molland) Copyright 1974 WB Music Group ASCAP
Nothing came easy for Badfinger. Though they had success with their first few albums (all of them are must-have classics), they soon had a tough time, thanks to terrible management, record label indifference and bad timing. In 1974, worn-down & exhausted from the non-stop touring/recording/touring again grind, they dragged themselves into the studio… and, with help from producer Chris Thomas, made one of their best albums. Many fans say it IS their best. Unfortunately, few people heard it as it was withdrawn from stores shortly after its release, thanks to legal shenanigans. Things only got worse after that. But this record is a masterpiece; let’s celebrate it with a look at the song “In the Meantime/Some Other Time”.
“In the Meantime/Some Other Time” (Mike Gibbins, Joey Molland) Copyright 1974 WB Music Group ASCAP
Oh, I can’t live if living is without you friends– this is the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast on the Pantheon Podcast Network. I’m your host, Brad Page, and this episode, we’re digging into a deep track back by Badfinger: “In The Meantime/Some Other Time”.
Most people, if they know Badfinger at all, it’s from their Beatlesque power pop hits like “Baby Blue”, “No Matter What”, “Come And Get It”, and “Day After Day”. We covered “Day After Day” on this show, way back in episode number nine. But Badfinger had a heavier side too, late in their career. After they had fallen off the pop charts, they released one of their best albums. And we’re going to listen to a track from that album, actually a blend of two songs called “In The Meantime/Some Other Time”.
Rock history is littered with artists who suffered bad management, financial disasters, misfortune and untimely death. But by any measure, the story of Badfinger may be the most tragic. It’s the one that breaks my heart the most. With Badfinger, everything that could go wrong did go wrong. And yet they managed to leave behind some incredible music.
The story of Badfinger begins in 1961 with a band called the Iveys. After years of paying their dues, in 1968 they signed to the new record label started by the Beatles, Apple Records. In fact, they were the first act signed to Apple. Pete Ham and Tom Evans on guitars, Ron Griffiths on bass and Mike Gibbons on drums, and all four members shared vocals. The Iveys recorded a couple of singles and an album, but they didn’t have much success. In 1969, Paul McCartney agreed to contribute three songs to the film “The Magic Christian”, starring Ringo Starr. McCartney had written one song for the film already, “Come And Get It”. And he offered that song to the Iveys. They recorded their version of it and it was featured in the film, along with two of their original songs. Before the songs were released, the band changed their name to Badfinger.
The first Badfinger album was issued in January 1970, and it included the three songs from the film, some other new material, and some tracks recycled from that previous Ivey’s album. After the release of that record, Ron Griffiths was pushed out of the band. Tom Evans switched to playing bass, and Joey Molland joined on guitars and vocals. This would be the classic Badfinger lineup. In November 1970, they released their next album, “No Dice”. “No Dice” is one of my favorite albums; it shows all the strengths of this band. All four members could write and all four members could sing. Pete Ham in particular was really coming into his own as a songwriter and singer during this period.
But 1970 also saw the band signing on with a new manager, Stan Polley. This turned out to be a bad move. Polley got them to sign a series of bad deals that would eventually cost the band everything. But the music kept getting better.
In May of 1971, they started work on their next album, and though they had to change producers three times before the album was done, “Straight Up” was released in December 1971, and it was their biggest success yet. “Straight Up” is universally considered a classic, and it spawned two big hits: “Day After Day,” which we talked about on the show before, and “Baby Blue”.
Unfortunately, in a case of one step forward and two steps back, they couldn’t capitalize on the success of the album, because Apple Records was falling apart. The Beatles had split, everyone was suing everybody else, and the cash dried up. Apple wasn’t able to promote the album. Whole situation was just a bummer.
But Badfinger was still under contract for one more album for Apple, so they recorded their last Apple album in 1972. They called that album “Ass”, as in “jackass”. But this time, the album was tied up in legal issues at Apple and it was put on hold. Stan Polley set them up with a new recording contract at Warner Brothers with a $3 million advance. Polley told them that they were all going to be millionaires, and it sounded great to them… unless you looked at the details. They were committed to do six albums in three years. That meant a new album every six months– a punishing schedule, and they had to pay to produce each of those albums out of that advance money. So after you deducted Polley ‘s cut as the manager, there was barely anything left for the band.
Six months after finishing the “Ass” album, they went back into the studio to make their first album for Warner Bros, simply titled “Badfinger”. That album was released in February 1974. But right before that album was released, Apple finally issued the “Ass” album, essentially putting two new Badfinger albums on sale at the same time… which confused everyone, including the buying public, which pretty much ensured that both albums were a commercial disappointment. Still, there were gigs to perform and contracts to fulfill, so after a US tour, the band headed back into the studio again, completely exhausted to work on another album. With no time to prepare new material, they barely had any finished songs, just a bunch of fragments and ideas. Thank God for producer Chris Thomas.
This would be Thomas’ third time working for Badfinger. He had produced the last two albums. He had also worked with the Beatles, Pink Floyd and Roxy Music. Chris Thomas knew what he was doing, so he sat down with the tired and dejected members of Badfinger and said, “the only way to beat this is to make the best album that anyone has ever made in the history of the world”. And damned if they didn’t come close.
