Sunday, June 30, 1968
Recording "Thingumybob"
Last updated on November 27, 2024
Sunday, June 30, 1968
Last updated on November 27, 2024
Session Jun 27, 1968 • Recording "Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey"
Session Jun 28, 1968 • Recording "Good Night"
Session Jun 30, 1968 • Recording "Thingumybob"
Session Jul 01, 1968 • Recording "Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey"
AlbumSome of the songs worked on during this session were first released on the "Thingumybob / Yellow Submarine" 7" Single
On this day, Paul McCartney, accompanied by Derek Taylor, Tony Bramwell and Peter Asher, visited Saltaire, close to Bradford, to produce for The Black Dyke Mills Band. The brass band recorded two tracks: “Thingumybob,” written by Paul as the theme for a TV comedy series of the same name, and The Beatles’ classic “Yellow Submarine.”
Initially, the recording took place in Victoria Hall, Saltaire, but at Paul’s suggestion, they relocated to the street to capture a different sound. Local children also participated, lending their voices to “Yellow Submarine.“
While in Saltaire, Paul was interviewed by Tony Cliff for the local BBC Television program “Look North“.
In April 1968, Neil Aspinall and John Lennon and Paul McCartney and I were sitting in Nat Weiss’s apartment in New York talking about nothing at all. On Nat’s record player Paul played a brass band-style version of ‘Thingumybob’, a tune he had written for a television series of the same name which was one of the magnificent line-up programmes with which the new London Weekend Television company was planning to open its first season and justify its manifesto of great promise.
The version was very ordinary. I was very stoned. I said: ‘Seems to me the only way to get a brass band sound on a gramophone record, is to use a brass band.’ The best band in the land,’ said Paul. Yes.
Now in those days there was never a long wait between the musical will and the recorded deed and by phone the best band in the land was swiftly found, hired and asked to report to the Victoria Hall, Saltaire, Bradford, a fine Northern location for a brass band, at ten o’clock on Sunday morning, a fine Northern time of day for a brass band. We flew back to England.
Derek Taylor – From “As Time Goes By” by Derek Taylor, 2018
My colleagues and I set about looking for the best brass band in the land, and when we studied the results of the recent brass band competitions, the clear winner was the Black Dyke Mills Band, sponsored by the factory of John Foster & Son in Yorkshire. We arranged a recording session at a local hall where the band had recorded before, and we all drove up there. When I say “all,” it was Paul McCartney; myself; the brilliant and legendary Derek Taylor, who was the head of press for the Beatles organization; Tony Bramwell, another key Apple employee; a reporter called Alan Smith; and Paul’s dog, Martha. The session went extremely well—the band more than lived up to their winning reputation and were very excited to be working closely with Paul as he produced the session with his usual expertise and charm, and I did whatever I could to help.
Peter Asher – From “The Beatles from A to Zed: An Alphabetical Mystery Tour“, 2019
At Laudate in Newdigate I decided that Saturday to take a very modest 250 milligrams of LSD in a final cup of tea with Joan before setting off for St John’s Wood to pick up Paul McCartney and Peter Asher and Tony Bramwell, the Apple team due next day at Bradford.
A fine black Rolls arrived and I was packed and ready for a rolling trip of medium duration, minimal strength and maximum visuals for there is nothing like a ride in a Rolls on a little acid on a Saturday afternoon in June in the lanes of Surrey.
And so it turned out. Paul seemed very positive and played us some rare recordings; ‘dubs’ he had made of songs, written by him for others, dubs on which he was singing for the first and last time. Maybe one day they will make an album of them, but maybe it will have to be over his dead body for I don’t see him wishing to complete that particular symphony in his lifetime. […] We arrived in Bradford after dark.
Derek Taylor – From “As Time Goes By” by Derek Taylor, 2018
We stayed over in an ancient hotel and I didn’t know where to look when Paul handed Martha to the hall porter in a deadpan way with some cryptic instructions. “Er, remove her clinkers, would you?” Well, Martha was a shaggy sheepdog and sometimes things clung that shouldn’t have clung. Without blinking, the porter said, “Why gladly, Mr. McCartney, and will Madam be requiring a dish of water and her supper?”
“Thanks,” Paul said, and we all went off to sink a few pints of good Yorkshire ale.
Tony Bramwell – From “Magical Mystery Tours: My Life with the Beatles“, 2005
Next morning, another lovely day. I felt very nice and clean around the brain, always have a lovely morning after acid. A few months earlier Paul and I had gone shopping for suits; he had told me navy blue pinstripe was already on the way back (meaning that he wore it) and I fell for it – and ordered one.
