Fact #128234
When:
Short story:
EMI Engineer Norman Smith offers The Beatles a song at Abbey Road Studios, London, England, UK. Smith will later enjoy a briefly successful pop career under the name Hurricane Smith.Full article:
It was the fag-end of a long Friday in Abbey Road. The Beatles needed just one more song to complete the requisite fourteen tracks for their forthcoming album, Help! The catch was that they didn't have one. After much moptop-scratching, engineer Norman '2dBs' Smith hesitantly informed producer George Martin that, actually, he'd written a song that would be ideal for John and he, er, happened to have it in his jacket pocket. After playing it through to Paul and John in Studio 3, all agreed it was a goer. To seal the deal, Beatles' publisher Dick James offered Smith £15,000 to buy the song outright. Norman was about to leap at the offer, when he noticed the older, wiser George Martin shaking his head behind Dick James, implying that the offer was much too low.
Cannily, Norman told James that he would 'think about it over the weekend.' McCartney asked Smith to demo the track in time for Monday's session.
Demo in hand, Smith returned to the studio on Monday morning only to be taken aside by an apologetic McCartney. Every Beatles album, pointed out Paul, included one track sung by Ringo but, this time, they'd forgotten to do one. Three days later Ringo recorded Act Naturally, and Norm's tune returned to his jacket pocket.
(Source : Johnny Black)
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Cannily, Norman told James that he would 'think about it over the weekend.' McCartney asked Smith to demo the track in time for Monday's session.
Demo in hand, Smith returned to the studio on Monday morning only to be taken aside by an apologetic McCartney. Every Beatles album, pointed out Paul, included one track sung by Ringo but, this time, they'd forgotten to do one. Three days later Ringo recorded Act Naturally, and Norm's tune returned to his jacket pocket.
(Source : Johnny Black)