On August 14th, 1964, The Beatles launched into “Mr. Moonlight” as a contender for Beatles For Sale album, the first cover song they chose to include.
Four takes of the song were made on this evening, only two of which made it through to the end. The first didn’t get past John’s vocal introduction, John himself calling for the band to stop. McCartney encouragingly interjects “nearly!” while Lennon replies, “yes, not bad, that one.” This first attempt can be heard on the “Anthology 1” album.
Take four on this day was temporarily deemed as best, although they understandably thought differently later. The primary reason undoubtedly was George Harrison’s rather experimental shaky guitar solo which, even during the live performance, impelled McCartney to give out a couple of cat-calls that would mark the track as unusable. This performance is also included on “Anthology 1.”
Takes 5 through 8 showed the group running through the song with the same instrumentation as on August 14th, namely John on rhythm guitar while singing lead, George on lead guitar while singing harmony vocals and Paul on bass guitar while singing harmony vocals. The verdict is still out on what instrument Ringo is playing. Some writers suggest bongos, some a packing case (such as a guitar case) and some say he played the toms of his drum kit, such as he did when performing it live.
The first couple of takes still contained George Harrison’s guitar solo, but this was quickly ruled out. Engineer Geoff Emerick explains: “The stumbling block again was Harrison’s guitar solo – not the notes he was playing, but the odd, sped-up tremolo sound he was using…Lennon thought the unconventional sound was terrific – and, personally, so did I – but George Martin insisted that it was simply too weird. After some discussion, it was decided to overdub a cheesy organ solo instead. Even though I loathed the sound, I was most impressed to see Paul playing it – up until that point, I’d had no idea that he could even play keyboards.”
Take eight was the final rhythm track, onto which McCartney overdubbed his Hammond organ parts, in effect replacing Harrison’s guitar solo in the song. George instead was relegated to hitting an African drum on the two-beat of every measure the band went into a ‘break’ in the song.
Enjoy final version. In the comments, takes 1 and 4 from Anthology 1, George and his Gretsch Country Gentleman. Paul on organ (Hammond RT-3 w/ Leslie 145 cabinet).
