*Dateline, Liverpool, 1962:
A local rock and roll band, The Beatles, has been signed to a record contract and will be produced by newcomer Mickie Most.*
How would music history be changed? What if the story had been:
*Dateline, Liverpool, 1962:
A local rock and roll band, Gerry and the Pacemakers, has been signed to a record contract and will be produced by George Martin. Martin is best know for producing classical and comedy records.*
I think Martin and the Beatles were more synthesis than anything else. As the Beatles started exploring what they could accomplish in the studio - and especially once they gave up the idea of creating music that could be replicated in concert - Martin was with them every step of the way, filling in gaps in their knowledge as well as helping them accomplish the technical feats that they wanted.
If the Beatles had ended up with a more staid, hit-minded producer, I don’t know that any of their Rubber Soul and post-RS albums would have pushed as far or been as effective. Not to say they wouldn’t have pushed, I just think they found a willing co-conspirator in Martin.
Convsersely, I don’t think Martin would have pushed a band into anything interesting if the band itself wasn’t interested in pushing those boundaries.
George Martin did, in fact, produce Gerry and the Pacemakers, as well as Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, Matt Munro and Cilla Black.
They all did well, but none of them became the Beatles.
I think that, if the Beatles had used Mickey Most in the beginning, they would eventually have left him for another producer, probably Martin.
It probably wouldn’t have made an appreciable difference in their early songs, but from Rubber Soul on, they would have insisted on doing something more advanced, and if Most wasn’t interested, they would have found someone who was. Lennon and McCartney had developed their own musical ideas at that point, and would have rebelled at the idea of churning out sound-alike hits (I saw one comment that the group wanted to keep doing different type songs, since they felt that if they did something well once, they needed to try something new).