Following the sitar motif on ‘Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)’, ‘Love You To’ was The Beatles’ first full attempt at recording a piece of music in the classical Indian style.
At the time George Harrison was learning the sitar from Ravi Shankar, who inspired him to learn more about Indian music and Eastern religion.
I wrote ‘Love You To’ on the sitar, because the sitar sounded so nice and my interest was getting deeper all the time. I wanted to write a tune that was specifically for the sitar. Also it had a tabla part, and that was the first time we used a tabla player.
Recorded under the working title ‘Granny Smith’, ‘Love You To’ shows Harrison’s burgeoning interest in philosophy – as well as his love for new wife Pattie, whom he married on 21 January 1966.
A short extract from the song was included in the animated film Yellow Submarine, in the scene where Harrison’s character first appears.
In the studio
Recording began on 11 April 1966. Take one was George Harrison singing while accompanying himself on acoustic guitar, and Paul McCartney on backing vocals. Take three saw the introduction of the sitar, which appeared again as an overdub onto take six, along with tabla, bass and fuzz guitar.
‘Love You To’ was finished on 13 April. Harrison added more vocals, Ringo Starr played tambourine, and McCartney contributed falsetto harmonies, the last of which were left out of the final mix. A brief edit piece, containing Harrison’s solo sitar, was also recorded and used as the song’s introduction.
“Love You To” is one of those Beatles songs that was tough to determine who played what. Some sources will say that George was the only Beatle on the recording, others will say that Ringo played tambourine, while still some others will say that John and Paul provided backing vocals. I prefer to call this song a George solo song, as I don’t believe that there is real evidence of any other Beatle participating.
This song is complete gibberish, nothing at all compared to “Within You Without You”
Gibberish? The lyrics are pretty clear to me. It’s a song about making love.
“Within You Without You” is beautiful and meditative, while “Love You To” is not only beautiful, but rocks!
How much to tell you I’m 66 now and I was 10 when revolver came out, and even back then this was my favorite track and I could tell McCartney was on it 100%. McCartney is on the track three times doing high vocals on the lines as follows….. George sings you don’t get time to hang a sign on and on the word me is George and Paul. Next up the line what you got means such a lot too and then it’s George and Paul on the word me. Next up the line they’ll fill you in with all those things you’ll and then George and Paul are saying the word see.
Any information on the title being a typo – Love You To(o)?
I always thought it was a transposition of words in the line “I’ll make love to you”.
It’s not a typo, it’s like:
“Would you like me to?”
“[I’d] love you to”
Hmmyes, but then there’s the label text on side one of my Revolver LP (from that Beatles Collection box which came out in the 80s) which reads “Love You Too”. I’ve always thought that this made more sense and have always called the song that… 🙂
Homophone. Not that there’s anything wrong with that…
Full marks for shoehorning a Seinfeld reference into a Beatles forum. Well done sir.
I’m with you Daniel. I never imagined it any other way. The Beatles are notorious for word play.
Its a typo the song is “Love To You”
I’ve always thought that it was a typo, & that the title should’ve been “Love You Too”. Otherwise, it’s an incomplete phrase, as in “Love You To… (What?)”
Here in the US (it may have only been in my area – I don’t know), there’s an age group (which happens to be George’s age group) that was taught by a certain method to spell in school. This method had a flaw in it, where certain words that had the same pronunciation but different spellings were used incorrectly. I have a relative that’s George’s age that could never distinguish the difference between “to”, “too” and “two” when writing. She had the same problem with other words of the same ilk. She was the only one in the family at the time who had this problem, as the rest of us were excellent spellers. Once this flaw in the method was discovered, the method was done away with in our school system. Years later, this method was briefly brought back and my younger brother’s age group had exactly the same problem. His spelling problems were exactly the same as the older relative who was taught the same way. I’ve often wondered if this same issue happened in the UK to George’s age group.
I know I’m probably in the minority here, but I’ve always hated those 3 Indian songs of George’s. I don’t like the instrumentation. To my ears, most Indian instruments are very harsh-sounding and irritating. I don’t mind the odd instrument on occasion (sitar on “Norwegian Wood” for example), but too many of them together just doesn’t do it for me. I think those 3 songs would’ve benefited from more conventional (i.e… “Western”) instrumentation. Just my opinion, of course.
The above quote from George says the song is called
‘Love You To’ so why are you questioning the title?
I can’t hear any acoustic guitar nor bass guitar in this song. The only bass sound I can hear is the low “drum” of the tabla, all the time.
