Watching Get Back the second time

[Lord Reith]

I've watched episode 1 again and felt somewhat differently towards it this time. John is quite a bit more engaged than what i thought he was, but still holding back a lot. At times it seems like he and Ringo are the adults, and Paul and George are like two little school boys bickering with each other. John seems to keep out of it deliberately. I don't think he was high all the time, because we have a clear demonstration the morning after George quit what John looked like when smacked up, and he doesn't look that way the rest of the time (aside from a blank facial expression when not saying anything, which was normal for him).

Twickenham was just a terrible idea. They should have partitioned off part of it or found somewhere else. Everybody clearly hates being there.

Paul is "doing his bit to hold the group together", but he's also going beyond the call of duty at some points. I have zero issues with him demonstrating to Ringo a nice drum pattern for Don't Let Me Down (even though Ringo didn't take his advice). Also, giving George ideas about what to play on guitar is okay. Those who complain about this don't understand how bands work. But when he keeps shutting George down every time the guy tries to find a groove, that would be really frustrating and annoying. When they do Get Back Paul doesn't like the #9th chord that John and George play "(Get back!" - CHUNG - "Get back!" - CHUNG - ) and says it's dated. He asks where it came from and John plays a bit of Jimi Hendrix's "Foxy lady". Then George says it's just a chord and chords don't date and Paul totally shuts him down. After that George just looks so fed up and miserable. George has been saying "I want to feel like your songs are mine" and is trying really hard to express his ideas but is getting blocked at every turn. I think I'd have gone into a sulk and left too.

Looking forward to watching part 2 again, but my general feeling is that they started bad and then successfully pulled it together, whereas the narrative we've had over the years has always been that the whole month was a disaster.

[zaval80]

It's because the story has been told like this, due to perceptions of participants. But to a watcher from outside "after-the-fact", they've recorded an album's worth, yet basically washed their hands off it, left to other people to come up with the fruits of its post-production. But the songs were strong and the recorded renditions were good.

[millerTEK]

same here - watching again more closely - finding new things -

I'll give you an example - on part 1 (2:21:57)
January 10 before George quits. After that last play of Two Of Us (DDSI10.48) - JOhn starts playing I'm Talking About You while Paul is talking and Paul asks JOhn to stop playing because he's trying to talk to him about the arrangement. Then Paul brings up lunch and JOhn goes back to I'm Talking About You (DDSI10.49) when George quits.

So Peter Jackson has revealed some lost NAGRA footage between 10:48 and 10.49 - because currently there is a static dropout of audio at the end of the moment between these two tracks in the audio releases. So the footage could be repaired between these 2 tracks now. Pretty kool! I'm sure there is MORE!

As for George leaving - I watched and did not detect any TRIGGER that set off George. 2 songs were worked on before his exit - Get Back and Two Of Us. There was footage of Paul telling George that 'we don;t need 2 guitarists and eric clapton is not needed'. Then John says 'we just need George Harrison'. Maybe that pissed George off? Now I have to listen to the NAGRA audio I have for that day...maybe something was there and Peter Jackson did not show it. Appears to me something triggered George.

Then the Two Of US footage - George is pretty silent during that mess and it isn't until JOhn gets bored and starts playing something else, paul cuts him off, and lunch is called, - that George decides he's leaving....

Interesting.

[millerTEK]

Found something not in the NAGRA footage -
See Part 2 at 38:13 marked as DAY 10 on JAn 16.
The Twickenham set breakdown is happening yet MAINLY - we find Paul shows up at Twick and has Glyn record some Items - mainly Oh Darling (note the echo)...

these items are listed around DDSI14.48 at the end of JAn 14th. so it appears these were recorded on the 16th.
Nice DDSI update for those to a DDSI16....!

ALSO CHECK OUT the time afterward from Jan 17th to 20th....equipment testing. misc items - no recording allowed apparently. Beatles showed up on the 20th (you can see the footage of JOhn and Yoko arriving that was used in the LIB movie, etc).

[Lord Reith]

As for George leaving - I watched and did not detect any TRIGGER that set off George.

