Off The Beatle Track

I can’t say enough good things about George Martin. I’m convinced that without him, we in the U.S. would never have heard of The Beatles. That’s what makes this so difficult. We’re going to review his 1998 compilation album In My Life, which contains 10 Beatles’ covers, most by well-known artists, and two Martin-penned tracks. Most of the songs are performed by well-known artists, though some are know for arts other than singing or playing music.

Let’s get right to the track-by-track breakdown.

Robin Williams and Bobby McFerrin: Come Together

Sounds to me like Williams does most of the singing here, and McFerrin vocalizes the distinctive intro and sings other sections (he sings the third verse after Williams shouts, “Take it, Bobby!”). Williams is no singer, but he capably handles his parts. He keeps himself in check for most of the song but starts to riff over the minute-and-a-half fadeout. I think I heard a reference to the Heimlich Maneuver and a John Wayne impression. I remind myself that George Martin started out producing comedy records. . . but there’s nothing funny about this track.

Goldie Hawn: A Hard Day’s Night

I like Goldie Hawn. Who doesn’t? In movies. She sings and reportedly plays piano on this track, and the tempo is slower than The Beatles’ original. The over-the-top arrangement reminds me of Ella Fitzgerald’s Ella Wishes You a Swinging Christmas album.¹ After the first bridge, Goldie says/sings, and I hope I’m spelling this correctly, “Switcheroonie.” I don’t know why. Maybe because she’s switching from the bridge to the verse? Do we expect all singers to announce when they move between the parts of a song?² After “Switcheroonie,” she does some emoting (including a snore, followed by a giggle, and a kiss at the end of the song). The backing track is solid, and I would prefer to hear it with no vocal.³

Jeff Beck: A Day in the Life

This one is an instrumental, led by Beck’s guitar, with drums and strings. (George Martin’s orchestration on this album generally works well.) I like the effect on Beck’s guitar as John’s verses move into Paul’s bridge, but how will I know to anticipate the change if no one says “Switcheroonie”? A guitar player might lecture me about Beck’s virtuosity, but his guitar sounds shrill to me.

Celine Dion: Here, There and Everywhere

Dion is at least a professional singer, and she’s working with a beautiful song. The track starts with sparse instrumentation, which grows as Dion’s sings more loudly. She runs through the full set of lyrics in about a minute thirty, but the track still has about a minute forty left. That made me nervous the first time I listened to the song, but Martin fills some of that time with strings, and Dion repeats the last verse and chorus without stumbling into grandiosity. Not my preferred version of the song, but it’s far from the worst track on the album.

Vanessa-Mae: Because

Vanessa-Mae is a violinist, maybe better known in the U.K. than in the U.S.⁴ A chorus backs her up,⁵ but this is really Vanessa-Mae’s show. I like the idea of an instrumental version of a John song, and Because does have a pretty melody. But I don’t know much about classical music, and the lead violin doesn’t much appeal to me.

Jim Carrey: I Am the Walrus

Martin’s orchestration sounds very much the backing track on The Beatles’ 1967 original. But Carrey’s vocal . . . well, sucks so much that I question why Martin chose to make this album at all. Carrey doesn’t sing the so much as, I don’t know, Jim Carrey it. And it’s NF.⁶ Before the “Sitting in an English garden verse,” someone (must be Carrey, right?) says, in a voice that I guess is supposed to sound like John’s, “You know, we’re all just molecules bouncing around.” Hi-larious! Then Carrey sings the “English garden” verse with a British accent.⁷ How very clever! In the fadeout, Carrey says, “There! I did it! I defiled a timeless piece of art!”⁸ Then he “jokes” about defiling the Mona Lisa and Shroud of Turin. I’m not anti-Jim Carrey. His humor works well in the proper context. And this isn’t it.

John Williams: Here Comes the Sun

This is John Williams the classical guitarist, not John Williams the singer-songwriter or John Williams the Spielberg movie composer. Martin supplements Williams’ finger-picking with strings and horns. The result is pleasant, the kind of music that I enjoy listening to while I’m reading or writing. Does it then, by definition, work best as background music? I’ll let you decide.

Billy Connolly: Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!

BILLY, WHY ARE YOU SHOUT–nope, I won’t do it. Billy Connolly is a Scottish comedian and actor better known in the U.K. than in the U.S. I first remember hearing of him when he starred in the last season of the Head of the Class sitcom in the ’90s. He does indeed shout this song, the way a carnival emcee might, I guess? Whatever he’s doing, it doesn’t work, and it overpowers Martin’s arrangement, which includes a ghostly choir that sings backing vocals and part of the second verse. Remember when John said he wanted to smell the sawdust on the original version? I smell the animals.

George Martin: The Pepperland Suite

Side 2 of the Yellow Submarine album contains seven tracks written by George Martin for the movie score. He combines three of them here: Pepperland, March of the Meanies, and Sea of Monsters. It’s a pleasant enough medley. If this album were all instrumentals, I’d listen to it more often.

Phil Collins: Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight/The End

The Art of McCartney was a 2014 album in which Paul’s backing band plays songs written by Paul performed by a series of vocalists.⁹ This track reminded me of that project: Collins sings part of the Abbey Road suite scored by the man who scored the original. . . except Phil’s a drummer, so we get a 30-second ’80s-sounding drum solo on this version, and we don’t get the three guitar solos. Who am I to question George Martin, but how can the album, how can any album, not end after this medley?¹⁰

George Martin: Friends and Lovers

This instrumental track, with a title borrowed from In My Life, is a nice, if forgettable, bit of orchestration. Maybe it’s meant to introduce the next track. Except for the facts that George Martin wrote it and that it appears on this album, I don’t see that it has much to do with The Beatles.

Sean Connery: In My Life

I’ve commented before on The Beatles’ and George Martin’s exquisite taste; except for She’s Leaving Home (which George Martin famously didn’t score) and Good Night (which may have been intended as something of a joke), I can’t think of any tracks on which they lapsed into sentimentality. This track proves that George Martin is human after all. Connery recites the lyrics over a piano, strings, and horns background. Again, the orchestration works well. But I have a hard time conceiving of why anyone believed it was a good idea to stick with Connery’s cringey narration, full of whispers and pregnant pauses.

In conclusion

There are dozens (hundreds?) of great Beatles’ covers. Unfortunately, not one of them appears on this album, which makes me a little sad. What are your thoughts about In My Life? Email me at beatletrack@gmail.com.

1. Do yourself a favor and listen to that album instead. ↩︎
2. “I said something wrong, now I long for yesterday. Switcheroonie! Yesterday. . . .” ↩︎
3. Instead of hearing her sing that she feels “okie-dokie.” ↩︎
4. But, really, what the hell do I know about the popularity of violinists? ↩︎
5. Needlessly, I think. Their voices are buried in the mix. ↩︎
6. Not funny. I used that abbreviation so that I wouldn’t have to keep telling my young (at the time) son that Garfield sucks. ↩︎
7. Actually, it sounds like 3 or 4 different British accents. ↩︎
8. But it’s still better than Giles Martin’s 2023 remix. Kidding! ↩︎
9. The “highlight” of which was Bob Dylan’s version of Things We Said Today. ↩︎
10. Longing for the album to end was probably wishful thinking on my part. ↩︎