I can’t detect any bass either, but I’m pretty sure that’s an acoustic guitar being strummed throughout, often in tandem with the tambourine. It’s most prominent in the right stereo channel during the instrumental section in the middle.
From the first day’s sessions we hear an Indian group on the centre channel, George electric rhythm guitar on the right and a dub in the centre that sounds like a volume-pedal-controlled fuzz guitar.
The Indian instruments included a svaramandal, a Punjabi table harp with between ten and thirty brass and steel strings, a tabla, a pair of hand-played drums, sitar and tamboura.
This was all reduced when vocals from George and Paul were added along with a tambourine.
In mixing ADT was applied to both vocals.
Also John did vocals as well, Paul might have done bass guitar on this song but it may have been wiped out.
But did Harrison play the “lead” sitar? Some question as to whether he was accomplished enough to have handled that, or in fact it was more likely one of the uncredited Indian musicians.
‘Ian McDonald suggests that the sitar part on Revolver’s “Love You To”,
although not credited, might have been played by [Harrison’s] anonymous tutor, but it is more likely that Harrison played it himself with close supervision, according to Shankara Angadi.’
Ray Newman, Abracadabra!: The Story of The Beatles’ Revolver (London, 2006), p. 25.
I don’t believe Ian MacDonald, because George was clearly playing the sitar on his own song, and even Anil Bhaghwat confirmed this in an interview with Steve Turner.
There is no way this is Harrison on sitar. He was a rather clumsy guitar player up until this point but he the picks up the sitar and plays so wonderfully! I think not.
Clumsy? Have a look at the Ed Sullivan Show performance of Till There Was You, and tell me his solo wasn’t actually rather elegant.
He has few moments not many. He is not what you would consider a natural.
That is false to say. That was the style of electric guitar that everyone up to the mid sixties played. He could play very well and was improving every year. He was a natural and considered one of the premier guitarist in liverpool in the beginning.
Great point, Luke. Many, many legendary artists (too many to name) agree as well.
George Harrison is very good in “chord melody” guitar soloing, – a style in jazz guitar. He applied it in ‘Till There Was You’ & ‘All My Loving’ & some other Beatles songs. That was an advanced skill at that time especially for a pop and rock & roll band like them.
Harrison was the key guitarist of the 1960s, because he contributed powerful and distinctive riffs to Lennon-McCartney songs. Julio is welcome to correct me, but I have never heard Harrison pointing this out publicly.
There’s footage of George practicing and learning stuff with Ravi.
Ravi himself said this was not incredibly difficult stuff. He’s kind of the authority I’d say. lol So I tend to assume it’s George based on that critique.
I’m not convinced George played the sitar solo. He could be pretty clumsy on the the guitar. I doubt he had the chops to play it. Its too self assured and George’s solos were sometimes tentative.
That’s not very nice to say about George’s guitar playing – he was a very good guitarist. According to Anil Bhagwat, it was in fact George playing the sitar and obviously the solo.
There is obviously a percussion section in this song, but it’s not listed.
In addition to tambourine and tabla? Let me know what you can hear and I’ll try and verify it.
It also sounds like there’s a string section too
Hmm, don’t hear ’em myself. (Nor the “obvious” percussion section.) But the mix sounds kinda muddy to my ears, so who really knows?
George was exercising his sitar playing so much by the time, so he could play it really well for the recording of this song. Eventually there might be other musicians playing different instruments. I don´t think Paul was there for the ocassion. And I don´t think Ringo was needed just to play such a simple instrument as the tambourine.
Why wasn’t John in on this one? He couldve added the acoustic guitar easy.
He probably wasn’t needed and it was George’s choice to mostly recorded it with Indian musicians, being an Indian-influenced song.
John didn’t like George’s songs.
That’s rubbish, because John never openly said anything like that. He liked “Something”, “Here Comes the Sun”, “Within You Without You” and “The Inner Light” and he shared George’s dislike of The Hollies’ version of “If I Needed Someone”.
I wish people would stop repeating this “John was uninterested in George’s songs” myth, because there is no proof to back it up.
Sorry, but George’s Indian stuff always left me cold. I personally find most of those Indian instruments irritating.
I love these songs. They were among the most inventive songs any of the Beatles composed, although, of course, there is no denying that Tomorrow Never Knows was a gigantic breakthrough. George’s sitar playing sounds especially good compared to the other 60s bands that attempted to use the instrument. But I prefer the 12 string electric violin used by Shankar (not Ravi Shankar) in albums released starting (?) in the early 1990s, when it was “Shankar and the Epidemics”.
But Paint It Black is a wonderful exception.
