John Lennon and George Harrison hosting the Apple boutique grand opening in London December 5, 1967.
hi babe :) any chance we could get touch starved john who thinks he’s clingy & just wants held? you’re the sweetest, thank you doll <3
hello my dear ! i hope it’s okay that i used lennison for this ! i couldn’t resist !!! <3
“George,” John whines from the couch.
George can only roll his eyes, this is the fourth time in the past five minutes that John has called out for his boyfriend.
He knows exactly what John wants.
“Geo—“ John starts but is immediately interrupted by George.
“John—Please be quiet for just one moment,” he takes a deep breath, “I’m trying to focus on something.”
“Writing songs can wait, George. I can’t believe you would let the love of your life sit over here and waste away without so much as a kiss or a hug?” John asks incredulously.
George picks his head up from his guitar, “You are far from attention deprived, John. And even if you were, I think you would survive.”
John lets out another whine, “But George,” he pauses for a moment to attract his lover’s eye contact, “I could just drop dead right now and you’d just have to live with the fact that you wouldn’t give me any affection.”
George sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose, “You are insufferable,” he states plainly as he sets his guitar down and closes his notebook.
John grins as George’s figure appears in view, “Well hello there handsome,” John purrs as George settles beside him.
George rolls his eyes once again as John climbs into his lap and places his arms around George’s neck.
“Oh don’t act so unamused,” John teases, “I know you are just as needy as I am.”
George fights the urge to roll his eyes for a third time as his hands settle at John’s waist, “Y’know, John, I love you. I really do, but sometimes I’d like to just shut that pretty little mouth of yours.”
John lets out a gasp of (fake) surprise, “You love me? I had no idea!”
This time George does roll his eyes for a third time before pulling John forward to press a kiss to his lips.
“I like you better when you shut your mouth,” George whispers as they pull away.
John’s smugness can be seen from a mile away, “I always knew you did.”
JOHN LENNON and GEORGE HARRISON during recording sessions for the "IMAGINE" album
“I was falling in love. When I heard those songs I melted. They were mana from heaven to me. And he was so shy and fragile. I wanted to mother him and he seemed to want and need it. He seemed so helpless.”
-Joan Baez recalling her “first dates” with Bob Dylan, Positively 4th Street by David Hajdu
GEORGE HARRISON and BOB DYLAN rehearsing "If Not For You" for the CONCERT FOR BANGLADESH, July 1971
George Harrison and welsh singer Mary Hopkin - cca 1969
george harrison (+ john lennon) on the set of magical mystery tour, 1967
Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell, The Rolling Thunder Revue—Harvard Square Theater, Cambridge, MA, November 20, 1975 © Ken Regan.
George Harrison and Bob Dylan, Concert for Bangladesh, 1 August 1971; photo by Bill Ray (?).
Q: “One of the coups of [the Concert for] Bangladesh was Dylan’s appearance, because he had done so little since his motorcycle accident in 1966. Was he initially reluctant to do Bangladesh?”
George Harrison: “He was. He never committed himself, right up until the moment he came onstage. On the night before Bangladesh, we sat in Madison Square Garden as the people were setting up the bandstand. He looked around the place and said to me, ‘Hey, man, you know, this isn’t my scene.’ I’d had so many months… it seemed like a long time of trying to get it all together, and my head was reeling with all the problems and never. I’d gotten so fed up with him not being committed, I said, ‘Look, it’s not my scene, either. At least you’ve played on your own in front of a crowd before. I’ve never done that.’ So he turned up the next morning, which looked positive. I had a list, a sort of running order, that I had glued on my guitar. When I got to the point where Bob was going to come on, I had Bob with a question mark. I looked over my shoulder to see if he was around, because if he wasn’t, I would have to go on to do the next bit. And I looked around, and he was so nervous — he had his guitar and his shades — he was sort of coming on, coming [pumps his arms and shoulders]. So I just said, ‘My old friend, Bob Dylan!’ It was only at that moment that I knew for sure he was going to do it. After the second show, he picked me up and hugged me and said, ‘God! If only we’d done three shows.’” - Rolling Stone, 5 November 1987 (x)
thinking about how one of the first big moves george makes post-breakup is to run away to new york to record the dylan sessions
Rollin’ Rain and Hard Thunder - A Compilation Film by Swingin’ Pig from Swingin’ Pig (alternate account) on Vimeo.
PLEASE READ:
Here it is. I spent about a month editing this video together. I ripped the footage from a bootlegged tape of “Renaldo & Clara,” a 1978 film that was edited by Howard Alk and Bob Dylan himself. Some snippets are from Martin Scorsese’s incredible Netflix documentary “Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story.” If you’d like to see “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” and “One More Cup of Coffee” (both of which are in this compilation) in 4K quality, do yourself a favor and watch it. There are other incredible performances in it that weren’t in “Renaldo & Clara.”
Anyway, as I was saying, this footage is from a source tape and some of the best quality versions that are available at the moment. Someday these performances will be rescanned, restored and released, but for now, this is what I have to work with visually. I did my best to correct the faded colors, correct the lighting, and sharpen the image a bit, but please realize that this was recorded from a television broadcast in the 1970s, and unaltered since then, so the images won’t be perfect.
The audio is a different story, luckily. It took a long time to do, but I successfully overdubbed all of the original low-quality audio (it had a lot of hiss and was broadcasted in mono) with the soundboard recordings released on the Rolling Thunder Boxset. This took longer than I had expected because the footage and audio were sped up in the bootleg tape. But I eventually calculated the difference in speed and was able to synchronize them.
So, please enjoy this labor of love! Below is somewhat of a setlist and some of my personal thoughts on “standout” performances in this video.
CHAPTERS: 0:07 - It Ain’t Me, Babe 5:26 - It Takes A Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry [Excellent, rocking version] 8:32 - Fascinating historical commentary by David Blue 9:20 - A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall [released on YouTube and on Netflix’s “Rolling Thunder Revue” documentary] 14:15 - Romance in Durango 19:05 - Isis [Incredible performance, superior to the one in the documentary. His voice is sheer power and cuts like a knife. I dare say it’s Dylan’s best-filmed performance of the tour. The way he moves his arms and hands makes you feel like you’re looking into another dimension] 24:20 - Never Let Me Go [feat. Joan Baez] 27:05 - Interesting footage of the revue visiting Niagra Falls 27:32 - One More Cup of Coffee (Valley Below) [released on YouTube and on Netflix’s “Rolling Thunder Revue” documentary] 31:35 - Sara [Gorgeous version with some beautiful footage I edited together in the beginning. The verse starting at 34:54 has incredible enunciation] 36:21 - Just Like a Woman [This is my favorite version of the song. Just watch listen to the whole thing, uninterrupted. It’s just phenomenal. The bridge (“It was raining from the first”) is some of the strongest singing I’ve ever heard from Dylan and then in the subsequent verse, he abruptly drops into this sweet tone. Just phenomenal] 40:32 - Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door [Beautiful version, superior to the one released in the Netflix documentary. The instrumental at 42:56 gives me chills] 44:35 - An emotional and cathartic ending.
Enjoy this gem while you can!