BY ISMAIL AYDIN
ismail.aydin@ug.bilkent.edu.tr
In a previous issue of Bilkent News, one of my fellow music columnists wrote about the Beatles. Since he recounted the changes in their musical style and the way they became the Beatles we know, I want to tell you the story of just one song. This is a very tiny detail when you think about the entire history of the Beatles, but it’s still a very cute, personal story from that history.
The song is “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.” I know that every one of you who cares enough to read a music column in a school newspaper has heard the song. Some of you also know that it’s a song written by neither Paul McCartney nor John Lennon, but by George Harrison – in my personal opinion the hidden hero of the band. He doesn’t have as many songs recorded in the Beatles discography, but the ones he did write always strike a special note in my heart, as in so many other Beatles listeners’ hearts. This is not, however, a column on learning more about the Beatles or getting to know George Harrison better, so let me jump into the story of “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” without further introduction!
It was a sunny afternoon in Warrington, where George was staying at his mother’s house and reading the oldest of Chinese classics, “I Ching” – The Book of Changes – in English. He may have been the first of the Beatles to get into Eastern culture and philosophy. At any rate, influenced by the book, he came to the conclusion that there is no such thing as coincidence, and every little part, every second of a person’s life is meant to be; everything that happens has a purpose in life. So the song was shaped under the influence of this idea. George took his guitar, played a little riff and tried to write some lyrics, but couldn’t come up with any (as musicians just can’t sometimes). So he decided to open a book to a random page in order to give himself a start. In the first book he opened, he saw the words “gently weeps.” He then closed the book and started playing and singing the very first version of “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.”
The lyrics he wrote initially were somewhat different than the version we know today. For example, the following lines weren’t included in the recording: “I look at the trouble and see that it’s raging / While my guitar gently weeps. / As I’m sitting here, doing nothing but ageing, / Still, my guitar gently weeps.” I was horrified when I saw these lines that had not been recorded; they’re just as impressive as the ones that made it into the song. But George made the choice he thought was best. (By the way, the piece of paper he wrote the lyrics on sold in 2007 for over five hundred thousand dollars.)
After writing the lyrics and the main chords of the song, George decided to write a guitar solo for it. However, he couldn’t manage to write what he wanted; he worked for eight hours solid but couldn’t come up with anything near what he was looking for. He went to the studio and showed the song to the other members of the band, but even Ringo didn’t take pity on him and help him. He then decided to take the song to one of his best friends – and one of the greatest guitar players the universe has ever known – Eric Clapton. George Harrison tells the story like this:
I worked on that song with John, Paul, and Ringo one day, and they were not interested in it at all. And I knew inside of me that it was a nice song. The next day I was with Eric, and I was going into the session, and I said, “We’re going to do this song. Come on and play on it.” He said, “Oh, no. I can’t do that. Nobody can ever play on the Beatles records.” I said, “Look, it’s my song, and I want you to play on it.” So Eric came in, and the other guys were as good as gold – because he was there. Also, it left me free to just play the rhythm and do the vocal. So Eric played that, and I thought it was really good. Then we listened to it back, and he said, “Ah, there’s a problem, though; it’s not Beatley enough” – so we put it through the ADT [automatic double-tracker], to wobble it a bit.
Eric Clapton thus became the first person who was not a Beatle to play on a Beatles song. What he really added was the “weep” referred to in the title. The guitar solo that we hear in “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” is actually the sound of a weeping guitar, with Clapton making it weep. What made George go to Clapton was the fact that he himself hadn’t been able to pluck the strings and get that same sound, even though he tried for eight hours. There are rumors that Clapton did it in 20 minutes.
The guitar that the solo was played on belonged to Clapton, but he gave it to George as a gift; George named the guitar Lucy, although it’s a 1957 Gibson Les Paul. In the song, in addition to Clapton’s guitar, we can hear George’s Gibson J-200, while Paul used the Fender jazz bass for the first time instead of his Hofner or Rickenbacker basses. According to Walter Everett’s book “The Beatles as Musicians,” John’s electric guitar is audible only in the coda, with the tremolo switched on.
The full lineup for the recording was:
- George Harrison – double-tracked vocal, backing vocal, acoustic guitar, 12-string guitar, Hammond organ
- Paul McCartney – harmony vocal, piano, bass
- John Lennon – electric guitar with tremolo
- Ringo Starr – drums, tambourine, castanets
- Eric Clapton – lead guitar (uncredited)
So, that’s the story of the rock classic “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” – even though knowing how it happened won’t take the Beatles, George Harrison or Eric Clapton any higher, since they’re already at the top.
Thanks to Hasan Murat Sümer for giving me the idea of writing this song’s story with his column in Bilkent News (December 6, 2016).