When you Google the lyrics to “Love You To,” there is a discrepancy: Some websites show “Love me while you can… or I’ll get a plan…” And other sites list the lyric as “Love me while you can… before I’m a dead old man…” Which is the correct lyric? It’s not as if one makes more sense than the other; It’s just that when it comes to singing along with Beatles’ songs, I’d like to get a plan. At least before I’m a dead old man. Thanks to whoever has the definitive answer.
I think the second option is true, sense-wise & sonic-wise (not that it matters).
I think he very clearly sings “before I’m a dead old man.” It never occurred to me that he might be singing anything else. Perhaps a good pair of head phones would make it easier for you to understand what words he is singing?
In George’s book “I Me Mine” the lyric is written in his handwriting as “before I’m a dead old man,” and that’s what I hear on my MFSL vinyl through a high-end system.
I have the “Matching Music Book” that came out with “Revolver,” and it gives the lyric as “or I’ll get a plan.” Later on, instead of “They’ll fill you in with all their sins, you’ll see,” it gives “they’ll fill you in with all the things you’ll see.” Ironically, this book boasts it has “authentic off-the-record arrangements.” But stereo gear was not that great back then, so I guess the book’s author misheard the lyrics. I suspect this gave rise to these incorrect lyrics appearing online.
Originally George didn’t have a name for this song, he called it “Granny Smith” during it’s production. When a friend asked him if he think of a name for it, George replied “Love You To”. So it’s not a typo, but very interesting way it got it’s title.
Can anyone name the instrument that makes the groan sound at around 0:58, during “Love me while you can…”? It pops up in every, I guess what you would call, mini break from the main part. Thanks.
I guess it’s a backwards guitar, maybe?
I’m fairly sure that’s a fuzz guitar. It always grabs me
I believe the instrument at :58 is a guitar with an orchestra pedal effect so it kind of hums. It comes back later in the song and is at the end of Here There and Everywhere but the effect is more melodic there. I believe it is George on lead sitar. There’s footage of him playing with Ravi and he sounds like he’s got it down. Even take ! on Norwiegian Wood has more sitar on it and George sounds pretty good there as well.
Orchestra pedal? What is that supposed to be?
I think it’s a Shruti Box
A beautiful and cosmic song. Great melody and lyric.
I even like Blue Jay Way and love Northern Song, but for me this one is just dismal.
We’re going to perform the song in a forthnight. The longer I am working on It, the more I appreciate It! Great, great song!
It is a great song. This song has real punch and drive and it is George Harrison who leads the way on sitar. It was he that introduced much of the west to this instrument in late 1965 on John’s “Norwegian Wood”. This then influenced The Rolling Stones’ Brian Jones who is brilliant on sitar on their 1966 rock masterpiece “Paint it Black”. This Harrison composition adds much to “Revolver”, one of popular musics greatest albums.also in 1966.
This is one of the more ridiculous songs in the Beatles’ catalog (thanks to George H.’s religious and moralistic lunacies).
You have to be joking. First off, the song is a masterpiece. Second, you come off as a bigot. Or do you not mind how people perceive you?
It wouldn’t be a proper comment section regarding George if there wasn’t someone complaining about him. I mean, seriously, you regularly get people acting as if he burned their houses down. It kind of makes me want to commit mass arson on their houses so that they actually have a legit reason to be complaining about something.
Yeah, it really is a very fine composition.
The Sitar adds some excitement, the buildup here and there is really good.
George was creative and added to the expansion of the use of the Sitar by other bands and had bands doing more of a mystical/psychedelic way in new songs.
The Beatles were a full on/best band of the 20th century, as in rock/pop with the influence of brother George.
You can dig that
I have to say I always found George’s ‘Within you without you ‘ to be a bit dull. Then I heard the instrumental version and it blew me away. Exquisite melody all written on a single chord.
“Other musicians: sitar, tambura?”
Don’t you mean other instruments that Anil Bhagwat played?
George had already proven himself on the Sitar with Norwegian Wood but still owed a lot to Ravi Shankar. He definitely proved it on Norwegian Wood, Love You To and Within You Without You. I wonder if John or Paul ever recorded or played a song with the Sitar? Maybe but they could never play with George’s intensity.
Another one of the handful of Beatles songs that I bypass. All of this stuff probably helped George find his “voice” in his writing, playing, and singing but for me, I’d rather not relive the struggle.
This song is interesting to me because of what I might describe as an auditory illusion in the “love me while you can” refrain. If you’re not listening closely it sounds like the tambura is making a D note, but when you do listen closely it’s actually an F and an A# played simultaneously.
