GEORGE Harrison was the youngest of the four Beatles and often referred to as “The Quiet Beatle”. Something About George is a musical documentary – one might even say Rockumentary – about George’s life and work after the Beatles split up in 1969. The presentation is given by Daniel Taylor, himself a Liverpudlian, who as well as telling the story sings more than a dozen songs relating to the part of George’s story he is talking about at the time.

George was the first of the Beatles to have a Number One Album and Single in the UK and the show commenced with the song This is Life from the All Things Must Pass Triple Album that was released in December 1970 and contained much material that had been written by George during his time with the Fab Four. The title song of the album followed and then If Not For You, again from this inaugural album. Daniel then talked about George’s involvement with the Concert for Bangladesh and performed the song Bangladesh.

Daniel then moved on to talk about George and Religion leading to the song My Sweet Lord which was his first solo single, and the part that Ravi Shankar played in his life at this time. Also, his meeting with Patti Boyd who became his wife and for whom he wrote the song Something which was on the Beatles last album to be recorded – Abbey Road. Finally, to end the first half of the show, Daniel sang Give Me Love, Give Me Peace on Earth, from his second album Living in the Material World.

Later in the 70s George became involved in film making and production and mortgaged his property in London to finance the making of the Monty Python films which became huge successes for him financially. By this time, he had divorced from Patti and married his new wife Olivia for whom he wrote the song Dark Sweet Lady which again was performed by Daniel and his band. As a tribute to his former Beatles friend John Lennon who was shot in December 1980, George released the song All Those Years Ago which Daniel performed before moving on to talk about George’s collaboration with his friend Jeff Lynne in the late 80s, which resulted him releasing Got My Mind Set On You which reached number 2 in the UK charts and Number 1 in the States. Shortly after this the two of them combined with Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison, and Tom Petty to form the supergroup The Travelling Wiburys which resulted in two chart hits Handle With Care and End of the Line which again were superbly performed by Daniel and his band comprising two guitarists, percussion and keyboards.

To conclude the evening Daniel spoke about George’s cancer resulting in his death in 2001 and sang Here Comes The Sun and While My Guitar Gently Weeps from the Beatles’ White Album as a final tribute. This ended an exceptionally fine entertaining but also highly informative evening about the life and works of George Harrison MBE.

by John Burland