DISGRACELAND - George Harrison: Surviving the Beatles, the London Drug Squad, and a Home Invasion

Episode Date: June 14, 2022

George Harrison famously survived the dissolution of the Beatles, a bust by London’s drug squad, a potentially bloody visit from the Hell’s Angels, and a few rounds with cancer. But on the final day of the 20th century, his strength and faith were put to the ultimate test. A crazed fan, convinced that the Beatles were evil and George was a sorcerer who had possessed him, broke into George’s Friar Park estate in the dead of night with one goal: to murder George Harrison. For a full list of contributors, see the show notes at disgracelandpod.com To listen to Disgraceland ad free and get access to a monthly exclusive episode, weekly bonus content and more, become a Disgraceland All Access member at disgracelandpod.com/membership. Sign up for our newsletter and get the inside dirt on events, merch and other awesomeness - GET THE NEWSLETTER Follow Jake and DISGRACELAND: Instagram YouTube X (formerly Twitter)  Facebook Fan Group TikTok  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is exactly right. Double Elvis. When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands. I vowed, I will be his last target. He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves. We always say that trust your girlfriends. Listen to the girlfriends.

Trust me, babe. On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This season on Dear Chelsea with me, Chelsea Handler, we have some fantastic guests like Amelia Clark. When like young people come up to me and they want to be an actor or whatever. My first thing is always, can you think of anything else that you can do? Rather be disappointed in. Do that.

David O'Yellowo. I love this podcast, whether it's therapy or relationships or religion or sex or addiction or you just go straight for the guts. Dennis Leary, Gaten Matarazzo from Stranger Things, Tana Monsu, Camilla Morone, Carrie Kenny Silver, and more. Listen to these episodes of Dear Chelsea on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Sometimes a suspect is found guilty before a verdict is ever read in court.

On the Wicked Words podcast, I talk with the writers who dig deep into the cases that changed history, including Marsha Clark, who went from prosecuting one of the most famous murder cases to writing crime fiction. It doesn't matter that you didn't take part in the murder. If you were at the scene at all, you're guilty of murder. Every week, the real story is revealed. Join us every Monday for new episodes of Wicked Words. Listen to Wicked Words on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Disgrace Land is a production of Double Elvis. The stories about George Harrison are insane. He was set up and busted by London's notorious. drug squad. He attacked a paparazzo who leapt from the bushes with his camera flashing. He diffused a potentially bloody visit from the Hell's Angels. And on the last day of the 20th century, after rebounding from multiple cancer diagnoses, George Harrison was terrorized and violently attacked, an attack that left him hanging on for life with a collapsed lung. But before that, George Harrison made great music. Some of the most enduring,

and soul-searching music of all time. Unlike that music I played for you at the top of the show, that wasn't great music. That was a preset loop from my Melotron called Gortex Vortex MK2. I played you that loop because I can't afford the rights to smooth by Santana and Rob Thomas.

And why would I play you that specific slice of Spanish Harlem Mona Lisa cheese could I afford it? Because that was the number one song in America on December 31, 1999. And that was the day that a crazed fan broke into the historic 35-acre Friar Park estate and tried to kill George Harrison. On this episode, paparazzi, drug squads, crazed fans, a home invasion, and George Harrison.

I'm Jake Brennan, and this is Disgraceland. This was his great chant for deliverance, his sacred chant, his mystical sound vibration. Whatever you choose to call it, a mantra has incredible power. It's hypnotic. The more you repeat your mantra, the more powerful it becomes. Repetition carves a path deeper to awareness. And with the power of awareness, one can be prepared for anything. Even at this particular moment, however,

On the last day of the 20th century, George Harrison was not seeking enlightenment or awareness. George wasn't repeating Harry Krishna, Harry Krishna over and over again in order to communicate directly with God as many have done for close to 5,000 years. He was doing it to disorient the other man in the room because George Harrison was under attack. Harry Krishna, Harry Krishna. George Harrison was yelling at the man with the blonde hair running of the towards him. He just wanted the man to stop. He hoped the mantra would cause the man to become

confused and afraid, just like George had been confused and afraid when he was awoken by the sound of breaking glass and knew that someone was inside his home. But George's mantra didn't have the intended effect. If anything, it made the man charge faster, angrier. The man wasn't there to rob anybody. He was bounding up the steps two at a time because the man was there to more murder George Harrison. The man's eyes were wild, scraggly blonde hair squirming like Medusa. George stood his ground up in the gallery that overlooked the first floor. It was late, not quite 3.30 in the morning.