Here I use the following abbreviations:
AB (Alf Bicknell, the chauffer of John), AP (Alan Pollack), CS (“The Beatles Complete Scores” by Todd Lowry), DR (Dave Rybaczewski), GE (Geoff Emerick), IM (Ian MacDonald), JW (John Winn), KW (Kenneth Womack); ML (Mark Lewisohn), PL (Peter Laxezzoli), SL (Simon Leng), ST (Steve Turner), RR (Robert Rodriguez), SV (Steven Valdez), WE (Walter Everett).
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V-O-C-A-L-S.
There are two vocal parts that are sung mostly in unison except for the end of verses, where one voice holds one high note, and the other descends.
UNISON PARTS.
IM: multi-tracked George; DR, JW and SV: both are George; WE: George and Paul.
HARMONY PARTS.
George sings descending part, and as for high-note-part, there are contradicting opinions.
AP and SV: George; DR: Paul or George; IM: Paul (?); JW and WE: Paul.
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W-H-O W-E-R-E T-H-E-R-E.
THE BEATLES.
Some (for example, SV) say that this is the only song from ‘Revolver’ to include only one Beatle, and the other three never participated in the recording vocally or instrumentally. It is not true. ML say that Paul and Ringo also did participate. Even if AP and ML are right, and the vocals of Paul were omitted from the final mix, Paul did participate in the recording itself, because his vocals (at least on the early takes) indeed were recorded. Still, I think that some traces of Paul are there, on the final record. Don’t forget, that the very Paul mentioned ‘She said, she said’ as one of the only songs of The Beatles where he was not on the record (I know, I know, that some think that his bass is still there, but nevertheless…) and he was quiet in that respect about the other songs of ‘Revolver’. I am quite sure that Ringo is as well there, and I don’t know about John (no mention by ML). But who knows?
INDIANS.
Almost all the musicologists say that there were three Indians — Anil Bhagwat and two more (unnamed) guys. I wonder where that idea came from! In addition, I cannot find even a slightest hint of the answer. Anybody? As a rule, the Beatle-musicologists take as a basis the works of ML, but, as far as I know, (1) ML mentions only Anil Bhagwat and no other Indians. Then, (2), liner notes also mention only Bhagwat. At last, (3) there is the diary AB. The note from April 9 says that George played some of his new songs, including the one, where he accompanied to himself on some Indian instrument. George said that he needed to find someone else who would play on o-n-e more instrument, because no one in the group could do that. He talked to someone by the telephone and arranged a meeting. I will drive that Indian to the session. The note from April 11 says that Bicknell drove to take the Indian friend of George… As you can see, Bicknell also says about the only Indian guy (it must be Bhagwat). So, until someone else will give me a-n-y evidence, that there was some Indian else in the studio that day, I must conclude that there were only the Beatles and Anil Bhagwat.
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W-H-A-T I-N-S-T-R-U-M-E-N-T-S W-E-R-E P-L-A-Y-E-D.
Well, for the beginning, what instruments are mentioned CS?
1) “Guitar (Reverse)”. Which, according to CS, is heard only four times (one-per-measure) in refrains, playing the same two notes, what we hear as some loud buzzing “baa” sound;
2) “Others (Sitar I)”. CS attributes to it the part of the-only-instrument-of-the-slow-intro, the riff-based-part and the solo;
3) “Others (Sitar II)”. This, according to CS, appears after the intro and plays throughout the same three notes, creating buzzing (as well) sound;
4) “Bass”. There are note lines for bass in CS, but there is not a single note mentioned there. Why? I suspect, that TL means that bass IS on the record, but is so low in the mix, that it is impossible to get any particular note of it. At least, I see no other possible explanation;
5) “Drums”. There is drums’ score in CS and it includes quite busy tom-tom and also bass-drum with hi-hats.
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Well, let us go along with every mentioned above part (though not in that order).
DRUMS.
There is no classical drum set in the song. The part attributed to hi-hats — accenting some (two- or three-per-measure) beats — is Ringo’s tambourine. ML claims that it is the Beatles’ drummer who played it. Strange, that AP attributed it to one section only: “Ringo adds a tambourine in the second verse”. It is obviously, that DR is right saying, that it is heard “throughout after the intro”. The parts of tom-tom and bass drum were played by Anil Bhagwat on tabla. Tabla is a couple of drums — the bigger and the smaller ones. The bigger one is usually tuned an octave below the smaller one. It is clear, that the part attributed (in CS) to tom-tom was played on the smaller one and the part attributed to bass drum on the bigger one.
BASS.
