"The Day the World Gets 'Round" is a song by the English musician George Harrison, released on his 1973 album Living in the Material World. Harrison was inspired to write the song following the successful Concert for Bangladesh shows, which were held in New York on 1 August 1971 as a benefit for refugees from the country formerly known as East Pakistan. The lyrics reflect his disappointment that such a humanitarian aid project was necessary, given the abundance of resources available across the planet, and his belief that if all individuals were more spiritually aware, there would be no suffering in the world. Adding to Harrison's frustration while writing the song, the aid project became embroiled in financial problems, as commercial concerns delayed the release of the Concert for Bangladesh album, and government tax departments failed to embrace the goodwill inherent in the venture.
Harrison recorded "The Day the World Gets 'Round" in England between October 1972 and March 1973. The recording features an orchestral arrangement by John Barham and a similarly well-regarded vocal performance from Harrison. The other contributing musicians were Nicky Hopkins, Klaus Voormann, Ringo Starr and Jim Keltner. Reviewers have described the composition variously as a protest song, a devotional prayer, and a counterpart to John Lennon's peace anthem "Imagine".
As with all the new songs released on Living in the Material World, Harrison donated his publishing royalties from the track to the Material World Charitable Foundation, an organisation he set up to avoid the tax problems that had befallen his Bangladesh relief effort. The song typifies Harrison's ideal for a world unencumbered by national, religious or cultural delineation. In 2009, Voormann and Yusuf Islam covered "The Day the World Gets 'Round" and released it as a single to benefit children in war-torn Gaza.
Background In his 1980 autobiography, I, Me, Mine, George Harrison describes the period following the two Concert for Bangladesh shows as "very emotional". The concerts took place at Madison Square Garden, New York, on 1 August 1971, as the first part of his fundraising program for the 8–10 million refugees of the Bangladesh Liberation War.Lavezzoli, p. 187. The generosity of all the participants, together with the response from the general public,Clayson, p. 317. encouraged Harrison to feel "very positive about certain things". At the same time, the fact that it had fallen to musicians such as himself and concert instigator Ravi Shankar to address the issue left Harrison "slightly enraged", given the wealth of resources available to governments around the globe.George Harrison, p. 226. Author Gary Tillery writes that, through his humanitarian gesture, Harrison had "changed the perception" of rock musicians, "making it clear they could be good world citizens too",Tillery, p. 100. while music critic Mikal Gilmore has noted of Harrison's "cautious yet optimistic and tender" worldview: "[it] stood in stark contrast to the ugly dissolution of the Beatles and the defeated idealism that then characterised so much of rock & roll culture."The Editors of Rolling Stone, p. 40. The day after the Madison Square Garden concerts, Harrison began writing the song "The Day the World Gets 'Round", having stayed in New York to work with producer Phil Spector on the proposed live album of the event.Badman, p. 45.Spizer, p. 241.
The Concert for Bangladesh album release
Harrison found frustration in this next phase of the Bangladesh project, as the various record companies associated with the concerts' performers attempted to profit from the forthcoming release.The Editors of Rolling Stone, p. 43.Doggett, pp. 180–81, 192. Chief among these was the Beatles' US distributor, Capitol Records, who delayed issuing the albumGreene, p. 193. in the hope of negotiating a royalty rate to cover what they perceived as high distribution costs for the boxed three-record set. Harrison was resolute that Capitol should absorb the costs, just as the Beatles' Apple record label had already paid for the album's lavish packaging and full-colour booklet.Badman, p. 58.Leng, p. 121. All those involved with the concerts and post-production on the live album had given their services for free, in keeping with Harrison's hope that, in Tillery's words: "Every penny of income – from the gate receipts to the profits from an album and a film – would go toward alleviating the suffering."Tillery, p. 96.
By early October 1971, bootleg recordings of the concerts were available in New York,Badman, p. 50. potentially denying funds to the refugees. On 23 November, Harrison's exasperation with the situation saw him raging against Capitol president Bhaskar Menon during a late-night television interview with Dick Cavett, and threatening to take the album to a rival label.Badman, pp. 55, 58."Big Bop Baby", Contra Band Music, 4 May 2012 (retrieved 17 March 2013). Menon then backed down, ceding much of the distribution rights to Columbia/CBS,Clayson, pp. 314–15. whose artist Bob Dylan had made a successful comeback at the Concert for Bangladesh.Spizer, pp. 241–42. Further delaying the release until well into December, wholesalers objected to Apple's financial terms,Doggett, p. 181. which ensured that wholesalers and retailers could make little profit on each copy shipped. Ignoring the spirit behind the release, author Peter Lavezzoli writes, some US retailers "engaged in shameless price gouging".