Aware of darkness. George saw that the man had a stone sword in one hand. That would be from the statue of St. George and the dragon, the one that George's wife had created and was displayed in the gardens outside. In his other hand, the man held a knife. George thought of his wife back in their bedroom and of his mother-in-law who was sleeping upstairs in one of the guest rooms. Harry Krishna, Harry Krishna, George cried again, just as the man made it to the landing of the gallery level. That shit wasn't working.

So George leapt at his attacker, but just like the mantra, this plan also backfired. George and the attacker fell to the ground, and the man was on top of George, straddling him. George squirmed on the ground and held his hands up in self-preservation. He couldn't let the man get away. He couldn't risk his wife or mother-in-law getting injured. So he fought back. And then the man thrust the knife down. And George fended off the first blow, but subsequent blows came too fast.

The man was too powerful, too determined. He plunged the knife down into George's chest. George felt the blade pierced his skin and go deep inside his body. The man pulled the bloody blade out and stout. George a second time, then a third. George was yelling again. This time it wasn't a mantra, just shrieks of pain. Pain caused not just by a sharp knife in the chest,

but by the realization that the end of the line was here. And he had not planned for it to happen like this. George Harrison felt it coming on. Another headache was right in between his eyes. Sitting across from at Twickenham Studios in London, right in front of his eyes, was the cause of the pain. the other Beatles. Well, okay, if George was being completely honest,

the problem was Paul, only Paul. Sure, John made it a habit to dismiss George's songs, but right now he was tuning the fuck out and nodding the fuck off. And Ringo, well, Ringo was Ringo. George didn't have beef with Ringo. George's headache was all because of Paul. He was a dictator, kind of a dick, holier than thou, as if George wasn't a fucking beetle too.

By 1969, it was clear that George wasn't just a sideman for the esteemed songwriting duo of Lennon and McCartney. He was the Beatle who enriched the band culturally with Indian Raghas, with sitars and tablas and exotic sounds that went within and without you. He was the most generous member of the band, the lead guitarist who let Paul play the guitar solo on his song, Taxman. He even tossed the solo on one of his greatest songs while my guitar gently weeps to Eric Clapton, and Eric wasn't even in the band. But also, by 1969, George wanted a larger role. He wanted to write more, more than the obligatory one or two songs per record. He wanted to be as respected as John and Paul when he came to writing songs.

George had long played the role of the Quiet Beetle largely because Paul and John kept him quiet. And right now, at Twickenham, if being Stonewalled on the songwriting front wasn't enough to bear, George, the Beatles' lead guitarist, was being told how to play guitar by the fucking bass player. I'll play whatever you want me to play, George told Paul. Or I won't play at all. Whatever it is that'll please you, I'll do it. But George didn't really mean it. George just wanted to bail.

Fuck playing whatever Paul wanted him to play. It wasn't fun anymore. The Beatles weren't fun anymore. What a pity. The Beatles gave George a head. So he walked out of Twickenham, went home to his bungalow and Escher and wrote Wawa, which is not a song about a guitar pedal. It's a song about making the decision to leave the Beatles.

George hung in there for most of 1969 until it became unbearable. And once the Beatles did throw in the towel, George wasted no time. In fact, he made up for lost time. His 1971 triple album All Things Must Pass, technically his third song, solo album following two experimental releases was a fully realized artistic statement about the temporality of life. Songs like My Sweet Lord and What is Life were pop mantras all about change and transcendence. George Harrison had shed the Beatles and revealed the real George Harrison, a songwriter who could go toe to toe with his contemporaries and was just as prolific.