AP, IM and WE do not mention bass at all. DR says: “I leave it up to your Sherlock Holmes magnifying glasses to detect Paul’s bass playing on this recording, but since credible sources say it’s there, then I suppose it is”. ML claims that Paul indeed play it. KW attributes bass to George, but if there really is any bass on the record, then I think I should believe ML. The only one who specifies the part of bass is JW, but we will return to him later.
SITAR II.
DR attributes the “drone-like accompaniment throughout the song” to the “fuzz-guitar presumably played by George” and then continues: “The ‘fuzz’ was undoubtedly achieved by using ‘The Tone Bender’”. WE says about “drones on a tamboura”, perhaps attributing t-h-i-s drone to it. JW and DR also mention tamboura, the last one says that it “is heard” but doesn’t mentions what particularly it plays. I do not know. I am not sure. Do they all talk about the same drone throughout the song, but attributing it to the different instruments: to sitar (TL), to fuzz-guitar (DR) and to tamboura (WE)? As for tamboura, according GE, the studio employees saw it for the first time a week or two later, when George drove it (a coffin-size!) from his home to the studio for one of the late ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ sessions. Or, maybe, he confused the TNK-session with LYT-one? I think that, perhaps, here GE is right. The indirect evidence is that by saying “it had a tabla part, and that was the first time we used a tabla player” George did not mention tamboura. So I think that this part was played on the fuzz-guitar.
GUITAR.
DR thinks that the distorted “baa”-part in refrains was also possibly played on “the same fuzz-guitar while incorporating volume swells from either a volume pedal or by manually turning the guitar’s volume knob up and down”. WE also attributes this to “a volume-pedal-controlled fuzz guitar”. And JW claims that this part is played by Paul on fuzz-bass! By the way, WE hears “open fifths on Harrison’s electric rhythm guitar on the right”. Eh…
SITAR I.
WE claims that “two rapidly descending arpeggiations in the opening bar” were played on svarmandal (“a table harp with between 10 and 30 brass and steel strings”), but it seems he is the only one to claim that. I found three video of covers on ‘Love You To’ and every time that opening is played on the leading sitar. As in the case with tamboura many musicologists think that some unnamed Indian played this sitar part.
AP claims that George just couldn’t play that part.
IM says that most of that part was played by some Indian and attributes sitar to George with (?) mark.
DR thinks that George played free-form intro and the rest was by that Indian. He suspect that by that George saved his face and exactly that was the reason to not mention the Indian on the album cover. OK. But whose face was to be saved by not mentioning there the tamboura player (if there was one)?
WE says that “probably” George played on sitar. PL and RR attribute sitar to George.
SL: “Harrison is still playing sitar like a guitar player, using blues and rock-n-roll bends rather than the intensely intricate Indian equivalents”.
And now let speak those who were there.
In may 1966 George said in one of the interview about ‘Revolver’ album: “I play sitar on a track. I just play it because I like it”. He does not say “we play sitar” or “there’s sitar” but “I play”. Moreover, George said in his interviews not only that he wrote the song FOR sitar, but also that he wrote it ON sitar.
AB in his diary wrote, that they spent some time to finish a song of Paul, and then the Indian one of George began. Very nice song, where George played on sitar and the Indian tapped a small drum.
Anil Bhagwat said in interview to ST: “I can tell you here and now — 100 percent it was George on sitar throughout”.
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S-O-M-E M-O-R-E Q-U-E-S-T-I-O-N-S.
ML says (11 april): “The basic track had George singing to his own acoustic guitar accompaniment, with Paul supplying backing vocals. The sitar came at take 3 and again as an overdub onto take six along with a tabla, bass and fuzz-guitar. George played sitar”. Well… Does it mean that the first 2 takes were just acoustic guitar and vocals? And the takes 3-6 were with sitar? And then, on the take 6, were added one more sitar? At the same time with tabla (Anil), bass (Paul?) and fuzz-guitar (John?)? DR and IM mention acoustic guitar, but DR says it was buried in the mix. But if from the take 3 to 6 George was on sitar then… acoustic guitar by Paul? By John? Or there is no acoustic guitar on the record?
Back to some interesting remark of AB about finding someone else who would play on an instrument, because no one in the group could do that. Is that tabla part so difficult? Was it impossible for Ringo to play it? I am not a drummer but I think with some practice and training Ringo could do it. So why need the Indian musician? The answer is in the interview of George to ‘Crawdaddy’ in 1977: “I know Ringo didn’t want to know about tabla because it just seemed so far out to him”.
My favorite cover of a Beatles song? “Love You To” by Ronnie Montrose.