Cowboys and Indies: The Epic History of the Record Industry (20 page)

The musical correspondence continued. “You really must try to take up music seriously,” Harrison repeated.

“But look, I’m twenty-one, can I really take up music now?” wrote Martin.

“Of course you can,” assured Harrison. “You can go and study for three years at a music college. I’ll tell you what to do. You come along to the Guildhall, and play your compositions to the principal, and if he likes them as much as I do, you’re in.”

Martin was unsure, but as the war ended, he woke up to a frightening realization: He had no qualifications, no employable skills. So in February 1947, he cycled to the Guildhall and played piano for its principal, Eric Cundell.

“Very well. Come and start next year,” said Cundell.

“How on earth do I pay for it?” asked Martin, blushing with embarrassment.

“As a man serving in the navy, you’re entitled to further education. We’ll apply for a grant.”

Martin plunged into the otherworldliness of classical music as his mother died of a brain hemorrhage and his wife, Sheena, began suffering from agoraphobia. Surviving on a grant of £160 per year, he learned the crafts of orchestration, musical theory, harmony, counterpoint, and conducting. After three years, he got a job at the BBC Music Library archiving sheet music. There, in 1950, he received another mysterious letter.

Invited to meet a certain Oscar Preuss, Martin parked his bike on Abbey Road and entered the impressive mansion. In a large office with a coal fireplace and a grand piano, the old man explained that through a mutual friend, Sidney Harrison had made the recommendation. For the modest sum of £7 4s per week, George Martin, aged twenty-four, was hired as a recording assistant for Parlophone, an EMI sublabel.

Although EMI Records had fallen into a dark age under the poor management of its chairman, an Australian cycling fanatic named Sir Ernest Fisk, Oscar Preuss turned out to be an inspirational mentor who, conscious of nearing retirement age, acquainted Martin with record industry history and the mean-spirited machinations of EMI’s bureaucracy. Things began to change, however, when a new EMI chairman, Sir Joseph Lockwood, was appointed in 1955. Astute, adventurous, and gay, Lockwood thought little of his predecessor’s conservatism. Identifying America as the heartbeat of the musical world, Lockwood made his first big move and acquired Capitol for $9 million. It was in this spirit of rejuvenation that Preuss and Lockwood handed Parlophone over to George Martin, who chose as his niche “the label for humorous people.” Setting up mobile equipment in theaters, Martin recorded sketches and novelty songs from a new generation of daring comedians, including Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, Spike Milligan, and Peter Sellers.

Rock ’n’ roll landed on EMI’s plate thanks to a licensing deal with RCA. Clocking up fifteen Elvis smash hits, EMI’s 7-inch sales rocketed from 1 million to 7 million during 1957. George Martin looked on jealously as his colleagues at Columbia sold 5.5 million Cliff Richard records between 1958 and 1960. He was desperate for his own pop star. In a moment of ill-judged honesty, he admitted to Lockwood that he had stupidly turned down Elvis clone Tommy Steele, who went on to sell millions of records for Decca. Haunted by the blanched disappointment on Lockwood’s face, Martin remained desperate—until in April 1962 he got a fateful telephone call.

“George, I don’t know if you’d be interested,” said Syd Coleman, a veteran publisher, “but there’s a chap who’s come in with a tape of a group he runs. They haven’t got a recording contract, and I wonder if you’d like to see him and listen to what he’s got?”

“Certainly,” Martin replied. “I’m willing to listen to anything. Ask him to come and see me.”

“Okay, I will. His name is Brian Epstein.”

The Beatles had been turned down flatly by Pye, Phillips, and Columbia; Decca had given them two auditions before passing. A disillusioned Epstein had dropped in to the HMV store on Oxford Street to get his tape copied onto an acetate. Listening to Epstein’s sob stories, the technician suggested he walk upstairs to see Syd Coleman, who in turn suggested, “Why don’t you go round and see George Martin at Parlophone? He deals in unusual things. He’s had a big success with the most unlikely recording acts. I’ll give him a ring and make an appointment, if you like.”

At Martin’s new office on Manchester Square, Epstein launched into his pitch and even feigned surprise when Martin admitted he’d never heard of the Beatles. Seeing straight through Epstein’s routine, Martin had to stop himself from asking, “Excuse me,
where is
Liverpool?” When Epstein played the acetate, though, Martin warmed to the harmonized vocals—which, despite the weak songs, were promising enough to justify a test recording.

