The End

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Overview

Background

Pattern analysis

Recording

Mix variants & recording techniques

Documented mix variants

• 1969 UK stereo LP Abbey Road (26 September 1969, Apple [Parlophone] PCS 7088, stereo only) — Released master = the edited stereo composite from take 7, assembled across three editing sessions on 19, 21 and 25 August 1969 in Studio Two and Room 4 (Lewisohn pp. 190 — 191). P: George Martin. E: Geoff Emerick / Phil McDonald. 2E: Alan Parsons / John Kurlander. The released stereo master carries: the 23 July basic + ending section overdub (Paul piano / Ringo drum solo / John & George guitars per K/R p. 525); 5 August first vocals (Paul double-tracking lead, John and George backing per K/R p. 525); 7 August “love you” repeating vocal chant + electric guitar overdubs (Lewisohn p. 185 + K/R p. 525); 8 August drums and bass overdub (Lewisohn p. 186); 15 August 30-piece orchestral SI (Lewisohn p. 190); 18 August Paul’s four-second piano track “preceding his wonderfully philosophical line” (Lewisohn p. 190 verbatim); 19 August stereo remixes 1–3 from take 7 + crossfade/edit with Golden Slumbers / Carry That Weight; 21 August fly-in fix for out-of-sync orchestral ending + new remix 4 from take 7 (Lewisohn p. 191 + K/R p. 525); 25 August master edit (Lewisohn p. 191). Final length 2′05″ (Lewisohn p. 181 verbatim).
• 1969 US stereo LP Abbey Road (1 October 1969, Apple / Capitol SO 383, stereo only) — Same edited stereo master forwarded to Capitol for US pressing. Abbey Road was issued stereo-only worldwide; no dedicated mono LP master exists for The End.
• 30 July 1969 rough mix (unreleased, internal use) — Per K/R p. 525 verbatim: “Work then ceased for a week, until a rough mix was created on 30 July for inclusion in a ‘test edit’ of the Side Two medley”. Cut as a working reference for the medley sequencing experiment, not a commercial release.
• Anthology 3 (28 October 1996, Apple) — pre-edit version with the out-of-sync orchestral ending intact — K/R p. 525 quoted directly: “The song as it stood before editing and with the out-of-sync orchestral ending still in place can be heard on Anthology 3”. This makes the Anthology 3 alternate one of the rare cases where a Beatles compilation release documents a primary-source-attested technical defect that motivated a specific post-mix repair on the released master. Per §1, the Anthology 3 liner-note framing post-dates Lewisohn 1988; the page flags the variant with K/R’s explicit attribution rather than independently characterising it.
• 2019 Abbey Road 50th-anniversary remix (27 September 2019, Apple) — Giles Martin and Sam Okell stereo remix from the multitracks. Post-Lewisohn; documented in the album’s 50th-anniversary liner notes rather than in the primary-source canon; flagged here for completeness rather than independently characterised. (Note: the 1969 RS1 was assembled across three editing sessions with a primary-source-attested fly-in correction; the 2019 remix has more flexibility to address mix balance and orchestral timing.)

