17. The Long And Winding Road (Beatles)
One of the last Beatles songs, Paul McCartney wrote this
based on tensions within the band.
The road McCartney is talking about is the B842 which runs
down the east coast of Kintyre and on into Campbeltown near his Scottish
farmhouse.
McCartney: "I just sat down at my piano in Scotland,
started playing and came up with that song, imagining it was going to be done
by someone like Ray Charles. I have always found inspiration in the calm beauty
of Scotland and again it proved the place where I found inspiration."
The Beatles recorded this in January, 1969 as a fairly
simple ballad. By 1970, The Beatles were breaking up and and Phil Spector was
brought in to go through the tapes and produce the album. Spector was known for
his "Wall Of Sound" recording technique, where he added many
instruments and layered the tracks to create a very full sound. On this, he
took out most of The Beatles instruments and added a string section and choir
(The Mike Sammes Singers). The result was very different from what the group
originally had in mind. Even though he wrote this, Paul McCartney didn't go to
the sessions where Spector produced it. When McCartney heard the results, he
made it clear that he hated what Spector did to his song, and tried to get the
original version, which was mixed by engineer Glyn Johns, on the album. The
band was already falling apart, and this caused further turmoil within the
group, as Harrison and Lennon both supported Spector. Paul has not changed his
stance over the years, and still believes Spector butchered it. Lennon and
Harrison felt otherwise, and each had Spector produce their next solo efforts.
Lennon said of Spector's work on Let It Be: "Phil was given the
s--ttiest load of badly recorded s--t with a lousy feeling to it, and he made
something of it."
The Beatles performed this in the movie Let It Be.
Both the movie and album were the last The Beatles released. Abbey Road
was the last album they recorded.
This was offered to Tom Jones in 1968 on the condition it be
his next single. He had "Delilah" set for release so he turned down
the offer, something he would later regret.
This was the only Beatles song where John Lennon played
bass. He was ordinarily their rhythm guitarist. Harrison and Ringo had their
parts removed by Phil Spector, so they don't appear on this at all.
Alistair Taylor, the General manager at Apple Records,
witnessed Paul McCartney's recording of the original demo version of this at 3
in the morning. "He was picking out a melody and I said 'I like that, it's
a fabulous melody,' and he said, 'It's just an idea.' He told the engineer to
switch on the tape and he recorded 'The Long And Winding Road' then and there:
it was full of la-las as he'd only written a few lines, but it was quite
fantastic."
McCartney blocked release of the song as a single in the UK,
but he could not prevent its release in the US where it topped the charts for 2
weeks.
In 2003, Apple Records released a new version of the album called
Let It Be... Naked, with Spector's production removed. For this song, a
previously unreleased take was used when it was remixed. This version is what
McCartney had in mind when he wrote the song.
Some of the many artists who covered this song: "Tony
Bennett, George Benson, Cilla Black, Ray Charles, Cher, Judy Collins, Peter
Frampton, Aretha Franklin, Richie Havens, Cissy Houston, Gladys Knight and the
Pips, Liberace, The London Symphony Orchestra, Barry Manilow, Mantovani, Johnny
Mathis, Bill Medley, George Michael, Olivia Newton-John, Billy Ocean, Stu
Phillips, Kenny Rogers, Diana Ross, Kevin Rowland, Sarah Vaughan, Andy Williams
and Nancy Wilson.