Even better, George finally eclipsed his former bandmates. He stole their spot. light for a change. All things must pass spent eight weeks at the top of the UK charts and seven weeks at number one in the United States. This, all despite the fact that the record talked about God more than rock music was usually comfortable with and did so across an expensive three-lp set. But it sold, man. It sold better than Ram Paul's solo album from that same year, or sold better than John's Plastic Ono band, and Imagine, both of which happened to be produced by Phil Spector, the Gonzo record producer who also brought his wall of sound aesthetic to all things must pass. The cherry on top, that was having one of the album's songs at number one on the singles chart

at the same time the album was at number one. No Beetle had held the top spot of both charts simultaneously and no other Beatle would for two more years. where once he felt underappreciated and underprepared, George was now feeling ready. He was becoming the artist he always wanted to be. He was on the right path, to artistic freedom, to enlightenment. And when the time came, he would be ready to leave his own legacy behind, one that identified George as George and not as the guy who gave up and did what someone else told him to do.

The brass poker made a dull thud as it hit the back of the head of the man with the scraggly blonde hair. The man fell to the floor next to the guy. to where George was gasping for air. George tasted blood in his mouth, and every time he took a breath, his chest hurt like hell. Blood on his pajamas, blood on the floor.

He pressed his hands to his chest and felt the holes where the knife had gone through. He looked up and saw his wife, Olivia, standing above him, holding a brass poker from the fireplace. The end of the poker was bloody. Her stance was heroic, but the look on her face was absolute terror.

George felt he was dying at 56 years old. He began to repeat the Harry Krishna mantra silently in his head. The very same one he'd first heard from his divine grace, Swami PrabhuBada, 30 years ago. The mantra gave him purpose, clarity, power. He repeated the words in his head and thought of the yogic paths to enlightenment. But his strength was weak. Couldn't say the mantra out loud in order to feel its positive vibration. and thus it couldn't reach his heart and soul.

All it sounded like to him was a broken record in his head, a needle skipping on a worn-out groove. This wasn't the way he wanted to leave his body behind, and that thought terrified him. He had knots left to unravel a mind to clear karma to burn. And as he watched the man with the bloody blonde hair slowly climbed back to his feet and chase Olivia into the next room, George had his mind set on one thing he had to do before anything else.

He had to save his wife before she was killed by a madman. There's two golden rules that any man should live by. Rule one, never mess with a country girl. You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes. And rule two, never mess with her friends either. We always say that trust your girlfriends. I'm Anna Sinfield. And in this new season of The Girlfriends,

Oh my God, this is the same man. A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist. I felt like I got hit by a truck. I thought, how could this happen to me? The cops didn't seem to care. So they take matters into their own hands. I said, oh, hell no. I vowed. I will be his last target.

He's going to get what he deserves. Listen to the Girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. This season on Dear Chelsea, with me, Chelsea Handler, we have some fantastic guests like Amelia Clark. When, like, young people come up to me

and they want to be an actor or whatever, my first thing is always, can you think of anything else that you can do? Rather be disappointed in. Do that. Dennis Leary. I wake up and I'm hitting him in the head with a water bomb. And Bruce Jenner is on the aisle in a corrupt.

stance like he's about to attack me, like, making karate noises. And his entire, the Kardashian family over there, everybody's going, and the air marshal is trying to grab my arms and screaming. And I immediately know that I've been a sleepwalk. David O'Yello. I love this podcast, whether it's therapy or relationships,

or religion, or sex, or addiction, or you just go straight for the guts. Guy Branham. So anyway, Nicole Kidman broke up with Keith Thurban. Being half of a country couple was always a hat she was going to wear, not like a life she was going to lead. Oh, interesting. I like that. Did you practice that on your way over?

Gaten Matarazzo from Stranger Things. Tena Monsu. Camilla Morone, Carrie Kenny Silver, and more. Listen to these episodes of Dear Chelsea on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Kate Winkler Dawson, host of the Wicked Words Podcast. Each week I sit down with the true crime writers behind some of the most compelling true crime stories and discuss their years spent investigating and why it still matters. He sees his father coming out of the woods with his hands over his face,

and he knows something happened. His father just grabs him and says she's gone. She's gone. These are the cases that leave survivors, families, and the journalists who cover them changed forever. Working in national television, it'll push you to your limits, and you'll end up doing things you never thought you do. You know, you look back at it and you're like, I can't believe that really happened. Join me and step inside the investigation.

