The Beatles and the album ‘Revolver’

A still relevant band in the history of Rock and Roll, The Beatles released their seventh album Revolver on August 5th, 1966. Song writing duties with this album included John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison, with drummer Ringo Starr getting to sing. Tune in for the fourteen (14) songs that are this phenomenal album, with the initial song offering a surprise.

(The album cover for Revolver by The Beatles, which was released August 5th, 1966).

Opening Revolver with Taxman is a bold choice in giving voice to the quality of the songwriting offered by George Harrison. Inspired musically by the theme song for the 1960s television series Batman (1966-1968), the song was complained “about how much money The Beatles were paying in taxes,” as mentioned here.

Eleanor Rigby is a story that wrote itself lyrically in pieces, McCartney said as quoted here about the opening line, “It just came. When I started doing the melody I developed the lyric.” McCartney added that he “wasn’t sure what the song was going to be about until he came up with the line “picks up the rice in a church where a wedding has been.””

(Eleanor Rigby was released as a double A-side single with Yellow Submarine in support of the album Revolver by The Beatles).

John Lennon wrote I’m Only Sleeping, as mentioned here, “as a tribute to staying in bed, which he liked to do even when he wasn’t sleeping.” The notion of backwards guitar playing, as done on this song, was suggested by George Harrison after “a studio engineer accidentally flipped a tape and Harrison was amazed at the effect.”

Beyond Ringo Starr on tambourine, Love You To, George Harrison was “likely the only Beatle to play on the track,” as stated here. This song was “the first one George Harrison wrote on sitar.”

(Writing credit for Love You To went to George Harrison, pictured here. Harrison also wrote Taxman and I Want to Tell You).

Here, There and Everywhere invokes beautiful harmonies, having been “at least partly inspired by The Beach Boys‘ song “God Only Knows“” while “Paul McCartney…was lounging at John Lennon‘s pool,” as mentioned here. McCartney would add that the harmonizing came through in this song due to the inspiration of the mentioned song.

Yellow Submarine, as Paul McCartney is quoted here as having said shortly after the song’s release, “is very simple but very different. It’s a fun song, a children’s song…Paul purposely used short words in the lyrics because he wanted kids to pick it up early and sing along.”

(Ringo Starr sang Yellow Submarine, a song written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney).

She Said She Said introduces the psychedelic point-of-view associated with the album. As stated here, this “song was inspired by the actor Peter Fonda, who was on an acid trip along with George Harrison and John Lennon while they were together at a party. Accounts vary as to how events unfolded, but there is a consensus that Fonda kept saying “I know what it’s like to be dead,” which ended up being a key line in [an opening] lyric” for the song.

Good Day Sunshine is stated here as having been inspired by The Lovin’ Spoonful song Daydream. “[P]roducer George Martin added the piano solo on a tape recorder running a step slower so [the song] would sound sped-up,” adding to “the same traditional, almost trad-jazz feel” that McCartney reportedly wanted with Good Day Sunshine.

And Your Bird Can Sing includes a couple of interesting yet widely varying interpretations about meaning, at least as speculated at here. One points to Mick Jagger of The Rolling Stones while the other points to Frank Sinatra. The musicality of this song is quite strong, with the notes of the instruments and John Lennon‘s singing being of additional note.

For No One was written “in a chalet while on holiday” by Paul McCartney, as noted here. That McCartney had been dating Jane Asher at the point in time, and her schedule was sufficiently full to cause relationship conflict can be seen to explain the lyrics.

(From left, the primary song writers for The Beatles were Paul McCartney and John Lennon).

Doctor Robert invokes “Doctor Robert Freymann, a “Speed Doctor” in New York who supplied many celebrities, including The Beatles, with drugs,” as stated here. “John Lennon did indeed peg this song as autobiographical, stating in interviews that he was the one who carried a pocket full of pills on tour. However, both he and Paul McCartney deny going to this specific doctor, but say that this song was kind of a piss-take at the idea, which struck them as funny.”

I Want to Tell You gets into the songwriting difficulty George Harrison sometimes encountered. Thematically, the song is” [a]bout the avalanche of thoughts that are so hard to write down or say or transmit,” as noted here.

Got to Get You Into My Life reportedly does not wax about love. As quoted here, “[t]his beatific love song is actually about marijuana.” Paul McCartney added that “I’d been a rather straight working-class lad but when we started to get into pot it seemed to me to be quite uplifting.”

The title for Tomorrow Never Knows “came from an expression Ringo Starr used,” as reported here. Adding to the psychedelic persona for the album, “[t]he proper idiom is “tomorrow never comes,” meaning that when tomorrow arrived, it would become today. Ringo‘s variation of the phrase took the edge off the heavy philosophical lyrics.”

Additional musicians on Revolver by The Beatles included Neil Aspinall on vocals, Anil Bhagwat on tabla, Anvil Bhagwat on tabla, Alan Branscombe on tenor saxophone, Alan Civil on French Horn and horn, Peter Coe on tenor saxophone, Les Conlon on trumpet, Geoff Emerick on vocals, Mal Evans on vocals, Tony Gilbert on violin, Ian Hammer on trumpet, Patti Harrison on vocals, Jurgen Hess on violin, Norman Jones on cello, George Martin on organ, piano and vocals, Sidney Sax on violin, John Sharpe on violin, Stephen Shingles on viola, Derrick “Duckie” Simpson on cello, Eddie “Tan Tan” Thornton on trumpet and John Underwood on viola.

Matt – Saturday, August 5, 2023