Thomas worked with each band member to put the songs together. He asked them for any and every idea they could come up with. Partly inspired by side two of Abbey Road, he took different song ideas and worked out how to combine some of them. And that’s how we ended up with the song we’re going to listen to today. Drummer Mike Gibbons had an unfinished song called “In The Meantime. Guitarist Joey Molland had some fragments for a song he was calling “Some Other Time”. Producer Chris Thomas took those two ideas and found a way to blend them into one coherent song. It’s a masterful work of arranging.
Chris Thomas brought in Anne Odell to write string arrangements for some of the tracks, including this one. Odell created a dramatic crescendo to open.
Now we build to the first part of the song, Mike Gibbons contribution, “In The Meantime”. Pete Ham plays some nice lead guitar fills over an insistent piano part that’s filled with nervous energy. The vocal in this section is sung by Mike Gibbons.
Let’s stop to take a look at the music underneath the vocal here. The drums are doing a typical beat snare on the two and four. The bass is playing one note on each beat. The piano is playing two notes for every beat, twice as many as the bass. And then there’s a guitar hitting one chord every four beats. All of this mathematical playing gives the sense of an unrelenting movement forward, just like time itself. An unstoppable march forward like the ticking of a clock.
On top of that, the strings move in and out, swirling in the currents of time. Intricate little guitar part, before we return to the main section, Pete Ham on lead guitar. Now that guitar part returns to lead us to a new, much slower section.
Badfinger always had great vocal harmonies. Let’s see if we can bring those up in the mix a bit and listen to that again.
I love that arpeggiated guitar part there.
Nice little guitar part there, but it’s buried in the mix. Let’s listen to an alternative mix of this track where we can hear that a little clearer. There’s so much going on in this track, it’s easy for parts like that to get lost. This is one of those songs where every time you listen, you can hear something new.
There’s another variation of that guitar part in the background there.
Now the tempo rises and we’re introduced to a new section of the song. Listen for what sounds like castanets in the center, right. Such a great guitar. If there’s actually two guitars there, one playing a high part and one playing a lower part, that’s kind of hard to hear. Let’s bring both of those to the front section from earlier in the song.
Listen to how the strings embellish this section from earlier. You’ll hear a slight change in the guitar riff as we transition to the second part of the song.
Low in the mix there the backing vocals sing hold on echoing the lead vocal.
And here comes the big finale.
And some backwards guitar.
“In The Meantime/Some Other Time” by Badfinger.
The band released this song, along with eight other tracks, on an album called “Wish You Were Here”. Not to be confused with the Pink Floyd album of the same name, Badfinger’s “Wish You Were Here” was released in November 1974, and this album is a masterpiece.
But the Badfinger bad luck struck again. A large amount of cash that Warner Brothers had provided had gone missing. And Stan Polley was not responding. So, Warner Brothers sued the band’s management and then pulled the album out of the stores before it even had a chance to catch on. That just killed the album.
That was enough for Pete Ham. He quit the band. He eventually returned, but then Joey Molland quit, and they tried to make another album, but that wasn’t released.
By March 1975, all of their paychecks were bouncing, and Pete Ham was told that all his money was gone. On April 25, Tom Evans and Pete Ham went out for drinks. When Pete got home, he went out to his garage and hung himself. He was 27. He left a suicide note that read, “Stan Polley is a soulless bastard”.
The band eventually reformed and released a couple more albums that are pretty good, but just not the same without Pete Ham. There was conflict within the band, and at one point both Tom Evans and Joey Moland fronted two competing versions of Badfinger.
In November 1983, angry and frustrated, Tom Evans took his own life. He hung himself, too, just like Pete Ham. Two great singers, two brilliant songwriters and two good friends, both crushed by the heartlessness and cruelty of the business part of the music business.
Drummer Mike Gibbons went on to do quite a bit of studio work and released four solo albums. He died from a brain aneurysm in 2005.
Joey Moland is still out there. I saw him perform a set of Badfinger material a couple years ago. That was a great show. These songs, though, they carry the heavy weight of history. It’s hard to imagine a band with more heartbreak and tragedy than Badfinger. But the songs– the songs rise above it all. If you don’t have Badfinger’s “Wish You Were Here” album in your collection, go get it now. You will not be disappointed.
That’s it for this episode of the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast. What’s your favorite Badfinger song? Visit our Facebook page to post your comments and feedback. Just search for the “I’m In Love With That Song” podcast and you’ll find us there. Or share on our website, lovethatsongpodcast.com.
We are part of the Pantheon Network of podcasts; check out some of their other shows when you get a chance.
Thanks again for listening to this episode on Badfinger and “In The Meantime/Some Other Time”. We’ll see you next time.
RESOURCES:
Badfinger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badfinger
Pete Ham: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pete_Ham
Apple Records https://www.applemusic.com
The Magic Christian (Film) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064622/
Paul McCartney https://www.paulmccartney.com
The Beatles https://www.thebeatles.com
Warner Brothers Records https://www.warnerrecords.com
Stan Polley: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_Polley
Chris Thomas (Producer) https://www.allmusic.com/artist/chris-thomas-mn0000775910
Anne Odell (String Arranger) https://www.discogs.com/artist/
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