Almanac Music: ‘Long, Long, Long’ – George Harrison’s Best Beatles Song

 

 

George Harrison, 1974 – edited from larger picture. [Wikimedia Commons.]

 

 

‘Long, Long, Long’ – George Harrison’s Best Beatles Song

 

As any Beatles fan would know, the George Harrison song ‘Long, Long, Long’ first appeared on the double album The Beatles (also called the White Album), which came out in October 1968.

 

This song, to my way of thinking, is Harrison’s best ever single work while with The Beatles. Fundamentally, it concerns God, loving God, and being reconciled with God after existing in spiritual wilderness. ‘Long, Long, Long’ is not specifically connected with a Christian view of God, however – the sense evoked is more Eastern in nature. Of course, this is not surprising, as Harrison’s long-time passion for things Eastern is very well known, and the song itself arose out of The Beatles attendance at a Transcendental Meditation course at the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s ashram in Rishikesh, India, in early 1968. (One can also interpret the song as being associated with the love of a woman, but Harrison himself has given emphasis to the view, in subsequent comments, that the song is basically about God.)

 

Harrison’s tender lyrics are well worth quoting in full:

 

It’s been a long, long, long time
How could I ever have lost you
When I loved you?

 

It took a long, long, long time
Now I’m so happy I found you
How I love you

 

So many days I was searching
So many tears I was wasting, oh, oh
Now I can see you, be you
How can I ever misplace you?

 

How I want you, oh I love you
You know that I need you
Ooh I love you

 

‘Long Long Long’ can also be described as three minutes of mysterious, holy magic that seems to arise out of nothingness and disappear back into it again – or, if you wish to view the song in the context of the White Album, the song’s gentle acoustic guitar opening notes are like soft rain on the wasteland that is left at the end of the immediately preceding album track, the pulverising ‘Helter Skelter’.

 

The Beatles’ White Album cover. Original copies had the band’s name blind embossed on a white background and were numbered. [Wikipedia.]

 

Lovely Harrison acoustic guitar playing (that occasionally sounds like a sitar due to deliberate distortion) is highly important in the musical texture of the song, as is the beautifully simple, ethereal Hammond organ work by Paul McCartney. Ringo Starr’s booming ‘Thus Spake Zarathustra’-esque drum fills, all storm and thunder, are also a vital contribution, as is Chris Thomas’s emphatic, percussive piano (reminiscent of Thelonius Monk), evident in the song’s middle 8.

 

‘Long Long Long’ also employs ¾ time and a telling use of minor chords. In this context, Harrison himself points to Dylan’s ‘Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands’ from the Blonde on Blonde album (1966) as an important influence, though personally I can’t detect a strong direct impact here, though most likely Harrison meant that the earlier song helped to set him off in a particular musical direction.

 

A personal memory comes to mind … about a decade ago, I taught bass guitar to a teenage kid who lived with his family on the bush property across the road from me. ‘Long Long Long’ was one of our ‘set texts’, so to speak. I’d alternate playing rhythm and bass guitar in an effort to show him some possibilities on the bass, and was struck by the telling way in which the song employed minor chords to evoke a tender, meditative mood. I also noted the elegant simplicity of its chord choices and progressions in general.

 

Furthermore, getting back to The Beatles recording itself, the avante-garde use of the sound of a wine bottle vibrating on the top of a speaker – involved in the song’s coda – is so left-field, but oddly, mysteriously effective, as is Harrison’s strange wail that occurs at this stage. What is evoked here can be viewed as a sense of release, from spiritual pain, perhaps, though numerous interpretations are possible.

 

It’s so impressive that this song was written by a 25 year old man at an early stage in his songwriting career – though a similar point can of course be made about so much of the work of his fellow band members, John Lennon and Paul McCartney, as well as a select group of other songwriters of the era concerned, foremost among them Bob Dylan.

 

