The Beatles: Real Love (Drum and Keyboard Cover)

“Real Love” was the second song released of three songs The Beatles worked on in the 90s for their Anthology project. The song though had some history prior to this. Lennon recorded multiple takes of the song as a demo for an intended musical he and Yoko were working on titled The Ballad of John and Yoko and the song was titled ‘Real Life’. These demos were performed on both piano and acoustic guitar. It was even considered to be the opening to side two on Double Fantasy appearing in an earlier handwritten draft of the album’s track listing. In 1988, the take six demo, played on an acoustic guitar, was first released on the Imagine: John Lennon soundtrack album. The Beatles version was worked on in February of 1995 at Paul’s studio in Sussex. With Jeff Lynn producing, McCartney, George, and Ringo added overdubs of bass, electric and acoustic guitars, drums and percussion, and a double bass originally owned by Elvis’ bassist Bill Black. Other instruments include a harpsichord and a harmonium, both of which had been previously heard on earlier Beatles’ songs. The production of the song proved quite challenging. The quality of Lennon’s original demo was poor and there was an audible hiss that could be heard in the demo as well as problems with the timing. But everything was fixed up and the finished song would see a release on Anthology 2 the following year. This would ultimately be the final Beatles song released in George's lifetime and the final Beatles release overall until "Now and Then" 27 years later. Ringo’s drumming is in the same vein as “Free As A Bird” and “Now and Then.” Steady eighth note hi hat groove with a consistent bass drum pattern accented by overdubbed drum fills. In addition to the drums, I also decided to include the various keyboard parts that you hear in the mix. These include Lennon’s main piano part, a secondary piano part, the harpsichord, and the harmonium, part of which was played on an antique pump organ that I wanted to include in the video. Strangely, I had to adjust the tuning of the keyboards (the Yamaha keyboard) up About 40 cents to be in tune with song as it is slightly sharp. The pump organ however I had to record as is and then use a pitch correction plug in in my DAW to tune it up to the song. It was a challenge, but it all worked out. I’m not using the Anthology 2 version of the song, but using the audio you hear in the music video that can be found on Youtube as well as the 2015 remix from the 1+ compilation which included new guitar riffs, and a new drum fill heard just before the second verse. That’s pretty much it for the song. It took a long time to figure out the keyboard parts, but listening to isolated tracks, and very detailed covers on Youtube, I was able to come up with a performance. Thank you for watching and I hope you enjoy it! As always, more to come!