I had taken it with me to Bradford; just right for Bradford I said. I wore it down to breakfast and then we went off to the Victoria Hall where the Black Dyke Mills Band were waiting on hard wooden chairs, looking bloody marvellous and real and solid and honourable and stocky and lots of other words like that. Paul had on a magenta shirt and a white jacket, double breasted, with black trousers (no one had ever told him they were on the way back), and the Black Dyke Mills Band was quite stunned by his charm and by the way he handled the music.
Derek Taylor – From “As Time Goes By” by Derek Taylor, 2018
We did the first session in the village hall, which went fine. But between sessions, Paul roamed about with Martha and fell in love with the town itself. It was a beautiful day and he suggested a bit of authentic marching in the street, before finishing off in the village square. Everyone came to listen and watch and it went very well, with a carnival atmosphere.
Tony Bramwell – From “Magical Mystery Tours: My Life with the Beatles“, 2005
They are fabulous. This band plays my dad’s type of music. But even so I have enjoyed the session so much that I’d like to do another, bigger piece with a brass band.
Paul McCartney – From Melody Maker, July 13, 1968
They were an old-fashioned brass band from Yorkshire that had recently won the all-England brass bands competition at the Albert Hall—very much like the later film, Brassed Off. Ringo had discovered them through a builder working on his house, whose brother happened to be in the band. Paul loved their sound because it was so Northern, very working class and authentic. This recording was all part of Paul’s ambitious plan to launch the Beatles’ Apple record label with four new but totally diverse singles all on the same day.
Tony Bramwell – From “Magical Mystery Tours: My Life with the Beatles“, 2005
When Paul McCartney was faced with the challenge of producing his theme song for the London TV show ‘Thingumybob’ he decided to forget studio musicians, and the sophistication of formal studios and took himself up the trunk road which splits England from top to bottom. Up from exciting London to industrial Bradford in the north where, in an ancient city, he recorded The Black Dyke Mills Band in their home town. The results are strong and amazingly contemporary for within the song there are those strange, unique touches of the Beatle-flair. The ‘B’ side is ‘Yellow Submarine,’ one of the great youth marching songs of all time played as a march as it is begged to be played. Be played by them. March to them yourselves across the living room, be young again, and brave.
Derek Taylor – From the US press release
Beatle Paul, conducting Britain’s champion brass band
MOST musical outfits have been Influenced by the Beatles at some time or other. And yesterday those stout champions of British brass, the famous Black Dyke Mills Band, finally fell under the spell, too.
The band set out to record Thingmebob, a number written by Paul McCartney for a new television series. And Paul himself turned up for the recording session in the Victoria Hall at Saltaire, Yorks. It proved, as one would expect, quite a confrontation. Before the four-hour session ended, Paul had conducted a brass band for the first time in his life, forty local children unexpectedly found themselves on the record, and the people of Exhibition-road had been treated to an open-air concert.
Paul, 26, roped in the children for an oompah version of that Beatle oldie, Yellow Submarine, for the B-side of the record. And he had the band record Thingmebob in the street as an experiment. Afterwards he said: “I had Thingmebob recorded in London with three brass players, but it didn’t sound right. So I thought we should have it done by the best band in the land — the Black Dyke Mills.”
From Daily Mirror – July 1, 1968
A Beatle in Bradford and a big brass band
One day soon (when the cider wears off, and my cold is better, and I’m physically and mentally capable of telling it like it was), I’m going to go into the full story of the brass band and the Beatle; the happiness in the children’s eyes and on the grey face of Bradford; the Rolls-Royce voyage down the M1, the soul-searching at Newport Pagnell; Max Wax the Killer and Big Lovable Martha; the peace and friendship of the people of Harrold… beer and cider and cold pie and crisps in the Magpie… and sad, happy songs of love sung by Paul McCartney in a village dentist’s house in the still small hours of the morning.
Suffice to, at the moment, that Paul and his very human friends Derek Taylor, Peter Asher and Tony Bramwell were in Bradford at the weekend, and that the result was a breezy single of a McCartney instrumental called “Thingumebob” recorded by the Black Dyke Mills Band.
The atmosphere was marvellous. First of all they did “Thingumebob” in the smoke-black Victoria Hall, then we all trooped out into the sunshine for an “outdoor” sound in Exhibition Road.
All the children cheered and shouted on a version of “Yellow Submarine” on the B-side, Paul’s great big dog Martha slept at his feet, and the local reporters asked earnest questions about whether brass bands were to be the big new trendy thing from the Beatles. Eee, it were a grand day. And you don’t get likes of that every day of the week in Bradford, lad, believe you me.
Sandwiched between the recording session and staggering home in London at 5.30am, I have a million memories and a long taped conversation with Paul in which he had a go at me, I had a go at him, Peter Asher and Derek Taylor nicely kept the balance, and we all came out of it knowing a great deal more about each other than before.
