How George Benson Shocked the World With His ‘Abbey Road’

The Beatles released their classic Abbey Road in late 1969. Less than a year later, George Benson revealed his own take on a series of songs on the record, cleverly titled The other side of Abbey Road.

Supported by a now-legendary cast of jazz characters including Herbie Hancock and Bob James, The other side of Abbey Road offers a really cool, and sometimes funky, alternative take on what Abbey Road songs could have sounded.

As James tells UCR now, the reaction to what he did in 1970 wasn’t good, but he was glad he did it. “It really boosted my career,” he says. “It’s one of the best records I think I’ve ever made.”

Paul McCartney agreed, as the news reached Benson. “Man, we love what you did with our music.

Although Benson became a superstar in the jazz world, he always – and continues to cross multiple genres with his music. Peter Frampton was an early fan – and someone who eventually inspired Benson to re-examine his own musical process. He also covered songs by Leon Russell and James Taylor and worked with numerous musicians on his recordings, including the members of Toto.

Toto’s Steve Lukather is one of many impressive guitarists who will join Benson in January for his debut Breezing with the starsan immersive four-day music event taking place in Phoenix. During a recent phone conversation, Benson shared some great stories from his career.

Breezing with the stars It looks like it’s going to be a lot of fun. What do you hope people take away from the experience?
With something like this, you never know. Because these guys have a great reputation and are among the best guitarists of our time! I’m there for the same reason they are: trying to add something to my resume or my collection of ideas. Songs and stuff like that. Most of the guys there I know personally. But I never see them together in a single scene, so that makes it really unique.

There’s an incredible variety of players, guys like Steve Lukather, John Scofield and Lee Ritenour, just to name a few. What strikes me about the lineup is that it feels very true to the varied spirits of the collaborations that have influenced his career.
There’s no doubt about it, man. When they tell me I’m going to play with one of these guys, or even in the same city, we try to meet up and get to know each other! I always hear something or learn something that I didn’t know yesterday. Because I’m still interested. As a guitarist, I never get bored with other guitarists. There’s always something another guy is doing that you never imagined. Then you say: Well, how come I didn’t think of that first! (Laughter) I’m really looking forward to it. I think people who come there will see us from a point of view that maybe they haven’t seen us before.

I’m here in Cleveland. You worked with the late Tommy LiPuma on several of his records. What did it add to your process that you liked?
He reminded me of the greatest jazz record producer in history: Mr. John Hammond of Columbia Records. Tommy, like him, didn’t bother me with my playing, at least in the early days. (Laughter) He just said, “Man, go play! Whatever you want! He brought me songs, that was the difference between him and John. he said, “Have you ever heard of a guy named Leon Russell?” I said, “No.” He said, “Do you know the song ‘This Masquerade’”? I said, “No.” He said, “I’ll send it to you.” So he sent it to me and I didn’t listen. So he called me back: “Well, do you like this song?” I said, “What song?” He did this three times before I decided to listen! I listened because keyboardist Jorge Dalto and his wife came to visit me at my house.

I was telling him about the new record I was getting ready to record and he was going to be a part of it. I mentioned “This Masquerade” and his wife said, “Oh, that’s my favorite song and that’s my favorite artist, Leon Russell!” I said, “How the hell can she know about something in the music business that I don’t!” Because at that time I didn’t know she was a singer! (Benson laughs) So I decided to listen to the song. I listened and learned. We got to the studio and did a take of that song, because Tommy LiPuma decided he wasn’t going to put vocals on this wonderful instrumental album that we had just finished. He said, “No, you don’t need a vocal, I don’t want a vocal.” I said, “Well, man, you made me learn this crazy song! We have to record it at least once.” And so we did. One time, one take. Everyone who heard it after that said, “Damn, man, first of all, who’s singing? Dude, you gotta get this out. Tommy said, “No,” and then they pressed him and he said, “Okay.” He played it for the record company and they said, “When can we get this? We want it now!”

But Tommy LiPuma himself changed my whole life. He made me do something I almost never thought about. Tune the guitar. Halfway through the song, he would stop us and say, “George, check your tuning.” It became annoying at first, but then I realized (he was right) when I heard it back. I couldn’t tell what was wrong with the song before because I was so used to hearing myself playing out of tune, I guess. After that, everything felt right. He covered it by paying attention and then he had the great engineer with him, Al Schmitt. Al made this album a must have in your collection if you were an audiophile. I had all of this going for me and I had the new guitar that I had just bought from a brave young man who went to his girlfriend’s ex-boyfriend’s house and told him that he would have to give up the guitar that she bought for him. I said, “Man, this guy has a lot of nerve. He has a lot of heart!” He didn’t know anything about guitars so he brought it home and sold it to me and that was the guitar I used Breezing. I had never played that before in my life, except on that record. I also had a Polytone amplifier. They released one for me, fresh off the press and that sound became the Breezing sound. People heard me play in a way they had never heard before and the record just went off the charts.

Listen to George Benson’s version of Leon Russell’s ‘This Masquerade’

This guitar is one of the ones you’re about to sell in your new official Reverb store. I like the idea that you’re looking at the chance for these instruments to bring new magic to other musicians, like they did for you.
They’re like my relatives, like my babies, man! (Benson laughs, taking on a tearful tone) Take good care of my babies! I think you’ll have the same joy I had creating them, you know. Throwing some new and interesting things at them, there’s just nothing like it. Realizing that they exist because of me makes me feel like a real father! And I’m a father of seven boys, so I know what fatherhood should be like! It’s been great, man. I really hope they take from these guitars the inspiration they gave me, to reach different heights in their careers.

How did you arrive at the concept of doing The other side of Abbey Road? It’s a fantastic album.
I can tell you one thing, at that time for music, this is before the crossover period. I mean, stars are starting to come out and play crossover music, but it wasn’t popular yet. Probably the most popular crossover song was by Ella Fitzgerald, (when she recorded) “Can’t Buy Me Love” (Benson sings a small section of the song). It was like, “Wow, Ella Fitzgerald is singing a Beatles song! She tore it up to show that it could be done, first of all – and that it could be popular! Creed Taylor (record producer and record label owner) invited me to his office one night and said, “George, take this home and listen to this record.” I took it Abbey Road home and listen to him. I went back the next day and he said, “What do you think?” I said, “Man, everything here is a monster.”

He said, “Good! We’ll do the whole album!” I said, “What? The entire album! You’ve got to be kidding me! This is going to make me the enemy of the jazz world, man!” I already had conflict there, because my material was considered too commercial. But we went into the studio and the great arranger, Don Sebesky, arranged these beautiful things for a chamber orchestra. He invited New York’s best musicians from the New York Symphony Orchestra to play with us. Man, I got to sing one of the first songs, “Golden Slumbers” and a lot of those guys had never heard me sing before. So they’re looking at me like I’m crazy. “What? George is singing, man! We went into the guitar part and the guitar part was pretty good too. So Creed Taylor’s idea of ​​doing Abbey Roadit was a little early (for what we did) with that album. But it became popular – as I knew it would, years later Breezing it went out. People came back and found out The other side of Abbey Road and that really boosted my career. I was happy that this happened. It’s one of the best records I think I’ve ever made.

Hear George Benson’s covers of the Beatles’ ‘Golden Slumbers’ and ‘You Never Give Me Your Money’