Written by: Lennon-McCartney
Recorded: 21-23, 25, 29, 30 July 1969
Producer: George Martin
Engineers: Geoff Emerick, Phil McDonald
Released: 26 September 1969 (UK), 1 October 1969 (US)
John Lennon: vocals, rhythm guitar, electric piano, handclaps, tambourine
Paul McCartney: bass
George Harrison: lead guitar
Ringo Starr: drums, maracas
Available on:
Abbey Road
1
Anthology 3
Love
Come Together, the lead song on The Beatles' Abbey Road album, was conceived by John Lennon as a political rallying cry for the writer, psychologist and pro-drugs activist Timothy Leary.
It's a funky record. It's one of my favorite Beatle tracks or one of my favourite Lennon tracks, I'd say. It's funky, it's bluesy and I'm singing pretty well. I like the sound of the record. You can dance to it. I'd buy it.
Playboy, 1980
The song was composed for Timothy Leary's campaign to stand against Ronald Reagan as governor of California. Leary and his wife Rosemary had traveled to Montreal for John and Yoko's bed-in for peace, which took place on 1 June 1969. The Learys participated in the recording of Lennon's Give Peace A Chance, and were both namechecked in the lyrics.
Everybody's talking about:
John and Yoko, Timmy Leary, Rosemary,
Tommy Smothers, Bobby Dylan, Tommy Cooper,
Derek Taylor, Norman Mailer, Alan Ginsberg, Hare Krishna
Hare Hare Krishna
The following day Lennon offered to help Leary's campaign. His slogan was 'Come together, join the party'. Lennon sent Leary a demo tape of song ideas. However, when Leary was imprisoned for cannabis possession the campaign ended, enabling Lennon to record the song with The Beatles.
The thing was created in the studio. The lyrics are gobbledygook and Come Together was an expression that Leary had come up with when he was running for president. They'd asked me to write them a campaign song. I tried and tried and tried and couldn't come up with it. But I came up with this Come Together, which would have been no good for them. They couldn't have had a campaign song like that, right? But Leary attacked me years later, saying I ripped him off. Well, I had written another little thing called [singing] "Come together and join the party..." It never got further than that. And they never came back to ask for the song. I didn't rip him off. I had the song there waiting for him.
Playboy, 1980
Leary was bemused when he came to hear The Beatles' recording of the song.
Although the new version was certainly a musical and lyrical improvement on my campaign song, I was a bit miffed that Lennon had passed me over this way... When I sent a mild protest to John, he replied with typical Lennon charm and wit that he was a tailor and I was a customer who had ordered a suit and never returned. So he sold it to someone else.
A Hard Day's Write, Steve Turner
Come Together was Lennon's last politicised stance in The Beatles, although much of it was shrouded in imagery: the song lampooned the hippy figureheads who would seek followers among the dropouts of society.
Musically, Come Together took its cue from Chuck Berry's 1956 song You Can't Catch Me; both songs contain the lines "Here come old flat-top". Lennon was later sued by Berry's publisher Morris Levy. They settled out of court, and Lennon agreed to record more songs owned by Levy.
It's me, writing obscurely around an old Chuck Berry thing. Though it's nothing like the Chuck Berry song, they took me to court because I admitted this once years ago. I left in one line, which is not just Berry's: "Here come old flat top." I could have changed it to "Here comes old iron face." The song remains independent of Chuck Berry or anybody else on this earth.
Playboy, 1980
The result was his 1975 album Rock 'N' Roll, which contained Berry's Sweet Little Sixteen and You Can't Catch Me, along with Lee Dorsey's Ya Ya (also recorded with the 11-year-old Julian Lennon on drums for 1974's Walls And Bridges).
A version of Come Together was included on The Beatles' Love album. Its lengthy fade-out is augmented with elements from Dear Prudence. After the song, the "Can you take me back" snippet that followed Cry Baby Cry on the White Album can be heard.
What is the rattling noise at the opening?
Paul did not sing on this track, as he himself complains about on the next page. Also, according to Emerick, while Paul composed the electric piano bit, John learned it and performed it on the record.
The harmony vocals certainly sound a lot like McCartney. I took the quote to mean that he wasn't singing a duet with Lennon - ie at the same time, as they did on The Ballad Of John And Yoko. The version of Come Together on Anthology 3 shows how it was recorded at first with just Lennon on vocals.
However, it may be that Lennon double-tracked his vocals. Can anyone shed any light on this?
I'm fairly certain it is, in fact, Lennon's voice slowed down on the vocals, an effect which usually makes him sound more similar to Paul than usual.
