The genius of George Harrison and why he’s still underrated

[@johngreen5293]

Not a single mention of The Concert for Bangladesh, which set the template for Charity concerts and was totally down to Harrison's drive and generosity (fantastic concert as well). So, he didn't always just sit around waiting for others. I also believe that he was the initial driving force behind The Traveling Wilburys.

[@garyrigby21]

I love George's solo albums

[@desmondmccabe8321]

all of them

[@garyrigby21]

@desmondmccabe8321 I like all of them too

[@keriford54]

When he said that George's output dropped off with his self titled album I couldn't disagree more, it is a gorgeous album, one of my favourites. Of all the Beatles solo catalogues I find George's the most satisfying, there is real emotional depth and sincerity in his writing, his albums are always made with care. Brainwashed his final album is still fantastic.

[@ContemplativeCat]

@@keriford54 I think George always did exactly what he wanted to do and didn't much care what critics thought.

[@MercuriusHibernicus]

Without a doubt George was underrated and added an entire emotional/spiritual component that was missing from Lennon & McCartney but I don't know what to think of all these books... if you're already interested you've heard it all before and could type out a manuscript from memory... the whole Beatles industry has become absurd in many ways and George would always ask... 'were you there?'

[@JJONNYREPP]

The genius of George Harrison and why he’s still underrated 2046pm 10.11.24 i think they harped on about George Harrison being the underrated beatle 20 odd years ago... i think when discussing his demise. i think the humour came from his rutland weekend tv skit where he began with my sweet lord and fell into the pirate song... a pirate's life for me etc etc who sailed the seven seas... though being an educate carrot is the only way to get one's voice heard in such matters as these. i mean, i just played a word: pander on this online word game thingy................ and it suggests pander is not a word. if i'd have had ginger hair that word would surely have been allowed. as would Geroge Harrison's status as the workman behind the beatles tunes. not so much his religion, though...

[@desmondmccabe8321]

he was and is underrated, partly because of the relative thinness of his voice - none of his albums are easy to listen to all the way through (for that reason alone) - but (in my opinion) he rarely wrote a song in his solo 'career' (to the late 1990s) that couldn't have fitted somewhere into a beatles album (maybe a minor track but often a medium track) - his lyrics were consistently thoughtful and surprising to the very end and his songs had bite and melodic complexity always - even the least of them (miss o'dell, cockamamie business, poor little girl and others). You need to mix his songs with those of the others to get the grit and value in them - that is easy to miss otherwise - you need their sweetness to appreciate his 'sourness'. He was far and away more consistent in quality than the others as a solo beatle (mccartney is wildly uneven).

[@JJONNYREPP]

The genius of George Harrison and why he’s still underrated 2055pm 10.11.24 he had a thin voice? he was a discernable beatle. only lost in the limelight of the most attractive and media friendly face - such as PM and JL allegedly had. they been there and done that etc during the mess that was germany. and were left to get on with it as popular culture icons or victims of media hackers. there's far too much mist where the beatles are concerned which dulls the senses re: what it was all about. you had to be there. as with most things. we are just left to listen and concur with what was. or allegedly was. easy enough to comprehend.

[@Suburbangeek]

Plus, from 1973, there's the almost magnificent Don't Let Me Wait Too Long, the co-write of Ringo's mega-seller, Photograph and the loopy, musically unusual, Sunshine Life For Me.

[@JJONNYREPP]

@@Suburbangeek The genius of George Harrison and why he’s still underrated 0638am 11.11.24 which i shall listen to now. surprised these guys haven't chatted about ringo's musical input - both from the novelty aspect of the beatles and as a solo performer... david essex's films also might need discussing..

[@dimsylsodium1]

I was at a Pat Metheny (solo) concert this week. One of his encores got an immediate audience response as soon as he played the first 4 notes. That encore wasn't even a Pat Metheny original. It was "And I Love Her" - so recognisable because of George's acoustic guitar part.

[@ContemplativeCat]

There's an interview in which Paul talks about George's guitar work on 'And I Love Her'. He said it made the song.

[@kennyhaughan9605]

Going to see Pat in Birmingham on Thursday! I’ll watch out for any reaction to the Harrison intro.

[@dimsylsodium1]

I have no idea if he has a fixed set list or not. He did quite a lot of talking during the concert. And I had the impression that since he was performing without anyone else on stage, to some extent he was playing what he felt like. But I could be wrong. I can only say that I had a great time and thoroughly enjoyed the concert. I hope you experience the same thing.​@@kennyhaughan9605

[@michaele9751]

@@ContemplativeCat and Til There Was You...George is brilliant.

[@RobertBush-cb1gz]

"Don't Bother Me" from Meet/With the Beatles remains his best work- I'm just waiting for McCartney to take all the credit for it.

[@KevKavanagh]

Pretty sure George was onto obscure American R'n'B like Got My Mind Set On You because his sister moved to the USA, he'd visit her, source the records while he was there, then bring them back with him (this is a Google free memory of a factoid I've encountered somewhere or other).

[@AndrewjWilson]

George should of wrote songs with the brilliant Badfinger. What a combination that would of been

[@markuspboeddeker5930]

Should've

[@kennyhaughan9605]

I love all George’s stuff. I feel his best work is when he was supported by a great band. Beatles - think for yourself & if I needed someone / taxman & I want to tell you / something & here comes the sun. Derek and the dominoes- all things must pass. Is it reasonable to say that the arrangements of here comes the sun, something, art of dying, awaiting on you all, my sweet lord transcend the songs themselves?

