George in London Summer of 1972

 

I am sure that you all have been wondering to yourself what exactly was George Harrison doing 50 years ago.  Well -- do I have a treat for you because I have found a diary written by a fan that was in London in late July/early August of 1972 and shared what was happening with George during that time. 

London 1972

By Kris Martell

The Harrison Alliance

January 1973

 

July 25^th - Saw Pattie today at the office, as well as Alf, Mal (He’s got new glasses!  Wire ones!), and Neil.  We saw Ringo come out again as well.  Joanne went over to Pattie when she came out and spoke with her for a while – her hair’s cut differently now and she’s got bangs.  She waved at all of us as she passed by in her red car!

July 26^th – Today was the premiere of the Bangla Desh film – Angela (an Italian girl) gave me an extra ticket she had, so I got in.  Joanne (who got in thru Alf) and I sat downstairs for a while then decided to try to make it upstairs. That was for “reserved” seats and anybody who was anyone was up there.  We managed to get up there and sat right behind Nilsson (who was making out with some chick) and to our right was Bolin – a few seats away.  George never showed up.

July 29^th – Today I went with Joanne to go to Chelsea and visit the antique market Pattie recommended to us (AntiQuarius).

August 1^st – It’s raining at Apple – we chatted with Alf.  Saw Ringo go in.  Found out George just started recording – saw him go in at 7pm.  “I’m late – good evening!”  He came out at 1:05am (he always made late nights) – smiled – and just waited like he usually does! (Klaus and Nilsson left with him).  Paul Mosian (a man who works for Klein at the NY office) showed up and I directed him down to the studio.  Lindsay – the night guard at the studio, sent cups of coffee up for us – god it was cold!

August 2^nd – George went in at 6:50pm.  Ringo said “Hello” to us – “Hi” to the 3 Scruffs.  When he came out the thanked the Scruffs for the cake, then said, “oh, you shouldn’t wait around, it’s been 10 hours!” His usual speech.  He said goodnight to us, as did Nilsson.

August 3^rd – Today my friend from California gave George a shirt that read “I Dig Love” – white lettering, blue background.  He smiled and said thank you.  Pattie went in at 10:20pm and came out about half hour later.  This was a long night and cold!  We had blankets and slept on the steps huddled against each other – singing sometimes to keep awake and normal.  A policeman greeted us midway through the night and chatted.  Anyhow there was always about six of us – no more – no less – and we sat huddled on the steps.  3 of the Scruffs and 3 of us.  When he came out it was light out (we must’ve looked a sight!) and he thanked the Scruffs for the present they’d given him.  Then my friend said “how’s it going?” to which George said, “now I know why Phil Spector is crazy.”  My friend, “why?”  George:  “Well you have to listen to the same thing over and over again and it makes you go crazy!”  Anyhow – you know how slow George is – talking about that took about six minutes (one must also include the one-minute state breaks he takes while talking).  As he drove past us, he waved – we waited for the trail and got home at 6am.

 

August 4^th – There were a lot of people at the studio today.  George went in and smiled while saying “freak show!”  He came out and said “good morning” to the 5 of us at 4:40.  My friend said “is it getting any better?” to which George said, “It always sounds better early in the evening and then it sounds worse as the night goes on.”  He strapped himself into this blue BMW before starting the car – then he went past us, and waved goodbye as he usually did.  Our friend in the studio arranged for us to have a little tour of the Studio – as soon as the Scruffs left and all the musicians.  So at 5am we were playing “Here There and Everywhere” on the control room piano.  He showed us all over and explained everything – really interesting.  I noticed that all of George’s instruments still had the tags on the Park Lane Hotel and the Queen Elizabeth II.