Aha - according to Geoff Emerick, John did his own backing vocals: http://www.musicradar.com/news/guitars/beatles-engineer-geoff-emerick-on-abbey-road-219542/4
Wow, I always always thought it was Paul doing the low harmony backup vocals on "Come Together." But Paul himself says he didn't sing on it.
That puts the song in a whole new light for me now...
it sounded like Paul...but I read many times that the relation between them was so tense at that time that Paul was embarrassed to add harmonny...
even though, Paul piano and specially great Bass line makes a distinctive mark in the track
Who plays the solo? The guitar's tone sounds like John's Epiphone Casino, but is it him playing?
Again a display of the genius John Lennon.
To me, those four verses are basically a description of the four Beatles, with a John-twist.
First verse: George (Holy roller, his Indian influence, hair down to his knees..)
Second verse: Paul (No shoeshine, Abby Road-cover, toe-jam football, rugby, monkey finger, how you hold your hand when you play bass)
Third verse John himself (Ono sideboard)
Last verse, Ringo (Got to be goodlookin' cause he's so hard to see(awesome line) as Ringo was standing behind the three Beatles)
How did John Know Paul wasn't going to wear shoes on the cover?
I think John does a bit of a disservice to the contributions of the other Beatles when he says "Lennon song" ... Paul's bass in particular really makes the song. And George's guitar leads are great too.
When making these comments neither John, Paul, or George were given the time necessary for an elobarate explanation.
John made contributions to songs that are described as a"McCartney Song" or a "Harrisong Song".
To suggest that his opinion is a disservice to the other Beatles is a disservice to Lennon.
It was the task of everyone in the group to flesh out the vision of the author's song with their contribution. Without the vision, all of the bass parts and guitar parts don't mean a thing.
Does anyone know which kind of electric piano was used on the Abbey Road track?
In reply to Arthur, I agree the 4 verses are about each Beatle but you mixed up Paul and Ringo. The second verse is Ringo(monkey fingers being drum sticks) and verse 4 being Paul who John called a mojo filter, roller-coaster(helter-skelter) and hard to see (understand) because he is good looking - which Paul is and Ringo is not in most opinions. Also, the positioning of the first 3 verses prior to the instrumental break was deliberate by John because it showed Paul that the others were with John(on Allen Klein) and that Paul was separate. That is why in the last verse John sings "One and one and one is 3" meaning Paul you can count that it is 3 against one so "come together over me".Paul eventually responds on Ram with the song 3 legs. Pretty interesting play between them as they fought for control of the Beatles.
During the guitar licks, I read somewhere that John is saying "Shoot Me" but the Me portion is buried in the hand claps.
I think it's slightly easier to hear on the remastered version. A couple of times it's very clear that he says "Shoot me".
It's most definitely "Shoot me", according to the lyric track in The Beatles Rock Band. But I agree with Mark; it's very hard to notice if you don't know it's there.
Most covers I've heard, including Michael Jackson's and Aerosmith's, replace the "shoot me" with a generic "shoop" sound.
It's Paul playing the electric piano bit, and it's defenitly him doing harmony vocals (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nr5nDAZ0p3E) and the verses are like this:
1. George (Holy roller = indian influence, Hair down to his knees)
2. Paul (No shoeshine = Abbey road cover, Toe-jam football = Rugby, Monkey finger = Bass finger positioning)
3. John (Ono-sideboard = Do I need to explain this one?)
4. Ringo (Got to be goodlookin' cause he's so hard to see = People focusing mor on the other 3)
Who's narrating that YouTube clip? Because unless it's someone who was actually there, or who knows definitively that it was Paul on electric piano, it may just be supposition. The same with the vocals - they were recorded on different tracks, so it could still have been Lennon doing both. It's hard to tell. Great clip though - thanks for sharing.
EDIT: I've found out it's from this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00mc0cc
The hosts were Richard Allinson and Steve Levine.
Wow! Thanks Jacob! It IS Paul singing background vocals! Had me for a loop there for a couple of weeks.
Your welcome!
I'm pretty sure Paul plays the EP part too. In Beatles Rock Band it shows him playing it, and I know it isn't a reliable source, but if Lennon played it don't you think they would show him playing it?
I remember reading in a Beatles biography years ago that the song was about the Maharishi. It's not hard to construe that from some of the lyrics, but apparently it was a false assumption.
No; Sexy Sadie is the Maharishi song.
Another interesting thing about this song: when John brought it in it was an uptempo 12-bar piece. Paul suggested slowing it down and making it "swampy." All the difference, and a great example of how their polar differences created musical alchemy.
And another bit of trivia: The first takes of Come Together were recorded the same day Neil Armstrong walked on the moon.
On the note about Epi Casino riff:
All the Beatles (Save Ringo) had purchased Casinos. It could be either John or George.