And why do I feel the song is Harrison’s best single song with The Beatles? I believe that ‘Long Long Long’ plumbs greater depths that his other Beatles work, and, in general terms, is more integrated and rounded holistically. It is also the epitome of clarity and unpretentiousness. For example, the earliest Harrison Beatles songs, like ‘Don’t Bother Me’ from With The Beatles (1963) and ‘You Like Me Too Much’ from Help! (1965) are clearly apprentice pop/rock efforts, and mid-Beatles Harrison songs like ‘I Want to Tell You’ and ‘Love You To’ from Revolver (1966) strike me more as experiments with Indian music than totally ‘achieved’ work, while ‘Within You Without You’ from Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) is a tad ponderous, even if lyrically wonderful. ‘The Inner Light’ (B-side of the ‘Lady Madonna’ single, 1968) is brief and beautiful but light as a souffle compared to ‘Long Long Long’, while ‘Something’ from Abbey Road (1969), has always felt more like a very good ‘adult contemporary’ song to me, as opposed to a striking, original, standout piece. ‘Here Comes the Sun’ (Abbey Road) is a lovely, melodic contender for the laurel of Harrison’s best Beatles composition – and of course one can’t forget ‘Taxman’ from Revolver, or another classic from the White Album, ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’. Who knows, though, really? – I freely admit that in a year’s time I may change my mind on precisely how I view these songs by this great songwriter, all of which have their fine qualities. I may put another song forward then as Harrison’s best Beatles work. But now is the issue at hand, and I give the nod to the beautifully spiritual ‘Long, Long, Long’.

 

 

 

 

MAIN REFERENCES

https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/beatles/longlonglong.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Harrison

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long,_Long,_Long

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beatles

 

 

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About

Kevin Densley is a graduate of both Deakin University and The University of Melbourne. He has taught writing and literature in numerous Victorian universities and TAFES. He is a poet and writer-in-general. His fifth book-length poetry collection, Please Feed the Macaws ... I'm Feeling Too Indolent, was published in late 2023 by Ginninderra Press. He is also the co-author of ten play collections for young people, as well as a multi Green Room Award nominated play, Last Chance Gas, which was published by Currency Press. Other writing includes screenplays for educational films.

Comments

  1. Colin Ritchie says

    My George favourite is undoubtedly ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’. A friend I worked with bought ‘The White Album’ when it first came out. He played in a band and had a flash amp set up that he would play the album through. We’d have regular record nights and crank the records up through his amp. In 1968 this was loud, very loud indeed but George’s song was the stand out for me from the album, and played at full volume sounded even better.

  2. Kevin Densley says

    Many thanks for your comments, Col.

    Yes, ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ is a favourite George – Beatles – song for many. I agree – it’s a beauty. I first got to know the White Album well as a teenager in the late seventies, when a mate of mine used to play it a lot on his bedroom cassette player. We’d listen to a great deal of classic stuff on this little machine, including, as I recall, a double cassette of the Stones 40 greatest hits. Before or after the music session, we’d typically sneak a smoke or two in his backyard – for years we thought no-one knew, but much later his mother told us the family did know what we were doing the whole time, but didn’t say anything!

  3. For me, “If I Needed Someone” is a special Harrison moment.
    Jangling guitars, a superb melody, and just so sweet.

    Quite possibly, it was the moment at which he thought “Hey, I am actually not bad at this song-writing caper!”

  4. Kevin Densley says

    Hi Smokie.

    Yep, I totally agree with you about ‘If In Needed Someone’ – a key song in Harrison’s Beatles songwriting career, with great guitar (based on a “Rickenbacker 12-string sound” in George’s words) and melody. The only reason I didn’t mention it in my piece, was that, to me, this 1965 Harrison song was just that – a great ‘marker’ in a considerably longer songwriting story, with even greater songs to follow.

    I’m so pleased you saw fit to mention ‘If I Needed Someone’, though.

  5. Kevin Densley says

    Oh – and I meant to ask you, Smokie … what do you consider to be George Harrison’s best Beatles song?

  6. DBalassone says

    We must on wavelength KD. I speak about this song on Col’s post here:

    https://www.footyalmanac.com.au/almanac-music-she-loves-you-the-beatles/

    ‘Spiritual’ is the word. I love ‘Something’, ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’, ‘Here Comes the Sun’ and a lot of George’s solo stuff (I could list a few songs here), but ‘Long, Long, Long’ just takes you to another dimension. It’s the eternal spiritual quest.

  7. Kevin Densley says

    Wow, DB!

    We are very much on the same wavelength with ‘Long, Long. Long’ – when you write about it in response to Col’s post and say ‘this George song is so spiritual it’s almost beyond music’, you are so right!

  8. KD

    I think George’s best song is “Here Comes The Sun”.
    Uplifting lyrics, acoustic guitar, handclaps, an unforgettable melody.
    It builds into a crescendo of hope and positivity.

    Simply a glorious example of a pure pop song.

  9. Kevin Densley says

    Thanks, Smokie.

    ‘Here Comes The Sun’s is right up there for me too, as far as Harrison’s Beatles songs are concerned – I indicated this in my piece, of course.

    I think you’ve encapsulated this song so well in your comments. It’s a beauty!

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