New episodes drop every Monday on the Exactly Right Network. Listen to Wicked Words on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The place was a fixer-upper. That was the understatement of the decade. In 1970, the sprawling Friar Park had fallen into disrepair. The half-Victorian Gothic, half-French chateau estate, had been neglected for years. With its grottoes, tunnels, caves, sandstone replica of Matterhorn,

an assortment of impish garden gnomes, the place had once been one of the most extraordinary in all of England. But all things must pass. Its 35 acres of gardens were fading away. Its extensive system of small lakes and waterways were drying up. Henley on Thames, the small town in Oxfordshire, where Friar Park had stood since its construction in 1889, slated the property for demolition. However, Friar Park presented the right challenge to the right person, a person with money and time on his hands.

George Harrison, newly liberated from the biggest band on the planet, had both of those things. He bought the place in 1970, settled in. Derek Taylor, the Beatles press officer, called it a dream on a hill. George invested millions over the years to make the dream a reality. He planted trees, brought the gardens and waterways back to life. He even installed the state-of-the-art recording studio inside the 120-room mansion, which officially served as the headquarters of his new record label, Dark Horse. The decision to retreat further into the country had been sealed the year before.

In March, 1969, Sergeant Norman Pilcher and his notorious London drug squad paid a visit to George's home in Escher. George was arrested for some hash hidden inside one of his shoes. On the day of Paul's wedding, no less, George fumed. The cops were dirty. They'd been setting up rock stars left and right with similar trumped-up charges. Did George take drugs?

Obviously. Did he keep drugs in his shoes? George famously said at the time, I'm a tidy person. I keep my socks in my sock drawer and my stash in the stash box. It's not mine. Didn't matter. The drug squad hauled George outside where a photographer for a local newspaper sprung from the bushes,

camera flashing. George took a swing and told the paparazzo to beat it or he'd get a beat down. The dude dropped his camera in fear and ran. George managed to smash it to pieces with his beetle boot before he was hauled off to jail. He pled guilty to unlawful possession and paid his 250-pound fine. At Friar Park, George didn't fear being under the microscope of the London Drug Squad, but that didn't mean that he was no longer afraid. Since the height of Beatlemania, George had regularly feared for his life.

The hordes of screaming fans, the crush of an infatuated crowd. crowd, it was like he was constantly being chased by people in a violent trance. What would the fans have done if they had actually caught up to them? Years before the Beatles called it quits, George was already asking himself, what is life? Is this it? Does this make me feel happy? Will this get me to where I want to go? Am I safe? The fear hit a fever pitch in December 1980 when John Lennon was gunned down outside his apartment at the Dakota in New York City. That was enough to make every beetle paranoid. George dumped another million pounds in a Friar Park, but this time it wasn't to make the gardens green. This time it was to install razor wire, cameras, alarms, guard dogs.

Historically, the Tolkien-esque grounds of Friar Park were open to the public. No more. The gates were locked. George Harrison was no longer expecting anyone uninvited to visit Crackerbox Pallet. But just because he wasn't expecting anyone, didn't mean that they wouldn't seek him out. Over the years, George and his wife, Olivia, received numerous death threats in the mail. Crazed fans attempted to scale the estate walls and break in, and the FBI even managed to foil the plans of an American who intended to burn Fryer Park to the ground while George, Olivia, and their son were at home. And as the century wound down, George's existential fear ramped up.

He'd found a lump in his neck. cancer. The doctors found more in his lung. A few operations and radiation treatments later and George was feeling better. The cancer was in remission. George had found solace in meditation. He focused on his mantra. Mantras made you feel good. Repeating the words out loud over and over again was a bomb. So the more George used repetition, the better he felt. He became focused, aware, strong, unafraid. He went to sleep before midnight on the evening of December 30th, 1999. Tomorrow will be a new day, and soon he would chant in the name of the Lord to welcome a brand new century. Just hours later, shortly before the sun rose on the morning of New Year's Eve, Michael Abram

climbed through the shattered window of George Harrison's Friar Park mansion. He'd broken it with the stone's sword that he'd been able to rip off of the statue outside. The statue was a depiction of St. George slaying the dragon. Abram thought it fitting, seeing as he was on a mission to do a little slaying of his own. He also thought it humorous because the George on the inside of this house, he was no saint, despite what the world said to the contrary. Abram brushed his scraggly blonde hair away from his eyes with the blade of the knife he held in his other hand. A lit cigarette burned between his lips. He scanned the room. It was dark, but he could tell he was in the kitchen. He listened for him. He listened,

