The First Time The Beatles Let Down Producer George Martin
The Beatles’ longtime producer George Martin worked with them on each album they put out in the 1960s. He was a key part of their success and got to know them well throughout their collaboration. Their antics, particularly in the early 1960s, grew familiar to him. Still, they sometimes pushed Martin too far. He shared what they did to let him down for the very first time.
The Beatles frustrated George Martin while recording songs in German
In the early 1960s, The Beatles traveled to Paris for a concert. While they were there, Martin booked them studio time to record German language versions of “She Loves You” and “I Want to Hold Your Hand.” A record company executive believed there was no chance the songs would sell in Germany if they were in English.
“I was disinclined to believe this, but that’s what he said and I told The Beatles,” Martin said in The Beatles Anthology. “They laughed: ‘That’s absolute rubbish.’ So I said, ‘Well, if we want to sell records in Germany, that’s what we’ve got to do.’ So they agreed to record in German. I mean, really it was rubbish, but the company sent over one Otto Demmlar to help coach them in German.”
Demmlar and Martin waited for The Beatles in the studio on the day they were meant to record, but they never arrived.
“It was the first time in my experience with them that they had let me down, so I rang the George V Hotel where they were staying, and Neil Aspinall answered,” Martin said. “He said, ‘I’m sorry, they’re not coming, they asked me to tell you.’ I said, ‘You mean to tell me they’re telling you to tell me? They’re not telling me themselves?’ — ‘That’s right.’ — ‘I’m coming right over,’ I said.”
A furious Martin rushed to the hotel
Martin arrived at the George V Hotel to find the band having tea with Paul McCartney’s girlfriend, Jane Asher.
“So I went to see them and I had Otto with me,” Martin said. “I was really angry and stormed in to find they were all having tea in the center of the room. (They were, after all, very charming people.) It was rather like the Mad Hatters Tea Party with Alice in Wonderland in the form of Jane Asher, with long hair, in the middle pouring tea.”
When the band saw Martin, their reaction was enough to mollify his frustration.
“As soon as I entered they exploded in all directions, they ran behind couches and chairs and one put a lampshade over his head,” Martin said. “Then from behind the sofa and chairs came a chorus of: ‘Sorry George, sorry George, sorry George…’ I had to laugh. I said, ‘You are bastards, aren’t you? Are you going to apologize to Otto?’ And they said, ‘Sorry Otto; sorry Otto.’”
The Beatles proved to George Martin that their records would sell in English
Ultimately, Martin was able to wrangle them into the studio to record the German versions of their songs. As it turned out, though, they had all been correct in thinking it was unnecessary. The English versions did well.
“They finally agreed to come down to the studio and work,” Martin said. “They did record two songs in German. They were the only things they have ever done in a foreign language. And they didn’t need to anyway. They were quite right. The records would have sold in English, and did.”