Recording techniques

• 23 July 1969 — basic + ending section, Studio Three (Lewisohn p. 181 + K/R p. 525) — Studio Three, 2.30–11.30pm. P: George Martin. E: Geoff Emerick / Phil McDonald. 2E: John Kurlander. Recording: Ending (working title of The End) (takes 1–7). Lewisohn p. 181 verbatim: “after John Lennon counted the group in — right from take one this was a tight recording, picking up with some lead guitar notes and paving the way for Ringo’s one and only drum solo on a Beatles song. The group had seven attempts at the song and, interestingly, the style of the drum solo changed with each. The final edition, take seven, was a highly effective one, the solo lasting almost 16 seconds.” Backing track per K/R p. 525 verbatim: “John and George’s guitars, Paul’s bass and Ringo’s drums”. K/R p. 525 records the ending section overdubbed onto take 7 the same evening: “Paul on piano, Ringo on drums, and John and George on guitars”. K/R p. 525 also captures Paul’s early piano lines: “brief ascending piano lines at 0:04 and 0:16”. After the 11.30pm wrap, the Beatles + George Martin + Phil McDonald + John Kurlander “trooped across to the control room of studio two for a one-hour playback, ending at 12.30am” (Lewisohn p. 181 verbatim).
• True-stereo drum miking — STC 4038 overheads (K/R p. 525) — The 23 July basic captured Ringo’s drums in genuine stereo for the first time in the Beatles catalogue. K/R p. 525 quoted directly: “for the first time, Ringo’s drums were recorded in true stereo… Ringo’s drums filled the entire stereo picture, a fact most evident during his tom work on his solo. Geoff Emerick recalls using STC 4038 microphones as stereo overheads during the recording of Abbey Road, and it is probably this track that he is remembering”. Contrast Glyn Johns’ Let It Be sessions which used two drum tracks but not stereo (bass drum left, overhead/tom/snare right). The true-stereo capture is what gives the drum solo its tom-work spatial depth in the released master.
• Ringo’s only Beatles drum solo — multitrack revelation (Lewisohn p. 181 + K/R p. 525) — The released drum solo runs ~16 seconds and sits on two of the eight tracks — a “major breakthrough” given that Beatles drum tracks usually occupied a single track (Lewisohn p. 181 verbatim). Lewisohn p. 181 also records that the final eight-track tape carries TWO LEAD GUITARS AND A TAMBOURINE alongside Ringo’s solo — both deliberately MIXED OUT for the released master “to leave the solo just that — solo”. Ringo via K/R p. 525, quoted directly: “Solos have never interested me… That drum solo is still the only one I’ve ever done… I was opposed to it: ‘I don’t want to do no bloody solo!’ The others finally talked him into it, however, and it became a highlight of the song.”
• 30 July 1969 — rough mix for the Side Two medley test edit (K/R p. 525) — A week after the 23 July basic, a rough mix of take 7 was created for inclusion in a working “test edit” of the Abbey Road Side Two medley sequencing. K/R p. 525 verbatim: “Work then ceased for a week, until a rough mix was created on 30 July for inclusion in a ‘test edit’ of the Side Two medley”. Used internally to validate medley pacing before further overdubs landed.
• 5 August 1969 — first vocals SI, Abbey Road Room 43 + Studio Two (Lewisohn p. 185 + K/R p. 525) — Abbey Road, Room 43 and Studio Two, 6.30–10.45pm (shared booking with the Because Moog overdubs — the first Beatles Moog session, with George’s Moog synthesizer fed via mono cable from Room 43 into Studio Two’s control room per Lewisohn p. 185 — the Moog model is not enumerated in either Lewisohn p. 185 or K/R p. 525). P: George Martin. E: Geoff Emerick / Phil McDonald. 2E: John Kurlander. Recording: Ending (SI onto take 7). Lewisohn p. 185 verbatim: “The final overdub on this day was of vocals for ‘The End’, the song’s first.” K/R p. 525 specifies: “Paul double-tracking his lead vocal and John and George lending backing vocals”.
• 7 August 1969 — ‘love you’ vocal chant + electric guitar overdubs, Studio Three (Lewisohn p. 185 + K/R p. 525) — Studio Three, 6.00–12.00pm. P: George Martin. E: Geoff Emerick / Phil McDonald. 2E: John Kurlander. Recording: Ending (SI onto take 7). Lewisohn p. 185 verbatim: “vocals/electric guitar overdubs for ‘The End’ in studio three”. K/R p. 525 details the vocal stack: “the repeating ‘love you’ vocal chant was recorded. Though it apparently occupies only one track on the tape, subjective listening suggests that it is, in fact, a combination of several vocal overdubs; if so, this was very likely accomplished through internal bouncing”. K/R adds: “One of these vocal overdubs onto ‘The End’ was almost certainly carried out with the machine running slightly slow, resulting in some unnaturally high vocal parts on proper playback” — a varispeed technique consistent with the Strawberry Fields Forever tape-speed manipulation tradition.
