Customer Reviews

George Harrison

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Of the albums George Harrison released in between All Things Must Pass and Cloud Nine, this is my favorite. Despite the uncharacteristically boring packaging, his self-titled album finds George more in his element than he had been in the past six years (though the subject of God is conspicuously absent, or maybe I'm just not looking hard enough).
The optimistic "Love Comes To Everyone" sets the mood for the album. Although it's a great song, the best is yet to come. "Not Guilty" is a great song that George had since the Beatles' White Album sessions (why the Beatles never used it is unknown--they recorded over 100 takes!). "Here Comes The Moon" (a "little brother" to "Here Comes The Sun") was written in Hawaii after George witnessed the sun setting as the moon came up...beautiful song, very visual. I don't particularly care for "Soft-Hearted Hana," as it seems somewhat out of place on this album. It's quirky, though it doesn't spoil the album's mood. "Blow Away" & "Faster" (my two favorites) prove that, although his music wasn't the most commercial, George could still write an A1 pop song. "Dark Sweet Lady" & "Your Love Is Forever" (two of my other personal favorites) are both soft & warm. "Dark Sweet Lady" has a spanish feel to it. "Soft Touch" was written about George's newly-born son and is another warm, sweet song. "If You Believe" kicks up the tempo slightly and finishes the album on a happy, hopeful note--full circle.

I bought the cd this afternoon and i've been listenning to it for more that 6 hours right now without any hesitation. Before I bought it, I had read all those silly reviews on this and all his other albums, and believe me, currently listening the album, I've once again hated all those prejudiced editors, reviewers, and talent lacking musical experts(!). This album, from the beginning to the end, is a masterpiece! A completely soul touching influence, beyond its time, even much better than Mr. McCartney's silly love albums!..

At the first glance, I catch the up-beat disco rhytmn of Love Comes to Everyone. And please look at the time this album was released! 1979.. Right before the world went into heavily shynthisized disco craziness. And see how George's touch changes things. Just don't believe in those people who say that he in fact imitated the musical understanding of the time period this album was released, just to be able to sell more!.. No!.. George was always among the ones to open the path for the future of music. And this fact is once again proved in this case. If only he was the only one to decide!! Popular music today wouldn't have gone far beyond weird, bizzare and crazy!.. Go to a record store and buy an arbitrary album, how many of them can you listen to, without having an aching head in the end, or how many of them would really relax your soul when you feel tense? NO MORE THAN THE FINGERS OF ONE HAND. And would certainly contain his last work "Brainwashed".

Jazzy tracks like "Not Guilty" and "Soft-Hearted Hanna" takes your soul to another world with their fantastic arrangement and presentation!.. These pieces are among the strongest tracks on this album which will certainly make you want to listen to it over and over again!.. Those who claim that Sweet-Hearted Hanna is bizzare or strange, just burn all your cds and quit keeping your noses in musical stuff!! Fantastic piece, which will remind you of "Ne na na na" style jazzy bluesy songs. Would have gone wonderfully in Sgt. Pepper... Paul could only catch this sound with the introductory tracks on "Flaming Pie" about 20 years after George's work here, and they were not even close!! But when it's Paul doing it, he is the "genious"(!) and when it's George suddenly things become "weird"(!). This is not fair! Before listening to this cd, just free your minds, float up stream and leave all your prejudiced thoughts behind!.. I bet you're gonna love it!..

Tell me how many song writers, ever existed, could manage to combine blues and latin riffs as beautifully as we see in "Dark Sweet Lady"? More than five again? I don't really think so!..

I could right now, write a hundred pages about this great album and about musical editors who have never even owned a tiny piece of musical vision, but i guess this much is enough for now!.. Buy it right now, if you can find it anyway, and you'll be glad to have listened to such a fabulous album!.. George's magical touch will surround your body immediately!.. These are what made him George Harrison and those people (you know who they are) are what prevented him from growing much bigger!.. We miss you George!! I wish you were here to continue your fight with all the craziness around by your touching songs. Sooner or later, all the world will understand how important and beautiful all the thing you had done in the past have been, are and are going to be!...

