by Peter Brown
27 Nat Weiss handled some of the arrangements in the United States, including the rental of a house for a weekend that Paul asked for in San Diego. Since no house was available for a weekend, Nat rented one for a month. The family who was living in the house happily vacated it for Paul and jane—at a much greater price. The only problem was Paul wasn’t going to San Diego at all—he meant to say San Francisco. “I didn’t realize there was that much of a difference,” he told Nat. The house in San Diego went unused.
28 “A Day in the Life,” arguably the best-remembered song of the album, employed the services of a forty-two-piece symphony orchestra, which was assembled at the Abbey Road huge studio number one in black tie for the occasion. George Martin had scored all twenty-four bars of music for them beginning at “pianissimo” with a line right through all twenty-four bars to the highest possible note, ending in “fortissimo. The forty-two pieces were double-tracked again and again into a thundering, shattering finale. The last note of the album trails off for forty-five seconds, and the microphone pots were turned so high to catch the last fading tones the air-conditioning system at Abbey Road is audible. For a final touch, a note of 20,000 hertz was added, which could only be heard by a listening dog.
29 Brian tried his best to show the boys he was as tough as anyone. In a good show he raised the Beatles’ royalty to 10 percent on all singles and albums sold under 100,000 and 30,000 pieces respectively and 15 percent on all albums and singles sold above that. In America, at Capitol, the royalty rate was brought up to 17½ percent. The new advance, which confusingly included accrued royalties, was approximately £1 million.
30 I took a favorite Queen Anne chair, John took two paintings, by a northern England painter named Lowry, and Nat took a blackamoor table.
31 John had met with Sir Laurence Olivier, then the director of the National Theatre, but John turned up at the meeting tripping on LSD and Olivier couldn’t figure out a word he was saying. The project was summarily turned over to Victor Spinetti.
32 They signed the door of the bedroom they occupied. That door now hangs on a wall in Nat’s apartment.
33 When Jane walked out on Paul, he came into the office the next day determined to have Peter Asher fired in retribution. Ron Kass was able to talk him out of it. The following year, on May 2, 1969. Dr. Richard Asher was found dead in the basement of his Wimpole Street home after being missing for six days. The police found Dr. Asher lying on the cellar floor with half a bottle of whisky by his right hand. Dr. Asher had recently suffered some professional setbacks. The cause of death was attributed to a mixture of alcohol and barbiturates.
34 It is probable that Yoko was pregnant when this photograph was taken.
35 The suit against the Sunday Times was later dropped. The research file, including the Bishops report, is missing as of this writing. The journalist who wrote the piece, John Fielding, later went to work for Klein on the picture The Greek Tycoon, which Klein produced.
36 It was actually John Lennon who blew his mind out in a car. John and Terry Doran were driving into London from Weybridge one night with John at the wheel, so stoned on acid he couldn’t figure out if the traffic light had changed. However, the song for the most part was based upon the death of Guiness heir, Tara Browne, who was killed in a traffic accident.
37 George was later to father a son, Dhani, in his second marriage. Pattie is still childless.
38 John received his “green card” as a permanent resident on July 26, 1976.
39 All rights for the U.S.A., Mexico and the Phillippines controlled by Maclen Music, Inc. c/o ATV Music Corp. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
