Produced by Jeff Lynne

Incompetently...

 

I'll see if I can dig that Martin interview up.

I can understand where you're coming from about Lynne's production. I like it, and the "Threetles" all liked it as well. So it's easier for me to handle it as opposed to something like Spector's work, which Paul clearly never liked from the get-go.

I also feel that the song sounds more like what the Beatles would sound like circa 1994, because they certainly would have sounded different had they stayed together in those intervening 24 years. They wouldn't have still been trying to recreate a 1968 sound, etc. I guess to me, the songs sound enough like what each of them were doing solo circa 1994, and even close enough to what Lennon was doing circa 1980 and my best guess as to what Lennon might have sounded like solo circa 1994. That's not to say FAAB and RL sound just like what they were doing, but the production certainly isn't too dissimilar from what was appearing on "Time Takes Time" or "Cloud Nine" or "Flaming Pie" around this time, which of course brings us back to the fact that the "Threetles" both collectively and individually like what Lynne was doing.

I hope I can find that George Martin interview. I remember one of the comments he made seemed to indicate to me that he wasn't actually too aware of how the Threetles had actually recorded the songs, because one of the things he described (again, my memory is fuzzy here) that he would have done differently was something along the lines of re-recording the songs and then laying Lennon's demo back onto the finished songs, when in fact this is precisely what Lynne did with FAAB.

 

Then why did Ringo play those in the first place? If they're such an un-beatley element, why would three Beatles allow them to be placed on a Beatles record?

 

FWIW, I think Jeff Lynne's productions are a mixed blessing. Typically* when you hear one, it's unmistakeably his. This has its upsides and its downsides. For ELO obviously, it's perfect. Songs such as "All Over The World" or "Twilight" wouldn't be as great as they are without that bombastic Jeff Lynne production. On the other hand, as nice of a song as "Slipping Away" is, I really don't think that Dave Edmunds should have been produced by Jeff Lynne.

My encapsulation of Jeff Lynne's production style is that he has been trying to continuously pay tribute to "I Am The Walrus". And he has definitely achieved that, quite ably (and I mean that as a compliment). That was one of ELO's strengths. Unfortunately, when he had the chance to produce the remaining Beatles himself, he made them sound less like the Beatles than ELO. In hindsight, maybe not necessarily the best move, in my estimation.

*For me, the exceptions, when they happen, are excellent, and show just how talented he can be, with his depth of range. For example, Full Moon Fever does not sound like a typical Jeff Lynne production through most of it; Into the Great Wide Open, on the other hand, is legion with Jeff Lynne sonic trademarks, the echoey airplane-hangar reverb, the heavily echoed acoustic guitars... Flaming Pie wasn't as heavy handed of a Jeff Lynne production, IMHO.

 

That's why I think he's like Spector. One can complain about the echo on his records or all of the massed choruses, but that was Spector. And Lynne is Lynne. Thats what he does.

 

I'm not huge on Jeff's sound, but I did like his production of his own release "Armchair Theatre". I thought Paul agreed to Jeff Lynne producing the Anthology tracks as a concession to George, because, in part, Martin was McCartney's man, and Harrison was reluctant to sign on to the project - with Jeff there, George would have some support. I think Jeff did a great job on "Free As A Bird", it was "Real Love" I had trouble with - those answering Harrison guitar lines got on my nerves, though I loved his solo. I wish the bass had been mixed higher on both tracks.

 

If there's one thing that followed the Beatles throughout their career, it was a willingness to experiment, defy expectations and have it work out beautifully. I look at Free as a Bird in that light.

 

There has been talk that being near deaf was just an excuse since he worked on Love with Giles years later... of course I have no idea if that is factual or not.

 

As much of an ELO fan as I am, I am going to have to agree with Steve on this one.

The snare drum and 12 string guitar strumming has been done to death by Jeff. I can understand if that is the sound he loves, and doesn't see anything wrong with it, but for me as a listener of his music, it's grown extremely tiresome.

