GLASS ONION AND ITS INCREDIBLE RECORDING PROCESS.

John didn't have much of the song written by May 28th, 1968, when The Beatles met at George Harrison's 'Kinfauns' home in Esher, Surrey to record demos of the songs they've recently written. This fact, though, didn't stop John from putting down on tape what he had so far. The recording consists of John double-tracking himself on acoustic guitar and vocal with a hint of tambourine played by someone else in the third verse. All three verses, however, consist of the first verse repeated three times with slightly different lyrics from what became the finished version. John here sings “I told you about Strawberry Fields, well here's a place you know just as real...where everything glows.” In the second verse, John flubs the line “to see how the other half lives” which results in him mumbling gibberish, him doing the same thing when this point arrives during double-tracking. John then continues this nonsensical habit in many other places in this recording, right down to the song's last moments. Another difference is the dramatically slowed tempo in the third verse during the line “here's another place you can go, where everything glows,” during which time you hear other Beatle voices in the background, one even saying “Help!” at one point. This recording can be heard in its entirety on the compilation album “Anthology 3.”

September 11th, 1968, marked the first day “Glass Onion” was brought into EMI Studio Two and officially recorded. John got together with Paul to finish off the lyrics at some point prior to this day, so a completely written song was ready to go. They all arrived sometime after 7 pm with Chris Thomas at the helm since George Martin lulled on vacation at the time.

The Beatles ran through 34 takes of the rhythm track on this day, the instrumentation being John on his Gibson acoustic guitar, George on his Fender Stratocaster, Paul on a newly acquired Fender Jazz Bass and Ringo playing, as Mal Evans mentions in the November 1968 edition of "The Beatles Monthly Book," "two drum kits instead of one."  Ringo had just acquired a new drum set, a Ludwig Hollywood kit.  "I knew we weren't going to play live anymore," Ringo states in Andy Bakiuk's book "Beatles Gear," "and the others were getting different things to use in the studio, so I thought I would get a proper kit, real drums with real skin heads."  With this new drum set arriving in EMI Studios on this day, they decided to set both this new kit up along with his current black oyster pearl kit, creating a hybrid double-bass drum set for use on this song.  "So we set them all up," Ringo remembers, "and when I was to play the fill, the break came and I just froze, looking at all these drums!"  When The Beatles started rehearsals in Twickenham Film Studios for what became the "Let It Be" album, the new Ludwig Hollywood drum set alone was used from that point onward. 

The song may have reached completion, but with only three verses and no solo of any kind, it ran only one minute and fifty seconds long, almost each of these 34 takes being of that length. Take 15 was stretched out to around six minutes as the song turned into a longer jam session. Take 33 deemed as the best take of the day, although it includes an edited version of two other takes, the obvious edit detected in the drum/cymbal sounds heard in the final verse during the line “fixing a hole in the ocean.” This edit probably was performed at the end of this session by Chris Thomas and engineers Ken Scott and John Smith, after which the session ended at 3:30 am.

They returned to the song on the following day (aka later that evening), September 12th, 1968, for more overdubs. They arrived in Studio Two at around 8:30 pm that finalized  John recording his lead vocal plus double-tracking it, and Ringo adding a tambourine part. By 1:30 am, they left for the evening.

The following day, September 13th, 1968, they met again at EMI Studio Two, this time around 8 pm, for further work on “Glass Onion.” Ringo actually double-tracked his drums for the song on this day, which is especially noticeable on the snare beats throughout the song. Paul also overdubbed a piano part on this day, which plays a vital rhythmic role in the recording. By 1:45 am, this session was then over.

On September 16th, 1968, John, Paul, and Ringo returned to EMI Studio Two primarily to work on a new Paul McCartney song entitled “I Will.” After extensive work settled on this new track, they returned to “Glass Onion” for another overdub before the evening’s end. Someone, either John or Paul, came up with the idea to add a recorder to the song after the reference to “The Fool On The Hill,” since the recorder was in such prominent use in that song. At approximately 2 am, Paul added a simple melody line on recorder after the lyric “he living there still,” he then double-tracking the line afterward. By 3 am, this recording session closed.

John Lennon felt that the recording of “Glass Onion” still needed something, so he compiled sound effects of four different elements at home and brought them into the control room of EMI Studio Two on September 26th, 1968, for overdubbing onto the song. The purpose of this session, actually, was for creating mono mixes of recently recorded songs, but at John's insistence, his idea took precedence.

A four-track tape was created for this overdub: Track one contained a telephone ringing, Track Two contained a single note of an organ, Track Three contained BBC television soccer commentator Kenneth Wolstenholme shouting “It's A Goal!” over and over with a cheering crowd in the background, and Track Four contained the sound of a window smashed. All four tracks had these elements repeated over and over, the entire tape lasting 2:35, which is just a little bit longer than the finished song so far. After this four-track tape spliced together, two attempts at a mono mix of the song rendered by Chris Thomas and engineers Ken Scott and Mike Sheady, no doubt with input from John, interjecting these effects at different times in the mix. This session, the last one with Chris Thomas as producer, erected complete by 1:30 am the next morning.

Upon George Martin's return from vacation, he examined mixes of the Beatles songs that were recorded in his absence, “Glass Onion” included. He was unimpressed by John's sound effects and convinced him to let him score a part for strings to complement the song nicely. John relented, and the tape box containing “Glass Onion” with the strange sound effects was marked “do not use” which, of course, was readily noticed when compiling the “Anthology 3” album decades later.

