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American Morning

Reflections of George Harrison's Life

Aired November 30, 2001 - 08:52   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Former Beatle George Harrison is being remembered this morning. His solo career, his collaborations and of course his days with the legendary Fab Four have secured him a place in music history. Harrison died yesterday in Los Angeles after a long battle with cancer.

My colleague Jack Cafferty joins us now, along with two guests who have dropped by to talk about Harrison's life and legacy. Michael Wolff is a media columnist for "New York Magazine" and Michael Elliott is with "Time" magazine.

Welcome all.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you.

ZAHN: First of all, you grew up in Liverpool.

MICHAEL ELLIOTT, "TIME" MAGAZINE: I did.

ZAHN: So you have to tell us a little bit about that experience.

ELLIOTT: I did. I did. Well you know...

ZAHN: And any experiences with the Beatles.

ELLIOTT: I have to tell you, Paula, growing up in Liverpool in the 1960s, the whole of the rest of my life since then has just been about as exciting as toothpaste, you know. It's been kind of downhill all the way. My elder brother remembers the Beatles as just a kind of local band who played at the Cavern. And, you know, he used to kind of go across with his pals and see them. And he once broke his arm, or this is his story, and he got all of them to kind of autograph the cast on his arm. And then, of course, he threw it away.

ZAHN: And this is when they were just...

ELLIOTT: Then, of course, he threw it away. He was -- he was a little older than me. He was -- he was kind of absolutely the right age to kind of grow up listening to them in the -- in the local clubs and everything. I was...

ZAHN: When did (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...

ELLIOTT: I was a little younger. ZAHN: ... think they were any good?

ELLIOTT: I would say by 19 -- by -- "Love Me Do" came out in the fall of 1962. I can talk for a long time about this.

ZAHN: Yes, and we're going to have you sing a little bit later on this morning, too.

ELLIOTT: And...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

ELLIOTT: Actually, the other thing I can do is talk in a Liverpool accent, you know. I mean if you really want me to kind of, you know, talk like George and John did, you know kind of with this slow, kind of nasal tone of voice, I can do it really easily.

And "Love Me Do" came out in 1962, but they'd been known locally for two or three years before then. And then, of course, they'd been in Germany. (UNINTELLIGIBLE) they'd developed a reputation as a local band. Then they kind of went over to the Star Club in Hamburg and came back bigger and met Brian Epstein (ph) at Nems (ph), the famous record store in Liverpool, and then the rest, as they say, is history.

ZAHN: Any thoughts and reflections this morning on George Harrison?

MICHAEL WOLFF, "NEW YORK MAGAZINE": Well, you know -- you know I mean this is really a generational story for certainly somebody my age who was -- I 11 when the Beatles were -- came to the Ed Sullivan Show. So among other things, it makes you feel very, not only sad, but very old that it all begins to pass at this -- at this point. This is I mean certainly -- it's certainly the Beatles -- certainly this story which we have -- we have followed, there's no -- there's no detail of this story that we haven't followed for the past 40 years. It really is -- this is -- this is our life story.

ZAHN: Jack.

JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: Oh I'm probably the oldest one sitting at this table, and at the time of the Beatles, 1963, I was working at KCBM Radio in Reno, Nevada. And in addition to doing the morning program, I was the music director. I had a title. And what the music director did was as the albums would come in from the record companies, I would unwrap them and file them in the -- in the library.

And I remember sitting one morning, we would get advance copies of these things ahead of the release to the general public, and I unwrapped the first Beatles album. And as I pulled the album out of the -- out of the wrapping, I saw these four guys with these really weird haircuts. Now this was 1963 in Reno, Nevada, and I'm 58, so my generation it was still sideburns and ducktails and Elvis and Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins and country music, to a degree, but certainly not these guys -- weird looking guys with this long hair.

And then the title of the group, The Beatles. Reno, Nevada didn't -- it was not a trend setting center of the -- of the culture of this country at the time. And I can remember laughing out loud all by myself in the music library when I opened this thing. (UNINTELLIGIBLE) what the hell is this? And I went on to play probably one of the first Beatle songs ever heard in Reno, Nevada. And of course they, you know, they went on after that and very soon were embraced, even in Reno. But in that -- in that comparatively primitive cow town environment, in 1963, there were a lot of cocked eyebrows at the Beatles and at the haircuts (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

ELLIOTT: I think George was -- George was certainly very important to the whole thing, too. I mean he didn't kind of have the obvious boyish charm of Paul and he wasn't the kind of, you know, tortured intellectual art student like John was, but what he -- what he -- what he did do is kind of offer a kind of a little touch of mystery to the whole thing, you know. I mean he was quiet, you couldn't read him, he was interested in Indian religions, three's the whole Rabbi Shancar (ph) and Concert for Bangladesh stuff. And so there was -- there was a kind of, you know, that kind of '60s touch of mysticism and...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He also...

ELLIOTT: ... exotica that he brought.

CAFFERTY: He had given an interview where he talked about he never planned his music career. When he felt like going into the studio to make music, which was what he cared about, not performing, not selling records, but making it, he would go and make a record. But he never planned his career as a musician or an artist or a performer.

ZAHN: Final thought this morning.

WOLFF: Yes, it's one of those things. I mean the Beatles are one of those from the media business and when you write about the media you begin to look for these things. Where is the change? What's that one single development that changes everything, that makes -- changes our -- who we are, our personalities? And it was certainly -- it was certainly the arrival of the Beatles and then in some way, it also has been now for quite some time, the passing of the Beatles.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

ZAHN: Well thank you all for joining us. You're going to be with us through the next hour -- Michael Wolff, Michael Elliott, Jack Cafferty.

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