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George Harrison: Surviving the Beatles, the London Drug Squad, and a Home Invasion · DISGRACELAND

0:00
Speaker 1: Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis, and the stories
0:13
Speaker 1: about George Harrison are insane. He was set up and
0:17
Speaker 1: busted by London's notorious drug squad. He attacked the paparazzo
0:22
Speaker 1: who leaped from the bushes with his camera flashing. He
0:25
Speaker 1: diffused a potentially bloody visit from the Hell's Angels, and
0:29
Speaker 1: on the last day of the twentieth century, after rebounding
0:33
Speaker 1: from multiple cancer diagnoses, George Harrison was terrorized and violently attacked,
0:39
Speaker 1: an attack that left him hanging on for life with
0:42
Speaker 1: a collapsed lung. But before that, George Harrison made great music,
0:48
Speaker 1: some of the most enduring and soul searching music of
0:51
Speaker 1: all time. Unlike that music I played for you at
0:54
Speaker 1: the top of the show. That wasn't great music. That
0:57
Speaker 1: was a preset loop from my melotron called Gortex Vortex
1:02
Speaker 1: MK two. I played you that loop because I can't
1:06
Speaker 1: afford the rights to Smooth by Santana and Rob Thomas.
1:11
Speaker 1: And why would I play you that specific slice of
1:14
Speaker 1: Spanish Harlem mona Lisa Cheese. Could I afford it? Because
1:18
Speaker 1: that was the number one song in America On December
1:22
Speaker 1: thirty one, nineteen ninety nine, and that was the day
1:25
Speaker 1: that a crazed fan broke into the historic thirty five
1:28
Speaker 1: acre Friar Park estate and tried to kill George Harrison.
1:34
Speaker 1: On this episode, paparazzi, drug squads, crazed fans, a home
1:39
Speaker 1: invasion in George Harrison. I'm Jake Brennan, and this is disgraceland.
2:18
Speaker 1: This was his great chant for deliverance, his sacred chant,
2:23
Speaker 1: his mystical sound, vibration, whatever you choose to call it.
2:27
Speaker 1: A mantra, has incredible power. It's hypnotic. The more you
2:32
Speaker 1: repeat your mantra, the more powerful it becomes. Repetition carves
2:37
Speaker 1: a path deeper to awareness, and with the power of awareness,
2:42
Speaker 1: one could be prepared.
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Speaker 2: For anything, even death.
2:49
Speaker 1: At this particular moment, however, on the last day of
2:52
Speaker 1: the twentieth century, George Harrison was not seeking enlightenment or awareness.
2:58
Speaker 1: George wasn't repeating Harry Rish Harry Krishna over and over
3:02
Speaker 1: again in order to communicate directly with God, as many
3:05
Speaker 1: have done for close to five thousand years. He was
3:09
Speaker 1: doing it to disorient the other man in the room
3:12
Speaker 1: because George Harrison was under attack. Hiri Krishna Hari Krishna.
3:19
Speaker 1: George Harrison was yelling at the man with the blonde
3:22
Speaker 1: hair running up the stairs towards him. He just wanted
3:25
Speaker 1: the man to stop. He hoped the mantra would cause
3:27
Speaker 1: the man to become confused and afraid, just like George
3:30
Speaker 1: had been confused and afraid when he was awoken by
3:33
Speaker 1: the sound of breaking glass and knew that someone was
3:36
Speaker 1: inside his home. But George's mantra didn't have the intended effect.
3:41
Speaker 1: If anything, it made the man charge faster, angrier. The
3:46
Speaker 1: man wasn't there to rob anybody. He was bounding up
3:49
Speaker 1: the steps two at a time because the man was
3:52
Speaker 1: there to murder George Harrison. The man's eyes were wild,
3:57
Speaker 1: scraggly blonde hair squirming like Medusa. George stood his ground
4:02
Speaker 1: up in the gallery that overlooked the first floor. It
4:04
Speaker 1: was late, not quite three thirty in the morning.
4:07
Speaker 2: Beware of darkness.
4:10
Speaker 1: George saw that the man had a stone sword in
4:12
Speaker 1: one hand that would be from the statue of Saint
4:15
Speaker 1: George and the Dragon, the one that George's wife had
4:17
Speaker 1: created and was displayed in the gardens outside. In his
4:21
Speaker 1: other hand, the man held a knife. George thought of
4:24
Speaker 1: his wife back in their bedroom, and of his mother
4:27
Speaker 1: in law, who was sleeping upstairs in one of the
4:29
Speaker 1: guest rooms Hairi Krishna Harri Krishna. George cried again just
4:34
Speaker 1: as the man made it to the landing at the
4:36
Speaker 1: gallery level. That shit wasn't working, so George leaped at
4:40
Speaker 1: his attacker, But just like the mantra, this plan also backfired.
4:45
Speaker 1: George and the attacker fell to the ground and the
4:47
Speaker 1: man was on top of George, straddling him. George squirmed
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Speaker 1: on the ground and held his hands up in self preservation.
4:53
Speaker 1: He couldn't let the man get away. He couldn't risk
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Speaker 1: his wife or mother in law getting injured, so he
4:58
Speaker 1: fought back. And then the man thrust the knife down
5:02
Speaker 1: and George fended off the first blow, but subsequent blows
5:06
Speaker 1: came too fast. The man was too powerful, too determined.
5:10
Speaker 1: He plunged the knife down into George's chest. George felt
5:13
Speaker 1: the blade pierce his skin and go deep inside his body.