Because the Beatles were performing in Hamburg at the time, it wasn’t until June 1962 that they turned up at Abbey Road. George Martin instantly liked the musicians. Devout fans of Peter Sellers, they laid on the humor, knowing George Martin was a close friend and collaborator. As they performed, Martin’s sensitive ears were disturbed by the drummer, Pete Best; despite being the most handsome, he couldn’t nail the beat. Taking Epstein aside, Martin warned, “I don’t know what you’re going to do with the group, but this drumming isn’t good enough for what I want. If we do make a record, I’d much prefer to have my own drummer.” Martin’s grave judgment validated what the other three Beatles already wanted, to replace Pete Best with the hilarious Ringo Starr.

A contract was drawn up—a one-penny royalty, four singles per year, for a five-year term, allowing Parlophone a yearly get-out option. It was by no means a generous deal, but after so many refusals, Parlophone was their last chance in London. Hoping to identify the band’s star, George Martin took the train to Liverpool and descended into the Cavern, a revolting dungeon where sweat dripped from the ceilings onto cramped youngsters who regularly passed out in the heat. As he observed the Beatles in their natural habitat, Martin realized there was no front man—their offbeat gang format was the whole appeal.

Success wasn’t going to come easy. When “Love Me Do” was released in late 1962, EMI’s promotions division ignored it. Thanks mainly to the Epstein family’s record shop, NEMS, heavy sales in Liverpool got the record a chart position at No. 17. Relations between manager and producer got off to a frosty start, however, when even NEMS couldn’t get reorders. “What on earth is happening with EMI?” barked Epstein into the phone. The only way forward, Martin argued, was a brilliant follow-up and the help of an aggressive, well-connected music publisher. Martin suggested an old friend, Dick James, who had just set up his own company and urgently needed a hit.

Dick James convinced Brian Epstein to set up a separate company, Northern Songs, owned 50 percent by James with the other 50 percent divided between the Beatles and Epstein. It was a clairvoyant move; he even added a 10 percent handling fee to run the company from his main company, Dick James Music. Grateful for the introduction, James quietly offered Martin a cut. “It’s very kind of you to think of me like that,” Martin replied. “But on the other hand it isn’t ethical … I think it would be wrong to split my interests.”

For their follow-up, the Beatles speeded up a ballad called “Please Please Me,” with George Martin adding its opening hook and triumphant finale. When the winning take was in the can, Martin pressed the intercom button. “Gentlemen, you’ve just made your first number-one record!” Dick James secured the Beatles an appearance on Britain’s only music-oriented TV show,
Thank Your Lucky Stars.
EMI staffers, waking up to the record’s potential, ensured it was regularly aired on their flagship station, Radio Luxembourg.

As soon as “Please Please Me” went No. 1, Martin called the band into Abbey Road. “Right, what you’re going to have to do now, today, straight away, is play me a selection of things I’ve chosen from what you do in the Cavern.” By eleven o’clock that night, an entire album was on tape and, as hoped, the LP went straight to No. 1. One title from the album, “Twist and Shout,” seemed popular, so Martin released an additional EP with three other titles. It, too, went to No. 1. From that dream launch, original songs just kept pouring out; “From Me to You” and “She Loves You” sold 750,000 copies in four weeks. “We had opened the vent,” says Martin, “the oil had started gushing up, and the well, which I had originally thought might soon dry up, simply kept on producing more and more.” Just four months after their debut LP, they rushed out a second,
With the Beatles
, containing eight original songs and three Motown covers. It stayed at No. 1 in Britain for twenty-one weeks.

Apart from the Beatles, Epstein managed other Liverpudlian acts—Gerry & the Pacemakers, Billy J. Kramer, and Cilla Black—all signed to Parlophone. In 1963, the Epstein/Parlophone roster occupied the No. 1 spot for a total of thirty-seven weeks. Copying the formula, London’s record industry embarked on a gold rush into the North of England. Pye found the Searchers; English Columbia found the Animals; Martin’s new assistant found the Hollies in Manchester. Suddenly anything Northern became chic—singers, comedians, writers. It’s an often-forgotten fact that the British invasion of America in 1964 began as a Northern invasion of London in 1963.

