Ballad Of Sir Frankie Crisp (Let It Roll) | Fab Forum | The Beatles Bible

It’s my favourite track on the album. Its unorthodox placement of instruments evokes a mysterious atmosphere that grabs you, and for once the massive reverb works which gets a bit in the way of some of the other tracks. That mix of organ, electric piano and piano is really interesting, together with the distinctive sound of a pedal steel guitar. Going from left to right across the stereo image I hear a kick drum far left, snare and organ to the right, electric piano, acoustic guitar and vocals fairly centre, bass guitar just right of that and the pedal steel just right again and piano and a tambourine far right. Often the vocals will be doubled out to widen its reach (and there’s those spooky whispers starting in the middle and later panning alternately left and right). The electric piano and the pedal steel are playing complementary arpeggios and the organ is playing those thick chords and little licks in the verses on the left while the piano plays its chords and little licks on the right. What gives the song that enormous sound is the huge reverb on the pedal steel (there’s a bit on the other instruments too, but the steel is just drowned in it), as it almost solos during the verses. It takes a lot of panache to carry this off, a simple idea with difficult execution, there’s few successes like it in George’s catalogue.

There’s this video which isn’t a bad guide to the wild variety of views of the grounds/house over George’s life:

That’s true but Crackerbox Palace (and to some extent Ding Dong, Ding Dong ) are the best videos to quote about Friar Park.