June 26, 2006
"I was always brutally teased for being George Harrison's son."
"That was from the age of about four or five, before I even knew who he was. And for seven years people would follow me about school singing 'Yellow Submarine'. I still can't listen to that song to this day." -- Dhani Harrison.
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18 comments:
I wonder if he would have been "brutally teased" if he was a she?
Or if he had not been named Dhani.
I sympathize. "Yellow Submarine" is a terrible song.
He would have been better off as
"A boy named Sue"
I've met Dhani Harrison; he was a coxswain for the Brown University rowing team when I was on Yale's rowing team in the late 90's/ early 00's. I met him once at a party, and we spoke for a little while, and he left to refill his beer and I turned to this other guy, Dave, and said, 'I swear to God, he's the splitting image of George Harrison.' Dave told me that he was Harrison's son, and then it all made sense -- he had a British accent, and when he was introduced to me, I mistook his name for "Danny."
He's a really nice guy, and I had all the respect in the world for his father. He wasn't edgy like John or too cute like Paul, and he wasn't a clown like Ringo. He always struck me as a great musician who played music for music's sake, and I really admired that about him.
My friend knows him from Brown too. He said he's a really cool guy.
No wonder Dhani's upset-"Yellow Submarine" was Ringo's song.
George was a fairly good guitar player, but let's not get silly-he was no great talent. Lennon was a damned good songwriter, and had a great rock voice, but Paul was the serious talent in the group. For one thing, by the last few albums the Beatles did he was producing everything.
Paul was on a PBS special a few weeks ago, doing some of his and the Beatles songs, and playing guitar, electric and acoustic bass, piano, drums...and he even plays some fluegelhorn on his latest CD, Chaos and Creation in the Backyard, which is brilliant.
Harrison was a superb musician. He had great technique, but that technique was seldom revealed, because his playing was always -- always -- in service of the song. His greatest moments are often the statement of the musical theme. Think of the opening to "Something." Or all the slide work on "All Things Must Pass," like on "I'd Have You Anytime," or the Beatle-y opening on "Wah-Wah." For that matter, the openings of "Hard Day's Night," "Ticket to Ride," "Rain," "Day Tripper"...these riffs didn't fall off a turnip truck.
It's noteworthy that when Eric Clapton began hanging around George Harrison that it was Harrison who transformed Clapton's playing style, and not the other way round. Simple, elegant and memorable musical statements such as Harrison made during his peak years are simply not available to lesser musicians.
John Salmon:
How could you say that Harrison was not one of the greatest of all time? He was-- if a guitar could cry, he was the one who could do it. As a pure musician, he has rarely been rivaled.
He also had the lack of an ego that held the band together probably for a couple of years longer despite the Montana-sized egos of its two lead singers.
And don't just take my word for it. Rolling Stone magazine a couple of years ago listed the top 100 guitarists (and they've been there, listened and written about all of them over the years) and they have Harrison as #21 although I think he is probably underrated at that.
I'd agree with them on Jimi Hendrix as #1, and I'd put Jerry Garcia as #2, but I'd put Harrison as #3.
Any list where Joni Mitchell and Joan Jett are the token women guitar players over Bonnie Raitt gets no respect from me.
Besides the fact Kurt Cobain is that high. I love Nirvana but his guitar is simplistic even I can play most of his stuff and I have sausage fingers with no dexterity.
And no Joe Satriani doesn't seem quite right.
Recently the guy who's playing I like the most is the guitarist from Los Lonely Boys.
Personally, I feel sorry for Dhani. No one should be "brutally teased" for any reason. On the plus side, however, the standard mother's non-palliative would have been spot on: "They're jealous of you, sweetheart."
Regarding George, I always wondered whether it was truly him playing the lead on "Octopus's Garden." I'm no musician, but the fingering seemed unusually nimble and the intonation unusually accurate. Come on. Compare it to the solo from "Dig a Pony" where it sounds like George's wearing Platex Gloves(tm) or something.
Maybe JBass or somebody could shed some light?
Strange. Dhani's story is reminiscent of the plot of the movie "About A Boy", in which the main character's hatred of hearing his father's hit song over and over again is complicated by the fact that it made him rich.
No sympathy for this dude.
I could agree with you if I felt this dude was the one that pursued celebrity status and found his success in capturing it to not be as wonderful as he had hoped, but in this case I have to believe he is more a victim of his father's celebrity than anything. I don't know, of course, whether he has ever deliberately tried to benefit from whatever inherited celebrity he has or not, but absent that knowledge I fall on the side of empathy, if not downright sympathy for his plight.
And I'm damn sure he didn't choose that name for himself!
Yellow Submarine was written to be a children's song and a goof at that. No different than the Barney song. Due to the movie, made popular by lots of stoned people going to see it at midnight, and that it was a Beatles song, there is no doubt it gets more credit that it should.
No one deserves to be teased, but I can't imagine it could ruin his life.
I rather think its silly to criticize George Harrison as a musical talent.
Perhaps there are some comment readers who don't yet know about this. Just in case.
Well, I still kinda wonder if he was a she, if dhani would still be teased. dhani is hindu,yes?
I love george`s playin and voice.
I believe that George Harrison was a great guitar player.I listed to songs like:Tomorrow never knows and I am only sleeping,and it was his ideas for the backwards guitar solos.He played the guitar through a leslie speaker and a fuzz box at the same time,In 1966 nobody was doing that.The only two guitar players that were innovative in 1966 were Jeff Beck of the Yardbirds and George Harrison ofthe Beatles.His phrases can be heard on songs like:And your bird can sing,She said She said(he is also playing the bass as well),And I love her(playing classic guitar solo),Yer Blues(with George playing all those string bends;the closest the Beatles sounded to Cream),Something(one of his greatest guitar statement of all time;a great song even Frank Sinatra covered it),Not Guilty(very fierce guitar playing;him playing lead, rhythm and solo),His playing is all over Abbey Roads and Let it be.His solo career is filled with his guitar playing.Everytime I listen to "Isn't it a pity", the song brings tears to my eyes.
To claim that George was "no great talent" is to claim that the While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Something, Here Comes the Sun,Old Brown Shoe, If I Needed Someone, Within You and Without You, to name but a few, were never on the Beatle albums.
RIDICULOUS.
George's guitar solos, in the end (pun intended), outlast the Macca's for taste, technical acumen, and sheer musicality:
1) Something
2) Let it Be (both versions)
3) Dear Prudence
4) Hey Bulldog
5) Til There Was You
6) One After 909
7) Octopus's Garden
8) Fixing a Hole
9) She Said, She Said
10) Come Together
ETC.
Range. Melody. Grit. Wit. Taste. Lyricism. Eclectism. ETC.
End of discussion.
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