Miscellaneous questions about the Beatles | Page 12 | Fab Forum | The Beatles Bible

John and Paul sat down with George M for 24 hours working out the running order of the White Album and i believe the Beatles (more than likely John and Paul) were involved in working out the sequencing from Revolver onwards. Lewisohn notes in Chronicles in the 15th November 1965 entry that for ‘Rubber Soul ‘

On 16 November George Martin worked out the LP running order and telephoned it over to Abbey Road . On 17, 19 and 23 November discs were cut, lacquers were rushed to the pressing plant, the sleeve was quickly printed, and finished copies of the LP were in the shops by Friday 3 December.

For Pepper Neil Aspinall is quoted as saying

“The back of the cover took some time and had to be left till last because we were printing lyrics and they had to be designed and we had to have a running order.  We couldn’t have that until everyone had decided on it.  I remember Paul and I walking along.  I think Kingly Street in the West End, trying to work out some clever word using S for Sgt Pepper : and then we’d try to get a vowel, say–but we couldn’t get it right so the running order had to be done in another way.”

There is a thread on the rejected Pepper running order for anyone who wants to read the thread/discuss it.

Joe said

George Martin decides the running order for Rubber Soul (16 November 1965)

I think it’s a safe assumption that all albums prior to that were decided by GM too.

As mentioned by others, by the time of Pepper it was a collaborative effort, and I assume subsequent ones were too. The White Album was decided during the group’s only 24-hour session – George and Ringo were both on holiday at the time.

This is from Mark Lewisohn’s Complete Recording Sessions book which, despite its age, is still essential:

Even working to the tried and trusted George Martin formula of opening each side of vinyl with a strong song, and ending it with one difficult to follow, the 31 songs were just too varied and wide-ranging in styles to slip easily into categories. In the end, after dropping What’s The New Mary Jane altogether, there was an approximate structure, the heavier rock songs (Birthday , Yer Blues , Me And My Monkey, Helter Skelter ) mostly ended up on side C, George Harrison ‘s four songs were spread out one per side, no composer had more than two songs in succession* and each side lasted between 20 and 25 minutes. And, as a joke, most of the songs with an animal in the title (Blackbird , Piggies , Rocky Raccoon ) were placed together, in succession, on side B.

Another decision was to link each successive song, either with a crossfade, a straight edit or simply by matching the dying moments of one with the opening notes of the next. The Beatles, like Sgt Pepper , had none of the customary three-second gaps between songs.

*This isn’t strictly true, as John has Cry Baby Cry , Revolution 9 and Good Night in succession. However, there’s Can You Take Me Back in between the first two, so maybe Lewisohn was counting that.

Glyn Johns was given the responsibility of sifting through the Get Back session tapes. I believe there were three rejected running orders that he presented to the group. Phil Spector was drafted in and spent a few days mixing and overdubbing (his involvement is usually hugely overstated). I assume he decided the running order for the album too, although the takes he used had mostly been selected as ‘best’ before he started work on the project.

I’ve always thought it was more the Beatle who sang lead than who wrote the track (tho one could argue that Revolution 9 has no lead vocalist as its a sound collage).

I posted this about the White Album a while back, just an observation

Random thought.

Was there an early plan to have each side of the While Album end with tracks by John, Paul, George and Ringo but it was forgotten about during the 24 hour running order work out?

What i mean is as follows

Side 1 – Happiness Is A Warm Gun = John.

Side 3. Long, Long, Long = George.

Side 4. Goodnight = Ringo.

the only wrong one is side 2 which ends with Julia (John) and not a Paul track.

Was there a late switch with Julia and I Will as they felt it worked better?

John, Paul and George Martin did put all the animal themed tracks on side 2, the more rock tracks are on side 3, so there is a precedent for such an idea. 

and

Was listening to the end of side 1 and beginning of side two and it occured to me that sides 1, 2 and 3 open with a Paul track which is quite a big deal considering side openers were a big deal with LP running orders back in the day (John closed all but one album (Beatles For Sale) up to and including Pepper, Pepper, no lead singer gets two tracks in a row on Revolver etc) and it got me thinking.

John, Paul and George Martin spent 24 hours working out the sequencing: the animal themed songs are on side 2, the heavier tracks on side 3; George gets 1 track on each side of each LP, Ringo gets one song on each LP; John and Paul get a maximum of two songs in a row. It was very clearly organised and diplomatic. So would it be too far fetched to think the original plan was that John and Paul got two side openers on the album and that each Beatle got to close a side (see this post above) but it proved too difficult to achieve? Its damn close for it to happen as for that to be achieved all thats needed is that on side two for Julia to become a Paul track and Martha My Dear be switched for a John track (tho not a direct switch as that wouldnt work well). Too damn close.

Had to fix the tables

I wonder if there is a way to make it work.

When John dreamed of the Beatles becoming bigger than Elvis, did he think about the loud, screaming concert crowds that eventually grated on their nerves? Did he see that coming if the Beatles got that big? Surely he knew about the noise of the fans drowning out Elvis’s music.