Recording "Real Love", "All For Love"

About

(The content of this page is taken from the page https://reunionsessions.tripod.com/al/faabsessions/1995may.html)

With the imminent release of Free As A Bird and Real Love now public knowledge after an Apple press release, Paul, George and Ringo reconvened at The Mill where they completed the final parts on Real Love, planned as the second “comeback” single.

Having abandoned both Now And Then and Grow Old With Me, the group tackled a new song for the third single. There is still little inkling as to the nature of this track, although rumour has it that the song wasn’t one of the John Lennon demo tapes handed over by Yoko, but was, in fact, a brand new song written by George and Paul called All For Love (only their second ever collaboration, after the 1958 composition In Spite Of All The Danger).

Confusion and mystery still surrounds this track. Neither Paul, George, Ringo, Yoko nor Jeff Lynne seem to have so much as mentioned the existence of any such song.

Without a contribution from John Lennon it’s difficult to imagine how All For Love could have been presented as a Beatles recording, which begs the question as to whether it was, in fact, a John Lennon song and not a new composition at all (after all, Yoko is rumoured to have supplied two demo cassettes comprised of three songs each, and only four titles – Free As A Bird, Real Love, Grow Old With Me and Now And Then – have surfaced so far).

A third possibility is that, as there was confusion over the actual title for the Now And Then demo, that it somehow ended up being called All For Love, possibly due to extra lyrics being written by McCartney and Harrison.

In March 1996 Beatles Monthly reported that recording of All For Love was completed during these sessions. However, in his excellent book, The Beatles After The Breakup, author Keith Badman notes that these recordings “…turned into a disaster and the sessions are aborted early. The group then decides to shelve plans for any further Beatles recording sessions, with George the chief instigator behind this…“

Despite the disasterous sessions, Paul apparently remained optimistic that something could be done with the All For Love recording. George, however, later becomes even more determined to call it a day after the poor reception given to the release of Real Love.

Whatever the reasons, this mysterious track has, so far, been firmly locked away in the vaults along with Now And Then.

Last updated on September 6, 2020

Songs recorded