Love Comes to Everyone

Template:Use British English Template:Use dmy dates Template:Template otherTemplate:Main other "Love Comes to Everyone" is a song by English rock musician George Harrison from his 1979 album George Harrison. It is the opening track on the album and was also issued as the second single, after "Blow Away". The song reflects Harrison's contentment in his personal life as he was soon to become a father for the first time and married his second wife, Olivia Arias. Despite its commercial qualities, and contrary to some reviewers' predictions at the time of release, the song failed to become a hit.

The lyrics to the song refer to human love and spiritual love as one, furthering a characteristic of Harrison's songwriting. He recorded the track at his Friar Park home studio in England in 1978 following a year away from the music industry. The recording includes synthesizer solos played by Steve Winwood and a guitar contribution from Eric Clapton over the intro to the track. Clapton's presence on the song formally signalled the continuation of his and Harrison's musical friendship after the potential complications presented by Clapton having eloped with Pattie Boyd, Harrison's first wife, in 1974.

Harrison included "Love Comes to Everyone" on his Dark Horse Records compilation Best of Dark Horse 1976–1989. Clapton covered the song on his 2005 album Back Home as a tribute to Harrison, four years after his death.

Background

George Harrison began writing "Love Comes to Everyone" in September 1977 and finished it in Hawaii in February 1978.Template:Sfn Its writing and recording coincided with a period of domestic contentment for Harrison,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn who married his second wife, Olivia Arias, and saw the birth of his only child, son Dhani, during the sessions for his self-titled album.Template:Sfn In his autobiography, I, Me, Mine, he describes the message of the song as "very optimistic". He also says the melody came about through using a Roland chorus effect on his guitar.Template:Sfn

According to the date given in I, Me, Mine, "Love Comes to Everyone" was the first new song Harrison wrote for the George Harrison album.Template:Sfn He approached the project after taking a sabbatical for much of 1977,Template:Sfn during which he and Arias travelled and attended races in the Formula 1 World Championship.Template:Sfn In June that year, Harrison and his first wife, Pattie Boyd, divorced amicably,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn and he continued to maintain a close friendship with Boyd's partner, Eric Clapton,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn whom Harrison took to calling his "husband-in-law"Template:Sfn and "guitarist-in-law".Template:Sfn He later attributed the relaxed mood of the album to "everything ... happening nice for me" in the two years since Thirty Three & ⅓, adding, "I'm happy, and I think that it's reflected in the music."Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

Composition

Music critic David Fricke describes the mood of "Love Comes to Everyone" as "church-bell strum and beatific stroll". Author Simon Leng likens the song's harmony to that in "Far East Man", a 1974 composition in the soul style that Harrison wrote with Faces guitarist Ron Wood.Template:Sfn

The lyrics continue a theme typical of Harrison's songwriting since his 1968 Beatles track "Long, Long, Long", whereby human love and spiritual or divine love are inseparable concepts.Template:Sfn He states the song's message with an ambiguity that initially suggests it is focused on human love and romance.Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Refn The lyrics encourage the listener that love is there for all to experience, and that it "only takes time" before "that door" opens.Template:Sfn In the song's bridges,Template:Sfn he sings of a love "here in your heart" that will not change or age, referring to the assuredness of divine love and the inward journey required to experience it.Template:Sfn

While Harrison's songs often focus on the Hindu deity Krishna as his idea of God, "Love Comes to Everyone" includes imagery equally typical of Christian teaching.Template:Sfn In the final verse,Template:Sfn his line "Knock and it will open wide" recalls phrases from the New Testament books of Matthew and Luke.Template:Sfn

Recording

Harrison recorded "Love Comes to Everyone" at his home studio, FPSHOT,Template:Sfn between April and October 1978.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn As with all of the George Harrison album, he co-produced the track with Russ Titelman.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The project marked the first time that Harrison had fully shared the producer's role on one of his albums since working with Phil Spector in the early 1970s.Template:SfnTemplate:Refn According to author Robert Rodriguez, "Love Comes to Everyone" is the one track on George Harrison that appeared to follow contemporary music trends. He says it incorporates a "danceable tom-tom" beat.Template:Sfn

The Roland guitar effect on the song was also used on "Your Love Is Forever",Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn adding a phased, ambient quality to the recording.Template:Sfn Leng describes Harrison's electric guitar parts on "Love Comes to Everyone" as eschewing the "screaming axes" approach of rock music and instead serving as "smooth, ringing purveyors of elegance".Template:Sfn In a 1996 interview, Titelman recalled that while making the album he came to appreciate the precision and craft Harrison had applied to the Beatles' music, and the "unique" quality of his guitar styles and sounds. He recognised Harrison's "fluid approach" in the guitar parts on songs such "Love Comes to Everyone" as a legacy of his immersion in Indian music.

