It’s one of the most celebrated albums of all time. But so much was going on during the making of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, both thanks to The Beatles‘ brilliance and the general wildness of the times, that it’s understandable if some of the minuet facts might have escaped you.
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Here are five facts about the recording of Sgt. Pepper’s that might have snuck past you! Some of them are quite bizarre, but all of them are undoubtedly Beatlesque.
Elvis Presley’s Cadillac Played a Part
Fed up with the chaos of touring, The Beatles decided to focus all their talent and ambition into the studio in 1967. That was an unusual move for a rock band to make at the time, and there was concern that they might lose connection with their audience. And that’s where the King’s influence came into play.
Presley, unable to tour because of movie commitments, sent his Cadillac around to different cities in the Southern US in 1965. Since there were elements of a live show incorporated into the structure of Sgt. Pepper’s, The Beatles imagined that they were sending the album out on tour in their place.
One Song Caused a Temporary Rift Between Paul McCartney and George Martin
The smooth working relationship between The Beatles and producer George Martin proved integral to the excellence of the band’s records. But Paul McCartney’s impatience angered Martin during the recording of “She’s Leaving Home”.
The beautiful ballad about a runaway teen required an orchestral arrangement. On the day McCartney wanted it done, Martin had another engagement. He assumed that the group would wait for him to return. But instead, McCartney asked Mike Leander insteaad, who provided the score that would end up on the finished version of the song. Martin wasn’t pleased about it.
A 14-Year-Old Was Responsible for One Song
This is on the truly fascinating side of Sgt. Pepper’s facts you may have never heard. The Beatles’ collective imagination was brimming as they made Sgt. Pepper’s, not just in terms of the overall thematic bent, but also via the songwriting. They also dipped way back to 1956 for one song.
No, it wasn’t a cover version. That was the year that Paul McCartney wrote the song “When I’m Sixty-Four” at the tender age of 14. McCartney was quite productive in those early years, with other future Fab Four songs like “I’ll Follow The Sun” and “P.S. I Love You” coming from that era as well. What’s interesting about “When I’m Sixty-Four” is how Macca was looking 50 years into the future to write the song.
The Animal Kingdom Gets Out of Hand at One Point
When you get right down to it, the stories told within the songs on Sgt. Pepper’s tend to be routine slices of life. In the case of “Good Morning Good Morning”, John Lennon’s narrator finds utter boredom in his day-to-day existence.
But as with other songs throughout the record, the music, a rush of horns and stinging electric guitar in this case, casts a special glow on the proceedings. Then, there are the special effects. At the end of “Good Morning Good Morning”, a raucous menagerie is heard. The funny part is The Beatles structured it so that each successive animal that’s heard is larger and more imposing than the one before.
You Can, as Warren Zevon Once Sang, Listen to the Air Conditioner Hum
The Beatles chose the perfect song to close out their masterpiece album. “A Day In The Life” is the song where John Lennon and Paul McCartney attempt to make sense of life and death. The music keeps building tension and then releasing it, until at last, a massive piano chord ends it all.
It was decided that the chord (achieved when the four members of the group played different pianos all at once) should last as long as possible. As the song naturally diminished, the studio faders were jacked up by engineer Geoff Emerick. By the end of it, the air conditioners within the studio were audible.
Photo by David Magnus/Shutterstock
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