A Hard Day's Night | Page 16 | Fab Forum | The Beatles Bible

@Cousin Mark,

Going thru ‘The Daily Beatle’ around the time of that post I have found the entry related to the train music (here) and which links to an article on studiodaily.com on the restoration of ‘AHDN ‘ when re-released in 2014. The section related to the train music is below in case the web page ever dies.  

George Martin not only produced The Beatles’ songs, but was also responsible for creating incidental score music, mostly instrumental versions of Beatles songs. While he recorded tracks (such as “This Boy ”) at Abbey Road for inclusion on the accompanying American United Artists soundtrack album over five days in late March and early April (this, according to Beatles historian Mark Lewisohn), Martin re-recorded those four songs at Cine Tele Sound (CTS) Studios on June 8 – and possibly with different musicians.

“I played on ‘This Boy ’ for George at Abbey Road .  I didn’t record at CTS,” recalls legendary session guitarist Vic Flick (famous for his work on the James Bond theme).  Flick’s sessions included drummer Clem Cattini (at that point, fresh from The Tornadoes) and, likely, bassist Alan Weighell, all of whom worked as session players together for Martin through the period.

Mystery Train

Flick and friends do not appear on one cue which has been baffling fans for decades — a brief rock-and-roll clip heard when Ringo flips on a portable radio while riding on a train. “That’s not me,” Flick states. So who is it? Notes Giles Martin, “My instinct says it’s not The Beatles, but more likely the session players my dad would have gotten in for the soundtrack recording.” 

The track is indeed driven by Cattini and likely Weighell, the drummer tells StudioDaily. “That’s definitely me,” Cattini says. “The guitars, I think, were ‘Big Jim’ Sullivan and Jimmy Page. They did a lot of the rock stuff together in those days, particularly on these kinds of sessions.”

Bassist Herbie Flowers, who played on many such recordings, though not these, before playing for the likes of David Bowie, Lou Reed and, later, George Harrison , conjectures the 37-second cue may have simply been a library track recorded by Martin (or another producer).

“It wasn’t uncommon in those days when, if a session was booked for three hours, and musicians completed their work early, to be asked then to record bits and pieces for use as library tracks,” Flowers explains.  “George Martin would no doubt have done a lot of that type of recording, where publishers ask composers for 12 short tracks. One might be ‘fear’ or ‘motivation’ or ‘mechanical’  or ‘mad rock and roll,’ like that one.  Film companies would snap these things up, because they didn’t have to pay for the recording or any licensing, other than payment to the publisher.”

The four songs were recorded at CTS onto 35mm full-coat magnetic film, and, not long after, transferred to three-track ½-inch tape and provided to United Artists for mixing the soundtrack, says archivist Ron Furmanek, who discovered the tapes while working on a previous restoration of the film. That tape was provided to Martin and Okell for the current restoration. “That actually had the ‘train music’ cue on it, along with another of a tinkling piano, which you hear when Paul McCartney is fiddling around on one in a hotel room,” Furmanek says. Adds Okell, “It’s funny, we had some other version of that train cue on the effects reel, and it was a different track. So they obviously changed their mind about it at some point.”