George Harrison once threatened to sue Ringo Starr as drummer’s cover was ‘so bad’

George Harrison once threatened to sue The Beatles‘ drummer and his friend, Ringo Starr, because of a dreadful cover song.

Starr was set to release a cover of a Harrison track, I’ll Still Love You, on his fifth studio album. Ringo’s Rotogravure was set to be a collection of cover songs written by his friends, with tracks written by Paul McCartney and Eric Clapton featured. But a track he had selected from Harrison’s backlog caused a rift between the pair, as the so-called quiet one of The Beatles didn’t like Starr’s interpretation of the track. Though Harrison had agreed to let Starr use I’ll Still Love You, the song soon turned sour. It would appear on Ringo’s Rotogravure, but Harrison took his friend to court over the interpretation of his song. Starr would say he enjoyed the song thoroughly, hence his desire to cover the song.

He said of I’ll Still Love You: “I remembered the song from 1970. I always loved it and no one ever did it.” He would go on to tell NME he had asked for contributions from all three of the ex-Beatles, as well as Clapton. He said: “Well, Paul asked to write a song. I asked John and eventually he came up with You Got Me Cooking.

“I also asked George to write one, but there was an old one of his that was never released by anybody that I always loved. I asked him if, instead of writing one, could I have that old one? He said fine; it saved him a job. It’s called I Still Love You, a big ballady thing.”

But after hearing the final product, Harrison was “not happy” and decided to enter a legal pursuit against Starr. The pair settled the matter out of court, the results of which were undisclosed. Despite the potential legal battle between the pair, Starr and Harrison would remain close until the latter’s death in 2001.

It’s not the only internal drama with The Beatles after their break-up, with Starr once calling Paul McCartney “petty” for trying to change the Lennon-McCartney songwriting credit.

McCartney once said: “Lennon and McCartney is still the rock’n’roll trademark I’m proud to be a part of – in the order it has always been.” But a year before his statement, he caused controversy by flipping the credit on his live album, Back in the U.S., much to the annoyance of Lennon’s widow, Yoko Ono. Even peace-loving Starr weighed in on the credit controversy, saying McCartney’s actions were “petty and silly.”

Ono would bring a threat of legal action to McCartney, who backed down and has accepted the credit is stuck for good. Speaking to The Guardian at the time, McCartney said: “It snowballed. People were phoning me up saying, ‘You’re doing yourself no favours with this, you know.’

“I was like, ‘What are you talking about?’ ‘Well, you know, you want to knock John’s name out. He’s dead. It’s terrible: you’re walking on a dead man’s grave.’ I was like, ‘Get the fuck out of here.'”