Etcetera
From BeatlesWiki
Etcetera was a song recorded in demo form by Paul McCartney in 1968 during the sessions for the album The Beatles. It was written by Paul McCartney. It has not appeared on any album or bootleg, making it one of the most sought-after unheard Beatles tracks.
Contents |
Writing and Recording
The song was recorded with the intention to give it to Marianne Faithfull to record during the session that produced Mother Nature's Son and Wild Honey Pie on August 20, 1968. Alan Broan, an engineer, recalls this, "This was a very beautiful song. I recall it was a ballad and had the word 'etcetera' several times in the lyric. I only heard it twice: when he recorded it and when we played it back to him. The tape was taken away and I've never heard of it since." In Paul's biography, however, Paul himself recalls it in much less favorable terms, "I knew Marianne so it was natural that I would be asked to write a song at some point. I did write a song but it was not a very good one. It was called Etcetera and it's a bad song. I think it's a good job that it's died a death in some tape bin. Even then I seem to remember thinking it wasn't very good. There was always the temptation to keep your better songs for yourself and then give your next-best songs to other established people, so when it was someone like Marianne, who at the time was a newcomer, those people would tend to end up with fairly dreadful offerings of mine. I suppose, thinking back on it, after As Tears Go By maybe they were looking for more sort of a Yesterday, something more poignant, more baroque. I probably thought, well, this is really all I've got at the moment. I'll send it round and hope it's all OK, and maybe they'll put a baroque thing on it and that'll make it OK. She probably did Yesterday because they figured, Well at least it's better than Etcetera." It is unusual that Paul recalls it this way, because she recorded Yesterday in October 1965, years before the Etcetera demo was recorded. Also in Paul's biography, it says that Faithfull and Mick Jagger had requested Eleanor Rigby after rejecting Yesterday. "Marianne was much more interested in Eleanor Rigby but I had to say, 'No, I want that one'," Paul recalled. This could mean that Etcetera was written around early 1966.
Personnel
Musicians
- Lead Vocals: Paul McCartney
- Rythm Guitar: Paul McCartney
Production
- Producer: George Martin
- Engineer: Ken Scott