The other musicians on the recording include Steve Winwood (who plays the Minimoog synthesizer solos), Neil Larsen, Willie Weeks, Andy Newmark and Ray Cooper.Template:Sfn Newmark recalled a far "mellower" Harrison, compared with his demeanour during the sessions for his Dark Horse album in 1974.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn After suffering the loss of his father, who died in May, Harrison and Arias's son was born in August and the couple married the following month.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Harrison's contentment was especially relevant since he had long wanted to become a parent.Template:SfnTemplate:Refn

Author Ian Inglis says that Winwood's contributions on synthesizer and backing vocals give the track "an unusual depth".Template:Sfn Clapton, Winwood's former bandmate in Blind Faith, played lead guitar over the intro to the track.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn It was Clapton's first appearance on a Harrison record since the Concert for Bangladesh live album in 1971,Template:Sfn after which gossip columnists had been intrigued by Harrison divulging details of the romantic triangle between himself, Clapton and Boyd in his Dark Horse track "Bye Bye, Love".Template:Refn Inglis views Clapton's participation in this and later Harrison projects as a sign of "the depth of their mutual affection" despite the potential awkwardness of their romantic entanglements.Template:SfnTemplate:Refn

George Harrison was scheduled for release in December but an issue with the artwork delayed the process.Template:Sfn On 7 December, Harrison made a rare live appearance when he joined Clapton on stage at Guildford Civic HallTemplate:Sfn to play the encore at the final show of Clapton's UK tour.Template:Sfn

Release

George Harrison was released on Dark Horse Records in February 1979,Template:Sfn with "Love Comes to Everyone" sequenced as the opening track.Template:Sfn It was Harrison's first album in over two years, during which, particularly in the UK,Template:Sfn punk rock had established itself as the new phenomenon, predicated on a return to authentic rock 'n' roll values.Template:Sfn In opening the album, according to Leng, "Love Comes to Everyone" served as a statement declaring Harrison's resistance to the punk-inspired aesthetic. He adds that such was the song's "deliberately ambiguous lyrical sheen", its religious references were equally hidden from a pop audience.Template:SfnTemplate:Refn

The song was originally intended as the album's lead single in the United Kingdom,Template:Sfn and was Harrison's choice for the first single, but "Blow Away" was selected instead.Template:Sfn "Love Comes to Everyone" was issued as the A-side of the album's second single on 20 April in the UK and on 11 May in the United States.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn In the UK, it was backed by "Soft-Hearted Hana", while the US B-side was "Soft Touch".Template:SfnTemplate:Refn For the single, the track was given an early fade-out,Template:Sfn reducing the running time to 3:35.Template:Sfn

File:Love Comes To Everyone sheet music.jpg

Cover of the US sheet music for the song, depicting Harrison and his son Dhani

Unlike for "Blow Away" and the UK charity single "Faster", Harrison did not produce a music video for "Love Comes to Everyone",Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn and he did limited promotion for the album generally.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Coinciding with the single's UK release, he gave an interview to Capital Radio,Template:Sfn but the song failed to chart there.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn On 19 May, a week after the Capital Radio interview,Template:Sfn Harrison and Arias attended Clapton and Boyd's wedding reception in Ewhurst, Surrey.Template:Sfn The occasion marked the first time that three former Beatles had played live since the band's break-up, as Harrison, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr were among the musicians who performed on the makeshift stage in Clapton's garden.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The song placed at number 30 on the UK Airplay Top 50 chart compiled by the industry publication Radio & Record News, drawn from figures supplied by BBC Radio and JICRAR.

