In 1967, George Harrison Wasn’t Sure if He Felt Like a Beatle: ‘I’m Willing to Go Along With It’
George Harrison wasn’t exactly sure if he felt like a Beatle in 1967, but he was “willing to go along with it.” Throughout his time with the group, George never felt like “Beatle George.” That was just a suit he sometimes put on, although reluctantly at the end.
George Harrison wasn’t sure if he felt like a Beatle in 1967
During an interview on the BBC Radio program “Scene And Heard” (per Beatles Interviews), a reporter asked George how he felt about being out on the road again as “The Beatles” during the making of Magical Mystery Tour.
George didn’t know. He added that he’d never really known what it’d been like as The Beatles. As far as he was concerned, The Beatles was still something abstract. “It’s something that other people see us as The Beatles, and I try to see us as The Beatles but I can’t,” he said.
George supposed he felt like a Beatle in the beginning. “In fact I do sometimes, you see, when it’s in the midst of all this and people are saying ‘Beatles this’ and ‘Beatles that,’ then I’ve got to accept the thing that they think I’m a Beatle,” the “Blue Jay Way” singer said. “I’m willing to go along with it, you know, if they want me to be a Beatle then I’ll be one.”
George never felt like “Beatle George”
The spiritualist saw “Beatle George” as his alter-ego.
According to Rolling Stone, George once said, “The Beatles exist apart from myself. I am not really Beatle George. Beatle George is like a suit or shirt that I once wore on occasion, and until the end of my life people may see that shirt and mistake it for me. I play a little guitar, write a few tunes, make a few movies, but none of that’s really me. The real me is something else.”
Few people understood who George was, if not “Beatle George.” Rolling Stone wrote that George was many things, “including a master of understatement. However, “he was right to point out that his true character remains elusive.”
George was a walking contradiction. He was the guitarist of one of the most famous bands in the world, but he often hated stardom. He was spiritual, but told people not to take everything he said seriously. Even his views of The Beatles were contradictory. He thought they had a positive impact on the world, but hated when fans wanted the m to reunite because they weren’t “all that.”
The singer-songwriter came to terms with being a Beatle
George wrestled with being a Beatle his whole life, but eventually, he came to terms with it all. In a 1987 interview, Creem Magazine pointed out that George seemed comfortable having been a Beatle.
George replied that many years had past but things had settled down. “I’ve come to terms with it and it’s sunk into the past,” he said. Everyone had gotten older and he’d spent time away from the limelight. Into the late 1980s, he was able to go out and be an ordinary person.
Toward the end of his life, George made peace with his Beatle self.
