"SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND"
THE BEATLES
All music and lyrics by John Lennon and Paul McCartney
except "Within You Without You" music and lyrics by George Harrison
Produced by George Martin
Released June 1, 1967
Dear listeners, just look at that release date. 46 years ago on this date, this album was released to the world and music was changed forever once again.
I have often expressed (and I know that I will continue to do so on this site) that I have long wished to have been able to have experienced particular pieces of art, whether books, cinema or music, when they originally appeared in the world. The Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" is high on that personal list. But even so, as I sit and ruminate that this piece of musical artistry has been with us for 46 years years now, I am slowly realizing that it almost doesn't even matter that I didn't experience this album when the world first did. It only matters that I experienced it at all. The "when" of the experience is irrelevant, especially for something like this that is the prime example of something being of its time but is also something timeless. "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" is music for the ages.
My introduction to "Sgt. Pepper" occurred sometime in 1978 but it was actually not through the iconic album. It was, in fact, entirely through the universally maligned musical fantasy film of the same name from Director Michael Schultz and starring Peter Frampton and The Bee Gees as live action version of characters from Beatles songs parading through a candy colored rock opera adventure sans dialogue. To this day, I believe that I was the one person on the planet who loved that film. I loved it so much that I was obsessed with it and I only had the chance to see it once, partially because my family just didn't see films more than once in the theater usually (and I am certain that my Dad would not have tolerated the attempt of sitting through it a second time, especially as he bowed out midway through the first viewing and waited it out in the lobby), and most likely because the film was such a massive box office flop that I never would have had a chance to have a repeat viewing anyway. At any rate, my inner world was all about that movie, the sights, the visuals, the story and most absolutely, the songs, which I listened to constantly on the film's soundtrack, which I had on 8 track tape!
One day, my Dad returned from wherever he was with a gift for me. He pulled it out of the brown paper bag and I was surprised to find a record album. "This is 'Sgt. Pepper'," he said. "This is the original." He pulled off the plastic and opened the gatefold to reveal the sight of four men in the costume emulated to near perfection in the feature film I adored. My Dad pointed to the picture and said to me, "These are The Beatles." And then pointing to each member, he asked me, "Do you know who these people are?"
I studied the photograph and I do remember instantly identifying Paul McCartney, possibly because he was so visible and present through his band Wings. Then, I questioned and pointed to another member and said, "Is his name John?"
"Yes. That is John Lennon," my Dad replied.
Pointing to a third, i said, "He's the drummer, right?"
"That's Ringo Starr," he answered. And when I showed some confusion as to the identity of the fourth and final member, my dad proceeded to give the the missing name of George Harrison. My Dad placed the record onto the stereo and I began to listen.
The experience of listening to the original version of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" took me upon a musically adventurous path that I could never have anticipated. My curiosity about The Beatles, the individual members and these songs, my God, these songs, led me both forwards to all of their albums, one-by-one, and even backwards to the albums that my Dad already had within his collection and were actually played for me when I was an infant. The connection between myself and The Beatles was unquestionably primal as over several years, veritable Beatlemania raged within my house, propelling the band to become my favorite musical group of all time while also driving my Mother to intense irritation. My love for The Beatles eventually forged my status as a life long Anglophile who has housed dreams of one day travelling overseas to visit England one day. But I am getting ahead of myself...
Back to the album at hand, I just cannot express enough how beautiful of an experience The Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" is. While its status as the "first concept album" is debatable, McCartney's idea of having The Beatles write and record an album as if in the guise of fictional characters was a masterstroke as it creatively opened up the endlessly curious band unlike ever before. With the plucking of strings and the low murmur of an audience awaiting a performance, the album begins, as if a theater curtain has opened majestically revealing the titular band performing its instantly catchy theme song and followed by the excited screams with the announcement of singer Billy Shears (played by Starr) for the enormously engaging "With A Little Help from My Friends." This album could not have begun any better, to my ears.
"Sgt. Pepper" is gorgeously sequenced, so much so that if just one song were in a different place, the fantasia and musical pixie dust would immediately dissipate and with nearly every track cloaked with an audible echo, merged with audience effects, every moment feels as if we are hearing a live theatrical performance by this fictional band. "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" takes us magically into an audio dream world, while the two sided coin of "Getting Better" and "Fixing A Hole" bring some rock and almost vaudevillian energy to the proceedings.