for voices, but the voices inside his own head were making it difficult. They wouldn't shut up. Sometimes he would drown the voices out with his walkmen, the volume cranked up all the way to 10. Oasis cassettes were the best. They were mastered for maximum sonic impact. And Oasis was the best, period. That song, Wonderwall? Abram believed that the Gallagher brothers had written that song about the walls of his flap. People complained that Oasis just ripped off the Beatles, but Abram knew better. Oasis were better than the Beatles. Abram used to listen to the Beatles, and that was before the voices escalated in his head and showed him the light, an inner light perhaps. The Beatles, well, they were just pure evil. All you need is love? Patently untrue. That was just a manufactured

sentiment to shroud one of their spells in. Because the Beatles were actually witches. They traveled on brooms. They had spoken in mantras ever since they returned from Rishikes. And Abram knew that mantras like Harry Krishna were really the devil's tongue. Of course, none of this was actually true, but Abram believed it was. His belief was unwavering. He was in the middle of a full-blown psychotic episode from which there was no escape. He didn't know why he believed the things he did. The voices told him these things, and he took them as gospel.

Things like George Harrison was the most evil beetle of all, that he was the cause of the voices in Abrams' head, that George had cast a spell, taking possession of Abraham. Martin's mind and tortured him from 300 kilometers away, from Oxfordshire to Liverpool where Abram called home. Abram believed it wasn't a coincidence that he lived in the same city where the Beatles had famously got their start, and the voices further told him that the only way that he could break that spell and thus to be free of the voices in his head was to find George Harrison and kill him.

Enveloped within the darkness of Friar Park, Abram was surprised that an alarm had yet to sound or that he had been able to make it over the exterior fence of the estate unseen. All that money spent on security, wasted. And where were the guard dogs that had supposedly started their watch 19 years ago? Old, senile, probably buried on the grounds among the garden homes. George Harrison, on the other hand, despite all the threats and the fears and the recent treatments for cancer, he was very much alive,

and he was somewhere inside this enormous house, maybe behind that locked door. Abram slowly made his way through the kitchen, into the main hallway. The stone soared in one hand and his knife in the other. He heard noises coming from upstairs, footsteps. They were getting closer and louder. Abram approached a set of stairs that led up to the gallery overlooking the main floor. He braced himself for a beetle to come shooting out into the open,

riding a wooden broom with a long, flowing cape, transfiguring spells at the ready. And then, from out of the shadows, he appeared at the top of the stairs. George Harrison. He had no broom, no cape. He was unarmed. He appeared unafraid, and he was reciting unspeakable incantations of evil.

And the louder George spoke, the more it steadied Abrams a resolve. It was sorcery, all of it. There was no turning back. This was the moment. Here, in the darkness, it wouldn't last all day. George Harrison had better be prepared to die. We'll be right back.

After this word, word, word. There's two golden rules that any man should live by. Rule one, never mess with a country girl. You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes. And rule two, never mess with her friends either. We always say that trust your girlfriends. I'm Anna Sinfield, and in this new season of the girlfriends... Oh my God, this is the same man.

A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific. FitCon artist. I felt like I got hit by a truck. I thought, how could this happen to me? The cops didn't seem to care. So they take matters into their own hands. I said, oh, hell no. I vowed.

I will be his last target. He's going to get what he deserves. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This season on Dear Chelsea, with me, Chelsea Handler,

we have some fantastic guests. like Amelia Clark. When like young people come up to me and they want to be an act or whatever and my first thing is always can you think of anything else that you can do. Rather be disappointed in.

Do that. Dennis Leary. I wake up and I'm hitting him in the head with a water bomb. And Bruce Jenner is on the aisle in a karate stance. Like he's about to attack me. Like making karate noises.

And his entire the Kardashian family over there, everybody's going, And the air marshal is trying to grab my arms and screaming. And I immediately know that I've been at sleepwalking. David O'Yellowo. I love this podcast, whether it's therapy or relationships or religion or sex or addiction or you just go straight for the guts. Guy Branham.

