07 February 2018
Newsdesk
Music legend Quincy Jones has stunned music fans by revealing the Beatles were terrible musicians.
The composer, arranger and producer has savaged the Fab Four in a new Vulture interview, insisting he was never a fan of the band considered by many to be the best of all time.
Quincy still recalls the first time he heard the band, telling the outlet, "They were the worst musicians in the world.
"They were no-playing motherf**kers. Paul (McCartney) was the worst bass player I ever heard. And Ringo (Starr)? Don’t even talk about it."
The drummer was singled out for further attack as Jones remembered working with Ringo on his 1970 solo album Sentimental Journey.
Quincy reveals he duped Starr into thinking he'd recorded the drum track on Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing - because the rocker was really struggling in the studio.
"We were in the studio with (Beatles producer) George Martin and Ringo had taken three hours for a four-bar thing he was trying to fix on a song," Quincy tells Vulture. "He couldn’t get it. We said, 'Mate, why don’t you get some lager and lime, some shepherd’s pie and take an hour and a half and relax a little bit?' So he did, and we called Ronnie Verrell, a jazz drummer.
"Ronnie came in for 15 minutes and tore it up. Ringo comes back and says, 'George, can you play it back for me one more time?' So George did, and Ringo says, 'That didn’t sound so bad'. And I said, 'Yeah, motherf**ker, because it ain’t you'."
Still, Jones likes Ringo as a person, calling him a "great guy", and he loves hanging out with U2 star Bono, adding, "He’s doing good work all over the world. Working with him and (Live Aid genius) Bob Geldof on debt relief was one of the greatest things I ever did."