5:17
Speaker 1: The man pulled the bloody blade out and stabbed George
5:20
Speaker 1: a second time, then a third. George was yelling again.
5:23
Speaker 1: This time it wasn't a mantra, just shrieks of pain,
5:26
Speaker 1: pain caused, not just by a sharp knife in the chest,
5:29
Speaker 1: but by the realization that the end of the line
5:31
Speaker 1: was here and he had not planned for it to
5:34
Speaker 1: happen like this. George Harrison felt it coming on another headache.
5:44
Speaker 1: It was right in between his eyes. Sinea Cross Firm
5:48
Speaker 1: at Twickenham Studios in London, right in front of his eyes,
5:51
Speaker 1: was the cause of the pain. The other Beatles well, okay,
5:56
Speaker 1: if George was being completely honest, the problem was Paul
6:00
Speaker 1: only Paul. Sure John made it a habit to dismiss
6:03
Speaker 1: George's songs, but right now he was tuning the fuck
6:07
Speaker 1: out and nodding the fuck off and Ringo, well, Ringo
6:10
Speaker 1: was ringo. Georgia didn't have beef with Ringo. George's headache
6:14
Speaker 1: was all because of Paul. He was a dictator. I'm
6:17
Speaker 1: kind of a dick holier than now, as if George
6:20
Speaker 1: wasn't a fucking beatle too. By nineteen sixty nine, it
6:26
Speaker 1: was clear that George wasn't just a sideman for the
6:28
Speaker 1: esteemed songwriting duo of Lennon and McCartney. He was the
6:32
Speaker 1: beadle who enriched the band culturally with Indian ragas, with
6:35
Speaker 1: sitars and tablers and exotic sounds that went within and
6:38
Speaker 1: without you. He was the most generous member of the band,
6:42
Speaker 1: the lead guitarist to let Paul play the guitar solo
6:45
Speaker 1: on his song Taxman. He even tossed the solo on
6:49
Speaker 1: one of his greatest songs, while my Guitar gently weeps
6:52
Speaker 1: to Eric Clapton, and Eric wasn't even in the band.
6:56
Speaker 1: But also by nineteen sixty nine, George wandered a larger role.
7:00
Speaker 1: He wanted to write more, more than the obligatory one
7:04
Speaker 1: or two songs per record. He wanted to be as
7:06
Speaker 1: respected as John and Paul when he came to writing songs.
7:10
Speaker 1: George had long played the role of the quiet you know,
7:13
Speaker 1: largely because Paul and John kept him quiet. And right
7:17
Speaker 1: now at Twickenham, if being stonewalled on the songwriting front
7:21
Speaker 1: wasn't enough to bear, George, the Beatles lead guitarist, was
7:25
Speaker 1: being told how to play guitar by the fucking bass player.
7:31
Speaker 1: I'll play whatever you want me to play, George told
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Speaker 1: Paul or I won't play at all. Whatever it is
7:36
Speaker 1: it'll please you, I'll do it. But George didn't really
7:41
Speaker 1: mean it. George just wanted a bail fuck playing whatever
7:44
Speaker 1: Paul wanted him to play. It wasn't fun anymore. The
7:48
Speaker 1: Beatles weren't fun anymore.
7:50
Speaker 2: What a pity.
7:52
Speaker 1: The Beatles gave George a headache, so he walked out
7:55
Speaker 1: of Twickenham, went home to his bungalow and esher and
7:57
Speaker 1: wrote Wah Wah, which is not song about a guitar pedal.
8:01
Speaker 1: It's a song about making the decision to leave the Beatles.
8:05
Speaker 1: George hung in there for most of nineteen sixty nine
8:09
Speaker 1: until it became unbearable, and once the Beatles did throw
8:12
Speaker 1: in the towel, George wasted no time. In fact, he
8:16
Speaker 1: made up for lost time his nineteen seventy one triple
8:23
Speaker 1: album All Things Must Pass, technically, his third solo album
8:26
Speaker 1: following two experimental releases, was a fully realized artistic statement
8:31
Speaker 1: about the temporality of life. Songs like My Sweet Lord
8:35
Speaker 1: and What Is Life were pop mantras all about change
8:38
Speaker 1: and transcendence. George Harrison had shed the Beatles and revealed
8:42
Speaker 1: the real George Harrison, a songwriter who could go toe
8:46
Speaker 1: to toe with his contemporaries and was just as prolific.
8:50
Speaker 1: Even better, George finally eclipsed his former bandmates. He stole their.
8:55
Speaker 2: Spotlight for a change.
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Speaker 1: All Things Must Pass spent eight weeks at the top
9:00
Speaker 1: of the UK charts in seven.
9:03
Speaker 2: Weeks at number one in the United States.
9:05
Speaker 1: This all despite the fact that the record talked about
9:09
Speaker 1: God more than rock music was usually comfortable with, and
9:12
Speaker 1: did so across an expensive three LP set. But it
9:16
Speaker 1: sold man It sold better than Ram Paul's solo album
9:20
Speaker 1: from that same year, or sold better than John's Plastic
9:23
Speaker 1: Ono Band and Imagine, both of which happened to be
9:26
Speaker 1: produced by Phil Spector, the gonzo record producer who also
9:29
Speaker 1: brought his Wall of sound aesthetic to All Things Must Pass.
9:33
Speaker 1: The cherry on top that was having one of the
9:35
Speaker 1: album's songs at number one on the Singles chart at
9:38
Speaker 1: the same time the album was.
9:40
Speaker 2: At number one.
