ARTIST: The Beatles
TITLE: “Revolution 1 (Take 20)”
WEB DEBUT: February 2009
ONE-LISTEN VERDICT: As a Beatles mouthbreather, I’ve heard about the lost bridge between the bluesy single “Revolution” and the experimental “Revolution #9″ for years. “Revolution 1 (Take 20)” is probably more casually experimental than most of the so-called “experimental” pop bands out there now. (I like Spoon and Wilco as much as the next guy but removing a rhythm guitar track or ending a song in a noise jam does not make you an experimental band, and yet still I see those terms bandied about in relationship to them and others.)
“Revolution #9″ might have been mind-blowing back in the day, but it might have been pretty grating, too. This eases you into its experiments, as the song, complete with awesome doo-wop backing vocals, slower tempo, and a sloppy sitting-around-the-mic vibe, gradually devolves into something more akin to “#9″, although it pulls up the reins right before it loses all sense of its original self. There’s this great buzz of a guitar (?) that leads out of the verse that keeps going and building, and, eventually, a woman (Yoko?) starts talking about…. something under the coaching of Lennon. In the end, it trades more in congeniality than cacophony, and, for that I prefer it (for the time being) to its more famous cousins, perhaps those two songs now seem more like canon than music to me.
Full 10 Minute take of The Beatles’ “Revolution 1″ Leaks [Twelve Major Chords via The Day Jobs]
Uh… damn. A Beatles leak? That’s amazing and ridiculous. As far as the track itself, well, it’s great. It’s The Fucking Beatles. It’s incredibly interesting to hear a different take (no pun intended) on such a classic track (and it’s slightly less classic experimental version).
Can’t wait for the mixtape.
@kicking222: It’s definitely the slow White Album version leading into the beginnings of #9, I think.
Cool. I’m always willing to entertain Beatles rarities. They’ll never get old.
Sounds less like a different take and more like a mashup.
It is the real take 20 friends…
John left with the only take of this…and although there have been only monitor tapes (back in the day it was cheaper and you didn’t have to go through the red tape of seeking approval from EMI to make a reference acetate - so you just had a tape recorder and a mic taping the mixes so that you as a Beatle could just take it home with you and reference that and come back in and work having prepped yourself for the next day of recording….this isn’t fiction…there are pics of them doing this…and it’s widely noted…but back to our story…)
There is a monitor tape with Yoko talking all over it into the microphone (specifically this was John’s tape so she was saying things about their relationship to him…) but in the backround you can hear this mix…
The detailed notes on this day state that John Lennon took the mixed tape of Take 20 (mono mix) home with him…
This is that tape…this isn’t a fake…it’s been gone over on all Beatle forums and some audio forums…
Listen to it until it’s gone…
Also…remember that Rev#9 was actually MADE from this take of Rev#1…Lennon has said so…that it is what happens after the fade on the record that constitutes what Rev#9’s main content is…
Hope that clears most of this up…
This is a really significant find!