14. Come Together (Beatles)
Timothy Leary was a psychologist who became famous for
experimenting with LSD as a way to promote social interaction and raise
consciousness. Leary did many experiments on volunteers and himself and felt
the drug had many positive qualities if taken correctly. When the government
cracked down on LSD, Leary's experiments were stopped and he was arrested on
drug charges. In 1969, Leary decided to run for Governor of California, and
asked John Lennon to write a song for him. "Come Together, Join The
Party" was Leary's campaign slogan (a reference to the drug culture he
supported) and was the original title of the song. Leary never had much of a
campaign, but the slogan gave Lennon the idea for this song.
After Timothy Leary decided against using this song for his
political campaign Lennon added some nonsense lyrics and brought it to the
Abbey Road sessions. Paul McCartney recalled in Rolling Stone magazine's
500 Greatest Songs: "I said, 'Let's slow it down with a swampy
bass-and-drums vibe.' I came up with a bass line, and it all flowed from
there."
In a 1980 interview with Playboy magazine, John
Lennon said: "The thing was created in the studio. It's gobbledygook.
'Come Together' was an expression that Tim Leary had come up with for (perhaps
for the governorship of California against Reagan), and he asked me to write a
campaign song. I tried and I tried, but I couldn't come up with one. But I came
up with this, 'Come Together,' which would've been no good to him - you
couldn't have a campaign song like that, right?"
John Lennon was sued for stealing the guitar riff and the
line "Here comes old flat-top" from Chuck Berry's "You Can't
Catch Me." The lawsuit did not come from Berry, but from Morris Levy, one
of the music industry's most infamous characters. He owned the song along with
thousands of other early rock songs that he basically stole from the poor,
black, and unrepresented artists. Levy sued the Beatles, or more accurately,
John Lennon, over the song around the time the Beatles broke up. For years,
Lennon delayed the trial while he and the Beatles tried to sort out all the
legal and business problems that plagued Apple Records. Finally, in an attempt
to avoid the court room as much as he could (Lennon felt like he was appearing
in court more often than not), he settled with Levy. In return for dropping the
suit, Lennon agreed to record his Rock N Roll album, which was just a
series of covers of songs Levy owned. Lennon always wanted to make a cover
album and was thrilled to have the opportunity, and Levy wanted the value of
his songs to increase, and when a Beatle re-records a song, that is just what
happens. To make a long long long story short, Lennon recorded the album over
the Lost Weekend, a year-or-two period when he was separated from Yoko Ono and
lived in LA. During that time he was often drunk or high, and was rather sloppy
and useless. Levy was getting frustrated with the lack of progress. Phil
Spector was the producer, but in a fit of madness (which was not too unusual
for Spector) he ran away and stole the recording session tapes. Levy invited
Lennon to his upstate NY recording studio, and that is where he finally
recorded the album.
The whispered lyric that sounds like "shoot" is
actually Lennon saying "shoot me" followed by a handclap. The bass
line drowns out the "me."
The Beatles recorded this on July 21, 1969 and it was the
first session John Lennon actively participated in following his and Yoko's car
accident 3 weeks earlier. John was so insistent on Yoko being in the studio
with him that he had a hospital bed set up in the studio for her right after
the accident, since she was more seriously injured than he was.
The line "Ono sideboard" refers to Yoko.
The British Broadcasting Company (The BBC) banned this
because of the reference to Coca Cola, which they considered advertising.
This has one of the most commonly misheard lyrics in the
history of popular music: "Hold you in his -armchair- you can feel his
disease." It's actually "Hold you in his arms, yeah, you can feel his
disease." All published sheet music had the "armchair" lyric,
including the inner sleeve of the 1967-1970 compilation, which contained lots
of other errors too, notably on "Strawberry Fields Forever." After
John heard that his lyric was incorrect in the sheet music and other folios, he
decided he liked "armchair" better and kept it.
The Beatles released this as a "double A side"
single with "Something."
In 1969, this won a Grammy for best engineered recording.
A rotary phone was used to make the sound heard before each
verse and after the chorus. The sound was accompanied by the bass Paul played.
Kids, ask your parents or grandparents what a rotary phone was.
Aerosmith's cover version was a #23 hit in 1978. They played
villains that year in the movie Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band,
which is considered one of the worst films ever. Peter Frampton and The Bee
Gees were also in the movie.
In 2001, Beck, Moby, Marc Anthony, and Nelly Furtado were
scheduled to put on a tribute concert in Radio City Music Hall called
"Come Together: A Night For John Lennon." Due to the terrorist
attacks on America, it was postponed and dedicated to the people of New York
City, with proceeds benefiting victims of the attacks.
Nortel used this in commercials, as did Macy's.
This has been covered by Michael Jackson, Tina Turner, Meat
Loaf, Guns N' Roses, Soundgarden, Marilyn Manson, Nazareth, and Oasis.
Though Ringo is best known for playing on Oyster Black Pearl
Ludwig drum kit, he used for this his Ludwig "Hollywood" maple-finish
equipment, with a 22" kick. Starr produced his distinctive late '60s drum
muffling sound on tracks like this by wrapping tea towels (dishtowels) around
his snares and toms.