ELO founder Jeff Lynne has been a Beatles fan from the time the band hit the charts till now. Over the years, he's not only produced George Harrison, Ringo Starr, and Paul McCartney separately and collectively, he co-founded the Traveling Wilburys with Harrison in 1988 and was behind the board for the Beatles' 1995 Anthology reunion tracks.
Lynne spoke about his admiration for the Beatles and was asked about his long and storied relationship with the group and its music, telling Classic Rock magazine, “I’ve had lots of luck when it comes to the Beatles. When I was recording with (my band) the Idle Race in London in 1968, a friend of our engineer phoned the studio to say he was working on a Beatles session at Abbey Road. He told us we could go down there to have a look if we wanted. . . I saw Paul and Ringo in Studio Three, doing a piano and vocal. Then I got invited into Studio Two, where John (Lennon) and George were in the control room. Down below, in the actual studio, George Martin was hurling himself around this pedestal, conducting the string section for 'Glass Onion.'”
He went on to say, “I was blown away. Nobody had heard it yet, but there I was in Abbey Road, actually listening to it being made. I stayed for maybe half an hour, then I thought it would be polite to leave, because you feel a bit of a d*** in that company. So I went back to where the Idle Race were recording and, of course, it didn’t sound quite so good.”