9:41
Speaker 1: No Beetle had held the top spot of both charts simultaneously,
9:46
Speaker 1: and no other Beadle would for two more years. Where
9:50
Speaker 1: once he felt underappreciated and underprepared, George was now feeling ready.
9:55
Speaker 1: He was becoming the artist he always wanted to be.
9:58
Speaker 1: He was on the right path to artistic freedom, to enlightenment.
10:02
Speaker 1: But when the time came, he would be ready to
10:04
Speaker 1: leave his own legacy behind one that identified George as George,
10:08
Speaker 1: not as the guy gave up and did what someone
10:10
Speaker 1: else told him to do. The brass poker made a
10:19
Speaker 1: dull thud as it hit the back of the head
10:20
Speaker 1: of the man with the scraggly blonde hair. The man
10:23
Speaker 1: fell to the floor next to where George was gasping
10:26
Speaker 1: for air. George tasted blood in his mouth, and every
10:29
Speaker 1: time he took a breath, his chest hurt like hell.
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Speaker 1: Blood on his pajamas, blood on the floor. He pressed
10:36
Speaker 1: his hands to his chest and felt the holes where.
10:38
Speaker 2: The knife had gone through.
10:40
Speaker 1: He looked up and saw his wife, Olivia standing above him,
10:43
Speaker 1: holding a brass poker from the fireplace. The end of
10:46
Speaker 1: the poker was bloody. Her stance was heroic, but the
10:49
Speaker 1: look on her face was absolute terror. George felt he
10:54
Speaker 1: was dying at fifty six years old. He began to
10:58
Speaker 1: repeat the Harry krish Namantra silently in his head, the
11:02
Speaker 1: very same one he'd first heard from his divine grace,
11:04
Speaker 1: Swami Prahubada thirty years ago. The mantra gave him purpose, clarity, power.
11:10
Speaker 1: He repeated the words in his head and thought of
11:12
Speaker 1: the Yogic paths to enlighten it, but his strength was weak.
11:17
Speaker 1: Couldn't say the mantra out loud in order to feel
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Speaker 1: its positive vibration, and thus it couldn't reach his heart
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Speaker 1: and soul. All it sounded like to him was a
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Speaker 1: broken record in his head, a needle skipping on a
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Speaker 1: worn out groove. This wasn't the way he wanted to
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Speaker 1: leave his body behind, and that thought terrified him. He
11:37
Speaker 1: had knots left to unravel, a mind to clear, karma
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Speaker 1: to burn, And as he watched the man with the
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Speaker 1: bloodied blonde hair slowly climb back to his feet and
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Speaker 1: chase Olivia into the next room, George had his mind
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Speaker 1: set on one thing he had to do before anything else.
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Speaker 1: He had to save his wife before she was killed
11:56
Speaker 1: by a madman. The place was a fixer rubber That
12:24
Speaker 1: was the understatement of the decade. In nineteen seventy, the
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Speaker 1: sprawling Friar Park had fallen into disrepair. The half Victorian Gothic,
12:34
Speaker 1: half French chateau estate had been neglected for years. With
12:38
Speaker 1: its grottoes, tunnels, caves, sandstone replica of matterhorn, an assortment
12:43
Speaker 1: of impish garden gnomes. The place had once been one
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Speaker 1: of the most extraordinary in all of England, but all
12:50
Speaker 1: things must pass. Its thirty five acres of gardens were
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Speaker 1: fading away, Its extensive system of small lakes and waterways
12:59
Speaker 1: were drying up. Henley on Thames, the small town in
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Speaker 1: Oxfordshire where Friar Park had stood since its construction in
13:07
Speaker 1: eighteen eighty nine, slated the property for demolition. However, Friar
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Speaker 1: Park presented the right challenge to the right person. A
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Speaker 1: person with money and time on his hands. George Harrison,
13:20
Speaker 1: newly liberated from the biggest band on the planet, had
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Speaker 1: both of those things. He bought the place in nineteen seventy,
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Speaker 1: settled in Derek Taylor, the Beadles press officer called it
13:32
Speaker 1: a dream on a hill. George invested millions over the
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Speaker 1: years to make the dream a reality. He planted trees,
13:39
Speaker 1: brought the gardens and waterways back to life. He even
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Speaker 1: installed the state of the art recording studio inside the
13:45
Speaker 1: one hundred and twenty room mansion, which officially served as
13:49
Speaker 1: the headquarters of his new record label, Dark Horse. The
13:54
Speaker 1: decision to retreat further into the country had been sealed
13:58
Speaker 1: the year before. In March nineteen sixty nine, Sergeant Norman
14:02
Speaker 1: Pilcher and his notorious London drug squad paid a visit
14:06
Speaker 1: to George's home in Esher. George was arrested for some
14:10
Speaker 1: hash hidden inside one of his shoes on the day
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Speaker 1: of Paul's wedding. No less, George fumed the cops were dirty.
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Speaker 1: They'd been setting up rock stars left and right with
14:21
Speaker 1: similar trumped up charges. Did George take drugs obviously? Did
14:25
Speaker 1: he keep drugs in his shoes? George famously said at
14:28
Speaker 1: the time, I'm a tidy person. I keep my socks
14:31
Speaker 1: in my sock drawer, in my stash in the stash box.
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Speaker 1: It's not mine. Didn't matter. The drug squad hauled George outside,
14:39
Speaker 1: where a photographer for a local newspaper sprung from the bushes,
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Speaker 1: camera flashing. George took a swing and told the paparazzo
14:47
Speaker 1: to beat it or he'd get a beat down. The
14:49
Speaker 1: dude dropped his camera in fear and ran.
