“All Those Years Ago” is a song by English musician George Harrison, released as a single from his 1981 album Somewhere in England. Having previously recorded the music for the song, Harrison tailored the lyrics to serve as a personal tribute to his former Beatles bandmate John Lennon, following the latter’s murder on 8 December 1980. The recording also includes performances by ex-Beatles Ringo Starr, on drums, and Paul McCartney, who overdubbed backing vocals onto the basic track. Released in May 1981, the single spent three weeks at number 2 on the US Billboard Hot 100, and peaked at number 13 on the UK Singles Chart. “All Those Years Ago” was the first time that Harrison, McCartney and Starr had appeared on the same recording since the Beatles’ “I Me Mine” in 1970, and the last time they would appear together until “Free As a Bird”, in 1995. (More from Wikipedia)
By contrast, the people at Gear Fab Records – one of the better reissue record companies – are quite enthusiastic about Homer; Galen Niles was brought in to write the liner notes for the 2012 CD, Homer. (The record company name comes from two Beatles-era expressions for “cool”; both are featured in the background singing on “All Those Years Ago”, the 1981 George Harrison song honoring recently assassinated John Lennon and also featuring the other two living Beatles in the band). Roger Maglio at Gear Fab worked for 10 years to bring the Homer music to CD; he first heard their songs in 2002 on an “unauthorized Italian release”: “I was amazed that their level of professionalism could be coupled with such a rawness that just seemed to work.” Nor is that the only coupling that he noted: Maglio called their sound “progressive rural rock”, and progressive rock with a rural flavor is so rare and improbable that I am hard pressed to think of another example.
(April 2014)