I tend to feel that it is what Paul says to him about the Hendrix chord he and John are playing in Get Back. Clearly George feels it works well (I agree, for what it's worth) but Paul just dismisses him outright. There's a brief moment where he looks visibly taken aback. But we're missing the visuals for his actual exit. All we get is the audio with some other footage, so it's difficult to read his mood when he walked out. On the audio it sounds like he is flippant and joking, but we don't know whether he was actually angry or tearing up or whatever.

[millerTEK]

As for George leaving - I watched and did not detect any TRIGGER that set off George.

I tend to feel that it is what Paul says to him about the Hendrix chord he and John are playing in Get Back. Clearly George feels it works well (I agree, for what it's worth) but Paul just dismisses him outright. There's a brief moment where he looks visibly taken aback. But we're missing the visuals for his actual exit. All we get is the audio with some other footage, so it's difficult to read his mood when he walked out. On the audio it sounds like he is flippant and joking, but we don't know whether he was actually angry or tearing up or whatever.

I will check that out - I know I might have to review the nagra audio stuff if PJ didn;t show it in the movie, too...def explains more...as I watched George when he came in that day and did not get any impression he was planning to quit. However there is a lot of audio PJ did not show us that happened before that moment, so I want to find what 'triggered' him...

I thought it was George's Eric Clapton recommendation during Get Back that Paul dismissed and said 'no we don't need Eric', and even JOhn said "we only need George Harrison'. After that I noticed during the Two Of Us work, George had this stone face which made me think that is when he was thinking and deciding in his head - he was gonna split.

[harrythebannister]

Going to be watching again this week too. I couldn’t play the mkv files through my telly so had to watch on a tiny laptop through headphones. However, found an older laptop over the weekend with a hdmi which will plug into the tv, so will watch these again, very loud through my sound bar and hopefully get a different experience.

[millerTEK]

my Lord -

looking at your first comment about the early Twick sessions, I agreed with your assessment that John looked interested at first. Seemed like when the Maxwell and Two of us work started, he sort of started to lose interest.

Also when you watch the Paul and George argument shown in the 1970 LIB movie and then see how it was presented in real time in PJ's release - you see how the context changes completely. in 1970 to THE PRESENT - all we saw was that argument as shown by Hogg. PJ shows it in real unedited time so the first part was not even comments to George, but John. Also some of the comments to George took place in totally separate time periods, but Hogg edited them together in his version....the context is totally changed now when you get the unedited footage to watch.

what do you think?

[harrythebannister]

As for George leaving - I watched and did not detect any TRIGGER that set off George.

I tend to feel that it is what Paul says to him about the Hendrix chord he and John are playing in Get Back. Clearly George feels it works well (I agree, for what it's worth) but Paul just dismisses him outright. There's a brief moment where he looks visibly taken aback. But we're missing the visuals for his actual exit. All we get is the audio with some other footage, so it's difficult to read his mood when he walked out. On the audio it sounds like he is flippant and joking, but we don't know whether he was actually angry or tearing up or whatever.

I will check that out - I know I might have to review the nagra audio stuff if PJ didn;t show it in the movie, too...def explains more...as I watched George when he came in that day and did not get any impression he was planning to quit. However there is a lot of audio PJ did not show us that happened before that moment, so I want to find what 'triggered' him...

I thought it was George's Eric Clapton recommendation during Get Back that Paul dismissed and said 'no we don't need Eric', and even JOhn said "we only need George Harrison'. After that I noticed during the Two Of Us work, George had this stone face which made me think that is when he was thinking and deciding in his head - he was gonna split.

Yes, I noticed this too....he looks decidedly pissed off. I reckon he had made up his mind at this point to walk and was just waiting for the right moment. I think Paul hoped to get him back the next day but when it was found out he had gone to Liverpool, Paul looks a bit shaken and thoughtful realising this could be a major set back to the schedule.
I wonder what he went to Liverpool for....maybe to visit family perhaps.

[MarkRJones1970]

I read that George's mum was ill at the time