14:52
Speaker 2: George managed to smash.
14:54
Speaker 1: It to pieces with his beetle boot before he was
14:56
Speaker 1: hauled off to jail. He pled guilty to unlawful possession,
15:00
Speaker 1: paid his two hundred and.
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Speaker 2: Fifty pounds fine.
15:05
Speaker 1: At Friar Park. George didn't fear being under the microscope
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Speaker 1: of the London drug squad, but that didn't mean that
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Speaker 1: he was no longer afraid. Since the height of Beatlemania,
15:15
Speaker 1: George had regularly feared for his life, the hordes of
15:18
Speaker 1: screaming fans, the crush of an infatuated crowd. It was
15:22
Speaker 1: like he was constantly being chased by people in a
15:25
Speaker 1: violent trance. What would the fans have done if they
15:28
Speaker 1: had actually caught up to them? Years before the Beatles
15:31
Speaker 1: called it quits, George was already asking himself, what is life?
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Speaker 1: Is this? It? Does this make me feel happy? Will
15:38
Speaker 1: this get me to where I want to go?
15:40
Speaker 2: Am I safe?
15:44
Speaker 1: The fear hit a fever pitch in December nineteen eighty
15:47
Speaker 1: when John Lennon was gunned down outside his apartment at
15:50
Speaker 1: the Dakota in New York City. That was enough to
15:53
Speaker 1: make every Beetle paranoid. George dumped another million pounds into
15:57
Speaker 1: Friar Park, but this time it wasn't to make the
16:00
Speaker 1: garden's green. This time it was to install razor wire cameras,
16:05
Speaker 1: alarms guard dogs. Historically, the tolkienesque grounds of Friar Park
16:11
Speaker 1: were open to the public.
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Speaker 2: No more.
16:13
Speaker 1: The gates were locked. George Harrison was no longer expecting
16:17
Speaker 1: anyone uninvited to visit cracker Box Palace. But just because
16:21
Speaker 1: he wasn't expecting anyone didn't mean that they wouldn't seek
16:24
Speaker 1: him out. Over the years, George and his wife Olivia
16:29
Speaker 1: received numerous death threats in the mail. Crazed fans attempted
16:33
Speaker 1: to scale the estate walls and break in, and the
16:36
Speaker 1: FBI even managed to foil the plants of an American
16:39
Speaker 1: who intended to burn Friar Park to the ground. While George, Olivia,
16:42
Speaker 1: and their son were at home, and as the sentry
16:45
Speaker 1: wound down, George's existential fear ramped up. He'd found a
16:49
Speaker 1: lump in his neck cancer. The doctors found more in
16:54
Speaker 1: his law. A few operations and radiation treatments later, and
16:58
Speaker 1: George was feeling better. The cancer was in remission. George
17:02
Speaker 1: had found solace in meditation. He focused on his mantra.
17:07
Speaker 1: Mantras made you feel good. Repeating the words out loud,
17:11
Speaker 1: over and over again was a bomb. So the more
17:14
Speaker 1: George used repetition, the better he felt. He became focused, aware, strong, unafraid.
17:21
Speaker 1: He went to sleep before midnight on the evening of
17:23
Speaker 1: December thirtieth, nineteen ninety nine. Tomorrow will be a new day,
17:28
Speaker 1: and soon he would chant in the name of the
17:30
Speaker 1: Lord to welcome a brand new century. Just hours later,
17:37
Speaker 1: shortly before the sun rose on the morning of New
17:39
Speaker 1: Year's Eve, Michael Abram climbed through the shattered window of
17:42
Speaker 1: George Harrison's Friar Park mansion. He'd broken it with the
17:46
Speaker 1: stone sword that he'd been able to rip off of
17:48
Speaker 1: the statue.
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Speaker 2: Outside.
17:50
Speaker 1: The statue was a depiction of Saint George slaying the dragon.
17:54
Speaker 1: Abram thought it fitting, seeing as he was on a
17:56
Speaker 1: mission to do a little slaying of his own. He
17:59
Speaker 1: also thought it humorous because the George on the inside
18:02
Speaker 1: of this house he was no saint, despite what the
18:05
Speaker 1: world said to the contrary. Abram brushed his scraggly blonde
18:10
Speaker 1: hair away from his eyes with the blade of the
18:12
Speaker 1: knife he held in his other hand. A lit cigarette
18:15
Speaker 1: burned between his lips. He scanned the room. It was dark,
18:19
Speaker 1: but he could tell he was in the kitchen. He
18:21
Speaker 1: listened for voices, but the voices inside his own head
18:24
Speaker 1: were making it difficult. They wouldn't shut up. Sometimes he
18:28
Speaker 1: would drown the voices out with his Walkman, the volume
18:31
Speaker 1: cranked up all the way to ten. Oasis cassettes were
18:34
Speaker 1: the best. They were mastered for maximum sonic impact, and
18:38
Speaker 1: Oasis was the best period That song Wonderwall. Abram believed
18:42
Speaker 1: that the Gallagher brothers had written that song about the
18:45
Speaker 1: walls of his flat. People complained that Oasis just ripped
18:48
Speaker 1: off the Beatles, but Abram knew better. Oasis were better
18:52
Speaker 1: than the Beatles. Abram used to listen to the Beatles,
18:55
Speaker 1: and that was before the voices escalated in his head
18:57
Speaker 1: and showed him the light and inner light. Perhaps the Beatles, well,
19:01
Speaker 1: they were just pure evil. All you need is love,
19:04
Speaker 1: patently untrue. That was just a manufactured sentiment to shroud
19:08
Speaker 1: one of their spells. Because the Beatles were actually witches.