The one thing I must tell you is that if you are a Beatle's fan and cherish the upbeat mood, craftmanship and consistency of the finest Beatle albums, buy this if you can find it. It's a no brainer!

I have retained the vinyl copy I bought in college when it came out in 1979 and revisit it frequently and repeatedly. I could never understand how this Beatle-related gem became such an unknown item...probably just buried under the overall prolific magnitude of the whole Beatles thing combined with the changes in pop music sensabilities at the time of release.

It doesn't matter...the fact is it is a finely crafted Beatle-esque gem! Solid songwriting, fine musicianship by George and crew, GEorge Martin-like production, variety of sounds and moods and musical influences, great flow from tune to tune from start to finish.

Innovative pop? Probably not! Rock? No. THe Beatles already covered so much of these grounds during their peak years. But I'd argue this is one of the highest quality and one of the most "Beatle-esque" recorded results of all their varied solo albums.

I am very picky in my musical taste! Why is this CD out of print? I have listened to this recording, literaly near a thousand times. Mr Harrison's eclectic, spiritual sound that is prevelant on all his recordings (Including his last "Brainwashed") never sounded better than it does here. "Soft Hearted Hana" is amazing. "Not Guilty" which was originaly recorded for the "Let it be" sessions, finally finds it way to album form. How could the beatles not have used this? "Blow away" is george having fun, I wish he made more music like this. "Here comes the moon" his answer to the beatles "Here comes the sun" is a more than adequate follow up. "Your love is forever" is my personal favorite. This CD has it all! From start to finish! If you cant find the CD. Hunt it down in LP form. You will wonder what all the fuss with "All things must pass" was. This is his finest work. The only album that has the same "feel" is the afor mentioned "Brainwashed" which I find interesting, considering the more than twenty years span between. Maybe Mr Harrison in the waining years of his life also realized some of his finest work!

George Harrison's 1976 album "Thirty-Three & 1/3" was a huge change from its predecessor, 1975's "Extra Texture", despite less than a year & ½ gap between the two albums. On the contrary, this self-titled 1979 follow up to "Thirty-Three & 1/3", despite the 2+ year gap between albums, has a very similar feel to the one that preceeded it. This album is pleasant, & the sound is often appealingly lush (though at times overproduced), but, like the last album, it's frustratingly slight. To put it a certain way, this album is like white bread--it's good & certainly not worthless, but it dramatically lacks both excitement and emotional impact. It`s also high in the sap department--George admitted in his book "I Me Mine", which originally came out in 1980, that he had been suffering from writer`s block for a lengthy period of time in the late `70s, & with this album, it really sounds like it. The fact that he does a re-recording of the 1968 "White Album" outtake "Not Guilty" does nothing to suggest writer`s block hadn`t sunk in. "Love Comes To Everyone" has a splendid melody that puts the lyrics over, making it a highly enjoyable feel-good tune--it gets the album off to a strong start, although the last 45 seconds or so of the song do drag--it's as if George was just stretching the tune out for the mere sake of making it longer (the version of the song on the "Best of Dark Horse 1976-1989" compilation avoids this problem by fading out much earlier). "Blow Away" has lovely, sighing slide guitar work, and it's nice, as is "Soft Touch", though they're both rather underdeveloped & brought down by their sappiness. "Not Guilty" has a nice, ringing acoustic guitar line, but overall this jazzy soft rock tune is fluff & sounds a bit tossed off. "Faster" has a seemingly never-ending intro consisting of a race car sound before the actual tune finally starts, & it ends up not really being worth the wait--it's a ho-hum attempt at an inspirational song with some really weak lyrics & orchestration that doesn't help any. "If You Believe" is another limp attempt at an uplifting, inspirational number. "Dark Sweet Lady" is an attempt at writing something Spanish-sounding, & it sounds like something you're likely to hear on the Weather Channel, & it's musically & lyrically half-baked, and sappy. "Your Love Is Forever" has nice ringing guitars, but, once again, the sappy lyrics bring it down, plus the slide guitar solo sounds startlingly & displeasingly clumsy as if George was having an off day & was too lazy to do another take. "Here Comes the Moon", in similar fashion to "Here Comes the Sun", is in 4/4 time & switches to 3/4 for a nice ringing, arpeggiated guitar line that unfortunately gets beaten into the ground, plus the verse melody is slight beyond all belief, the bridge portion is painfully "cosmic", & the lame chorus gets repeated way too many times. There is a very annoying tune on here, & as with "This Song" from the previous album, it happens to be the 4th track on the album (I told you these albums have a lot in common!)--it's the jokey, Leon Redbone-style "Soft-Hearted Hana", made additionally annoying by the intentional speed/ pitch fluctuations on the fade. In the end, "George Harrison" is a heck of a disappointing listen indeed. For all its faults, the album is overall quite pleasant--it's rarely ever bad enough that you'll be compelled to reach for the stop or fast-forward buttons, but the way good musical ideas get buried & the overall slightness make for an album that leaves a lot to be desired.