• 8 August 1969 — drums and bass overdub, Studio Two (Lewisohn p. 186) — Studio Two, 2.30–9.00pm (shared booking with the I Want You (She’s So Heavy) Moog/effects SI session and Paul’s parallel Studio Three Oh! Darling overdub). P: George Martin. E: Geoff Emerick / Phil McDonald. 2E: John Kurlander. Recording: Ending (SI onto take 7). Lewisohn p. 186 verbatim: “After the overdub of drums and bass onto ‘The End’, two sessions ran concurrently for the remainder of the evening”. Same morning as the Iain Macmillan zebra-crossing cover shoot at 10.00am (Lewisohn p. 186).
• 15 August 1969 — 30-piece orchestral SI via cross-studio CCTV, Studio One into Studio Two (control room) (Lewisohn p. 190) — Studio One into Studio Two (control room), 2.30–5.30pm. P: George Martin. E: Geoff Emerick / Phil McDonald. 2E: Alan Parsons. Recording: Ending (SI onto take 7) + parallel orchestral SI for Golden Slumbers / Carry That Weight. The same cross-studio CCTV booking covered four songs across two consecutive sessions — see Something §Mix variants for the full Lewisohn p. 190 CCTV narrative and the Phil McDonald “All right, Bert? Are you ready?” quote verbatim. The orchestra for the GSCTW + The End pair: 12 violins, 4 violas, 4 cellos, 1 string bass, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 1 trombone, 1 bass trombone (Lewisohn p. 190 verbatim) — the largest orchestration on the album. Alan Brown via Lewisohn p. 190 quoted directly: “The orchestral overdub for ‘The End’ was the most elaborate I have ever heard: a 30-piece playing for not too many seconds — and mixed about 40 dBs down. It cost a lot of money: all the musicians have to be paid, fed and watered; I screw every pound note out of it whenever I play the record!”
• 18 August 1969 — Paul’s four-second piano SI + first stereo remixes, Studio Two (Lewisohn p. 190) — Studio Two, 2.30–10.30pm. P: George Martin. E: Geoff Emerick / Phil McDonald. 2E: Alan Parsons. Recording: Ending (SI onto take 7). Stereo mixing: Ending (remixes 1–6, from take 7). Lewisohn p. 190 quoted directly: “Stereo mixing, with one new overdub: Paul’s very brief (four seconds) piano track for ‘The End’, preceding his wonderfully philosophical line ‘And, in the end / the love you take / is equal to the love you make’.” This is the piano figure heard immediately before the closing couplet — the final overdub onto take 7’s eight-track tape.
• 19 August 1969 — second stereo remix pass + GSCTW crossfade master, Studio Two (Lewisohn p. 190) — Studio Two, 2.00pm–4.00am (shared booking with the Something stereo remixes 1–10 and the one-and-only Here Comes The Sun Moog SI + 51-Hz mixdown). P: George Martin. E: Geoff Emerick / Phil McDonald. 2E: Alan Parsons. Stereo mixing: Ending (remixes 1–3, from take 7); Golden Slumbers / Carry That Weight and Ending (crossfade/edit for master). Lewisohn p. 190 verbatim flags the numbering quirk: “One other numbering confusion this day was for ‘The End’, with stereo remixes one to three being made, despite the one to six numbering of the previous day’s attempts.” The 19 August mixes produced the version that ALMOST became the released master — but listening back revealed an orchestral-timing defect that required the 21 August fly-in fix.
• 21 August 1969 — fly-in fix for the out-of-sync orchestral ending (K/R p. 525 + Lewisohn p. 191) — The stereo remix from 19 August revealed that “the timing of the orchestra was noticeably off toward the end of the dub; the last note, in particular came in well behind the beat” (K/R p. 525, quoted directly). The fix per K/R p. 525: “on 21 August the last section of the song was bounced over to a four-track tape, the backing reduced to a stereo pair on two of the tracks, and the two orchestra tracks bounced over to the other two tracks. After some slight editing by Phil McDonald, it was then Tape Op Alan Parson’s job to fly the orchestra into a new mix of the song”. Parsons via K/R p. 525, quoted directly: “That end section was flown-in. I remember that I started the four-track machine just before the string line that follows ‘...is equal to the love’. It took several attempts to get the timing right.” The original out-of-sync orchestral overdub on the eight-track tape was muted; only the time-shifted orchestra on the four-track flown-in mix was heard. Lewisohn p. 191 records the session-sheet manifestation: a new remix 4 from take 7 made that day, inserted into the finished master. The pre-fix version is preserved on Anthology 3 (1996) per K/R p. 525.