So anyway, Nicole Kidman broke up with Keith Thurban. Being half of a country couple was always a hat she was going to wear, not like a life she was going to lead. Oh, interesting. Dang, I like that. Did you practice that on your way over? Gaten Matarazzo from Stranger Things. Tana Monsu. Camilla Marone, Carrie Kenny Silver, and more.

Listen to these episodes of Dear Chelsea on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Remember when you'd walk into your local video rental place and there were always those two employees behind the counter arguing about movies? Well, that's us. I'm Millie de Cherico. And I'm Casey O'Brien. And now we're arguing about movies on our podcast, Dear Movies I Love You, from the Exactly Right Network.

Can I say something about the Criterion Clause? Go ahead, dude. They're letting too many people in there. Okay, that's another film, Grip I Got 2. Sadly, that rental place doesn't exist anymore. It's probably a store that sells running shoes. Or an ice cream shop with an extra P and an E at the end. So consider us your slacker movie clerks in podcast form.

I would like to establish a timeline of, The moment you figured out who Channing Tatum was. Every Tuesday, we dig into the movies we can't stop obsessing over. From hidden gems to big screen favorites. New episodes drop every week on the exactly right network. Listen to Dear Movies I Love You on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Hells Angels had taken over three Saville Row. They were loud, rude, drunk.

They smelled like shit. And they were everywhere. They'd muscled their way past Jimmy the Dorman. Now they're making a racket inside the offices of Applecore. Their black leather MC jackets and unruly wind-swept hair were a sharp contrast to the clean green carpets and white walls. It was 1968, Christmas party at the swinging headquarters of the Beatles' burgeoning media company. But the dozen or so angels who had crashed the party were fucking up the peace and love vibe. They exuded not goodwill towards their fellow men.

Man, but menace, intimidation, terror. Two angels from the San Francisco chapter, tumbleweed, and friscoe, were wasted on scotch and coax and now they wanted food, and they could smell the turkey in the kitchen. All 43 pounds of it, they were apples' guests, and they wanted to eat now. John and Yoko, festively dressed as Santa and Mrs. Claus, tried to calm the bikers down, but even a woody bloke like John was no match. Frisco Pete looked John dead in the eye and said, without a hint of humor,

what the fuck is going on in this place? We want to eat. Neil Aspinall and Peter Brown tried to subdue them. They managed people for a living after all, and they'd gotten the Beatles out of many a dicey scrap in the past. The angels could give two fucks. They weren't listening. There was only one person they'd listened to,

and that was George. George Harrison was the one who had extended an open invitation to the Hells Angels in the first place. The hippies and the hate seemed beyond burnout to George when he paid a visit to San Francisco back in the summer, but the angels were all right in his eyes. He even sent a memo to Apple staffers ahead of the MC's visit, which warn, quote, There will be 12 in number complete with black leather jackets and motorcycles. They made look as if they're going to do you in, but are very straight and do good things,

so don't fear them or uptight them. Try to assist them without neglecting your Apple business and without letting them take control of Sathal Row. It was easier said than done. The situation was officially out of control. George Harrison was a Pisces, the zodiac sign with the fish. You know, one fish goes one way, the other fish goes the other way. And George is saying, so what do you want for me?

It was duality, right? It would explain George's dual fascinations with quiet ukuleleys and loud Formula One race cars, or why in one moment he'd be practicing transcendental meditation and the next he'd indulge in a Savoy truffle-sized line of cocaine. And it would also explain why he saw only the best in people, even a group as polarizing as the Hells Angels. Because on some days, George himself acted like a Hells Angel, and on other days he was the guy who uninvited the Hells Angels from the party.

George arrived at Saville Row as the bikers were tearing the Christmas turkey apart and continuing to harass anyone who dared get in their way. George was quiet, as was his reputation. And although he spoke softly, the bikers listened up. Yin and yang, George said. Heads and tails, yes and no. One moment you're here, the next moment you're not. Tumbleweed and Frisco Pete weren't following.

George cut to the chase. You know, bugger off. The angels got on their bikes and left. Michael Abram was no angel. He wasn't going anywhere. And no amount of screaming from George or Olivia Harrison was going to change his mind. After Olivia had gone full Sammy Sosa on his head with the brass poker, Abram rebounded and chased her into a meditation room nearby.

