John Lennon & Paul McCartney Talk Maharishi, Beach Boys on TV, May 68 (audio)

[Cam Mott]

I'm assuming Henry would have personally known Carl too, since he was with Brian on more sessions in 65-66 than the others, and I'm assuming even stronger that he would have known Bruce since Bruce was doing sessions on his own and playing with the same musicians Henry was working with in those studios. I don't know, but I wouldn't doubt Henry and Bruce may have even worked on the same session at some point.

Was The Association mentioned in your talks?

Didn't the whole group record vocals at Western before Columbia? How long was Lewy on staff?

The only mention of the Association was by Henry and he said one of the Association house-sat for them while they were in India in 1967.

Henry didn't say who it was but I believe there is a liner notes quote by Gary Alexander on the  “and then…along comes The Association” album saying he “doesn’t smoke, drink or eat meat and would like to travel to India to ‘study the mystic religious life there’.”  So maybe him?

I got the impression Henry was more of a freelancer, I don't think he was specifically employed by Western/United and was producing and engineering too, kind of like Bones Howe. He worked at Gold Star on some famous records, along with the other big studios, which is how I thought he and Bruce would have known each other if they did.

Jules/Gary Alexander actually did go to India in May 1967 or thereabouts, and ended up leaving the band until 1969, so perhaps it was him! I ask too because it sounds like Alexander may have followed Henry Lewy's lead with TM if that's what he traveled to India to do, but the other band members were more heavily involved in a non-TM spiritual/meditation group and philosophy at the time (1966) and have spoken about it, I just wondered if that had come up with Henry.

But the whole group and Lewy could have been very familiar with each other through Western or at least had the opportunity.

[guitarfool2002]

I have something very interesting on Henry in my digital archives, let me upload it and post it...

[guitarfool2002]

It may be a little hard to read, but this is clipped from the "United And Affiliates Newsletter" April 1967 issue, which was the internal company newsletter when Henry was working at Western/United/UA, and it describes the trip he and Nadine were taking to India.



EDIT: If you right-click on it and "view image", or just go to the link itself, you'll be able to enlarge and read it better.
http://i115.photobucket.com/albums/n295/guitarfool2002/henrylewynews_zps515d48de.jpg

[Cam Mott]

I don't want to read too much into it but it is interesting that this Lewy/meditation-centric article doesn't mention the MMY's name or mention "Transcendental".

[Cam Mott]

It may be a little hard to read, but this is clipped from the "United And Affiliates Newsletter" April 1967 issue, which was the internal company newsletter when Henry was working at Western/United/UA, and it describes the trip he and Nadine were taking to India.



EDIT: If you right-click on it and "view image", or just go to the link itself, you'll be able to enlarge and read it better.
http://i115.photobucket.com/albums/n295/guitarfool2002/henrylewynews_zps515d48de.jpg

The December 1965 issue of those newsletters shows Henry Lewy as one of "our engineering staff".

https://studioelectronics.biz/newsletters/65dec.pdf

Haven't looked at the earlier issues for his name.

[guitarfool2002]

Henry was on the UA staff for sure, as the newsletters show at least from 65-67 and the time he traveled to India.

I posted that both for the interest/relationship to the conversation, and to show exactly what Cam picked up on as well. The name "Maharishi" is not mentioned, nor is "TM" or "Transcendental Meditation", rather it is described more as a form of yoga, or yoga-based meditation.

Why not mention "The Maharishi" or anything like we are familiar with? I thought about it, and without having the solid, 100% right answer, I have a theory.

What happened in the latter half of 1967? The Maharishi became visible as a media personality, with the public association to The Beatles, his visibility and market share (if you consider it that) rose about a thousand-fold higher than it had been even a year earlier.

Along with that, you had in latter 1967 magazine profiles of him, articles written about him, TV appearances by him, and in general what could be seen as a "media blitz". He became a topic of conversation because he was in the news and the media.

How many media blitzes are purely accidental? If you get print, TV, radio, etc all on board in 1967, there was something of a concerted effort to publicize the Maharishi and TM. It worked.

What about my theory that it was planned that way in 1967 whereas at the time Henry Lewy was set to travel to India as reported in his company newsletter, the Maharishi wasn't as much of a media figure, and his efforts to spread his meditation techniques were not looking as much like an advertising campaign?

The Henry Lewy UA newsletter piece describes almost exactly what I believe the Beatles thought they would be getting in India...the banks of the Ganges, a simple, primitive lifestyle, no major roads or modern conveniences, basically the escape from the media culture they were looking for.

When they arrived at the ashram, they saw a sprawling office-complex type of facility, funded by Doris Duke, complete with broadcast center, corporate offices, a helicopter port, and other very "modern" and corporate features. Then they have the simple, basic man they expected asking them to send millions into a Swiss bank account, have them appear in films with him, and also see him planning a rock and roll tour as well as making press junkets just as they had been doing as superstar musicians.

So the Maharishi and his TM methods got marketing-savvy as 1967 went into 1968, and perhaps some of the followers he had picked up knew their way around a media campaign? The Maharishi became a visible entity in order to better "sell" the movement, perhaps? Where in early '67, most people would not know the Maharishi, and as in the Lewy article above, his name wasn't as important as what Lewy was going there to study. That of course would soon change. Just a thought.

[Cam Mott]

With Nadine making a point of mentioning that TM may not have been known as TM at the time, it now seems very much more  likely that you could attend a lecture at the Lewy's in late 1966 and not hear the name of MMY or the term TM.

[Cam Mott]

I found something else regarding the BBs' brush with Deep Meditation/Spiritual Rejuvenation/TM. We were wondering if the Lewy's didn't know what they were talking about or were confusing someone like the Vosse Posse with the Boys. I had posted a quote from VDP suggesting he wasn't one of those at the introductory lecture since he had never met Nadine Lewy who supposedly was doing the introduction/classes, etc.. I found another related quote. The parentheses and punctuation etc.  are Michael's.

"As for the T-M connection with Henry and Nadine... I don't have a notion of the thread nor it's place in any timeline. If Henry and Nadine were T-M'ing with the Wilsons before I came along, or after, I don't remember it.  I remember Henry and Nadine very very very well, they were great pals of mine and Henry was my patient mentor in the studio the time A&M (foolishly) let me co-produce and album ( with Henry Thank God). I did have plenty of conversations with Henry about T-M and knew he and N were quite involved and all that. But that would be many months After leaving BB's."

Michael Vosse e-mail 12/18/2001

So apparently Michael was not one of those at the introductory lecture at the Lewy's either.

Also I had been presuming that Henry's invitation to Brian, which he associated with hearing an unfinished GV track with Theremin, was in September of '66 but really it could have been anytime at Western from May 4 '66 up to September 8 '66 I suppose.

[Cam Mott]

Al's Lennon Tribute interview seems to confirm that Brian had taken TM instruction long before the Boys met the Maha in Paris.