THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD
1,437) The Remo Four/George Harrison — “In the First Place”
Noel Gallagher is the one who saved from the cutting room floor this “hidden gem”, an “extremely strong piece of psychedelic pop” that “sounds exactly as though it was a track from the Beatles’ Magical Mystery Tour – recorded just a few weeks earlier . . . . [with] the same swirling eastern psychedelia found on [George] Harrison’s . . . “Blue Jay Way”. (Martin Lewis, https://web.archive.org/web/20050311075929/http://abbeyrd.best.vwh.net/wonderwall.htm)
The road that leads us to “In the First Place” is certainly winding: George Harrison recruited the Liverpool group the Remo Four to help him record the instrumental score he was commissioned to create for Wonderwall, in Harrison’s words a “kind of 60s hippie movie”.(https://web.archive.org/web/20151104113245/http://www.georgeharrison.com/albums/wonderwall-music/, Jay Allen Sanford gives us his groovy take on the film at https://www.sandiegoreader.com/weblogs/big-screen/2011/may/24/wonderwall-w-george-harrison-music-lost-1968-psych/)
In the process, Colin Manley and Tony Ashton of the R4 wrote the song, which the band recorded with Harrison contributing acoustic guitar (according to John Winn, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_First_Place) and maybe background vocals. However, “since the commission had been for instrumental music and there seemed to be no obvious location for a song in the movie – [Harrison] had not bothered to submit the track to the film’s director!” (Martin Lewis again). Anyway, the movie, “a heavily psychedelized impressionistic fable featuring the young Jane Birkin – premiered in London on January 20, 1969 – but it was not a commercial success and fell from distribution rapidly [and] never secured release in the USA.” (Lewis again). And that was that.
Until, as Lewis writes:
[Noel] happened to see the film on one of its occasional middle-of-the-night TV airings and became fascinated with [it] and its music. . . . le[ading] him [to] writing a song incorporating the film’s title. . . . [which] became a worldwide hit for Oasis. . . . Once people realized the inspiration for the song – the success of the track sparked renewed interest in the original Wonderwall film. So director Joe Massot decided to bring his 1967 production out of mothballs and see if there might be some interest in reissuing the film. . . . [H]e felt that the film could be improved with some re-editing and restoration work. [Massot] started to re-edit the film and create a new ‘director’s cut.’ He also decided that he needed to restore the glory of the film’s original soundtrack which – conforming to the low-fi exhibition standards of the day – had been mixed in mono. [He] set about tracking down all the original elements of the soundtrack. . . . [and] decided to contact George Harrison . . . [who] searched deep in his personal vaults and eventually located all the multi-track masters . . . . [and] passed the tapes to Massot . . . . [who heard “In the First Place” and] felt that he could find a way to include this long-lost gem. . . . He approached Harrison . . . . [who] agreed to the use of his recording in the film. . . . [seeking] just two minor conditions. . . . [H]e wanted to be sure that [the Remo Four] were properly credited for their composition – and that the song was not erroneously represented as having been his . . . . Secondly, Harrison did not want to be officially credited as the artist or as a vocalist on the record. . . . H[e] was . . . aware that none of the four members of the defunct group were in good financial health and that one of the song’s two composers – Colin Manley . . . was also in poor physical health. In fact Manley died just a few months later. Close friends say that Harrison’s insistence on sole credit going to a forgotten and long unsung band of pals (and to not take any credit for his performance) is a typically generous gesture by the reclusive ex-Beatle.
https://web.archive.org/web/20050311075929/http://abbeyrd.best.vwh.net/wonderwall.htm
Matt Hutwitz tells us of the R4’s work on the soundtrack:
George did the first of a number of sessions with a group he had known from Liverpool, The Remo Four . . . . The quartet, recording at Abbey Road, and played on nearly all of the western music tracks, typically by themselves, with only occasional overdubs added by George or [John] Barham. . . . The process was straightforward in coming up with the unique music for the cues. “We would sit in a circle and listen to George explaining what he wanted, sometimes on a guitar,” [the R4’s drummer Roy] Dyke recalls. “Then we’d jam a little bit, come up with something, and he’d say, ‘Yeah, I like that,’ and we’d record. It was all improvised, nothing written down, all very quick. And it was such a warm atmosphere.” . . . George produced five takes of a song of the band’s called “In the First Place,” with Tony Ashton singing.
https://web.archive.org/web/20151104113245/http://www.georgeharrison.com/albums/wonderwall-music/
Martin Lewis provides some additional background:
[The] London-based American director . . . was deeply entrenched in the Swingin’ London of the era. . . . [H]e was searching for the right musicians to create the soundtrack for his movie. The film’s production had created quite a buzz and several artists were vying for the opportunity. The Bee Gees . . . and a post-Hollies pre-CSN Graham Nash both made pitches . . . . Massot attended the now famous opening party for the Beatles’ Apple boutique . . . . [and] found himself in conversation with George Harrison. . . . Harrison indicated that he wanted to find a creative outlet for his growing interest in Indian music. Massot offered Harrison the job of creating the Wonderwall soundtrack – and Harrison accepted. He immediately set about writing and recording music for the film. . . . a groundbreaking blend of . . . . . psychedelic rock with the Indian music which was his passion at the time. . . . [Harrison] recruited . . . The Remo Four. . . . primarily known as an excellent instrumental band and as a backing group for singers such as Tommy Quickly and Billy J. Kramer who (like them) were represented by Beatles manager Brian Epstein. Since the movie commission was for an instrumental score – their lack of major vocal talent was not an issue. []The Remo Four were available for the session work because they were, sadly, in the throes of breaking up. They had already been dropped by two labels which had become disillusioned with their lack of record success – and the group hadn’t had a record released since 1966. . . . Massot went on to a variety of other projects – most notably directing the . . . Led Zeppelin documentary The Song Remains The Same and 1981’s Dance Craze about the two-tone ska revival – featuring Madness and The Specials et al. . . .
