Recording the Beatles

By ROB PATTERSON

My rock autobiography binge has continued. Two of the ones I’ve enjoyed most have a technical recording bent to them. And led me back to listen again to the music discussed within.

Geoff Emerick’s “Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles” is required reading for serious Beatles fans as well as anyone in popular music who has ever worked in a recording studio (like me on both counts). He was the engineer and first assistant to producer George Martin on such landmark albums as “Revolver,” “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” and “Abbey Road” as well as other Fab Four recordings plus Paul McCartney’s pivotal LP with his group Wings, “Band on the Run,” plus such other diverse artists as Judy Garland, The Zombies and Badfinger. His discography as a producer includes two of my favorite albums: Elvis Costello’s “Imperial Bedroom” and Nellie McKay’s “My Weekly Reader.”

The book brings the reader into the Abbey Road studios for fly-on-the-wall/you-are-there accounts of the Beatles recording sessions he worked on. It spotlights not just the fascinating creative endeavors and collaborations of the four Beatles and Martin but also Emerick’s many contributions as an engineer and a keen set of ears. Perhaps the more general reader might not be as interested in microphone placement techniques or as into the details of recording on (first) four-tracks and then later eight as I am, but it does provide a primer of sorts for laymen to get an idea how recording music works. And is studded with intriguing accounts of the musical and technical adventurism, experiments and TK that made the Beatles albums Emerick engineered truly landmark popular music recordings.

The book often prompted me to take a reading break and go listen to the Beatles songs he discusses and marvel at how not just musically compelling but technically fascinating and great-sounding they are. I’ve been hearing that music for more than half-a-century and already knew it well. But thanks to Emerick’s details on the recordings, it’s like hearing them anew – and hearing new details one had never noticed before.

The book is also chock-full of non-musical stuff on the Beatles that helps us know them a bit better. And it illuminates the tensions and conflicts that led up to the band’s break-up. Last but not least, it’s an engaging and quite enjoyable read, rich with Emerick’s English charm.

Also engaging and charming is “A Spy in the House of Loud” by Chris Stamey, best known as a member of the NYC-based late-’70s/early-’80s rock-pop combo of North Carolina expatriates The dB’s. And known to me since those late-’70s when he also played with former Box Tops/Big Star cult hero Alex Chilton, and after that someone I have known relatively well.

One of the most enjoyable aspects for me of reading his superbly-written tome was learning how deeply and broadly Stamey has delved into music in his life, including our mutual college background of making electronic music with a Moog synthesizer (and I don’t mean Emerson, Lake & Palmer; my college prof gave anyone who did in our college class a ‘D.’ I got an ‘A’ but bummed that I took the class pass/fail). The book also sent me back to the dB’s albums to marvel at how sophisticated their work is beyond how sophisticated I already thought they were.

Stamey’s stunning musicality earns my awe and reminds me how sometimes we know not nearly enough about people we know, like and admire. And both books prove that rock life memoirs can run quite smart and deep, beyond the usual tropes of the genre.

Populist Picks

Book: “Me” by Elton John – Yet another highly-recommended rock autobiography read. Funny, utterly honest and modest, a charming and entertaining tome by a superstar refreshingly free of star attitude.

TV Series: “Nash Bridges” – Returning to the San Francisco-steeped Don Johnson cop-show vehicle to rewatch from the beginning. I used to consider it a guilty pleasure but now savor its redeeming and even intellectual merits. Fun!

Rob Patterson is a music and entertainment writer in Austin, Texas. Email orca@prismnet.com.

From The Progressive Populist, September 1, 2020

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