It was also the best drink-up and general night out I’ve had since sliced bread, and my heartfelt thanks for a nice piece of living go out to Paul, Derek Taylor and Co. (for the lift), the villagers of Harrold (for being real-people) and to Gordon the Irish dentist and his wife Pat (for feeding us all at 3 am with such pleasant meat and rice).
Just give me a few weeks to go on holiday and sort myself out, that’s all I ask, and then I’ll be back with the details in a clear and (I hope) readable form. Right at this moment, I couldn’t even try!
From New Musical Express, July 6, 1968
Paul joins band
Beatle Paul McCartney joined forces with the National Brass Band champions, the Black Dyke Mills Band, at Shipley, Yorkshire, last Sunday to record the soundtrack of “Thingamebob,” (sic) the new London Week-End TV comedy series set for the autumn.
Paul has written the score for this show, which will feature Stanley Holloway. The script is by Kenneth Cope.
The session, with Apple Records A&R man Peter Asher in charge, also saw a single in the can with the Black Dyke Band recording this after the sound track had been completed. Both the sound track and the A side of the single is “Thingamebob,” named after the show’s title. Release date for the single is tentatively fixed for next month.
“I have enjoyed the session tremendously but, really, it is my dad’s type of music,” said Paul afterwards, “I would still like to do a bigger piece with a brass band as good as this one,” he added.
Backing for the “Black Dyke Plays Paul McCartney” single will be their version of “Yellow Submarine.”
From Melody Maker – July 7, 1968
Paul’s shout up at Shipley
One of the strangest ever permutations of Britain’s best musical talent of two spheres — Beatle Paul McCartney and National Brass Band champions, the Black Dyke Mills Band — joined forces along with a hundred young shouting, singing Shipley fans at the Victoria Hall in this Yorkshire town for a recording which had hit written all over it.
The occasion was the recording of the theme music for the London Weekend TV new comedy series titled “Thingumybob” which is screened this autumn starring Stanley Holloway.
Paul wrote the music and Kenneth Cope the script. The music is also being released by Apple Records by a single, probably next month, with a march version of “Yellow Submarine” on the B side.
How did this unlikely combination of musical talent arise? “Paul did the score for brass and we tried it with a band in London. Then, as we wanted the best, we asked around and everyone said, ‘get the Black Dyke’ — so here we are,” said a delighted Apple A&R manager Peter Asher, who took charge of the session.
The Black Dykes, under conductor Geoff Brand, rose to the occasion like the champions they are. During one break in takes, Brand told the huge gathering of press men and bandsmens’ relatives, “Shhh… we are doing a masterpiece.”
His obvious delight at having the opportunity of tackling a piece of Beatle music in the brass idiom was obvious throughout this Sunday morning session in the sunshine. For an outside session followed that in the hall.
Asher, on leaving the control room, said, “They (the band) are fabulous.” Paul echoed these sentiments but added, “This band plays my dad’s type of music. But even so I have enjoyed the session so much that I’d like to do another, bigger piece with a brass band.”
Throughout the session Paul was with the band in thought as he aped Brand in bringing in the trombones then the cornets or drum sections. In between came the inevitable autograph signing sessions.
When he thought a take lacked something he managed to get all the mums, dads, sons and daughters and — a not inconsiderable achievement — the galaxy of reporters and photographers to join in by singing and shouting at the end of the “Yellow Submarine” recording.
The idea for this number came from the dual purpose of the recording session. “Thingumybob” went down for the TV show and the single and the “Submarine” was an obvious B side.
Both, I’ll wager, add up to hit material. For the music sounds at once typically Beatle in style and yet tailormade for the brass band work. How can it fail with these two substantial backings?
Paul’s part in all this was rather that of professional spectator. One felt he was like the author watching his book being turned into a film. There was no doubting his obvious desire to “have a go” at times and, when a cornettist handed him an instrument during the outdoor session it became too much.
He tried his hand — and the outcome sounded like every young scout when he joins a band for the first time! But an example of the McCartney pull over critical faculties was provided by one group of girls who shouted, “You sound fabulous, Paul.”
There was one other little failure but everyone forgave the culprit his error — and smiled in the process.
It came at the end of one take which was climaxed with a sound from rattles, whistles, bells and shouting bystanders. As Brand signalled the end and pursed his lips for seconds of silence, in wandered Martha, Paul’s huge, shaggy, Old English sheep-dog and whined in protest at the din. I can’t say I blamed her.
The recording incidentally has nothing to do with “Yellow Submarine,” the cartoon film, released on July 18, for which the Beatles have written the soundtrack.
From Melody Maker, July 13, 1968
Recording
Recording
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