Although Capitol has put out a remastered version of this album at this point (which contains a demo of "Here Comes the Moon" as a bonus track), the sound quality is very strong on this older version of the CD as well.

I don't own the CD of this album. I bought the vinyl back when it came out in the late '70s and lost it. Recently my brother died and his whole huge record collection was left behind. I brought it down and found four of Harrison's albums in it, including this one. It was a revelation, after nearly 25 years, to listen to the vinyl recording again. How well it stands up! Practically every cut is remarkable. My favorite is "Your Love is Forever," which is truly beautiful, with the guitar "chimes" just echoing glassily over the chords and vocals. It's one of the most beautiful songs Harrison ever did, though there is much to choose from on this album. Sometimes you can go home again. Highly recommended.

When you ask anybody to name all the George Harrison albums they know, they might say All Things Must Pass, Living in the Material World, Cloud 9, and Brainwashed. While all of these are classics, anyone who just owns these albums is missing a very vital album. George Harrison's self-titled album is his happiest, featuring an ode to newly-born son "Soft Touch." The track "Blow Away" is one of George's most famous non-hit singles. Even a 1979 acoustic re-working of the Beatles' "Not Guilty" (first released on Anthology 3, in 1996) is on this set. Your solo Beatle collection is incomplete without this essential record. There's even an LSD-inspired sequel to "Here Comes the Sun"! Like the album, my review shall close with these encouraging words: "Everything you thought is possible if you believe." This album is pure gold.

I lied. I haven't heard the CD, but I have a couple copies of the LP. However, seeing as how the songs are in the same order, differences are probably non-existant. It is filled with fantastic songs that provide substance as well as melody. I must say, however, that 'Love Comes to Everyone' scares me every time I hear it because it has a disco beat, and that's just plain frightening (especially coming from George). 'Soft-Hearted Hana' is a truely bizarre song, and like 'I Am the Walrus', challenges the listener to get all the words and then learn them (without help of the notes- that's just cheating). I'm also glad to say this album drags a lot less than most of his other post-Beatle ventures. Eric Clapton makes his regularly scheduled appearance by providing the opening guitar on 'Love Comes to Everyone' (again, scary business there). 'George Harrison' is a throughly entertaining album, and reaffirms any beliefs that despite not havng turned out a real beauty in fifteen years, Harrison knew what was involved once (this was originaly released in 1979).

For me, This album is quite simply George Harrison's best work!
My favorite G.H. song comes from this Album. "Your Love Is Forever"
I still get Goose Bumps when listening to the Awesome Guitar in this
Great Song!!