"Hari's on Tour (Express)" is an instrumental by English musician George Harrison, released as the opening track of his 1974 album Dark Horse. It was also the B-side of the album's second single – which was "Ding Dong, Ding Dong" in North America and most other territories, and "Dark Horse" in Britain and some European countries. Among Harrison's post-Beatles solo releases, the track is the first of only two genuine instrumentals he released from 1970 onwards – the other being the Grammy Award-winning "Marwa Blues", from his 2002 album Brainwashed.
Harrison recorded "Hari's on Tour" in April 1974 at a spontaneous session held at his home, Friar Park. A slide guitar-based composition, the track also features saxophonist Tom Scott and the latter's jazz-rock band L.A. Express, who were touring as Joni Mitchell's backing group at the time. It was the first Harrison song to feature Scott, who became a regular collaborator and served as band leader during Harrison's only series of concerts in North America, the highly publicised "Dark Horse Tour" with Ravi Shankar. "Hari's on Tour (Express)" was played as the opening number throughout this tour, over November and December 1974.
Although music critics and Harrison biographers have generally viewed the album track in an unfavourable light, several concert reviewers identified it as an effective opener for the shows. "Hari's on Tour" is one of only two songs from the 1974 tour to have been released officially, after a live version was included on the limited-edition Songs by George Harrison 2 EP in 1992. This live recording was taken from the Washington, DC stop on the tour, during which Harrison met with President Gerald Ford at the White House.
Background George Harrison first worked with jazz saxophonist, flautist and arranger Tom Scott in April 1973,Badman, p. 94. during the Los Angeles sessions for Ravi Shankar's Shankar Family & Friends album.Leng, p. 138.Rodriguez, p. 237. The two musicians also contributed to Ringo Starr's album Ringo around that time, as well as Cheech & Chong's Los Cochinos.Castleman & Podrazik, pp. 199–200, 211–12.Rodriguez, pp. 228, 266. Outside of his session work, Scott's main activities were leading his band, L.A. Express,Clayson, p. 335. and backing Joni Mitchell, both live and in the studio.David Rensin, "Tom Scott: Joni's Spark", Rolling Stone, 1 August 1974; available at Rock's Backpages (subscription required).Romanowski & George-Warren, p. 877. Just as Harrison had long combined elements of Hindustani classical music with Western rock and gospel, and was now moving towards the funk and soul genres,Leng, pp. 59–60, 83–85, 96, 153, 156–57. Scott's solo work fused jazz, funk, pop and Middle Eastern influences.Alex Henderson, "Tom Scott Tom Scott & the L.A. Express", AllMusic (retrieved 19 December 2012). His collaborations with Mitchell also coincided with her move from confessional folk songwriting towards pop and jazz,"Joni Mitchell biography", rollingstone.com (retrieved 22 May 2015). and eventually avant garde.Romanowski & George-Warren, p. 672.Jason Ankeny, "Joni Mitchell", AllMusic (retrieved 19 December 2012).
Harrison, Scott and Mitchell soon developed a mutual rapport, according to L.A. Express bassist Max Bennett.Leng, p. 149. In addition to carrying out further sessions for Shankar Family & Friends in Los Angeles, in March 1974,Doggett, p. 217. Harrison had begun spending time there trying to set up his own record label,The Editors of Rolling Stone, p. 223. with the winding down of the Beatles' Apple Records from mid 1973 onwards.Madinger & Easter, pp. 441, 442.Clayson, pp. 320–21. In August 1973, rumours in the music industry claimed that Harrison, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez and Paul Simon were forming a label together;Badman, p. 106. in fact, Harrison founded Dark Horse Records, one of the first releases of which was the Shankar album,Madinger & Easter, p. 442. and Dylan temporarily signed with David Geffen's Asylum Records, which was Mitchell's label.Sounes, pp. 273, 276.
Composition and recording Mitchell's tour in support of her critically acclaimed Court and Spark albumJason Ankeny, "Joni Mitchell Court and Spark", AllMusic (retrieved 19 December 2012). arrived in London in April 1974.Michael Gross, "George Harrison: How Dark Horse Whipped Up a Winning Tour", Circus Raves, March 1975; available at Rock's Backpages (subscription required; retrieved 28 September 2014). While backstage at her and Scott's show at the New Victoria Theatre, Harrison invited the five members of the L.A. Express to come out to his Oxfordshire home, Friar Park, the following day. Bennett recalls that they arrived by limousine and he mistook the property's grand gatehouse for the main residence.
Scott later told music journalist Michael Gross that only a social visit was planned, but the band were impressed with Friar Park's 16-track home studio, FPSHOT, and Harrison suggested they record something. The first song they worked on was an untitled instrumental tune that later became known as "Hari's on Tour (Express)", for which Scott made a lead sheet for the band. Part of the title was taken from "Hari Georgeson", the latest pseudonym adopted by Harrison when working with non-EMI/Capitol artists,Castleman & Podrazik, pp. 200–08. since he was still contracted to Apple until January 1976.Schaffner, pp. 179, 188.Doggett, pp. 224, 240.
