The three songs George Harrison wrote about Pattie Boyd
No relationship in rock and roll is meant to last for too long. As much as you might be committed to one person in theory, the constant touring and swinging lifestyle of rock and roll has always pulled the most devoted couples apart. When George Harrison first locked eyes with Pattie Boyd, though, it was love at first sight.
As the Beatles began working on their first movie, A Hard Day’s Night, Boyd appeared in one of the train scenes, where she and her partner get charmed by Paul McCartney. After meeting with the ‘Quiet Beatle’, both Harrison and Boyd became an item. While Harrison hadn’t had that much experience writing music before meeting Boyd, one of his first classic songs from the Beatles came courtesy of her.
He was a famous Beatle, and she was a supermodel and muse with an air of easy cool; for a moment, they were the epitome of swinging sixties beauty. Theirs was a difficult relationship, though, as are many rock ‘n’ roll romances. Although Pattie remained immersed in the cultural and social maelstrom, Harrison found himself increasingly drawn inside as his interest in spirituality grew, especially in Indian philosophy and meditation.
As the band began work on Help!, Harrison came up with ‘I Need You’ as his tribute to Boyd. Although the song seems like a sweet message of love from the title, this is a much more sombre affair, as Harrison talks about his relationship being on the rocks. Framed as a post-breakup song, Harrison cries out to Boyd to remind her that he can’t live without her. Despite Harrison’s great intentions with this material, it wasn’t until he had a few more trackers under his belt that the real classics came rolling in.
After the disastrous sessions for The White Album wrapped up, Harrison was in a creative rut. Since none of his creations were given the same attention as those by the John Lennon and Paul McCartney songwriting machine, he began demo-ing songs by himself, including the sketch of ‘Something’.
Although Harrison knew that there was a particular shine to the song, he originally wanted to shelve it, thinking that it came to him too quickly. Even when fleshing out the rest of the song, he initially gave it to Joe Cocker to sing before using it on Abbey Road. After being in the everglow of martial bliss, Harrison wears his heart on his sleeve throughout this song, talking about being smitten by how Boyd moves.
Harrison wasn’t known to write traditional love songs, though, and the bridge talks about wondering if his love will ever grow past the electricity that he’s feeling at the moment. Even though Harrison may have been the lone-wolf songwriter in the Beatles, McCartney had to commend him for this song, saying to John Lennon during a break that Harrison’s tracks for the album were at least as good as theirs, if not better.
While Harrison blossomed as a songwriter once the Beatles broke up, most of All Things Must Pass had lyrics that were tied up in the Fab Four’s fallout as well as his spiritual journey. There were songs about trashing McCartney like ‘Wah-Wah’ alongside songs that sought spiritual enlightenment on ‘My Sweet Lord’. After spending years in marital bliss, cracks started to form once Eric Clapton entered the equation.
Despite Clapton being one of Harrison’s best friends, his infatuation with Boyd led him to make his own tribute song, ‘Layla’. After a handful of secret romantic liaisons, Harrison finds out about the affair and puts his feelings down in a song on Dark Horse. While most of Harrison’s third album talks about him feeling down and out, ‘So Sad’ is the only song that directly confronts the breakup.
Harrison doesn’t play the cynical angle here; instead, he lies his sadness out on the table by mentioning how cold and alone he feels now that his lover has fallen out of favor with him. After ‘I Need You’ and ‘Something’ had their existential questions about love, this is the sad conclusion where Harrison realizes that he’s left feeling worse once that infatuation is snuffed out.
Then again, Harrison’s fractured marriage quickly became water under the bridge. Clapton would eventually marry Boyd and write his tributes like ‘Wonderful Tonight’, and Harrison would even attend the wedding, later referring to his old friend as his ‘husband-in-law’. Across these three tracks, though, listeners see how Harrison sees love. There’s some trepidation in ‘I Need You’, helpless romance on ‘Something’, and ultimately becoming strangers again on ‘So Sad’.
The songs George Harrison wrote about Pattie Boyd:
- ‘I Need You’
- ‘Something’
- ‘So Sad’