19:14
Speaker 1: They traveled on brooms. They had spoken in mantras ever
19:17
Speaker 1: since their return from Rishikesh, and Abram knew that mantras
19:21
Speaker 1: like Hari Krishno were really the Devil's tom. Of course,
19:26
Speaker 1: none of this was actually true, but Abram believed it was.
19:29
Speaker 1: His belief was unwavering. He was in the middle of
19:32
Speaker 1: a full blown psychotic episode from which there was no escape.
19:35
Speaker 1: He didn't know why he believed the things he did.
19:37
Speaker 1: The voice is told in these things, and he took
19:39
Speaker 1: them as gospel things like George Harrison was the most
19:44
Speaker 1: evil beetle of all, that he was the cause of
19:47
Speaker 1: the voices in Abram's head, that Georgia cast a spell,
19:50
Speaker 1: taken possession of Abram's mind and tortured him from three
19:53
Speaker 1: hundred kilometers away from Oxfordshire to Liverpool, where Abram called home.
19:57
Speaker 1: Abram believed it wasn't a coincidence that he lived in
19:59
Speaker 1: the city where the Beatles had famously got their start,
20:02
Speaker 1: and the voices further told him that the only way
20:05
Speaker 1: that he could break that spell and thus to be
20:07
Speaker 1: free of the voices in his head, was to find
20:10
Speaker 1: George Harrison and kill him. Now enveloped within the darkness
20:17
Speaker 1: of Friar Park, Abram was surprised that an alarm had
20:21
Speaker 1: yet to sound, or that he had been able to
20:23
Speaker 1: make it over the exterior fence of the estate unseen.
20:26
Speaker 1: All that money spent on security wasted, and where were
20:30
Speaker 1: the guard dogs that had supposedly started their watch nineteen
20:33
Speaker 1: years ago. Old senile probably buried on the grounds among
20:37
Speaker 1: the garden gnomes. George Harrison, on the other hand, despite
20:41
Speaker 1: all the threats and the fears, and the recent treatments
20:43
Speaker 1: for cancer. He was very much alive, and he was
20:47
Speaker 1: somewhere inside this enormous house, maybe behind that locked door.
20:52
Speaker 1: Abram slowly made his way through the kitchen into the
20:55
Speaker 1: main hallway, the stone sword in one hand and his
20:58
Speaker 1: knife in the other. He heard noises coming from upstairs, footsteps.
21:03
Speaker 1: They were getting closer and louder. Abram approached a set
21:07
Speaker 1: of stairs.
21:07
Speaker 2: It led up to the.
21:08
Speaker 1: Gallery overlooking the main floor. He braced himself for a
21:11
Speaker 1: beatle to come shooting out into the open, riding a
21:14
Speaker 1: wooden broom with a long flowing cape, transfiguring spells at
21:17
Speaker 1: the ready, and then from out of the shadows, he
21:20
Speaker 1: appeared at the top of the stairs, George Harrison.
21:26
Speaker 2: He had no broom, no cape.
21:28
Speaker 1: He was unarmed, He appeared unafraid, and he was reciting
21:32
Speaker 1: unspeakable incantations of evil. And the louder George spoke, the
21:36
Speaker 1: more it's steadied, Abrams resolve. It was sorcery, all of it.
21:41
Speaker 1: There was no turning back. This was the moment, here
21:44
Speaker 1: in the darkness. It wouldn't last all day. George Harrison
21:49
Speaker 1: had better be prepared to die. We'll be right back
21:57
Speaker 1: after this word word word. The Hell's Angels had taken
22:07
Speaker 1: over three Savo Row and they were loud, rude, drunk,
22:11
Speaker 1: They smelled like shit, and they were everywhere. They had
22:15
Speaker 1: muscled their way past Jimmy the doorman. Now they're making
22:19
Speaker 1: a racket inside the offices of Apple Core. Their black
22:22
Speaker 1: leather MC jackets and unruly, windswept hair were a sharp
22:26
Speaker 1: contrast to the clean green carpets and white walls. It
22:30
Speaker 1: was nineteen sixty eight Christmas party at the swinging headquarters
22:34
Speaker 1: of the Beatles' burgeoning media company. But the dozen or
22:37
Speaker 1: so angels who had crashed the party were fucking up
22:40
Speaker 1: the peace and love vibe. They exuded, not goodwill towards
22:44
Speaker 1: their fellow man, but menace, intimidation, terror. Two angels from
22:50
Speaker 1: the San Francisco chapter, Tumbleweed and Frisco Pete, were wasted
22:54
Speaker 1: on Scotch and cokes, and now they wanted food, and
22:57
Speaker 1: they could smell the turkey in the kitchen, all forty
23:00
Speaker 1: three pounds of it. They were Apple's guests and they
23:03
Speaker 1: wanted to eat now. John and Yoko, festively dressed as
23:08
Speaker 1: Sanna and Missus Klaus, tried to calm the bikers down,
23:12
Speaker 1: but even a woody bloke like John was no match.
23:15
Speaker 1: Chrisco Pete looked John dead in the eye and said,
23:17
Speaker 1: without a hint of humor.
23:19
Speaker 2: What the fuck is going on in this place? We
23:21
Speaker 2: want to eat.
