“Across the Universe” is the product of Lennon in a weakened state of lysergic bliss, its lyric a child’s perspective. This version, also included on the “Blue Album” Beatles hits compilation in 1973, became, by default, the canonical version of the song, and the model for Bowie’s cover. A few months later, Phil Spector took the same ’68 recording, brought it down to D flat, and globbed on a choir and strings. “Across the Universe” had first appeared on a World Wildlife Fund record in late 1969, where the ’68 recording (in D) was moved up to E flat and layered with wildlife noises. The inclusion of a run-through of “Across the Universe” in the Let It Be film led to the track’s official release on the subsequent soundtrack record. Upon his return, Lennon seemed indifferent to “Across the Universe”-he didn’t attempt to rerecord it during the White Album sessions, or even on Abbey Road, where he used scraps he’d had around for years. As the Beatles were about to get on a plane to India, “Across the Universe” was shelved (“Lady Madonna” was the single choice). Lennon second-guessed himself at every turn, erasing vocals, wiping instruments (he scrapped a backwards bass guitar track, as well as George Martin’s contributions on organ and his own mellotron work). Originally slated as the Beatles’ spring 1968 single, “Across the Universe,” after two days of studio work, emerged as a ramshackle performance with chirping backing vocals by two teenage Beatles fans recruited off the street. “Across the Universe,” like a vivid dream, had never quite translated to reality. Mark Lewisohn, The Beatles Recording Sessions, on “Across the Universe.”
#Across the universe soundtrack how to#
The only problem was, John wasn’t entirely sure how to capture on tape the sounds he was hearing in his head. It was likely a matter of Bowie being star-struck: how could he deny the temptation to include his very own Beatle collaboration? He told the NME later that year that he was proud of his performance on the track despite the fact that “not many people like it.” So Lennon went down, played acoustic guitar on “Universe,” then stuck around to jam on another attempted take of “Foot Stompin'” and wound up co-writing a #1 hit, “Fame.”īowie still kept “Across the Universe” on Young Americans after it had served its purpose. Tony Visconti (who met his future wife, Lennon’s then-girlfriend May Pang, that night) recalled that the party ended with everyone in the room getting into “a dismally dark conversation about ‘what does it all mean,’ ‘it’ being life, which left us all staring dejectedly at the floor.”Ībout a week into New Year ’75, Bowie called up Lennon and said he was in Electric Lady Studios doing a cover of “Across the Universe” (the whole thing seems like a set-up, as there was no need for another track on Young Americans Visconti, oblivious to these developments, was in London doing string arrangements for a record he thought was completed). The two didn’t converse for hours until, cocaine- and Cognac-fueled, they began sketching caricatures of each other on notepads. Bowie and Lennon had first met in late 1974 at a small party in Bowie’s New York hotel suite. A Joplin-esque blues singer is introduced as Sadie, and you just know somebody’s gonna call her “sexy.” Max wields a silver hammer in one scene.Bowie’s cover of John Lennon’s “Across the Universe” was a blatant, and successful, attempt to lure Lennon into the studio. It opens with Liverpool native Jude (Jim Sturgess) hunkered down on a beach, smirking his way through John Lennon’s “Rubber Soul” chestnut “Girl.” The girl in question is Lucy, played by Raleigh native Wood, who plunges into the underground counterculture with Jude and her brother Max (Joe Anderson) after her soldier boyfriend dies in Vietnam.Īs you can guess from the names, the film’s unsubtle reference points often induce winces. The film touches on Vietnam, radical politics, racial tension, drug use, the sexual revolution and other period hot buttons as the characters move through America’s Vietnam war years.īut mostly, “Across the Universe” is about a girl, with a surprisingly conventional boy-gets/loses/regains-girl story arc. Taymor (“Frida,” Broadway’s “The Lion King,”) keeps things in constant motion with everything from football practices to protest marches precisely choreographed. Still, “Across the Universe” is fun to watch.
0 kommentar(er)