Jeff abandoned the classic ELO sound with the strings and choir arrangements , and felt a need to stray away from it seemingly forever. I wish he'd do the same with the sound he's been attached to since George Harrison's 'Cloud Nine' in 1987.

Again, I am a huge JL fan, buy it's time for a change. But then again, if he doesn't want to change, then he doesn't have to, and I'll still keep buying his music.

 

I think what he was criticizing was the sound of the drumbeats, not the beats themselves. Although I would add that Lynne probably did have some influence as far as suggesting how Ringo drummed, since boring, metronomic drums are a hallmark of Lynne productions, and Ringo has rarely (if ever) sounded more boring than he does on Free as a Bird.

Why would the Beatles allow the incongruous Lynne sound to be stamped all over the two songs? Well, it was really only George specifically that chose that sound. McCartney was against it but conceded because he had no choice if he wanted the reunion to happen at all. I don't know why George liked that sound so much at the time. I almost wonder if it was the presence of Lynne, rather than his sound, that was most important to George, since the actual sound seems such a terrible fit for the Beatles. They might just as well have gotten Giorgio Moroder to put a disco drum machine on the track. Those two tracks for me are better than nothing, but so much worse than they could have been.

 

I don't know if it's just the way you worded this that I'm misconstruing, but are you saying that McCartney didn't like how the songs came out but conceded? I've never heard this suggested before. McCartney himself said in interviews that he has reservations before the sessions began about Lynne being involved, but even then he wasn't even talking so much about the sound that Lynne might bring; he seemed more concerned with Harrison and Lynne wielding too much power, the two having worked together so much before. Paul did say that there were a few times during the sessions where they had disagreements (and these disagreements seemed to involve George specifically more than George and Jeff), but McCartney seemed quite happy with how the tracks came out.

I don't think it would be out of line to wonder if Paul held back a bit and let Harrison have his way in a few instances for fear that Harrison would otherwise simply forego the "reunion." But among the many rumors at the time was that part of the reason Harrison seemed more into it and motivated than many would have otherwise thought was that he needed an influx of money at the time. So perhaps Harrison "needed" the reunion as much as Paul, if for different reasons. This is just a theory based on rumors of course.

Paul may have made more concessions to appease George than he otherwise would in the old days of the Beatles or on a solo project, but I don't believe he was "against" Lynne's sound specifically and then let it happen anyway for fear of George quitting.

I do agree with your theory that perhaps George wanted the presence of Lynne as much or more than any particular specific sound that Lynne would bring. As it ended up, Paul had Geoff Emerick as engineer, and Emerick in the post-Beatles era had a lot more connection with Paul than George. I realize that Lynne as producer would have more control than Emerick, but nobody came out of those sessions and then years later expressed any major displeasure with how anything came out. Everybody including George Martin had nothing but good things to say back when the stuff was released and launched, which is no surprise. But now 13 years later, I haven't heard of any major displeasure about how those tracks turned out.

The biggest problem I've always had with the songs is that the cassettes they were given to work with were, for whatever reason, intentional or not, inferior dubs to what is now (and perhaps even then) floating around among collectors. It would be interesting for Lynne to go back and re-dub the Lennon vocal from a better source tape on "FAAB", and perhaps even re-do the Lennon vocal on "Real Love" with newer digital technology that could alter the speed and pitch of Lennon's vocal to match the band performance while at the same time not sound so sped up.

At the end of the day, I can understand criticisms of the tracks, even though I love them. I can understand one's preference or lack thereof for the sound of the tracks or the whole concept. But I don't agree with reasoning that involves the idea that Paul or anybody involved with the tracks "let" Lynne do anything. Remember that Harrison, McCartney, and Starr all were co-producers with Lynne.

 

Since Jeff Lynne's sound is SO influenced by Beatle sounds, it shouldn't be so surprising that George wanted him on the Threetles Project. And the snare, for sure in my mind (no matter how the sound was achieved) was based on Ringo's snare sound in Let It Be -- you know, with a towel over it for that big smash-y, no-ringing sound.