In the US, "Love Comes to Everyone" had been favoured by DJs as an album track while "Blow Away" received heavy airplay. Defying expectations that it too would become a commercial hit there, the single failed to chart on the Billboard Hot 100.Template:SfnTemplate:Refn Record World reported it at number 118, and the song reached number 38 on BillboardTemplate:'s Adult Contemporary chart. The prominent synthesizer sound on the recording later found greater commercial success as a feature of Winwood's 1980 album Arc of a Diver, particularly his 1981 hit single "While You See a Chance".Template:Sfn Given a limited production run,Template:Sfn the US picture sleeve for "Love Comes to Everyone" became highly prized among collectors.Template:Sfn By 2000, it was the most valuable collectible among Harrison's record-related items.Template:SfnTemplate:Refn

Harrison included "Love Comes to Everyone" on his 1989 compilation album Best of Dark Horse 1976–1989.Template:Sfn The track used there is around five seconds longer than the 1979 single edit.Template:Sfn He performed the song on his Japanese tour with Clapton, in December 1991,Template:Sfn but dropped it from the setlist after the opening night.Template:Sfn As a tribute to Harrison, four years after his death, Clapton covered the song on his 2005 album Back Home.Template:Sfn As with the other material on what he called his "'family' album", Clapton's choice was inspired by fatherhood and his contentment with Melia McEnery, whom he married in 2002.Template:Sfn

Critical reception

Writing in Melody Maker in 1979, E.J. Thribb named "Love Comes to Everyone" among the three most enjoyable songs on an album that reflected the singer's happy approach to life. Thribb grouped it with "Blow Away" and "Not Guilty", saying: "The chords roll and tumble, the melodies are good to chant, and the lyrics are simple but tell their story." BillboardTemplate:'s reviewer considered it to be the album's "best cut" and admired the track for Harrison's "vintage guitar strumming", Clapton's guitar intro and Winwood's backing vocals. In Rolling Stone, Stephen Holden found the album "refreshingly lighthearted" and evidence that Harrison "was always a much better tunesmith than priest",Template:Sfn and he highlighted the "prettiness" of the song's melody.

In his review of the single for Record Mirror, Paul Sexton paired "Love Comes to Everyone" with "Blow Away" as a song that suggested Harrison had "sold out" but was nevertheless "a very proficient AOR record". Sexton added that he had always liked Harrison's voice and musical arrangements, but with "Blow Away" having soon disappeared from the UK chart, the former Beatle was becoming a "poor man's Paul McCartney" in terms of his songs' longevity. Cash Box predicted success for the single, describing it as a "soothingly melodic followup" to "Blow Away". The reviewer admired the blend of guitar motif, electric piano, tambourine and synthesizer soloing, along with Harrison's "top notch" vocals and "inspirational message".

Writing in 1981, Bob Woffinden of the NME described the track as "joyous" and an example of how, thanks to its creator's happiness as a husband and father, George Harrison was "characterised by many of the positive qualities (consistency, professionalism, confidence, ebullience)" that had distinguished the Beatles' work throughout the 1960s.Template:Sfn NME critics Roy Carr and Tony Tyler referred to "Love Comes to Everyone" as a "poised and relaxedly melodic all purpose choon". They commented that Harrison incorporates a composing trick first heard on his 1965 song "If I Needed Someone", that of "basing his phrases on the off-beats of a two-bar sequence", a device they deemed one of Harrison's "best loved and least worn out".Template:Sfn

Among more recent assessments, AllMusic critic Richard Ginell dismisses the song as a "depressing" choice to open the album, and "a treadmill tune with greeting-card verses". Morgan Enos of Billboard recognises it as one of the three "gems" on George Harrison that showed the artist to be "happier than he'd been in years".

Pop historian Robert Rodriguez calls "Love Comes to Everyone" a "melodic, gentle slice of commercial pop, managing to sound at once contemporary and idiosyncratically Harrison".Template:Sfn He says that the song deserved to become a hit and describes the single's lack of commercial success as "baffling".Template:Sfn Harrison biographer Elliot Huntley deems the song a "glorious piece", despite Clapton's "mediocre" guitar intro and the "paper and comb" synthesizer sound, and he considers that its failure to become a hit was "mystifying ... given that it seemed perfect for AOR radio stations the world over".Template:Sfn

Personnel

According to author Simon Leng, the line-up of musicians on Harrison's recording is as follows:Template:Sfn

• George Harrison – lead and backing vocals, electric guitars
• Eric Clapton – guitar intro
• Neil Larsen – electric piano, organ
• Steve Winwood – Minimoog, backing vocals
• Willie Weeks – bass
• Andy Newmark – drums
• Ray Cooper – percussion

Cover versions

In 1983, Brazilian singer Zizi Possi released a Portuguese cover version of this song, named O Amor Vem Pra Cada Um on the long play record Pra Sempre E Mais Um Dia.

External links

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