George Harrison
Brainwashed

Any road
PS Vatican Blues (Last Saturday night)
Pisces fish
Looking for my life
Rising sun
Marwa blues
Stuck inside a cloud
Run so far
Never get over you
Between the deil and the deep blue sea
Rocking chair in Hawaii
Brainwashed

GENERAL COMENTS

After an excited wait, the "Brainwashed" CD is finally on my CD player. Over and over. And over again. And then again. Ang again.

To be honest, things got to a point where I thought I’d never experience the excitement of listening to a new George studio album again. But now, after all these years of waiting, we can finally listen to this gem.

The first thought that comes to me concerns the joy of listening to George: his fragile but yet warm, terrificly in-tune singing, the astonishing slide guitar parts; the strenght of the melodies. This is like going back to a place where we’re so familiar, where we feel so comfortable in, but we hadn’t been there for so long.

I must confess I don’t share the position of some of my fellow Beatles fans, who try to assume sort of an "impartial" attitude, trying to find the deffects on their works. I’m not capable of doing that. To me, nothing they do is less than perfect; the feeling of joy and admiration of their remarkable talent is louder than anything everytime I listen to beatle music. This couldn’t be differet with "Brainwashed", already one of my top favortie albums.

But then, there’s the feeling of sadness, just to think George is no longer among us.

PRODUCTION OF THE ALBUM

I once read an interview in which George claimed he didn’t want Jeff Lynne to produce the next album, because he didn’t want all his work sounding like an ELO record. Jeff himself said, in the DVD that comes with the special edition of the new CD, that George preferred thes etracks to be released in the form they were before, just as demos. Still, I can’t think of anyone better than Jeff Lynne to finish "Brainwashed". George and he obviously shared a mutual affection and professional respect, and Jeff proved once to be very good tasted musician, finding the exact balance between keeping the original material while doing new overdubbs onto George tapes. I bet most of it sound exactly like it would have sounded if George was here to work on the tracks.

I must admit I didn’t always love the "Jeff Lynne sound", but I learnt to love it and, in adition, I think Jeff gained a lot working with the Beatles on "Free as a bird", "Real love", and then with Paul on "Flaming pie". His drum soung become more realistc after that, and the close-mic technic got better, resulting in a very warm sound., which I really love. And he’s possibly the best producer/ arranger/ musician on today’s rock music, not to mention being a fantastic songwriter. But above all he seemed to understand and love George’s music.

I’d like to know more about the level of envolvement of George in the making of the album. How much of it had he planned the way it has been? Was he really planning to release it? How much of it he left finished? Was this the original line up or did he have other songs in mind?

NOTES ON SOME OF THE SONGS AND WHAT TO EXPECT

He had done "Any road" on VH1 in 1997, while promoting Ravi Shankar’s "Chants of India". "Brainwashed" and "Pisces fish" were mentioned of Chip Madinger’s "Eight arms to hold you", which would have to date them at least from about 2000. "Run so far", of course, was on Eric Clapton’s "Journeyman", from 1989. "Between the devil and the deep blue sea" is from a star stunned 1991 session. "Rocking chair in Hawaii" was already known with a different approach from the 1970 sessions which originated "All things must pass". There’s no mention in history to "Stuck inside a cloud" and "Never get over you", but I wouldn’t be surprised if they were from the early eighties.

Of these tracks, "Any road" was a real surprise, because it’s so much more vibrant the the original VH1 version, which I already loved. "Run so far" was a dream come true. I have always loved it, but have always wanted to listen to George singing it, because I felt it was too georgish for Eric to do it (ok; "that kind of waman" was perfectly suitable to Clapton and I still want to hear a George version of it!). "Rocking chair" was a real surprise too. I always thought of it more as a jam and never expected it to resurface 30 years later.

The title tracks is marvellous, with it’s fulfilling anger. I share George’s hate for several of the modern schizophrenia, so crying it that loud is sort of consolating. And it’s a little funny how George didn’t realize he had been sort of brainwashed himself with religion, but then, as he sings on "Pisces fish", "I’m a living proof of al life’s contradictions".

At least 6 of the 12 tracks had been already written or recorded for at least a couple of years. This makes me think in how many of which did George record on the final months and, of course, in how many other songs George had written. Not too much before he left us, George mentioned a "Radiotherapy song" on an interview. I never took it seriously, but, even keeping his low profile, I bet there’s a lot of material left in the vaults, not to mention a handful of b-sides and live or movie performances that have yet to appear on a commercial CD. I guess anyone who’s a musician and has a big collection of instrumentes and a well equiped studio inside the house will do music regularly, even if he considers himself a gardner. In the "Making of Brainwashed" video, George still refers to "his music", leaving no doubt his work was still a vivid experience for him.

Judging by George’s tempo, these basic tracks for the songs in "Brainwashed" possibly had some kind of drum, above which Jim Keltner (again, who better than him?) might have done his part. The George demos we know from bootlegs are relatively well produced, even matching a regular studio recording, so I wouldn’t be surprised if more material is still to appear. Meanwhile, I’ll pray for someone who can get some of the pre-Jeff Lyne original basic tracks. I’m not complaining about the way the songs are presented; I just wanted to know how they sounded before.

PACKAGING

As far as the packaging is concerned, it’s a wonderful choice to create an original cover instead of a memorable picture or something like that. The special edition box is wonderful, specially the guitar pick, which is a really nice gift. Canadian and English fans, don’t complain too much. We Brazilian NEVER get this sort of thing! By the way, our "Brainwashed" wasn’t released in digipack, but on a regular jewel box. The CD booklet was adapted for that, by means of changig it’s cover and adapting its size.

SO…

I don’t have nothing to add, except for what we already feel: an artist like that can’t be replaced. "Brainwashed" is the perfect work of someone who has never spoke much but have always done it with grace and significance.