Inside George Harrison’s Archives: Dhani on His Father’s Incredible Vaults
Like his father, the late Beatles guitarist George Harrison, Dhani Harrison is a musician. He made his professional debut on his dad’s last studio album, Brainwashed, issued after George’s death in 2001. Now 36, Dhani composes film scores and is half of a band, the newno2 – named after a recurring character in the late-Sixties British television show, The Prisoner – with another musical son, Paul Hicks. (His father, Tony, is the founding guitarist of the Hollies.)
Unlike his father, Dhani is – with his mother, Olivia – a caretaker. Since George’s passing, Dhani has been active in the archiving and release of his father’s solo legacy, including a 2004 box, The Dark Horse Years 1976-1992; a 2012 rarities CD, Early Takes: Volume 1; and the first comprehensive reissue of George’s early life away from the Beatles, The Apple Years 1968-1975. The centerpiece of that set – seven CDs with bonus tracks plus a DVD, issued in September – is, of course, the 1970 masterpiece, All Things Must Pass.
But The Apple Years begins with George’s initial, eccentric excursions – the 1968 Indo-rock film score, Wonderwall; the ’69 Moog holiday, Electronic Sound – and runs through the focused spirituality of 1973’s Living in the Material World and the understated-R&B writing and meditation on 1974’s Dark Horse and ’75’s Extra Texture (Read All About It). “I’ve been dying to get to this for about ten years,” Dhani claims. “There were some things record companies had done over the years. My dad had already remastered All Things [for a 2001 reissue]. But no one was doing Electronic Sound.”
When Dhani and I spoke for a recent news story about the new box in Rolling Stone, we covered more ground than space allowed. What follows is a longer, deeper walk through the opening chapters of George Harrison’s career apart from and beyond the biggest band in pop history. Dhani says Wonderwall is his favorite album in the set and admits he is still surprised by his father’s music – even records as familiar as the sonically opulent All Things Must Pass. “I was trying to work out some chords for one of those songs,” Dhani says. “And I realized that you can’t hear the chords in there – because there are 50 horns going on over the top.”
A Full-On Freakout
Why is “Wonderwall” your favorite record in this box? Aside from”Electronic Sound,” it is the least heard and understood of your father’s Apple albums.
I remember getting a CD of it in the early Nineties and thinking, “What is this?” You’re sitting there, almost meditating to the music, literally drooling in your lap. Then a shenai [an Indian oboe] will come in and practically take the top of your head off. It’s such a deep, psychedelic record. It had Eric Clapton in it, all this backwards guitar, horns – it’s a full-on freakout record. And it was instrumental. Any singing on it was deep Hindu chants.
It was functional music, a movie soundtrack, but also a record made for tripping – the spiritual kind.
It was a cross of spaghetti-western music, the Chants of India things my Dad with Ravi [Shankar] and the Beatles’ best freakouts. For people who haven’t heard that record, that’s the first thing you should listen to in the box. Wonderwall, for my generation, is a title associated with Oasis. It’s not. It’s one of the first things my dad did on his own, away from the Beatles.
Where did you find the instrumental outtake of the Beatles’ 1968 B-side “The Inner Light”?
My father recorded that track of his own accord in Bombay. It was part of the same reels as Wonderwall, which is why I put this version on the reissue. It sounds so different without the singing and the Beatles’ production on it.
The studio chatter at the front is fascinating – you hear George’s interaction with the players, translating his ideas into that setting.
The Indian musicians’ way of doing it is spoken – all oral. That’s the way it’s passed down. There’s a great count-in, where the Indian engineer is going “Abracadabra,” instead of “1, 2, 3, 4.” It’s a cool bit of history. For someone who hasn’t heard Wonderwall before but who knows “The Inner Light,” this gives them a better idea of where that album fits into my father’s history. That album is a missing link to the end of the Beatles.