With the allotted time for finishing the album coming to a close, the needed session to record the string arrangement for “Glass Onion” happened on October 10th, 1968, in EMI Studio Two, starting at 7 pm. Eight musicians were brought in for the overdub on the song as well as on George Harrison's “Piggies.” An eerie orchestral score was recorded as an edit piece for the conclusion of “Glass Onion” which slowed in tempo as it progressed. With this complete, both the stereo and mono mixes used on the finished album were created by George Martin and engineers Ken Scott and John Smith, them adding a manual ADT "wobble" effect to both mixes. Two attempts loomed at each of these mixes, undoubtedly the second of both being the ones used, both having the eerie string section faded down at the conclusion of the song. One noticeable difference between the two mixes is an additional “ooh yeah” from Paul after the break in the mono mix.

A mash-up mix of the song was created by George Martin and his son Giles Martin sometime between 2004 and 2006 in Abbey Road (formerly EMI) Studios for inclusion on the album “Love.” This “Glass Onion” track combined vocal elements of “Hello Goodbye,” horns from “Magical Mystery Tour” and “Penny Lane,” and guitar work from “Things We Said Today.”

The structure for “Glass Onion” couldn't be much simpler, this being 'verse/ verse/ bridge/ verse/ conclusion' (or aabac). The “conclusion” consists of the menacing string arrangement that George Martin added to the end of the song which actually works as a link between album tracks. The idea was to come up with different types of segues between the songs on this album, these taking on many different forms. The first two songs, “Back In The U.S.S.R.” and “Dear Prudence,” had a crossfade between them. The next two songs, “Glass Onion” and “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” had this George Martin orchestral score. Even though this conclusion was not in John's Lennon initial vision of the song, it remains  universally accepted as an integral element of “Glass Onion.”

The song begins with two double-tracked snare drum flams from Ringo which startle the listener after the mellow fade of John's guitar ending for “Dear Prudence.” The first fifteen-measure verse begins immediately thereafter, ushering in Ringo's steady rock solid 4/4 drum beat, Paul's treble-heavy bass work, John's acoustic rhythm guitar and lead vocals, and George's electric guitar chops and accents. The strings first appear in measures six through nine with swooping ups and downs while the tambourine appears in this verse only in measures seven through nine.

The downbeat of measures ten through fourteen are anticipated and accented by a cymbal crash from Ringo. The tenth measure also ushers in Paul's piano for the first time, him playing descending and then ascending chords until the fourteenth measure where he pounds away on chords until the 'Beatles break' on the downbeat of the fifteenth measure. The cellos chop out dramatic eighth notes in the fourteenth measure to highlight the lyrical focal point “looking through a glass onion” before they disappear with the rest of the elements on the downbeat of the fifteenth measure. The only thing heard in the silence of this fifteenth measure is two more double-tracked snare flams from Ringo to usher in the next verse.

The second verse is nearly identical in arrangement from the first verse, the only noticeable difference being an excited “woo” in the silence of the fifteenth measure during another set of double-tracked snare flams.

The simple bridge heard next is ten measures long and vocally consists of three emotive “oh yeah”s (Paul getting vocally over excited in the background during the third one) until John finishes this section as if it's a verse with “looking through a glass onion” once again, ushering in yet another 'Beatles break.' The piano thumps away throughout this bridge and even throws in a thumb roll at the end of the eighth measure. The strings hold out long notes throughout the first eight measures which rise along with the chords to add a tense feel to the bridge. The final piano chord rings out into the silence of the tenth measure as Ringo adds only single-tracked flams this time to bring in the final verse.

While the arrangement of this third verse is very similar to the other two, there are some differences worth noting. The fourth and fifth measures include a double-tracked recorder played by Paul to accompany the mention of “The Fool On The Hill.” The orchestral swoops in the sixth through ninth measures are boosted, which stand out much more in the song than before. The tambourine is absent in the seventh through ninth measures this time, but appear in the tenth measure and then continue to finish out the song. The rough edit in the rhythm track, as heard here in the tenth measure, appears to happen because Ringo forgot to put in his anticipated cymbal crashes at this point of the song, another 'take' edited in to attempt to rectify this matter.

Before the silence of the fifteenth measure gets revealed, however, George Martin's eight-measure orchestral score unexpectedly pops in. Upon careful listening, it appears that this score is entirely in 4/4 time, but the downbeat of the first measure is missing, this orchestral recording reappears edited onto the master tape on the second beat of the measure. This results in the first measure of this section being in 3/4 on the released recording while the rest of it is in 4/4. As these eight measures progress, however, the tempo slows, and the volume decreases as a slow fade, but it doesn't fade away into silence. On the last beat of the eighth measure, the strings all slide their notes menacingly downward as if they've all just nodded off to sleep at that precise time in the studio that day.

There may have been some strange endings to Beatles songs up to this point, but with headphones on, this one surely lifted up the hairs on the back of listeners necks. Once again, the view that the “White Album” didn't see cooperation by all four Beatles playing as a band falls on deaf ears with this track. Everyone played a vital role, everyone shined on top of their game as well. John's vocals make you sure he's imparting you with some hidden wisdom (even though there wasn't any) along with well performed acoustic guitar playing. Paul's rough sounding bass works well here, as does his piano and recorder performances. George puts in a proficient job on electric guitar as does Ringo on drums and tambourine. And good thing George Martin came back from vacation in time to recognize where another tantalizing orchestral score was needed.

Stop by my blog next week and discover the intricate details showcased upon Ob-La-Di, Ob-La- Da.

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