[@Glicksman1]

Regarding George’s famous “’ Til There Was You” solo, it’s an outlier, a one-off. George never played in that style or used those kinds of phrases, intervals, or note choices before or after it. It is indeed an excellent, remarkable solo - too excellent and remarkable, in fact, for it to have had its genesis in George’s musical imagination at that or at virtually any future time. While the reason for this and where it came from is, of course, a matter of speculation, I think that George was carefully taught that solo, every note and phrase of it, by a jazz guitarist who well-knew how to play in that genre, which George certainly did not. Some of what he learned from that jazz player must have stayed with him, however, although he did not use it again until his beautiful solo in “Something” which distinctly smacks of this kind of playing. Accordingly, I do not credit the TTWY solo to George’s ability on guitar other than that his ears and ability to learn and mimic what someone taught him were apparently fairly keen. It’s not a technically difficult solo to play (or George would not have been able to play it, at least not then); however, to create it would have required a good understanding of jazz harmony and phrasing that Geoge had never before or since demonstrated that he possessed or of which he ever had the slightest knowledge. His guitar style, particularly in the first three years or so of the Beatles’ meteoric rise to mythological status indicates that his guitar heroes were primarily American country players. While Chet Atkins, who as a county/jazz player was perhaps the greatest American guitarist of his era was a strong influence on George, he, like so very few, if any, never mastered Chet’s fabulous pan-fretboard, multi-string finger-style, or his unique virtuosity on the instrument. George’s choice of and preference for bright, twangy, single-coil pickup guitars such as his DeArmond pickup-equipped Gretsch Duo-Jet (my vote for the best guitar he ever had), Rickenbacker 420 six-string, Gretsch Tennessean, Fender Stratocaster, Epiphone Casino, Fender Telecaster (his two filtertron-equipped Gretsch Country Gentlemans being exceptions and no doubt sonically if not visually disappointing) also indicates this. I always smile when I hear “’ Til There Was You”, as I do think that I might just have guessed the secret behind what George played on it.

[@danieladams9950]

There are times when David and Mark know far too much about the subject than the interviewee. This was one.

[@Pete-Fisher]

Yet another book that nobody needs, written by someone who would have been 2 when the Beatles went to Hamburg and 9 years old when they split up and had probably never heard of them. Why would I need to read about why George Harrison is a brilliant musician and songwriter? I've thought that ever since hearing all the Beatles albums when they came out, and bought All Things Must Pass in early 1971.

[@danieladams9950]

M'lud may I direct you to 'All Things Must Pass' as counter-argument. Also, 'If I Needed Someone' is the best song on Rubber Soul.

[@jasonladd6400]

I get why he was discouraged after that ridiculous My Sweet Lord lawsuit judgement and being ripped off elsewhere. Must have been hard to take. Interesting he died at same young age of 58 as his latter day friend Gary Moore who was also victim of an absurd meritless lawsuit in a German court.

[@MrBrindleStyle]

How much time did he spend in Australia.

[@candelise]

Alan Klein and his reputation were suspect long before The Beatles. The Rolling Stones, anyone?

[@paulmargach9403]

I agree with David about Beatles covers of Chuck Berry songs being better than the originals. For all of his many attributes (guitar playing, songwriting, showmanship), Berry wasn't much of a singer. In fact, he had easily the weakest voice of all their idols.

[@tomcarl8021]

Not one Chuck Berry cover The Beatles covered or recorded was superior to Chuck's original. Not one. Their version of 'Roll Over Beethoven' was the perfect example of watered down whiteboy British crap. I'm am so tired of Beatle worship.

[@2009framat]

@@tomcarl8021 The ROCK & ROLL MUSIC cover of the Beatles is better than Berry's but ROLL OVER BEETHOVEN by Chuck Berry is still the best version that was ever recorded.

[@candelise]

It feels a bit thin to hear from someone who was a, to be frank, a whippersnapper at the time of The Beatles era telling us about history many Beatle fans already know. At this point I am more down with people who were there or of that generation.

[@pedrorocha9722]

He's so underrated that one of his Beatles songs is the most listenned on spotify. As for the rest, between 72 and 87, give take year, his musical path was just a bit less unimpressive than Ringo's.

[@markuspboeddeker5930]

Yeah, he just just wrote 22 songs for the band. Most of them top drawer. That's more than Paul bleedin McCartney can muster.

[@MrBrindleStyle]

Shit! The guy who stand Harrison only got 3 years psychiatric! No prison!

[@billythedog-309]

l don't think he's underrated. There have been numerous defences of poor George not being respected enough as a songwriter and perhaps he should have been encouraged more, but the fact is he wasn't as good as Lennon and McCartney. He wrote a handful of good songs and two great songs, but he didn't have the consistency to maintain his composing at a high level and never again reached the heights of Something and Here Comes the Sun in his subsequent career.

[@apollomemories7399]

It's All Too Much is easily one of the best songs by anyone.

[@innertube47]

On his own compared to a partnership. What about Lennon/Harrison if John had tried as hard as George did with John’s songs. Same with Paul (to be fair though he did put a bit of effort in to G’s songs). Anyway, solo George wrote a few songs that would have graced a Beatles album eg Isn’t It a Pity, indeed it is a pity..

[@michaele9751]

Idiotic comment

[@michaelb.9548]

Agree but You forgot While My Guitar Gently Weeps and Taxman.

[@michaele9751]

@michaelb.9548 and If I Needed Someone, Think for Yourself, It's All Too Much, Old Brown Shoe and 17 songs on ATMP... No one who was ever in a band could think they weren't all essential

[@LaughingStock_]

Oh, please. George is underrated for a reason - he only wrote 3 excellent Beatles' songs and an excellent solo LP. The rest? Sorry, he simply was not that good enough as a songwriter. Far, far too much fluff.

[@miketomlin6040]

His solo Lps were horrendous, could not sing!, then the nadir of the ghastly Wibury's! Seems to be the fate of Beatles members to struggle, musically speaking, post their ceasing to be!