23:22
Speaker 1: Neil Astminhall and Peter Brown tried to subdue them. They
23:26
Speaker 1: managed people for a living, after all, and they've gotten
23:28
Speaker 1: the Beatles out of many a dicey scrap in the past.
23:31
Speaker 1: And the Angels could give two fucks. They weren't listening.
23:34
Speaker 1: There was only one person they'd listened to, and that
23:37
Speaker 1: was George. George Harrison was the one who had extended
23:45
Speaker 1: and opened invitation to the Hell's Angels in the first place.
23:48
Speaker 1: The hippies and the hate seen beyond burnout to George
23:51
Speaker 1: when he paid a visit to San Francisco back in
23:53
Speaker 1: the summer, but the Angels were all right in his eyes.
23:57
Speaker 1: He even sent a memo to Apple staffers ahead of
23:59
Speaker 1: the MC's visit, which Warren quote, there will be twelve
24:02
Speaker 1: in number, complete with black leather jackets and motorcycles. They
24:05
Speaker 1: may look as if they're going to do you in,
24:08
Speaker 1: but are very straight and do good things, so don't
24:10
Speaker 1: fear them or uptight them. Try to assist them without
24:14
Speaker 1: neglecting your apple business and without letting them take control
24:17
Speaker 1: of Savile Row. It was easier said than done.
24:21
Speaker 2: The situation was officially out of control.
24:24
Speaker 1: George Harrison was a Pisces, the zodiac sign with the fish.
24:29
Speaker 1: You know, one fish goes one way or the other
24:30
Speaker 1: fish goes the other way, And George is saying, so
24:33
Speaker 1: what do you offered me? It was duality right. It
24:35
Speaker 1: would explain George's dual fascinations with quiet ukuleles and loud
24:39
Speaker 1: Formula one race cars, or why in one moment he'd
24:42
Speaker 1: be practicing transcendental meditation and the next he'd indulge in
24:45
Speaker 1: a Savoy truffle sized line of cocaine. And it would
24:49
Speaker 1: also explain why he saw only the best in people,
24:52
Speaker 1: even a group as polarizing as the Hell's Angels, because
24:56
Speaker 1: on some days George himself acted like a Hell's Angel,
25:00
Speaker 1: on other days he was the guy who uninvited the
25:02
Speaker 1: Hell's Angels from the party. George arrived at Savile Row
25:06
Speaker 1: as the bikers were tearing the Christmas turkey apart and
25:09
Speaker 1: continuing to harass anyone.
25:10
Speaker 2: Who dared get in their way.
25:13
Speaker 1: George was quiet, as was his reputation, and although he
25:16
Speaker 1: spoke softly, the bikers listened up, yin and yang. George said,
25:21
Speaker 1: heads and tails, yes, and no one moment you hear
25:24
Speaker 1: the next moment you're not. Tumbleweed and Frisco Pete weren't following.
25:29
Speaker 1: George cut to the chase. You know, bug her off.
25:33
Speaker 1: The angels got on their bikes and left. Michael Abram
25:41
Speaker 1: was no angel. He wasn't going anywhere, and no amount
25:45
Speaker 1: of screaming from George or Olivia Harrison was going to
25:48
Speaker 1: change his mind. After Olivia had gone full Sammy Sosa
25:51
Speaker 1: on his head with the brass poker, Abram rebounded and
25:55
Speaker 1: chased her into a meditation room nearby. Olivia stumbled, grabbed
26:00
Speaker 1: her by the neck, both hands grasped tight. He squeezed
26:04
Speaker 1: her throat tight. He hadn't intended to kill anyone else,
26:07
Speaker 1: but so helping the fucking god. If the she devil
26:09
Speaker 1: was going to stand in his way, he would do
26:11
Speaker 1: what he believed he had to do. The voices in
26:15
Speaker 1: his head were getting louder, now elongated bowels, hard consonants.
26:19
Speaker 1: They weren't speaking the King's English. They wouldn't stop, so
26:23
Speaker 1: he kept going. He kept his grip tighter. Olivia struggled
26:26
Speaker 1: to breathe. She dug her hands at Abram's face, and
26:30
Speaker 1: George managed to get off the ground and was also
26:32
Speaker 1: struggling to breathe. Every time he exhaled, he felt more
26:35
Speaker 1: blood empty into his mouth. He stumbled into the meditation area,
26:39
Speaker 1: the wounds and his chest bleeding, his legs nearly.
26:41
Speaker 2: Giving out on him.
26:42
Speaker 1: He reached out and grabbed Abram and struggled to pull
26:45
Speaker 1: him off Olivia. The three of them fell to the floor.
26:48
Speaker 1: George and Abram wrestled on the ground. George felt the
26:51
Speaker 1: energy draining from his body. Even in his weak state.
26:54
Speaker 1: The fact that the attack was happening on that particular
26:57
Speaker 1: day was not lost on him. It was all too mutch.
27:06
Speaker 1: Just one week prior, a zealous fan had broken into
27:09
Speaker 1: George's house, not this house at Friar Park, but another
27:13
Speaker 1: house George owned and Maui along the Hannah Highway on
27:16
Speaker 1: a bluff overlooking the Pacific. Local police found an intruder
27:20
Speaker 1: in the kitchen after they've been ticked off by neighbors.
27:24
Speaker 1: She was eating a frozen pizza and drinking root beer.
27:27
Speaker 1: Turns out she'd been stalking George for months. Georgie had
27:30
Speaker 1: been so thankful that they were not in Maui when
27:32
Speaker 1: had happened, and he knew he dodged a bullet, maybe
27:35
Speaker 1: even an actual bullet.
