First pop record using only Indian instruments?

Photo by Saubhagya gandharv on Unsplash

George Harrison’s first serious attempt at an ‘Indian’ composition had the unpromising working title of “Granny Smith”. George revealed his 'difficulty with words' in an interview with Maureen Cleave for the London Evening Standard in February 1966.

He wishes he could write fine songs as Lennon and McCartney do, but he has difficulty with the words. “Pattie keeps asking me to write more beautiful words,” he said. He played his newest composition… ’Love me while you can: before I’m a dead old man…’ George was aware that these words were not beautiful.

Evening Standard readers may have had the impression that “Love You To” was a love song celebrating George’s recent marriage to new Pattie (Boyd). The couple had, after all, just returned from honeymoon in the (then) impossibly glamorous Barbados.

Perhaps more pertinent, however, was another Maureen Cleave’s observation from the same interview. Indian music and culture, she noted, “has given new meaning to [his] life”. In fact, George would later admit that this new passion had threatened to overwhelm any marital obligations.

I felt I wanted to walk out of my home that day and take a one-way ticket to Calcutta. I would even have left Pattie behind in that moment.

Anyone play tabla?

George booked studio time to record “ Love You To” in April 1966. On the day of recording a snag emerged. “I can do the sitar part,” George announced, “but we need a good tabla player”. This request created blank stares amongst Abbey Road staff. The tabla — a two-handed drum- was an instrument unfamiliar to western musicians.

Double hand-drum: tabla

Ever resourceful, George Martin contacted the north London-based Asian Music Circle. They recommended Anil Bhagwat, a twenty-five year old engineering student. The young man was astonished to find himself being whisked to the royal court of the pop world.

A chap called [Ayana] Angadi called me and asked if I was free that evening to work with George … he didn’t say it was Harrison. It was only when a Rolls-Royce came to pick me up that I realised I’d be playing on a Beatles session. When I arrived at Abbey Road there were girls everywhere with Thermos flasks, cakes, sandwiches, waiting for the Beatles to come out.

Recording

Inside the studio, Bhagwat found Ringo & John playing chess, while Paul had apparently gone home

George then arrived, with a basic demo track he had recorded with Paul earlier in the day. The two men from contrasting musical traditions then listened on headphones. Bhagwat was struck by what he termed the ‘Beatle elements’ — the stops and starts and fixed structure.

George told me what he wanted and I tuned the tabla with him. He suggested I play something in the Ravi Shankar style, 16-beats, though he agreed that I should improvise. Indian music is all improvisation.

Sitting on the studio floor, Bhagwat and Harrison rehearsed by playing along to the demo track. After after around a dozen run-throughs, they were ready to record

To capture an ‘in your face sound’, they recorded into high performance ribbon microphones. These had been ingeniously integrated into the instrument speakers by sound engineer Geoff Emerick.

They completed six takes, and chose the final one. At the end of the session, a car took Baghwat to his flat in Earls Court. Very unusually, his contribution was name-checked on the back cover of Revolver.

Reception

When Revolver was released in August of the same year, “Love You To” was greeted with astonishment. Many were suspicious about the high quality of Harrison’s sitar playing, but decades later Bhagwat has insisted that these doubts were unfounded

It was George on the sitar throughout. There were no other musicians involved. It was just me and him source: Steve Turner Beatles 66 p.149

Peter Lavezzoli has suggested that “Love You To” is “the first conscious attempt in pop to emulate a non-Western form of music in structure and instrumentation”. In other words, the song that began as Granny Smith became foundation disc of what would become known as world music.