August 5^th – I think we slept till around noon today.  It was Saturday but George even worked on those!  When he came in today (6pm) we all sort of made a pathway for him – you could understand better if you could see what I’m talking about, but imagine 8-10 people in a cluster then they see George and immediately form a path and diverge on both sides – well that’s what we did and noticed and was trying to hold his laughter in while saying “hello!” as he went in.  One of the Scruffs gave a big whistle and everybody just about cracked up.  At 7pm he came out (which was unusual) and walked to Piccadilly to go to the movies with Phillip – a technician.  He came back at 8:45 and some Spanish girls were there.  As he came in, one went to go over to him but tripped on some wiring near the construction there, to which George noticed and said, “you’d better watch yourself!”  She got herself untangled and went over to him – stated her name and said she was from Spain.  Then she planted a kiss on his cheek to which George seemed quite delighted, and he said “oh – I’ve never met anybody from Spain!”  At 4:40am George came out, he gave us all long individual stares and said “goodnight.”  We had sent down some wine to them with a card that read “Here’s something to make it sound good all night long.”  Nilsson came out with the bottle, offered us some, and chatted.  He was really nice and thought it was great that we waited so patiently for George. He was a real nice down-to-earth human being.  I liked him a lot.

August 9^th - George has stopped recording for a while.

August 11^th – George expected for lunch at Apple but never showed up.

August 13^th-- George is in the studio again.  My 2 friends unexpectedly walked by and saw him, Nilsson invited them in to listen to the tapes in the studio afterwards!  After that night he stopped using the studio again.  He suddenly left for Portugal alone.  Nobody at Apple knew anything.  Pattie remarked that she hadn’t heard from him – “Oh I hope he’s alright!”  He doesn’t speak a word of French or Portuguese!  By the way, he drove down to Portugal, and in Spain he met up with Gary Wright. 

August 1972

This is another article (I have several to type up) from the issue #1 (January 1973) of the fanzine by Marie Lacey called "McCartney Lovers and Friends."   It is about some fans who meet up with Paul during his Wings European tour in 1972 and then right after the tour at his home.   What I find the most interesting is this one sentence about how one of the girls was a "baddie" and was known as the girl who threw chocolate mousse in Paul's face.   What?   What happened there?  Why did she do that?   This story was written by Kris Martell who lived in New York City but was staying in London at the time.

 

McCartney’s Lovers and Friends

January 1973

Written by Kris Martell (NYC)