27:37
Speaker 2: Hear me, Lord, thank you Lord. Now.
27:42
Speaker 1: One week later, at Friar Park, George felt like he
27:46
Speaker 1: had no voice to ask for help or give banks.
27:49
Speaker 1: He did wonder if being a pisce he's had something
27:51
Speaker 1: to do with it. One week he was safe, the
27:54
Speaker 1: next week he was in mortal danger. He used every
27:57
Speaker 1: last bit of strength to keep abrahmat where the two
28:00
Speaker 1: of them were tossing around on the floor. Olivia stood
28:03
Speaker 1: up and grabbed a table lamp that was nearby. She
28:06
Speaker 1: swung it at Abram's head.
28:07
Speaker 2: It missed.
28:08
Speaker 1: She swung it again another miss. Abram reached out and
28:11
Speaker 1: grabbed the lamp's cord. He pulled hard. The force yanked
28:14
Speaker 1: Olivia towards him. She pulled back, but it did little
28:17
Speaker 1: to move Abram. Abram pulled again, like he was reeling
28:19
Speaker 1: in a big fish from a little pond. Olivia felt
28:22
Speaker 1: she was losing ground. Suddenly, there was more commotion downstairs.
28:26
Speaker 1: The sound of the front door being ripped open. More
28:29
Speaker 1: voices beams of light shot out into the darkness. Police
28:34
Speaker 1: Olivia remembered she had phoned both the police and some
28:36
Speaker 1: of the Friar Park's staff when George had initially gone
28:39
Speaker 1: downstairs to investigate the sound of breaking glass that had
28:42
Speaker 1: woken them up. She threw the lamp at Abram's head
28:44
Speaker 1: and ran out to the stairs to get their attention.
28:47
Speaker 1: The cops beelined to the meditation room, pounced, subdued Abram,
28:51
Speaker 1: and stopped the attack. George had lost a lot of
28:55
Speaker 1: blood by the time the authorities brought the melee to
28:58
Speaker 1: an end. Michael Abe was put in handcuffs and led
29:01
Speaker 1: away as the first rays of the sun struggled to
29:04
Speaker 1: peek out over the horizon. The medics took George's vitals.
29:08
Speaker 1: They tended to the numerous knife wounds on his chest.
29:11
Speaker 1: They placed him on a stretcher. One of his lungs
29:13
Speaker 1: had collapsed, Abram's knife had narrowly missed his heart. He
29:17
Speaker 1: needed to get to a hospital immediately.
29:20
Speaker 2: George knew that.
29:21
Speaker 1: The next few minutes and hours were incredibly important. Anything
29:24
Speaker 1: could happen. All things do pass, it's just a matter
29:28
Speaker 1: of when they pass. He needed to focus his mind
29:32
Speaker 1: and prepare for the day that he did leave the
29:34
Speaker 1: physical realm, whether that day was tomorrow or ten years
29:37
Speaker 1: down the road. That's the art of dying, to consciously
29:41
Speaker 1: leave one's body at death. No reincarnation meant that there
29:45
Speaker 1: was no loose ends to take care of, no knots
29:48
Speaker 1: to unravel. The liberation of the soul. The first thing
29:52
Speaker 1: George had to do was not lose his wits or
29:55
Speaker 1: his sense of humor. As he was carried out to
29:58
Speaker 1: the ambulance, George passed a new staff member who had
30:01
Speaker 1: only been at the estate for a few days. So
30:06
Speaker 1: George asked, without missing a beat, how are you liking
30:09
Speaker 1: the new job so far? Some things you just couldn't
30:29
Speaker 1: plan for. Some things just happened. Maybe you willed them
30:34
Speaker 1: into existence, but planning was out of the question. You
30:37
Speaker 1: just went with the flow. George Harrison was at a
30:41
Speaker 1: dinner in Los Angeles with Roy Orbison and Jeff Lynn
30:44
Speaker 1: when the unplanned happened. It was nineteen eighty eight. Jeff
30:51
Speaker 1: Lynn was cool. Sure. His band Elo were obviously indebted
30:55
Speaker 1: to the Beatles, and he had even produced George's latest
30:57
Speaker 1: solo album, Cloud Nine, but Roy Orbison was cool on
31:02
Speaker 1: another level. The voice, the big Oh. He was a legend.
31:06
Speaker 1: He was what the Beatles aspired to be when they
31:08
Speaker 1: were banging around clubs in Hamburg almost thirty years earlier.
31:13
Speaker 1: George realized that a massive opportunity was sitting across the
31:17
Speaker 1: table from him. He asked Roy and Jeff if they
31:20
Speaker 1: wanted to head into the studio the next day to
31:22
Speaker 1: sing on a song George was working on accelerate through
31:25
Speaker 1: the curve, just like the best F one drivers, or
31:27
Speaker 1: rather through life's curves. George figured in that moment, when's
31:32
Speaker 1: the next time he was going to be having dinner
31:34
Speaker 1: with Roy Orbison. Roy smiled behind his trademark dark sunglasses.
31:40
Speaker 2: Sure he would.
31:42
Speaker 1: So George rang up Bob Dylan because Bob was in
31:45
Speaker 1: town and he'd come and clutch when it came to
31:46
Speaker 1: sniffing out a studio to record him. George and Bob
31:50
Speaker 1: went way back back to even before Bob agreed to
31:52
Speaker 1: appear in the concert for Bangladesh that George organized in
31:55
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy one, the first of its kind, a star
31:59
Speaker 1: studded bee fit to raise money.
