We Can Work It Out
In late 1965 the Rivals were working things out and yet they weren't.
As the two bands recorded albums for release before Christmas of 1965 the growing collaboration between Lennon and McCartney grew. Lennon tended to sit in on the Sgt. Pepper's sessions that ended up being
Looking Through You and McCartney did the same for the Moondogs's sessions that became
Nowhere Man. A mutual respect had totally replaced the once upon a time antagonism. Even though they weren't doing the full collaboration that had created several tunes for "Help Me," after all these were songs for the independent bands, they kept finding themselves going to each other for advice.
Of course there was one man who stood between them, the man who'd worked for years to convince them at first to not hate each other and then had operated as a bridge between them. George Harrison at first took pride in bringing the two together, often suggesting to either one that the other one might have some ideas. What both Lennon and McCartney weren't realizing was that they had gone to Harrison in the first place to get some ideas.
It wasn't until, however, that something totally new happened that Harrison felt slighted. On December 3, 1965 two albums were released and one single. The albums were for each band. The single was released by neither band but by "The Rivals." All the songs on
Looking Through You were credited to McCartney. All the songs on
Nowhere Man were credited to Lennon. The double single with both sides being "We Can Work It Out" was credited to Lennon and McCartney. Harrison said, "I'm guess I'm the nowhere man that everyone keeps looking through," in a letter he wrote to Bob Dylan. What really upset Harrison was that neither band would include the songs he'd written on their albums and Lennon and McCartney ignored that Harrison had collaborated with them on "We Can Work It Out."
Starkey enjoyed the double work on tour and in the studio. But Harrison grew to hate it. By the end of 1965 after going from the 1964 tours doing double duty to working on the film "Help Me" to more double duty touring and then to double duty studio work he was exhausted, stressed and feeling totally unappreciated.
Things didn't get any better in 1966. "It felt like everyone wanted me and everyone needed me," Harrison explained in his notorious interview with Maureen Cleave for the
London Evening Standard, which appeared in an article in March 1966. He said, "But it felt like nobody valued me at the same time. Outside the circle of the Rivals I got the love. Clapton, Dylan, Orbison, Taylor. Inside Richie and Klaus were supportive, but they still followed the cues of Kiwi and Babyface. Denny, he almost always ignored me. I don't think I would have survived at all without my spirituality. The Rivals may think they're bigger than God, but they're not to me. I've basically had enough. It's all ego. It's all 'I, Me, Mine, I, Me, Mine, I, Me, Mine," all the time."
When the Rivals went on a joint Tour in 1966 they went without Harrison. Plus half the time it wasn't Sgt. Pepper and the Moondogs taking turns playing on stage like before. It was the Rivals playing together, a five man electrical band.
Harrison was in the studio with Clapton, Dylan, Preston and Orbison. Oh, and Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan.
He hadn't quit Sgt. Pepper or the Moondogs. But he would never tour with the Rivals again.