Living in the Material World

Release type:What's this?
studio album
First released:
May 30 1973

Overview Edit

Living in the Material World is an album by George Harrison and was released in 1973. As a follow-up to 1970's greatly-received All Things Must Pass and his mammoth charity project, The Concert for Bangladesh, Living in the Material World was among the most highly anticipated releases of 1973.

Due to the enormity of the Bangla Desh experience (one that left Harrison exhausted and frustrated), he was not able to record a new album until the latter part of 1972, which he undertook alone – without Phil Spector – at The Beatles' Apple Recording Studios in London. Once again, Harrison engaged the aid of his musician friends, including Ringo Starr, Jim Keltner, Nicky Hopkins, Gary Wright and Klaus Voormann. The backing track for "Try Some, Buy Some" had been recorded with Phil Spector back in 1971 in Harrison's efforts to give Ronnie Spector a hit single. Liking the track, he decided to use the same music track for his own rendition. Orchestral arrangements for this track and the new recordings on the album were by John Barham.

Preceded by the uplifting acoustic number "Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth)" – Harrison's second U.S. #1 hit, Living in the Material World appeared in June 1973 to brisk initial sales, reaching #2 in the UK and spending five weeks atop the US charts (having knocked off Paul McCartney and Wings' Red Rose Speedway in the process). But the critical reaction was less euphoric than that which had greeted All Things Must Pass. More somber in tone, Living in the Material World was distinguished by Harrison's philosophical and religious ruminations - making it clear he was in distress with the state of the world and where it was headed. Subsequently, sales soon fell off, and the feeling was that Harrison had suddenly lost much of the enormous momentum he had going for him since The Beatles' 1970 break-up. In hindsight, most contemporary reviewers now consider Living in the Material World to be a very worthwhile Harrison album with many fine moments.

On September 26, 2006, Living in the Material World was reissued on CD and in a deluxe CD/DVD package by Capitol Records and EMI. The remastered album features two additional tracks, the B-side "Deep Blue" from the 1971 single "Bangla Desh" and "Miss O'Dell," the B-side for "Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth)."

The DVD rounds up rare performance footage of "Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth)" from Harrison's 1991 Japanese tour with Eric Clapton, behind-the-scenes film clips shot during the 1973 sessions for "Living in the Material World" and previously unreleased versions of "Miss O'Dell" and "Sue Me, Sue You Blues" set to archival film clips.

The Overview appearing in this section is attributed to Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_in_the_Material_World. Portions of this Overview may be available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, version 3.0 or any later version, available at: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/. Additional terms may apply. See Wikipedia Terms of Use for details.

This particular version Edit

Record label:
Catalog number:
0946 3 66899 2 0
Release dates:
  • Sep 26 2006

Genres

Classic Rock, Pop Rock, Singer-Songwriter. Vote on Genres

What do Amazon.com customers think?

4 stars greatly needed update, keep 'em coming
I pre-ordered this set, knowing that I was going to buy it regardless of the reviews that had not yet been posted. I got it locked in at $23.99, which was subsequently changed to $29.88 as of the day of this review. So there may be a lesson about the value of the pre-order, especially if you just know that you will indeed make the purchase.

Being a big George Harrison fan, and now knowing that all we can look forward to are the things that already exist, I was happy to see the expansion of his …
Written by Albert G. Smith Jr.
3 stars Not His Best, But Not Bad
None of George's work can compare to his All Things Must Pass or even his Cloud 9 album. This one is definetly still worth buying though! Anyone who has enjoyed his work in the Beatles and enjoy his Solo work are sure to enjoy this one. There are one or two weak songs, but overall a good piece of work. Give Me Love being one of my favorite songs of all time. Anyone who is a George fan should definetly buy this album! Anyone who doesn't have any of George's solo work definetly start with All Thin…
Written by Paul A. Littlefield

Track listing Edit

  • CD 1

    format:
    number:
    title:
    number name artist hh:mm:ss
    1
    Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth)
    3:36
    Play Buy track
    2
    Sue Me, Sue You Blues
    4:48
    Play Buy track
    3
    The Light That Has Lighted The World
    3:31
    Play Buy track
    4
    Don't Let Me Wait Too Long
    2:57
    Play Buy track
    5
    Who Can See it
    3:52
    Play Buy track
    6
    Living In The Material World
    5:31
    Play Buy track
    7
    The Lord Loves The One (That Loves The Lord)
    4:34
    Play Buy track
    8
    Be Here Now
    4:09
    Play Buy track
    9
    Try Some Buy Some
    4:08
    Play Buy track
    10
    The Day The Word Gets 'round
    2:53
    Play Buy track
    11
    That Is All
    3:43
    Play Buy track
    12
    Deep Blue (bonus track)
    3:47
    Play Buy track
    13
    Miss O'Dell (bonus track)
    2:33
    Play Buy track
  • CD 2

    format:
    number:
    title:
    number name artist hh:mm:ss
    1
    Give Me Love (in 5.1 and stereo) live in Japan during the 1991 tour
    ?:??
     
    2
    Miss O'Dell (Alternative Version)-DVD
    ?:??
     
    3
    Sue Me - Sue You Blues (Acoustic Demo Version)-DVD
    ?:??
     
    4
    Living In The Material World-DVD
    ?:??
     

Credits Edit

  1. composer

  2. other

    1. Gary Wright [keyboards]
    2. Jim Gordon [drums on 'Try Some Buy Some']
    3. Jim Keltner [drums]
    4. Nicky Hopkins [keyboards]
    5. Ringo Starr [drums]
  1. producer

    1. Phil Spector [co-producer on 'Try Some Buy Some']
  2. writer

Other versions Edit

Living in the Material World 11 tracks format: 1 x CD
release dates: May 30 1973 in United States
view details
Living in the Material World 13 tracks format: 1 x CD
release dates: Sep 26 2006 in United Kingdom
view details
Living in the Material World 11 tracks format: 1 x CD
record label: Emd/Capitol
release dates: Jan 28 1992
view details
Living in the Material World 13 tracks format: 1 x CD
catalog number: 0946 3 66899 2 0
release dates: Sep 26 2006
view details
Living in the Material World 18 tracks format: 2 x CD
release dates: Sep 25 2006
view details
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