Olivia stumbled. Abram pounced, grabbed her by the neck, both hands grasped tight. He squeezed her throat tight. He hadn't intended to kill anyone else, but so helping the fucking God if the she-devil was going to stand in his way. He would do what he believed he had to do. The voices in his head were getting louder now, elongated vowels, hard consonants.

They weren't speaking to King's English. They wouldn't stop. So he kept going. He kept his grip tighter. Olivia struggled to breathe. She dug her hands at Abram's face. And George managed to get off the ground and was also struggling to breathe. Every time he exhaled, he felt more blood empty into his mouth.

He stumbled into the meditation area, the wounds in his chest bleeding and his legs nearly giving out on him. He reached out and grabbed Abram and struggled to pull him off Olivia. the three of them fell to the floor. George and Abram wrestled on the ground. George felt the energy draining from his body. Even in his weak state, the fact that the attack was happening

on that particular day was not lost on him. It was all too much. Just one week prior, a zealous fan had broken into George's house. Not this house at Friar Park, but another house George owned, in Maui, along the Hana Highway on a bluff overlooking the Pacific.

Local police found an intruder in the kitchen after they'd been tipped off by neighbors. She was eating a frozen pizza and drinking root beer. Turns out she'd been stalking George for months. George had been so thankful that they were not in Maui when it happened, and he knew he'd dodged a bullet, maybe even an actual bullet. Hear me, Lord, thank you, Lord. Now, one week later, at Friar Park, George felt like he had no voice to ask for help or give thanks. He did wonder if being a Pisces had something to do with it.

One week he was safe. The next week he was in mortal danger. He used every last bit of strength to keep Abram at bay, where the two of them were tossing around on the floor. Olivia stood up and grabbed a table lamp that was nearby. She swung it at Abram's head. It missed. She swung it again. Another miss.

Abram reached out and grabbed the lamp's cord. He pulled hard. The force yanked Olivia towards him. She pulled back, but it did little to move, Abram. Abram pulled again like he was reeling in a big fish from a little pond. Olivia felt she was losing ground. Suddenly there was more commotion downstairs, the sound of the front door being ripped open.

More voices, beams of light shot out into the darkness. Police. Olivia remembered she had phoned both the police and some of the friar park staff when George had initially gone downstairs to investigate the sound of breaking glass that had woken them up. She threw the lamp at Abrams head and ran out to the stairs to get their attention. The cops beelined into the meditation room, pounced, subdued Abram, and stopped the attack. George had lost a lot of blood by the time the authorities brought the melee to an end. Michael Abram was put in handcuffs and led away as the first rays of the sun struggled to peek out over the horizon.

The medics took George's vitals. They tended to the numerous knife wounds on his chest. They placed him on a stretcher. One of his lungs had collapsed. Abrams' knife had narrowly missed his heart. He needed to get to a hospital immediately. George knew that the next few minutes and hours were incredibly important. Anything could happen.

All things do pass. It's just a matter of when they pass. He needed to focus his mind and prepare for the day that he did leave the physical realm. Whether that day was tomorrow or ten years down the road, that's the art of dying. To consciously leave one's body at death, no reincarnation meant that there was no loose ends to take. care of, no not to unravel, the liberation of the soul. The first thing George had to do was

not lose his wits or his sense of humor. As he was carried out to the ambulance, George passed a new staff member who had only been at the estate for a few days. So, George asked without missing a beat, how are you liking the new job so far? Some things you just couldn't plan for. Some things just happened. Maybe you willed them into existence, but planning was out of the question. You just went with the flow.

George Harrison was at a dinner in Los Angeles with Roy Orbison and Jeff Lynn when the unplanned happened. It was 1988. Jeff Lynn was cool, sure, his band, ELO were obviously indebted to the Beatles and he had even produced George's latest solo album, Cloud 9. But Roy Orbison was cool on another level. The Voice, the Big O, he was a legend. He was what the Beatles aspired to be when they were banging around clubs in Hamburg almost 30 years earlier.