https://web.archive.org/web/20050311075929/http://abbeyrd.best.vwh.net/wonderwall.htm
Harrison’s soundtrack was the first album released on Apple and reached #49 on Billboard’s U.S. album chart. Richard S. Ginell writes that:
[The] offbeat score to . . . Wonderwall . . . . [is] mostly given over to the solemn, atmospheric drones of Indian music. Yet, as a whole, it’s a fascinating if musically slender mishmash of sounds from East and West, everything casually juxtaposed or superimposed without a care in the world. Harrison . . . presides over the groups of Indian and British musicians, with half of the cues recorded in London, the other half in Bombay. The Indian tracks are professionally executed selections cut into film cue-sized bites, sometimes mixed up with a rock beat, never permitted to develop much. Touches of Harrison’s whimsical side can be heard . . . .
https://www.allmusic.com/album/wonderwall-music-mw0000676515
Roy Dyke recalled that “George was really into Indian sounds and wanted to turn a lot of people onto it” and Harrison himself recalled that “I thought, I’ll give them an Indian music anthology, and, who knows, maybe a few hippies will get turned on to Indian music.” (https://web.archive.org/web/20151104113245/http://www.georgeharrison.com/albums/wonderwall-music/)
As to the Remo Four, Bill Harry tells us:
A Mersey group who first formed as a vocal outfit, the Remo Quartet, in 1958 and played at social clubs and weddings. They changed to rock‘n’roll music at the beginning of 1960 . . . . [and] appeared on a number of Cavern bills with The Beatles, changing their name to The Remo Four . . . . The group comprised Keith Stokes (rhythm/vocals), Colin Manley, who was rated as Liverpool’s top rock‘n’roll guitarist . . . Don Andrews (bass) and Harry Prytherch (drums). In December 1962 they became Johnny Sandon & The Remo Four in order to embark on a tour of US bases in France, when Roy Dyke replaced Prytherch and Johnny Sandon joined them. . . . The Remo Four turned down the offer of becoming Billy J. Kramer’s backing band but . . . accepted the offer of backing Tommy Quickly. . . . They were now managed by Brian Epstein and were included on the Beatles Christmas show at the Finsbury Park Astoria and also joined The Beatles on their autumn tour of Britain in 1964. They were excited when The Beatles provided them with “No Reply” to record and felt that it would be the single to take them and Tommy to the top of the charts. . . . Unfortunately, Quickly was slightly drunk and very nervous at the session and the single was never released. The group then began to back a variety of singers including Georgie Fame, Billy Fury, and Billy J. Kramer . . . . By this time Tony Ashton had joined the group . . . .
Stephen Thomas Erlewine adds:
Contemporaries of the Beatles, along with other Liverpudlian rockers . . . the Remo Four were . . . . in something of a time warp in 1966 and 1967. While their contemporaries were enjoying the fruits of swinging London, the quartet were stuck in Hamburg playing the Star Club, working off an enormous debt to their management company NEMS along with a tax bill. They were working hard, playing upwards of four times a night, delivering Merseybeat with a hard, jazzy R&B edge. In a sense, they hadn’t moved forward from the glory days of Merseybeat, relying on driving, crowd-pleasing, floor-filling covers, but the constant playing gave the group a deep, muscular groove and jazz chops . . . . [Their sole LP] Smile! and its accompanying singles [ate] rather unique: ostensibly, this is generic British R&B, but the Remo Four swing with an authority that no other British Invasion band had . . . .
https://www.allmusic.com/album/smile%21-peter-gunnand-more-mw0002073691
Finally, Tony Ashton and Roy Dyke later got together with bass player Kim Gardner and formed Ashton, Gardner & Dyke . . . . who recorded a version of “In the First Place” for their debut album in ’70. Dave Thompson writes:
[T]he album peaks with its closing track, “As It Was in the First Place” a lengthy Ashton adaptation from the classical “Adagio from Concierto de Aranjuez.” With an arrangement borrowed from the Modern Jazz Quartet’s own interpretation of the piece (among Tony Ashton’s idols, few were more significant than MJQ’s John Lewis) Ashton and Roy Dyke had already had one stab at the track, recording it with producer George Harrison during the last days of the Remo Four. The new version completely rewired that earlier performance, and stands as one of the pinnacles of British jazz-rock.
https://www.allmusic.com/album/ashton-gardner-dyke-mw0000039883
Here is Ashton, Gardner & Dyke:
Here is classical guitarist John Williams performing the Adagio from Joaquin Rodrigo’s concerto for classical guitar “Concierto de Aranjuez” with an unnamed orchestra:
Here is the Modern Jazz Quartet:
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