Art versus spirituality: The pivotal George Harrison song featuring Derek and the Dominoes
At one point or another, every single member of The Beatles wanted out. Some may have experienced this in tandem, with the crashing waves of potential further afield rearing it head to offer something freer, even if it didn’t yet exist. George Harrison experienced this in 1966, just as the band were about to embark on their most creatively daring venture yet.
Up until that point, The Beatles had accrued a vast following with live performances showcasing their palpable stage energy. With an endearing mix of youthful mischief and formal business etiquette, The Beatles did well to attract those from all over, while others were left vying for a fraction of their attention. However, when they appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show, no one else could burn as bright as their flame.
It was everything any aspiring musician could have ever dreamed of, a party that seemed never to stop even when the bell for the last call rang—instead of turning down the heat after a couple of years, they kept it rolling, in love with the shackles of an engine that would one day be out to get them. Harrison might have appeared more reserved in demeanour but committed nonetheless, that is, until he began to entertain the prospect of the other side.
Harrison released ‘Art of Dying’ on his 1970 album All Things Must Pass, but he wrote the song during this oddly enticing 1966 call for deliberation. Equipped with a new interest in Indian religion and otherworldly spirituality, ‘Art of Dying’ was Harrison’s flirtation with life beyond musical creativity and into one with deeper meaning. As the strings of intrigue pulled him in one direction, his proximity to The Beatles took a momentary backseat to make way for “searching for the truth among the lying.”
Harrison’s belief centred around the fact that you either keep on coasting or strive to search for something more significant and avoid the empty void of a meaningless existence. In this respect, he valued the prospect of reincarnation as it came with the promise of something more; something beyond the mundanity of everyday life that existed to give the heart and soul greater fulfilment. As he put it in 1968, “You go on being reincarnated until you reach the actual truth. The actual world is an illusion.”
Four years after he wrote ‘Art of Dying’, he was in the studio recording it with Derek & the Dominoes, who formed part of the record’s vast assembly of musicians. The journey to creating All Things Must Pass began at various junctures after the disassociation of ’66, but many things crossed the same superlative path to writing songs about breaking free. Derek & the Dominoes formed alongside the environment’s creative breeding ground, with the perfect fleeting timeliness of a band shortlived and the prospect of death’s inevitability looming like a dark shadow over such musical brilliance.
It was one of the first songs Harrison recorded just after The Beatles split, arguably during the time he was most interested in karmic ideology. With a cast of exemplary musicians, a mind filled with contemplative dissonance, and the prospect of limitless possibilities, Harrison formed the nucleus of the one thing that plagued The Beatles’ formative years without even realising it. “It was awesome when we were doing ‘Art Of Dying’,” musician Bobby Whitlock later recalled, “Eric [Clapton] on that wah-wah and it was all cooking, Derek and the Dominos with George Harrison.”
Ultimately, it was all about entertaining otherness in the crux of greatness—Harrison surrounded himself with the best in the business, yet his soul yearned for something beyond the legends of his time. It could be assembled into one well-known saying, something about the grass always being greener, but it demonstrated the power and allure of spirituality and how the music world, even when it’s in the palm of your hand, can leave you feeling void of something indescribable.
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