George realized that a massive opportunity was sitting across the table from him. He asked Roy and Jeff if they wanted to head into the studio the next day to sing on a song George was working on. Accelerate through the curve, just like the best F-1 drivers, or rather through life's curves. George figured in that moment, when's the next time he was going to be having dinner with Roy Orbison. Roy smiled behind his trademark dark sunglasses. Sure he would. So George rang up Bob Dylan because Bob was in town and he'd come in clutch when it came to sniffing out a studio to record him. George and Bob went way back, back to even before Bob agreed to appear at the concert from Bangladesh that George organized in 1971, the first of its kind,

a star-studded benefit to raise money to help refugees. Speaking of refugees, George had left his guitar at Tom Petty's house, so he had to stop and pick it up on the way to the studio, and it wouldn't be polite to not invite Tom along, seeing as he was tight with Bob having backed him up on that true confessions tour just a few years prior, and just like George and Bob and Jeff, Tom would do anything to record with the great Roy Orison. Within a matter of hours, the least expected supergroup of the 1980s had been formed. And after a few weeks of collectively strumming acoustic guitars and writing new songs during the day and then singing those songs around the same microphone together each evening,

the Traveling Wilburys had an album. The Traveling Wilburys Volume 1 was released in October of 1988. It unexpectedly put classic rock icons on the pop charts. It even made Roy Orbison seem cool to Jen Xers. Roy got to see the album go platinum before he died, not even two months later, at the age of 52. George hadn't planned for that to happen either, for Roy to be gone so soon after they had become so close. Was Roy ready to die? Had he properly prepared to leave his body behind? George could only hope. Only Roy knew the answer.

After Roy's death, the rest of the Wilbury shot the music video for the single end of the line. In it, the band sits in a train car and trades verses. When it comes time for Roy's verse, the spotlight is on a solitary guitar rocking in a rocking chair. The band thought it was the perfect tribute. Roy's body was gone, but his voice carried on. Well, George thought, it is all right. He'd meet Roy at the end of the line. But George wasn't quite ready for the journey to end just yet.

Even more than a decade after Roy's death in the year 2000, George didn't want the ride to be over. He had gardens to tend to, tunnels and caves left to uncover in the great expanse of his 35-acre estate. Restoring the grounds at Friar Park was a major undertaking that required both time and patience. He was the estate steward now, and he had to get it ready for the next century,

like its original owner as Sir Francis Crisp had done 100 years ago. And just like Sir Francis Crisp or Sir Frankie Crisp, as George immortalized him in song on all things must pass, George would never see the fruits of his many labors. The saplings he planted, he would never see them mature into full-grown trees. He really wanted to see them, but it takes so long. And George also knew that he had no control over when or how he would reach the end of the line. The attack that he had suffered at the hands of Michael Abram made that crystal clear. So he cleared his mind.

He focused on what he'd been able to accomplish in the gardens at Friar Park, not the parts he'd yet to get to. He didn't look back in anger at the final days of the Beatles and the frustration he'd felt towards Paul in particular. He forgave Michael Abram for that night of absolute terror. Abram had been found not guilty by reason of insanity and was being sent to a psychiatric hospital for further treatment. George hoped he'd get the help he so determined.

desperately needed. George didn't want to get to the end of the line. No one did. But when he did, if he was hit by a car or fell down the stairs or God forbid the cancer came back, then he would be ready. From that moment on, there were no more surprises. Not even when he died from lung cancer in November of 2001, and a Beverly Hills home owned by Paul McCartney,

with family and Harry Krishna devotees by his bedside chanting. a beautifully orchestrated exit from this world with grace. I'm Jake Brennan, and this is Disgraceland. Disgraceland was created by yours truly and is produced in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be found on the show notes page at disgracelandpod.com. If you're listening as a Disgraceland All-Axist member, thank you for supporting the show. We really appreciate it. And if not, you can become a member right now by going to disgracelandpod.com.

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I vowed, I will be his last target. He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves. We always say that, trust your girlfriends. Listen to the girlfriends, trust me, babe, on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This season on Dear Cheshiremberg, Chelsea, with me, Chelsea Handler, we have some fantastic guests like Amelia Clark. When, like, young people come up to me and they want to be an actor or whatever.

And my first thing is always, can you think of anything else that you can do? Rather be disappointed in. Do that. David O'Yello. I love this podcast, whether it's therapy or relationships or religion or sex or addiction or you just go straight for the guts. Dennis Leary, Gaten Matarazzo from. Stranger Things, Tana M'Ju,

Camilla Morone, Carrie Kenny Silver, and more. Listen to these episodes of Dear Chelsea on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get

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