• 25 August 1969 — middle-section re-edit (Lewisohn p. 191 + K/R p. 525) — Studio Two (control room only), 2.30–8.00pm. P: George Martin. E: Geoff Emerick / Phil McDonald. 2E: Alan Parsons. Editing: Ending (of master). K/R p. 525 quoted directly on the substantive editing decisions: “Though the exact details are unclear… the mix at this point still included the four measures of lead guitar that followed [the] drum solo and preceded the main guitar solo. It was decided to remove those bars and replace them with an edit piece that omitted the lead guitar. At the same time, [a decision] was made to lengthen the space between the drum solo and guitar solo. To accomplish this, Phil McDonald and Geoff Emerick created a new mix of the middle section, omitting the guitar solos completely. Several measures were then edited into the [same] mix [with] guitars, extending the song significantly.” K/R p. 525 quantifies the result: “The original 22 bars of the middle section were extended to 28 bars by duplicating sections via edit pieces”. Per K/R’s breakdown: edit piece (Bar 1 to Bar 6) at 0:34–0:46 + edit piece (Bar 9 to the fifth eighth-note of Bar 12) at 0:46–0:53 + original mix (sixth eighth-note of Bar 4 to Bar 22) at 0:53–1:29. K/R notes one continuity tell: “the backing track and ‘love you’ vocals heard from [bar X] are in fact exact duplicates of those heard behind the guitar solo from 1:02–1:09; to partially hide this fact, Geoff Emerick panned the vocals Right in the newly inserted measures, panning them back Left just before the edit into the guitar solo section”.
• Take 7 eight-track layout (K/R p. 525 diagram) — Per the K/R take-7 diagram (printed p. 525): the final eight-track carries drums spread across two tracks (the breakthrough stereo capture); bass; electric guitars; ending-section electric guitars; vocals; orchestra; and tambourine. Two tracks for drums was unprecedented in the Beatles catalogue (Lewisohn p. 181 — “On Beatles recordings the drums only usually occupied one”), and the tape-routing decision to dedicate two tracks to drums is what enabled the released drum-solo’s tom-work stereo image.
• Length arc — 1′20″ basic → 2′41″ with overdubs → 2′05″ released (Lewisohn p. 181) — Lewisohn p. 181 verbatim: “The ‘best’ take, seven, was only 1′20″ in duration at this stage. Later additions like a lengthy lead guitar solo, more drums, an orchestra, vocals and a piano track doubled that duration to 2′41″, although tight editing of the best mix brought it back down to 2′05″”. The released 2′05″ is the post-25-August re-edit length — net SHORTER than the 2′41″ pre-edit length despite the middle-section being extended by six bars, because other material was tightened or removed in the same pass.
• Stereo only — no mono LP master — Abbey Road was issued stereo-only worldwide; the EMI stereo-mandate that had been softening through 1968 was fully in force by mid-1969 (see also Here Comes The Sun, Something, Come Together). No dedicated mono The End mix exists in the primary-source canon; period mono airplay copies are stereo-fold-downs not separately created mono masters.
• Source conflict per §1 — whether the K/R middle-section edit description is mappable bar-for-bar to the released master. Kehew & Ryan p. 525 acknowledges uncertainty explicitly — “Though the exact details are unclear” — and presents the 22-bars-to-28-bars and edit-piece-timing reconstruction as their best inference from listening rather than as session-sheet-attested fact. Lewisohn p. 191’s 25 August session header records the editing event but does not enumerate the bar-level reconstruction. Per §1 less-specific-when-uncertain, the page records K/R’s reconstruction as the most detailed primary-source-adjacent account of the released master’s middle-section structure but does not present it as session-sheet fact.

Legacy & release history

Mono & stereo

• Stereo only on UK release — the band's last three LPs were mixed for stereo; no UK mono LPs were issued.

Documented alternate versions

• 2009 Stereo Remasters — Allan Rouse / Guy Massey remaster
• Abbey Road 50th Anniversary (2019) — Giles Martin stereo remix

Released on

• Abbey Road — LP, 26 September 1969

Cross-references

Other songs sharing themes (only-ringo-solo, trade-off-solos, closing-couplet)

Other songs led by the same vocalist

Other songs from this era

only-ringo-solotrade-off-solosclosing-couplet

Related songs