32:01
Speaker 2: To help refugees.
32:03
Speaker 1: Speaking of refugees, Georgia left his guitar at Tom Petty's house,
32:06
Speaker 1: so he had to stop and pick it up on
32:08
Speaker 1: the way to the studio. It wouldn't be polite to
32:10
Speaker 1: not invite Tom along, seeing as he was tight with Bob,
32:13
Speaker 1: having backed him up on that True Confessions tour just
32:16
Speaker 1: a few years prior, and just like George and Bob
32:18
Speaker 1: and Jeff, Tom would do anything to record with the
32:21
Speaker 1: Great Roy Orgison. Within a matter of hours, the least
32:25
Speaker 1: expected supergroup of the nineteen eighties had been formed. And
32:29
Speaker 1: after a few weeks of collectively strumming acoustic guitars and
32:32
Speaker 1: writing new songs during the day, and then singing those
32:34
Speaker 1: songs around the same microphone together each evening, the Traveling
32:38
Speaker 1: Wilbury's had an album. The Traveling Wilbury's Volume One was
32:43
Speaker 1: released in October of nineteen eighty eight. It unexpectedly put
32:47
Speaker 1: classic rock icons on the pop charts. It even made
32:50
Speaker 1: Roy Orbison seem cool to gen xers. Roy got to
32:53
Speaker 1: see the album go platinum before he died not even
32:57
Speaker 1: two months later, at the age of fifty two. George
33:01
Speaker 1: hadn't planned for that to happen either, for Roy to
33:04
Speaker 1: be gone so soon after they had become so close.
33:08
Speaker 1: Was Roy ready to die? Had he properly prepared to
33:11
Speaker 1: leave his body behind? George could only hope only Roy
33:15
Speaker 1: knew the answer. After Roy's death, the rest of the
33:19
Speaker 1: Wilbury shot the music video for the single End of
33:22
Speaker 1: the Line. In it, the band sits in a train
33:25
Speaker 1: car in trades versus. When it comes time for Roy's verse,
33:29
Speaker 1: the spotlight is on a solitary guitar rocking in a
33:32
Speaker 1: rocking chair. The band thought it was the perfect tribute.
33:36
Speaker 1: Roy's body was gone, but his voice carried on well.
33:40
Speaker 1: George thought it is all right. He'd meet Roy at
33:44
Speaker 1: the end of the line. But George wasn't quite ready
33:47
Speaker 1: for the journey to end just yet. Even more than
33:50
Speaker 1: a decade after Roy's death in the year two thousand,
33:54
Speaker 1: George didn't want the ride to be over. He had
33:56
Speaker 1: gardens to tend to, tunnels and caves left un cover,
34:00
Speaker 1: and the great expanse of his thirty five acre estate.
34:03
Speaker 1: Restoring the grounds at Friar Park was a major undertaking
34:07
Speaker 1: that required both time and patience. He was the estate
34:11
Speaker 1: steward now and he had to get it ready for
34:13
Speaker 1: the next century. Like its original owner, Sir Francis Crisp
34:16
Speaker 1: had done one hundred years ago, and just like Sir
34:19
Speaker 1: Francis Crisp or Sir Frankie Crisp, as George immortalized him
34:23
Speaker 1: in song on All Things Must Pass, George would never
34:26
Speaker 1: see the fruits of his many labors. The saplings he planted,
34:31
Speaker 1: He would never see them mature into full grown trees.
34:33
Speaker 1: He really wanted to see them, but take so long.
34:38
Speaker 1: And George also knew that he had no control over
34:40
Speaker 1: when or how he would reach the end of the line.
34:42
Speaker 1: The attack that he had suffered at the hands of
34:44
Speaker 1: Michael Abram made that crystal clear, so he cleared his mind.
34:50
Speaker 1: He focused on what he'd been able to accomplish in
34:52
Speaker 1: the gardens at Friar Park, not the parts he'd yet
34:55
Speaker 1: to get to.
34:56
Speaker 2: He didn't look back.
34:57
Speaker 1: In anger at the final days of the Beatles and
34:59
Speaker 1: the frustration he felt towards Paul in particular, he forgave
35:03
Speaker 1: Michael Abram for that night of absolute terror. Abram had
35:08
Speaker 1: been found not guilty by reason of insanity. It was
35:11
Speaker 1: being sent to his psychiatric hospital for further treatment. George
35:15
Speaker 1: hoped to get the help he so desperately needed. George
35:19
Speaker 1: didn't want to get to the end of the line.
35:21
Speaker 2: No one did.
35:23
Speaker 1: But when he did, if he was hit by a car,
35:25
Speaker 1: or fell down the stairs, or god forbid, that cancer
35:28
Speaker 1: came back, then he would be ready. From that moment on,
35:33
Speaker 1: there were no more surprises, not even when he died
35:37
Speaker 1: from lung cancer in November of two thousand and one
35:40
Speaker 1: and a Beverly Hills home owned by Paul McCartney, with
35:43
Speaker 1: family and Harry Krishna devotees by his bedside, chanting a
35:48
Speaker 1: beautifully orchestrated exit from this.
35:50
Speaker 2: World with grace.
35:57
Speaker 1: I'm Jake Brennan in this this Disgraceland. Disgraceland was created
36:33
Speaker 1: by Yours Truly and is produced in partnership with Double Elvis.
36:37
Speaker 1: Credits for this episode can be found on the show
36:39
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36:43
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37:22
Speaker 1: Rock a Roller, He the bed Don Man