After a lot of disappoints and much confusion, Pat Miller and I were off to see Wings in Holland.  We were not sure if we had tickets or not.  We had called Holland a few times and got different answers every time.  We wanted to go to all of the concerts in Holland, that being Breda, Groningen, Rotterdam and Amsterdam.  After several calls to the Dutch Tourist Office, it seemed that Paul kept changing his mind and cancelled out on a few (Breda included).  With the little money we had, it seemed that Amsterdam would be all we would make.  So, on august 19, Pat and I were lucky and got a KLM flight (stand-by) to Amsterdam.  We were really happy that we got that flight because if we didn’t, a boat that left that midnight was the last resort and that didn’t please us too much!  Everything was so sudden that I left with just a knap-sack on my back and we were off.  We were in the Netherlands by 9:30p.m. and headed for the Dutch Information Center.  They found Pat and I the cheapest dormitory on Kriserstraat, right on the docks (it was beautiful there) for only $2.00 per night, breakfast included.  The next day, we must have walked all over the city, every place from Ann Frank’s house to Rembrandt’s.  But, our first stop was the Concert Gerbou.  Stopping to ask some of the natives for directions, we came upon a group of young people who told us the concert was the night before.  Pat and I just couldn’t get over it, we believe it so much.  He had changed dates so many times right and left, why not Amsterdam as well?  It wasn’t until we had our tickets in our hands that we were happy.  You might say we floated across the city for 7 ½ hours.  We looked all over for his hotel, including Dam Square because we thought that would be the most likely place, but no such luck.  So we walked around the canals, took a boat trip and just enjoyed the beautiful city.  The concert was at 7pm on August 20^th so we got to the Concert Gerbou at 5:30 pm.  Around 6, we saw a little white bus coming towards us to Paul, Linda and the rest of the group, plus Mary, Heather and Stella.  Pat and I were the only visible fans around.  A few technicians were scattered nearby as they were using the Stones Mobile.  Paul came out in his white jacket holding Stella.  Mary was holding onto Denny Laine, and Heather to Linda.  He came right towards us, gave a big smile and said “hello girls” to which Linda turned around and smiled.  By this time, we were both getting a bit spastic!  Pat was totally shocked because her relationship with Paul wasn’t exactly the best (She was one of the “baddies” known for throwing a chocolate mousse in Paul’s face).   Was just so happy because he made it just so personal talking to us.  Well after the concert they all came out to listen to the playbacks in the mobile.  By this time a crowd had assembled but nothing like what I had experienced in Frankfurt.  He came out of the hall, giving the “thumbs up” sign, smiling and wearing sunglasses.  The whole family went into the mobile after him.  We could hear the playbacks from outside.  One of my friends managed to get inside and another of my friends followed.  They were two English girls that had been standing outside his home for all the years that he has lived there.  One of them went over to Paul, who was sitting in a chair listening to the playbacks.  She went over to him to say that she was not going to hang around the house anymore.  Paul seemed very pleased, took her hand and said that it was for the best.  Linda shed a few tears as they left.  It was really a very touching thing, the best way to end off the evening.  Paul must have been very happy, knowing that they had come this far to see him, and then to get in his van and say something like that.  Linda kept saying that she didn’t mind them coming in after a concert like this and talking and they seemed pleased that they had enjoyed themselves at the concert.  In 45 minutes the group came out and went into the white van.  Everybody cheered and Paul gave the “thumbs up” sign again.  The notable bus was absent.  Pat and I got to the airport and slept there for the night.  That was some experience.  I’d never done it before!  But it was great fun and by this time we were on Cloud 9.  I didn’t realize so many people sleep out at airports but half of the departure lounge was full of people.  I’ve got many memories from that night including banging a vending machine at 3am (we were hungry and had no money) then cleaning my feet in the bathroom and then trying to sleep while some janitor vacuumed the airport floor.  But the best memory was the Concert Gerbou!  We got to London the next day, literally exhausted. I slept all day and felt a bit sick.  At 9pm Alf from the Apple Offices came over to our flat and stayed for two hours.  He had his white Rolls parked right in front of the apartment – wonder what the neighbors thought!?!  By the 23^rd I was still sick and sleeping.  Pattie went to the “Godfather” premiere with Neilson.  By the 25^th (Friday) I was well recovered.  We thought that Paul might be coming home.  The concert in Berlin was the night before.  I really had my doubts though; we all thought he’d be going to Scotland for a rest.  Besides myself and my two friends from L.A., there was Harllet Vdo from Germany, Karen from Kansas, Angela, Mirella from Italy and two girls from Georgia that I had met two years ago.  We spent a few hours at #9, when Rosie came out and said that he’d be home “shortly.”  Food arrived, Martha was home, everything looked great!  I still had my doubts from previous experiences.  He was scheduled to come home between 6-7 pm.  We waited all day and never left, just to make sure.  We heard the phone ring and a few times we were so sure that it was Paul calling saying he’d be home in a week or so and not then.  Well at 8pm, the red Lamgerghini came around the corner.  (I still wonder how it got to the airport to meet him).  He got out to open the gate and had on a beautiful yellow and green shirt with his suspenders and tight black pants.  He said, “You know we really don’t like people hanging around the house.”  My friend said, “Well, we just wanted to welcome you home, Paul.”  Paul said, “Yeah, but we don’t like people hanging around the house.”  My friend said “We saw you in concert and it was really good.”  At the time, Paul was down on the ground unlocking the gate and he only half-heard what she said. HE looked up and said, “What?”  My friend said, “We saw the show in Paris and it was great.”  Paul said, “Oh thank you.”  As he was closing the gate, she gave him a letter from one of the English girls and he said, “Oh Ok.”  And “Goodbye.”  While this was going on, my other friend was talking to Linda who was in the car.  We had gotten flowers for her.  My friend gave them to her and said, “These are for you.”  Linda looked a bit surprised and said, “oh.”  Then my friend said “These are for Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam and Montreux.”  (I had gone to Frankfurt and Amsterdam, she to Paris and Karen to Montreux).  Linda took them and winked!  So did Heather, who had Stella on her lap.  When they went in, we all left, except for the two girls from Georgia.  They waited for Rosie, and walked her to the station.  Rosie said Linda came in and said, “They’re still out there.”  But Paul wasn’t affected by it at all.  Rosie said that they had been having some arguments and things were being thrown around.  She asked us if Linda was really as rich as the papers made her out to be.  She just couldn’t get over the fact that she was from such a well-to-do family.  Rosie also mentioned that the only thing Linda cooked for dinner was soup, some vegetables and sandwiches (all the time).