following jon's, tommy's and mike's talk of music, and as a way of rescuing us from post-christmas (or dark winter) blues, i'd like to suggest you all google "paul mccartney, jimmy fallon" and watch the video of their duet, performed on a rerun last night, of the original words for "yesterday" called "scrambled eggs."
it's a hoot.
i suspect many of you don't stay up very late so you likely missed the show. fallon, a standup comic, born in brooklyn, raised in saugerties &, eventually, a st. rose grad, had mccartney on his 12:30 a.m. talk show last night which was a rerun of the original on dec. 9th.
it seems when mccartney or lennon found a tune they liked but didn't have the lyrics yet, they'd save the tune by writing place holder or silly lyrics for it and then, later, write what would become the real lyrics. until fallon performed it with the ex-Beatle, mccartney had never performed "scrambled eggs" in front of an audience.
the lyrics make you smile with the first line. using "yesterday's" melody, the song begins, "scrambled eggs, oh, my baby how i love your legs, not as much as i love scrambled eggs, we should eat some scrambled eggs. ... waffle fries, oh, my darling how i love your thighs, not as much as i love waffle fries. oh, have you tried the waffle fries? etc. ..."
when mccartney wrote "yesterday", the other beatles didn't like it and resisted recording it for some time. they thought it wasn't in their style, it lacked a rock drive and the lyrics didn't resolve the singer's dilemma. in fact, john lennon said, "it's beautiful ... but i'd never have written it." lennon believed yesterday was gone, you couldnt do anything about it, and that "life can begin at 40," (something about half our league would probably agree with.) but eventually the group did it at the abbey road studios.
the song is listed as a lennon/mccartney tune as are most of the beatle tunes but years later, mccartney asked lennon's widow yoko ono if this one alone could be changed mccartney/lennon. she refused.
it seems the public has sided with mccartney's aesthetics on the song's appeal. i googled "yesterday," and found it's the most played and recorded beatles' tune of all time, with more than 7 million performances since it first came out in 1965. among those who recorded it were frank sinatra, joan baez, bob dylan, elvis presley, liberace, placido domingo and daffy duck.
so paul now has partial public credit for "yesterday," but full credit, ta da!, for "scrambled eggs". it's his alone.
and it really is a hoot.
hope you like it.
-mike
-- Edited by mhart on Thursday 30th of December 2010 06:43:17 PM
