Going to see Ringo was rather strange. He prowled around his own domain, restless and worried-looking. At home, he was very much an Andy Capp figure, as was John, whereas Paul had picked up more middle-class habits thanks to his friendship with Jane Asher.
I think Ringo worried about the future. The touring days were over and he knew that in the studio, especially with all the new synthesizer equipment then coming in, his drumming was not really as vital as it used to be. Many times Paul would take over the drums in the recording studio, to explain what was wanted. While George and John were fed up with being Beatles, and Paul wanted it to go on a bit longer because he could see there were things they had still not done, Ringo’s future seemed blank. Apart from a bit of acting, he couldn’t see what else there was for him to do.
Neil Aspinall and Mal Evans, their two road managers from the early days, and still then their constant companions and aides, were always being asked which Beatle they liked best. It was an impossible, but natural, question. There were so many facets to each of them. Paul and Ringo, as far as the general public were concerned, were the ‘nicest’, yet I often met people who worked with them closely who moaned about them all the time. Unlike John and George, they could turn nasty in private, suddenly deciding they were being taken advantage of, by some assistant or tradesman, especially over money matters. When it came to money, John and George hardly seemed to care.
John was the most original, so I always thought, but Paul was the most naturally gifted. Music flows through him all the time, and he is also gifted with the aptitudes to make the most of his talents. George was a combination, both original and talented, yet in ways different from the other two. Ringo had no pretence, and was totally without intellectual aspirations, unlike the other three, nor did he have any illusions about his work or worth. He had a commonsense approach to everything, and could be very quick-witted and sharp.
I looked forward equally to my conversations with each of them, but perhaps enjoyed Paul’s and John’s company most. They were also interested in my world, life at large, discussing topics of the day, that’s if it wasn’t one of John’s days for not talking to anyone. They were both, surprisingly, starved of good chat, which is why, I suppose, some strange people with odd ideas did come into their life from time to time.
Their lives in the last ten years had been so extraordinary that I was interested in all their observations, however naive. They had so little idea of how the real world worked, having been sealed off from reality for so long. John, for example, could not use the telephone. People had made his calls for so long that he had forgotten how to do it.
They were like specimens, people from another planet, who saw things differently from the rest of us, uneducated, unformed minds, yet they had seen things and experienced events and emotions the rest of us can only imagine. They had no conceit, which I found surprising, neither about their music nor their fame. They honestly believed that everyone, if they put their mind to it, could achieve what they wanted to in life. They had done it, so they did not see why others could not. The whole philosophy of Apple, idiotic and crazy though it was, was based on helping others to help themselves. They believed that education and training of any sort were a waste of time. They had broken all the rules, when people had told them they would never do it, coming from Liverpool, singing like that, so they believed others could do the same.
They were all seeking something, especially John and George, without knowing what it was, feeling a certain vacuum in their lives, an emptiness after all those hectic Beatle years. Every superstar since has felt much the same, and probably every pools winner or bingo millionaire or lottery winner, at least those with the slightest element of sensibility.
I too used to be asked which Beatle I liked most. And I used to reply by saying my favourite Beatle was the one I was last with. That was how Neil and Mal always used to reply, which was why I wanted to carry on observing them for ever, rather than getting on with the more mundane task of putting it all down on paper.
By the beginning of 1968, I was still interviewing away and had amassed about 150,000 words of notes. That book about British universities had almost gone from my mind. I thought about changing the title yet again, to the Class of ’68, then decided now to scrap the whole thing. There had been student revolutions and demonstrations, and the whole nature of university life had changed.
I was concentrating completely on the Beatles, though I was putting off actually starting to write the book. Sergeant Pepper had come out, to enormous acclaim, and that really changed the image of the Beatles in the eyes of those people who still tended to regard them as a passing fancy. Things were still changing and I didn’t want to miss any new stages, yet I knew I must soon call a halt and knock it all into shape. Every Beatle record, from 1963 to 1969, contained something new and different. Would I miss a dramatic new musical development by stopping now?
The most enjoyable part of doing the whole book was being present at Abbey Road. John’s doziness at home left him when he came into the studio. Working with Paul seemed to make him more alive. If he couldn’t finish a song, then Paul would help him out. They remained themselves, producing their own sort of music, but each other’s presence seemed to bring out the best in each of them. And if they did get completely stuck, ending up with two bits of tunes that did not appear to gel, as in ‘A Day in the Life’, then George Martin was there to solve the problem of melding them together.
They usually assembled at Paul’s house in Cavendish Avenue, St John’s Wood, in the afternoon, going up to the top floor where John and Paul would try out any new little ideas they had had on their own. It was all fairly informal, with close friends and relations coming in, hanging about, and they would all break for fried eggs and toast and tea. By the time they got into the studio in the evening, just round the corner in Abbey Road, and George and Ringo had then turned up, it would become more serious. Outsiders would not be allowed in the studio when they were working.
John and Paul would write out on the backs of envelopes or scraps of paper the latest words or versions of the songs they were working on, then give them to Ringo on the drums, so he would know what was happening. Bits would be altered as they went along, and new parts added.
At the end of the sessions, in the small hours of the mornings, I would often pick up scraps lying around, asking first if I could have them, as they obviously didn’t want them any more. They always said yes. A great deal of stuff was simply chucked out, or left for the cleaners to get rid of. They themselves never kept any memorabilia or cuttings or scraps about themselves. For years, life had moved on so quickly that they had no interest in collecting or keeping that sort of clutter.
I know that Paul and George later regretted this and made an attempt to collect their own past, once they started getting into their middle age. I gave George back the original of ‘Blue Jay Way’, written on the back of someone else’s letter when he was in California. He thought it had been lost for ever. And I gave Paul his master plan for Magical Mystery Tour, which he had written out for me in 1968 for the purpose of this book, to explain what his idea had been, but which I never had space for in the end. My own collection, bits they had given me as presents, was severely depleted some years ago when our house was burgled and I lost my Beatle records, copies they had personally signed to me. I’m sure their value was not realized. I often wonder where they are now, which is why I watch the Sotheby’s sales so carefully. I only wish now I had collected more of their songs from the floor of Abbey Road.