Child Of Nature

“Child Of Nature” is Beatles’ song which is now commercially available. However, this John Lennon composition evolved with different lyrics after The Beatles broke up.

White Album 50th Anniversary Edition (2018)

Written by John Lennon in 1968, the song was one those demos from George Harrison’s home in Esher, Surrey, UK. Inspiration came from a lecture by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi about a “son of the mother nature”. Because of this, Paul McCartney and Lennon both wrote songs on a similar theme. Obviously, McCartney’s song was, “Mother Nature’s Son“.

“[Paul McCartney’s song, ‘Mother Nature’s Son’] was from a lecture of Maharishi where he was talking about nature, and I had a piece called I’m Just A Child Of Nature, which turned into Jealous Guy years later. Both inspired from the same lecture of Maharishi.”

John Lennon
All We Are Saying, David Sheff

Although the song came to nothing with The Beatles, it did resurface when John Lennon went solo. Indeed, it became “Jealous Guy” on his 1972 solo album “Imagine”. Then, much later, it became a single in 1985.

The reason why the song remained undeveloped while The Beatles were still together remains unclear. However, the probability is that it was far too close to McCartney’s offering.

Recording Studio

Although the Esher demo came about during the “White Album” period, there was never any attempt to record it for that album. However, there was a second attempt to record it during the “Get Back/Let It Be” sessions. This was at the Twickenham Film Studios on the 2nd January, 1969, while partnering up with George Harrison.

The only other version we know of is from the Beatles’ Apple Studio on the 24th January, 1969. There is a 24 second snippet of this attempt available on the “Fly on the Wall bonus disc” which came with the 2003 album, “Let It Be… Naked“.

Of course, it is the demo which appears on the 2018 release of the “White Album 50th Anniversary Edition”.