Lennon or McCartney

May 5, 2016
43,464
48,496
AFL Club
Geelong
It’s almost cliched to say this now but in terms of their hits to misses ratio I preferred George Harrison to both of them. Obviously nowhere near as prolific but don’t think there’s really any song of his that I didn’t like.

I think the other two while obviously geniuses and I preferred McCartney’s songs for the most part, the fact that there was just this never ending competition to outdo each other kind of diluted the quality a fraction. When George wrote a song he wrote it because he wanted to not because he needed to.

Like the irony of the use of a Harrison song in that ‘Lennon or McCartney’ video above
 
May 13, 2008
36,308
57,842
Melbourne
AFL Club
Hawthorn
It’s almost cliched to say this now but in terms of their hits to misses ratio I preferred George Harrison to both of them. Obviously nowhere near as prolific but don’t think there’s really any song of his that I didn’t like.

I think the other two while obviously geniuses and I preferred McCartney’s songs for the most part, the fact that there was just this never ending competition to outdo each other kind of diluted the quality a fraction. When George wrote a song he wrote it because he wanted to not because he needed to.

Like the irony of the use of a Harrison song in that ‘Lennon or McCartney’ video above

I'm a huge Harrison fan as well. He might be the most underrated musician in history which is astounding considering he was a Beatle.
 

Vincent Hanna

Premium Platinum
Mar 15, 2020
784
968
AFL Club
Essendon
Lennon's solo work is so overrated IMO, apart from the first couple of albums (Plastic Ono and Imagine) the rest are very patchy. McCartney cut some great albums with Wings and later on also, his voice is shot now but I saw him a few years back when he finally made it back to Oz and it was everything.

Harrison solo stuff is fine but again, after the first two albums it gets murky. Ringo is the luckiest bloke in rock history, he's an average drummer at best (credit notes on Beatles albums make for interesting reading, so often they had hired help and even McCartney playing drums.) Ringo's All Starr bands always have a second "main" drummer because he simply doesn't have the chops.
 
Jul 28, 2012
11,010
10,327
Melbourne, the lost City.
AFL Club
Geelong
Other Teams
QPR, Buffalo Bills
Lennon's songs were the most interesting more rocky and edgier, Macca was often accused of "McCartney Sentimentalism". He wrote some great stuff "I Saw Her Standing There", "She's A Woman", "Drive My Car" and a stack of others. He did write "Yesterday" But he blots his copybook many times, "Maxwells Silver Hammer" being a prime example. John Had "In My Life", Nowhere Man, "She Said She Said, "Rain" but went mad in 1968 and gave us "Revolution No.9" Lennon once said "The problem with George is , he's in a band with two geniuses"...
 
May 5, 2016
43,464
48,496
AFL Club
Geelong
Lennon's solo work is so overrated IMO, apart from the first couple of albums (Plastic Ono and Imagine) the rest are very patchy. McCartney cut some great albums with Wings and later on also, his voice is shot now but I saw him a few years back when he finally made it back to Oz and it was everything.

Harrison solo stuff is fine but again, after the first two albums it gets murky. Ringo is the luckiest bloke in rock history, he's an average drummer at best (credit notes on Beatles albums make for interesting reading, so often they had hired help and even McCartney playing drums.) Ringo's All Starr bands always have a second "main" drummer because he simply doesn't have the chops.


You need to watch a YouTube video called The Genius of Ringo
 
May 5, 2016
43,464
48,496
AFL Club
Geelong
I'm a huge Harrison fan as well. He might be the most underrated musician in history which is astounding considering he was a Beatle.


There’s a few different sources that have said that even in the Wilburies, the ‘the man’ in that band wasn’t Harrison.

You’d assume that no matter what level of musician in a band, if you all looked next to you and saw a f***ing Beatle, THAT guy would be the one the others all talk about in hushed tones.

But no. It was Roy Orbison who apparently had the other four all rapping each other on the shoulder saying ‘can you believe we’ve got THAT guy in our band?!?’
 
May 13, 2008
36,308
57,842
Melbourne
AFL Club
Hawthorn
There’s a few different sources that have said that even in the Wilburies, the ‘the man’ in that band wasn’t Harrison.

You’d assume that no matter what level of musician in a band, if you all looked next to you and saw a f***ing Beatle, THAT guy would be the one the others all talk about in hushed tones.

But no. It was Roy Orbison who apparently had the other four all rapping each other on the shoulder saying ‘can you believe we’ve got THAT guy in our band?!?’

I have not read much about Harrison or the Beatles or any of Harrison's other bands - all I have really seen is YouTube interviews - but he just seems a super chilled easy going guy.

Anyone who tells The Beatles machine to GAGF and stays home to write here Comes the Sun instead is a pretty cool guy.

I also love the story that he had to get Eric Clapton to play on While my Guitar Gently Weeps just so John and Paul would take it seriously - kind of indicates Harrison was not huge on being the alfa.

I'm not sure there was any room for another alfa in The Beatles.
 
Sep 24, 2006
3,983
3,402
Wimmera
AFL Club
Collingwood
I have not read much about Harrison or the Beatles or any of Harrison's other bands - all I have really seen is YouTube interviews - but he just seems a super chilled easy going guy.

Anyone who tells The Beatles machine to GAGF and stays home to write here Comes the Sun instead is a pretty cool guy.

I also love the story that he had to get Eric Clapton to play on While my Guitar Gently Weeps just so John and Paul would take it seriously - kind of indicates Harrison was not huge on being the alfa.

I'm not sure there was any room for another alfa in The Beatles.
I reckon you're spot on. I love this clip from the landmark 1986 TV special "A Rockabilly Session: Carl Perkins And Friends" featuring a happy and seemingly star struck George Harrison, in awe of Rock'n'roll pioneer Carl Perkins, along with Ringo Starr, Dave Edmunds, Rosanne Cash, Eric Clapton and a couple of Stray Cats.

Paul McCartney once said that without Carl Perkins there would be no Beatles. Though Harrison, through the Beatles, became a much bigger star than Perkins ever could, here - especially in the last 2 minutes of the video - one can see the respect he holds for his teenage idol -
 

Zuma

Club Legend
Oct 8, 2010
1,722
1,226
long ago in the museum with his friends
AFL Club
West Coast
Other Teams
Swan Districts
I reckon you're spot on. I love this clip from the landmark 1986 TV special "A Rockabilly Session: Carl Perkins And Friends" featuring a happy and seemingly star struck George Harrison, in awe of Rock'n'roll pioneer Carl Perkins, along with Ringo Starr, Dave Edmunds, Rosanne Cash, Eric Clapton and a couple of Stray Cats.

Paul McCartney once said that without Carl Perkins there would be no Beatles. Though Harrison, through the Beatles, became a much bigger star than Perkins ever could, here - especially in the last 2 minutes of the video - one can see the respect he holds for his teenage idol -

Loved this George clearly like a kid in a candy shop
 

Zuma

Club Legend
Oct 8, 2010
1,722
1,226
long ago in the museum with his friends
AFL Club
West Coast
Other Teams
Swan Districts
McCartney for mine the better musician over Lennon though POB and Imagine are classics much of the solo career was patchy. I did like the material John was coming out with before he was taken so tragically.
 
Back