Legal and taxation issues
Of greater detriment to the project in the long term, Harrison's business manager, Allen Klein, had neglected to register the concerts as UNICEF fundraising benefits before they had taken place.Lavezzoli, p. 193.George Harrison, p. 61. As a result, the American and British tax departments were demanding a share of the proceeds from the live album and Saul Swimmer's concert film, ignoring Harrison's appeals that an exception be made in the case of this humanitarian disaster.Clayson, pp. 315–16. Until India's defeat of Pakistan on 16 December, America continued to supply arms and financial aid to the Pakistani army, led by General Yahya Khan,Lavezzoli, pp. 189, 194. despite reports of genocide being committed against the Bangladeshis.Mark Dummett, "Bangladesh war: The article that changed history", BBC News Online, 16 December 2011 (retrieved 14 October 2013). In reply to a New Yorker's offer to start a petition to make the US Treasury scrap its tax on the Concert for Bangladesh album, Harrison wrote: "Until the [politicians] become human, we must do our service to others without their help."Clayson, pp. 316, 479.
Although Rolling Stone and other countercultural publications lauded the Bangladesh concerts as proof that "the Utopian spirit of the Sixties was still flickering", in the words of author Nicholas Schaffner,Schaffner, p. 148. Harrison addressed, in "The Day the World Gets 'Round", the corporate greed and governmental apathy he had encountered.Leng, p. 135.Rodriguez, pp. 51, 154. While staging the concerts Harrison had made a point of distancing himself from the politics behind the war in what was formerly known as East Pakistan,Clayson, p. 307. and he similarly advocated peace activist Swami Vishnudevananda's proposal for Planet Earth passports – whereby "[one truth] underlies all nations, all cultures, all colours, all races, all religions".Olivia Harrison, pp. 296–97. Referring to the song and the moral responsibility of wealthy Western nations, he says in I, Me, Mine: "If everyone would wake-up and do even a little, there could be no misery in the world."
Composition
Author Robert Rodriguez describes "The Day the World Gets 'Round" as both "an expression of gratitude to all the good hearts that had contributed to the success [of the Bangladesh benefits]", and a "stinging indictment" of governments who had the power to help but instead "turned their backs when it suited their ends to do so".Rodriguez, p. 154. Harrison musical biographer Simon Leng notes also Harrison's dismay at how the 1960s countercultural revolution had failed to influence the motivations of the music business – to the extent that the altruism behind the Concert for Bangladesh "was almost torpedoed by boardroom balance sheets".Leng, pp. 121, 134–35.
A slow-paced ballad, the song's opening verse reflects Harrison's optimism and idealism, on the one hand:Spizer, p. 255.
His frustration is evident from verse two, where, in what Leng terms a "knee-jerk reaction" to the politics behind the Bangladesh crisis,Leng, p. 137. Harrison sings of a world "Losing so much ground / Killing each other, hand in hand".George Harrison, p. 225.
In the song's middle eight, Leng suggests, Harrison identifies the absence of humility as the root of humankind's problems, and concludes:
These lines have led to conflicting interpretations among Harrison biographers regarding a supposedly superior attitude on the singer's part. Ian Inglis writes of "an increasingly familiar elitism in his apparent perception of himself", adding: "When [Harrison] sings of 'the pure of heart' and tells the Lord that 'there are just a few who bow before you,' the implied conclusion is that he counts himself among their number."Inglis, p. 42. While acknowledging the ambiguity of this message, Leng writes: "This could be taken as Harrison's statement of his own spiritual superiority, or it might be his metaphor for a rejection of conceit. If ego-driven politicians and self-serving military leaders were able to bow before anything, even a 'concept' like God, the world would be a better place. 'The Day the World Gets 'Round' laments human nature and calls for a little humility."
Dale Allison, a Christian theologian, views these lyrics as a song-wide message where Harrison "mourns how few are working for a better world and paying homage to God".Allison, p. 140. Allison refutes the idea of any elitism or superiority in Harrison's compositions, suggesting: "George nowhere claims to have arrived [at his spiritual goal]; he is rather always a pilgrim, always on the road. In the words of 'The Day the World Gets 'Round,' he is one of those who has 'made a start,' nothing more."Allison, p. 22.
The same three biographers comment on the comparisons between Harrison and Dylan that were encouraged by this and other Harrison songs from 1971 to 1973,Allison, p. 37.Inglis, pp. 42, 44.Leng, pp. 126, 134–35. during a period when, author Peter Doggett writes, the ex-Beatle was "arguably music's most influential figure".Doggett, p. 175. Leng views Harrison's call for humility in "The Day the World Gets 'Round" as "identical to the thrust" of Dylan's "Masters of War", a protest song written about the 1962–63 Cold War arms race.Sounes, p. 131. Inglis suggests that whereas Dylan adopts the more analytical approach of an observer in his politically themed songs, Harrison "appears as a campaigner who is there to convert"; his words duly carry "a suggestion of self-satisfaction", Inglis opines, while also remarking on the "overall pessimism" of "The Day the World Gets 'Round".Inglis, pp. 42–43. Allison contrasts the song with "Slow Train Coming", a lyrically uncompromising Dylan composition reflecting the American singer's late-1970s conversion to born-again Christianity, and cites "The Day the World Gets 'Round" as an example of how Harrison's worldview instead "entails a happy ending".
Recording