The next problem was America. Although EMI owned Capitol, the Beatles’ first singles had to be licensed to independents, VJ and Swan. According to rumor, even Atlantic’s Jerry Wexler turned down the Beatles as “too derivative.” Capitol’s Dave Dexter replied rudely, “I got ’em in, they’re a bunch of long-haired kids. Forget it. They’re nuthin’.” When “Please Please Me” was No. 1 in England, Capitol president Alan Livingston sent a curt reply to George Martin, “We don’t think the Beatles will do anything in this market.” Capitol rejected two more Beatles singles, “From Me to You” and “She Loves You.” When Beatlemania began bleeping on the radars of the American media, Livingston conceded, “We’ll take one record and see how it goes.” The record was “I Wanna Hold Your Hand”—which went on to sell 15 million copies.

The game changed in January 1964, while the Beatles were in Paris playing two weeks of shows at the Olympia. Early one morning, Martin was awakened by a ringing telephone. It was Brian Epstein, audibly drunk. “I’ve just left the boys celebrating, and they’re as thrilled as I am.” A brief silence for theatrical suspense. “We’re number one in America on next week’s charts. It’s quite definite. I’ve just been on the phone to New York.” Martin sank back into his pillow and laughed at the ceiling. The adventure was entering a whole new dimension.

When they landed in America, Capitol’s handlers kept George Martin as far away from the action as possible. Stepping into camera view wearing a big grin, Alan Livingston personally greeted the Beatles at the now legendary press conference at JFK Airport. Despite the pungent aroma of hypocrisy, Martin was nonetheless happy to be there witnessing such a historical event. Middle-aged men were walking down Fifth Avenue wearing Beatles wigs; television stations were covering the latest scoop from the Beatles’ arrival. In front of the Plaza Hotel at Fifth Avenue and Central Park where the Beatles were staying, an enormous crowd had gathered. On virtually every station, Beatles songs played over and over.

As in England, audiences in America were instantly seduced by the Beatles’ humor and spirit. “That enjoyable charisma came through to the world at large, which was seeing something it had not seen before,” says Martin. “It was an expression of youth, a slight kicking over of the traces, which found a ready response in young people. Curiously, it was a response that the parents, though they might not have liked the music themselves, did not seem to begrudge.”

At their first concert, in a boxing ring in Washington, D.C., Martin looked around and studied the crowd. “The audience, despite the various parental presences, was mostly teenage, and very hot. In the seat next to me a little girl was bouncing up and down and saying, ‘Aren’t they just great? Aren’t they just fabulous?’”

Martin replied, “Yes, they are.”

“Do you like them, too, sir?” she inquired.

“Yes, I do rather,” Martin said with a smile.

Although at the age of thirty-eight he felt somewhat old, Martin joined in when the entire crowd sang along to “I Wanna Hold Your Hand.” “In that situation it was all too easy to scream, to be swept up in that tremendous current of buoyant happiness and exhilaration.”

That year, the Beatles rang up six No. 1 singles and three No. 1 albums, occupying the top spot for about seven months of the year. With other British groups scoring No. 1s in their wake, the statistics were without precedent. Never before had the American market been so completely bombarded with British pop. Despite rejecting smash hits from the Beatles, the Dave Clark Five, Herman’s Hermits, and the Animals, Capitol’s turnover jumped from $50 million in 1963 to $70 million in 1964. EMI’s British turnover in the same period grew 80 percent to £9 million.

The one person who wasn’t any richer was George Martin. Having joined EMI in 1950 as an assistant, he had been on a basic salary of £3,000 per year. EMI, in general, was a dusty bureaucracy whose senior managers and low-ranking staff all seemed to actively perpetuate the tradition of meanness. The Beatles were shocked to find the lunchroom fridges fitted with locks. Sound engineer Geoff Emerick had to get written permission to place a mic close to Ringo’s bass drum for fear of being docked wages if it blew.

At the end of 1963, Parlophone staffers were rewarded an extra four days’ pay as a special Christmas bonus—a shameful reward under the circumstances. Worse still, as boss, Martin was exempt. Studying the terms of his contract, he saw that a clause required him to give a year’s notice before resigning. So Martin informed his superiors that he would be leaving in twelve months.

Suddenly senior managers began inviting him out to lunch. If it wasn’t the “oh, c’mon now” approach, he’d get quizzed. Was he being poached by another label? Did the Beatles know he wanted to leave? Would he be available to produce the Beatles as a freelancer? Eventually a crunch meeting was called with Len Wood, head of EMI Records.