Harrison played slide guitar on the track, in his preferred open E tuning,Clayson, p. 279. adopting a similar sound to the one he had used three years earlier on John Lennon's song "How Do You Sleep?" Aside from Scott and Bennett's contributions, on saxophone and bass, respectively, the other musicians were Robben Ford (electric guitar), Roger Kellaway (piano) and John Guerin (drums).Madinger & Easter, p. 443. Harrison's musical biographer, Simon Leng, writes that the tune predominantly uses major chords, with the "main melodic interest" coming with a shift to C♯ minor seventh, which provides "a moment of softening sweetness".Leng, p. 150. Leng notes the contrast between Harrison's Fender Stratocaster "roaring into action" on this song and the "opulence" of his previous album, Living in the Material World, and suggests that Harrison now "just wanted to be one of the boys" in a "working, rocking band". The engineer at the session was Phil McDonald.Album credits, Dark Horse CD (Capitol Records, 1992; produced by George Harrison).
According to Scott, the basic track took "a couple of hours" before they had a satisfactory take. The musicians then recorded a second song, "Simply Shady", which, like "Hari's on Tour", would be included on Harrison's forthcoming album, Dark Horse.Spizer, p. 264. The five band members stayed over at Friar Park before Ford, Bennett, Kellaway and Guerin left for Denver the following day. Scott says he stayed on and worked further with Harrison at FPSHOT; in addition to the various horn parts, he played organ on "Hari's on Tour"."George's original [inner] sleeve design for the album", Dark Horse (2014 reissue) CD booklet (Apple Records, 2014; produced by George Harrison), p. 9.
In the same interview with Gross, for Circus Raves magazine, Scott recalled that he was the first Western musician that Harrison approached about joining him and Shankar for a tour of the United States and Canada later in the year. The tour would be the first in North America by a former Beatle since the group's 1966 US visit,The Editors of Rolling Stone, p. 44. and Harrison's first live performances since his staging of the Concert for Bangladesh in August 1971.Lavezzoli, pp. 192–93.Tillery, pp. 113–14, 162–63. Rather than include Beatles material on the 1974 tour, however,Woffinden, p. 83.David Cavanagh, "George Harrison: The Dark Horse", Uncut, August 2008, p. 43. Harrison planned to present a varied program combining rock, soul/R&B, jazz, funk and Indian classical music.Leng, pp. 170, 172, 174. Eight Arms to Hold You authors Chip Madinger and Mark Easter suggest that "Hari's on Tour (Express)" was written "simply as a show opener" for the North American concerts, which would also feature Harrison's former Apple Records protégé Billy Preston.Rodriguez, pp. 72–74.
Although his 1969 experimental album Electronic Sound consists of Moog synthesizer sounds and the 1968 Wonderwall Music soundtrack is almost entirely devoid of vocals,Inglis, pp. 17, 20.Leng, p. 50. out of all the tracks released by Harrison as a solo artist after the Beatles' break-up in 1970, "Hari's on Tour" is a rare example of a genuine instrumental composition.Inglis, p. 44. Only 2002's "Marwa Blues" stands as another.Leng, p. 299.Inglis, pp. 120–21. Among other projects they worked on together through to the early 1980s, Harrison played on the instrumental "Appolonia (Foxtrata)", from Scott's 1975 album New York Connection,Badman, pp. 163–64. and Scott helped produce Harrison's debut on Dark Horse Records, Thirty Three & 1/3.Madinger & Easter, p. 453.
North American tour and album release
Harrison's overcommittal of his time to Dark Horse acts Ravi Shankar and Splinter during 1974 resulted in him having to rush-record much of Dark Horse while preparing for the North American tour.Harrison, p. 312.Madinger & Easter, pp. 442–43. Due to the pressure, Harrison developed laryngitis during rehearsals and damaged his voice.Mat Snow, "George Harrison: Quiet Storm", Mojo, November 2014, p. 72.Leng, pp. 147–48, 166. As well as placing further importance on the instrumentals in his setlist,Clayson, p. 338.Peter Doggett, "George Harrison: The Apple Years", Record Collector, April 2001, p. 39. which included "Hari's on Tour (Express)" and Scott's track "Tom Cat",Huntley, pp. 115, 116. Harrison's depleted vocals marred the concerts for many observers.Tillery, p. 114.Rodriguez, p. 58.
In addition, while many critics admired the adventurousness of the musical program and reviewed the shows favourably,Leng, pp. 160–65, 174. others, particularly in music publications such as Rolling Stone,Rodriguez, p. 59.Clayson, pp. 338–40, 342. wrote scathingly of Harrison's reluctance to acknowledge the Beatles' legacy, together with his willingness to share the spotlight so readily with Shankar's orchestra of classical musicians and Preston.Woffinden, pp. 83–84. In his role as band leader, Scott spoke out in support of Harrison's musical direction and refuted reports that the tour was not going well; instead, he told Circus Raves, audience reaction had been "radically different from city to city" and dependent on whether concertgoers chose to listen, or came expecting to hear the Beatles.
Harrison played "Hari's on Tour" as the opening song throughout the tour,Madinger & Easter, p. 447. which began on 2 November 1974 in Vancouver and ended in New York City on 20 December.Badman, pp. 137–38.Lavezzoli, p. 196. It was preceded by a recording of Monty Python's "The Lumberjack Song", played through the concert PA while the band took the stage.Madinger & Easter, p. 446.Leng, p. 185. As the many bootlegs from the tour reveal, early on in each performance of "Hari's on Tour", Harrison often called out a greeting to the city or town in question.Clayson, pp. 338, 342."George Harrison Bootleg Discography – Live", Hari's on The Web (retrieved 19 December 2012). Some concert reviewers referred to the song as "Hari Good Boy Express" or "Hari Good Bye Express".The Editors of Rolling Stone, p. 126. The first of these two titles is how Harrison named the track on the preliminary artwork included in the 2014 reissue of Dark Horse.