Honey Pie

Among the songs that were demoed by the Beatles in May of 1968 was this tune by Paul McCartney that sounds as if it came right out of an old fashioned Hollywood musical from the 1930's.  Anthology 3 presents an edited version of Paul's Honey Pie demo, allowing us to listen in on the fun.  This demo was recorded at George Harrison's house in advance of the group moving into the studio to begin work on what turned out to be a sprawling double album.

The work on this album stretched out for months before the song finally resurfaced on October 1st at a session booked at Trident Studios in London.  All four Beatles were in attendance, and they obviously spent much of the session rehearsing the number before committing it to tape, as official documentation indicates that the master was take one.  The lineup for this take has Paul on piano, John on lead guitar, George on bass and Ringo on drums.

On the following day, Paul overdubbed his lead vocal and added a lead guitar part to the song's intro section.  And two days later, on October 4th, five saxophones and two clarinets performed producer George Martin's period-perfect arrangement.  The final touch was created by having Paul's line "now she's hit the big time" in the intro treated to sound as if it were playing on a scratchy old 78 rpm record.  All of the work on these subsequent days was done at Trident Studios, as well.

The "White Album" proved to be the most eclectic of the group's career, surpassing even Revolver in that respect.  And McCartney's compositions in particular spanned the widest range of styles, with this song certainly responsible for a good portion of that range.

This was the last album by the Beatles to be mixed for mono, and the mono mix of this song is notable for adding a few more measures of John Lennon's brief guitar solo.  George Harrison later praised this solo, saying, "John played a brilliant solo on Honey Pie - sounded like Django Reinhardt or something."

Honey Don't

To a man, the Beatles were big fans of rockabilly star Carl Perkins, composer of the seminal hit Blue Suede Shoes.  As they became worldwide stars in their own right, they naturally found themselves in situations where it became quite easy for them to meet their longtime idols.  Such was the case in May of 1964 when they made the acquaintance of Perkins at a party in London.

The group had been performing several of Perkins' songs in their stage act for years in Liverpool and Hamburg.  Ringo wasted no time in asking the rock and roll legend for permission to record his songs and Perkins reportedly gave the boys the choice of anything in his entire catalog.  Shortly thereafter, he attended the June session which saw Ringo sing the lead vocal on his composition Matchbox.

Later that same year, the group was finishing up work on their fourth album Beatles for Sale.  George had already sung the lead vocal on the Perkins tune Everybody's Trying to Be My Baby, but Ringo had yet to record his vocal outing for the album.  On October 26th, 1964, they turned to the Perkins songbook one last time for Honey Don't.  It only required five takes with George on lead guitar, John on acoustic guitar, Paul on bass and Ringo on drums and at the microphone before they had the master.  Ringo overdubbed a tambourine and the song was quickly complete.

Though the song was stuck in the middle of side two on Beatles for Sale in the UK, Ringo had many fans in America, so Capitol featured it prominently at the start of side two on the US album Beatles '65.  The label also made it the lead track on the final US EP 4 by the Beatles, released in February of 1965.

Yet the song had always been sung by John, not Ringo, in the band's stage act.  The 1994 collection Live at the BBC allows us to hear the way it used to be from a September 1963 broadcast on Pop Go the Beatles.  I have stated in an earlier post that I prefer Ringo's version - I feel the song actually suits his personality better - and I stand by that statement.  On Air - Live at the BBC Vol. 2 presents a November 1964 performance from the program Top Gear with Ringo on lead vocal.

The song briefly stayed in the group's live repertoire, most notably for the duration of Another Beatles Christmas Show at the Hammersmith Odeon at the end of '64.