I'm one who has critiqued his approach in the past, but I must say I really love Free As A Bird and Real Love. No matter what the production quality, those are just great songs.

 

I guess I didn't word things well, but I wasn't trying to say McCartney has expressed unhappiness with the final result. I was saying that beforehand he was reluctant to have Lynne produce. I know this was partly because of fear Lynne and Harrison would team up against him, but I'm pretty sure I also recall a quote where he said he was concerned Lynne would make it sound like the Wilburys.

We can only speculate how the Beatles really felt. At the time, Paul did express happiness with how the tracks turned out. It would have been very uncharacteristic of him not to... he is pretty much always upbeat and positive about any new project he has completed. It is true that he has not (to my knowledge) said anything negative in more recent years. I don't know if he's said much of anything. I haven't seen an interview recently where anyone has asked him anything about those tracks. Ironically, it is George who was somewhat outspoken against the Lynne sound in his final years, although not specifically in regard to the Beatles reunion tracks.

Huh. I don't hear a similarity at all. Ringo's drums in Let it Be sound like dull thuds (I mean that in a good way). Lynne-produced drums sound like a shotgun blast recorded in the middle of a wind tunnel. I don't hear a similarity at all. The ELO records were Beatley, but the 80's Lynne production sound, with it's wall of acoustic rhythm guitars and explosive, metronomic drumming doesn't seem like the Beatles at all to me. What Beatles song has that sound?

 

Mr Martin certainly didn't seem to have any misgivings about dubbing a string arrangement onto John's "Grow Old With Me". Maybe he warmed to the idea after hearing "Free As A Bird" ...

Stephen

 

Without feeling I have to justify it, I simply love Jeff's sound. Always have, always will. Jeff Lynne is one of the reasons I love music so much. He's in my top 5 favourite musicians of all tme. Not for any other reason than making me feel good when I listen to him play, sing, produce.

 

I can't listen to those fills without remembering that George wanted to do a similar thing on "Hey Jude" - but Paul vetoed the idea. I guess George finally got his chance on "Real Love" ...

Stephen

 

Agreed. When I hear that drum "sound"...click!

 

IMHO, Jeff Lynne became incredibly boring after the second ELO album (II). He completely straightened out Bev Bevan's signature drums and lost any sense of humanity in his productions. The clipped background vocals are played out.

For a real sense of what Jeff was capable of, listen to "Message From the Country" by The Move. Or compare The Move's take on "Do Ya" with the manicured, soulless ELO version that most people know.

 

Anybody who could pull an album out of George Harrison like Cloud 9 is alright by me.

I guess Jeff was recommended to GH by Dave Edmunds.

 

George Martin might be more meaning his ears dont have the frequency response like they used to, deaf as a producer vs. actual deafness. Thats the more detailed explination i have seen in interviews with him.

What about Jeff getting the best produced vocal of Brian Wilson's SOLO career on Let it Shine from the Brian Wilson album ??? that IMHO is Jeff Lynne's finest 80s production.

 

I love Lynne's production work with two exceptions: "Real Love" and "Free as a Bird."

When I hear the beauty of the "Real Love" home recording on the Lennon Anthology box, it really upsets me that "The Beatles" put out their own version.

And that, in the end, probably isn't even Lynne's fault!

 

I agree with this. TP's Full Moon Fever and PM's Flaming Pie are his 2 best produced albums. The Orbison stuff wasn't bad either.

 

This must be an overdubbed snare, right, Steve? I mean otherwise the whole set's gonna sound that way.

 

IIRC there are ELO records where the whole kit is overdubbed.

I quite like Jeff's sound; I know what to expect when I buy a Lynne-produced album. The only Lynne production issue (for me) was when I heard "Free As A Bird" for the first time, on the radio; I thought I was hearing a Tom Petty track, until the voices came in. Then, absolute magic occurred.

 

I love that "Tchh,chh,chh,chh" sound he'd made on "Don't bring me down".I always thought that was great...the way he incorporated six crates (!) of Brown ale,a cement mixer,and then ran with it...unique,and GREAT!!