Truth be told, I never much enjoyed "She's Leaving Home" as a child. It all felt to be so melodramatic with Producer George Martin's weepy orchestrations. But over time, the melancholic beauty of the piece has become blissfully overwhelming to me and I can easily understand how this track was influenced and inspired by Brian Wilson's iconic work on The Beach Boys' "Pet Sounds" (released May 16, 1966) and how this song also inspired Wilson to begin work on what I and many believe to be his greatest musical achievement the long gestating, deeply troubled, abandoned and majestically resurrected "SMiLE," Wilson's self-described "teenage symphony to God." McCartney's tearful story of a girl sneaking away from her doting parents to take up with "a man from the motor trade," was elegantly told and when he and Lennon trade lead vocals, as the song's narrator and the parents, respectfully, the song perfectly expresses the then widening cultural generation gap without judgement and completely with empathy for both sides of the story.
While the idea and many of the songs on "Sgt. Pepper" sprung from Paul McCartney's brain, I think perhaps John Lennon was the one who took the concept to its furthest sonic reaches as his songs tended to fly through the looking glass the most via head spinning word play combined with a psychedelic wall of sound. "Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite" is a magical fairground odyssey whose swirling keyboards and vivid lyrics bring the circus to life so absurdly well that you can almost smell the sawdust and hear the hoof steps of circus horses in the distance. That song's transition into Harrison's metaphysical "Within You Without You" could not be any more perfect as we ascend into an astral plane that was completely lost on me as a child (so much so that I tended to skip the track altogether) but masterfully makes complete sense to me as an adult, in terms of its spiritual message as well as its presence within this cornucopia of sound.
The theatrical showtune of "When I'm Sixty Four," the gentle sexual ambiguities of "Lovely Rita" and the breakfast cereal jingles of "Good Morning, Good Morning" bring us back to Earth and the theater curtain closes to rapturous applause with a reprise of the theme song from the fictional band, who energetically yet sorrowfully express to us, "We're sorry but it's time to go."
And then, as the patrons leave the theater, The Beatles return to us with surprise and awe with the dark return to reality with Lennon's apocalyptic "A Day In The Life." The more I think about it, the more I am just gobsmacked that The Beatles chose to conclude to end their childlike dream world with such an adult nightmare. John Lennon tale of a news story about "a lucky man who made the grade" who later "blew his mind out in a car" is a jaw dropper, a masterpiece that truly sobers the listener to the harshness of the real world as expressed by the cacophony of orchestral sounds that builds to an explosive crescendo. "A Day In The Life" suggests that The Beatles were savvy enough to present themselves not only as optimistic dreamers but also as matter of fact realists and that duality and dichotomy plays out entirely within the song itself as McCartney's section of the song exists in a spellbinding conflict. His character wakes up late and races for the morning bus, takes a hit of pot (presumably) and floats off into a dream only to have George Martin's storm cloud orchestrations bring him crashing back to Earth, jolting him awake with a sweat drenched start. Lennon returns as the narrator, bringing the song to its conclusion which again finds us within the terrifying path of the orchestral crescendo which this time, ends with all four Beatles playing the same piano chord as if the world itself has exploded into oblivion.
It would seem that "A Day In The Life" serves no purpose on an album like "Sgt. Pepper" and perhaps The Beatles should have left that song as a stand alone single. But, I really believe that without "A Day In The Life," the album as a whole would not work at all as what The Beatles achieved was to create a rock album as an artistic expression of life and how it is lived. What is the act of going to a show, a movie, concert or even delving into a book and then returning from that experience to the real world but the exact experience as presented within this landmark album? It is telling the story of one listening to the album while you are also listening to the same album. Brilliant. Just absolutely brilliant.
If people of the i-tunes generation have not already done so, I would strongly urge them to unplug every other device they have and listen to "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" from beginning to end and take the journey and explore the album, not as a collection of singles, but as an artistic work that must be digested in its entirety. I feel so fortunate that I came of age with the album and how the experience of listening to the album without distraction was the event, in and of itself. I feel that has truly been lost over time as newer artists have not mastered that art and the industry has made its shift back towards singles created by production teams and anonymously disposable "singers." The more time passes, the greater the wonderment of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" and the astonishing career and artistic trajectory of The Beatles continues to be as the album in an embodiment of a time when anything seemed possible in rock and roll.
And as I listen to it now, I remain hopeful as I think that we really could return to that magical time and re-create it in the 21st century and change music forever all over again. I would LOVE to be a first hand witness to something like that!
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