George Harrison: "Let It Roll (Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp)" (1970)

All Things Must Pass is an odd album. Like George Harrison’s psychedelic contributions to the Beatles’ late albums, it makes such an effort to convince you how relaxed it is that it’s often not that relaxing to listen to – a meditation album build on walls of sound. For all their peaceful overtones, Harrison’s Hare Krishna chants don’t really feel that different from John Lennon’s Primal Scream experiments – both feel so determined to banish the past that it’s hard to stay in the moment, hard to stay truly mindful, in the way that seems so crucial to their respective solo debuts. In that sense, “Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp” feels anomalous precisely because it is so in keeping with everything All Things fails to do. From the moment it starts, you can’t help but feel that you’re at the epicentre of the spiritual architecture that hangs around the album, although what’s perhaps surprising is that it isn’t an ashram but the Victorian Gothic mansion that Harrison bought in the aftermath of the Beatles’ dissolution, and which was once owned by one Sir Francis Crisp, a nineteenth-century lawyer whose eccentric epigrams scrawled into the house’s walls formed the inspiration for several of Harrison’s subsequent songs. Martin Scorsese’s Living In The Material World made it clear how much Harrison loved and tended ths house and garden, which would become his studio shortly after All Things was released, and you can hear that in the song, along with how Crisp’s odd touches and flourishes nurtured and brought out Harrison’s wackier, more playful side as well. Drenched in one of Phil Spector’s most lyrical reverb landscapes, it’s probably the only song by an ex-Beatle about coming home that really sounds convincing, which makes it quite rare and strange, especially in the middle of such a convulsive, restless album.