It Was 40 Years Ago Today

This week is the fortieth anniversary of the release of The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, one of the epochal albums in the history of popular music. Perhaps no other record album has been written about, discussed, or pored over more than this one. A few years ago Rolling Stone magazine named it the greatest album of all time.

After forty years, there is bound be to some reassessment. Over the past few days I've read a few essays, one by Aimee Mann in the New York Times, another in Salon, questioning the accolades this album has received. Mann's article is a personal one, describing her love of the album as a young girl, but her inability to listen to it now, comparing it to a first love. David Marchese's article in Salon expresses a puzzlement over its continued reputation as somehow representative of the 1960s, and considers it overhyped. Then there's Jim DeRogatis, a Chicago rock critic, who a few years ago wrote an essay that dismisses the album entirely, summed up by these words: "It sucks dogs royally."

So, is Sgt. Pepper overrated? The Beatles are my favorite musical group of all time, regardless of genre, and in the face of such reflection I'm forced to step back and do some reassessing of my own. I've never consider Sgt. Pepper their best album, I suppose Abbey Road would be my choice if I had to make one, but I've never harbored hostile feelings about the 1967 release that turned the rock music world on its ear. To be honest, the album is a bit more than the sum of its parts. If you take it track by track, as DeRogatis does, it is wanting. Getting Better, Fixing a Hole, and Good Morning Good Morning are probably in the lower third of all Beatles' songs. George Harrison, fully into his Indian music phase, takes up five minutes of wasted space with Within You, Without You, which frankly isn't all that interesting.

With a Little Help From My Friends and Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds are, to my mind, underproduced, as evident by the superior cover versions by Joe Cocker and Elton John, respectively. The title song and its reprise, Being For the Benefit of Mr. Kite, and When I'm Sixty-Four are pleasant diversions, but not earth-shattering.

That leaves two genuine classics: She's Leaving Home and A Day in the Life. She's Leaving Home is dismissed by DeRogatis as syrupy nonsense, and in the cold light of forty years later, the lyrics do seem a bit facile. But The Beatles were creatures of their time and class. Men born in the 40s, they knew life in England as it once was. Many of their songs are influenced by music hall and other remnants of the war era. Today, a line like "Fun is the one thing money can't buy" seems so simplistic as to be moronic, but I've always thought of the song as the flip side of the hippie rebellion, told from the point of view of two drab, middle-class English people who wake up to find their daughter has split, maybe to go wear flowers in her hair. But beyond the lyrics, I love the orchestration of this song. Following Eleanor Rigby, it's another example of how they used the string quartet so brilliantly.

Every critic who knocks this record can't say anything bad about A Day in the Life, one of the Beatles' greatest creations, so I find no need to defend it here.

Was Sgt. Pepper a concept album? I don't think so. If it had included Strawberry Fields Forever and Penny Lane, as it was supposed to, it would have been clearer that this was a record about nostalgia. Was this record representative of its time period? Not really. There's no songs about Vietnam, or overt drug use (though most assume Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds is about LSD), and the musical style seems doggedly retro. Is it the greatest rock album of all time? No, but I'd say it's in the top twenty.

Aimee Mann makes a good point when she says she can't listen to it anymore. I can, but do I hear it anymore when I listen to it? How many times can you listen to an album before it starts to lose meaning? I bought the record in about 1975, when it was already old news, and I've probably heard it over a hundred times. Familiarity may have lessened its impact for me, but I'm not of the opinion that it has lessened its impact upon the history of music.

Comments

  1. The Beatles are my favorite group, too, and it's hard for me to objectively assess Sgt. Pepper. I would be willing to say it just might be the greatest rock album of all time, but I'm not sure it's my favorite--kinda like judging the greatest film of all time versus which one you've watched the most number of times.

    It may be my favorite Beatles album, but that's hard for me to judge, too. I'm just as likely to want to hear Magical Mystery Tour (which benefits from its hodgepodge inclusion of some great singles for its flip-side), or parts of The Beatles (the White Album) or Help!. Revolver is a great album. Abbey Road is an album I might volunteer as over-rated, but that's because it became way too familiar to me from how much it was overplayed on the radio when I was growing up.

    But the Beatles albums that most excited me when they were released on CD were Sgt. Pepper's (which got some deluxe treatment, natch) and the White Album.

    Jackrabbit--how can you call the Joe Cocker (ack!) and Elton John covers superior!?!? I used to prefer Elton's "Lucy" as a kid, but I haven't been able to go back to it in a long time--it just seems too poppy. And I can't stand Joe Cocker, so that's just my personal taste. Ahh well.

    "With a Little Help" and "Lucy" are two of the best songs on the record, and they pack a double-wallop as they follow each other, and come on the heels of the sit-up-and-take-notice title track.

    "She's Leaving Home," "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite," and "When I'm Sixty-Four" are all okay. And "A Day in the Life" might be over-rated, maybe. I think I almost prefer "Good Morning" to it.

    But I really dig "Lovely Rita."

    And what's always amazed me that hasn't gotten more notice is how the birth of heavy metal rock can be traced almost directly to the guitar riffs in the title track (though I know fans of the Kinks and the Who may disagree). And the "Reprise" version may be my favorite recording on the album--I can put that on repeat and listen to it over and over.

    Which reminds me--anyone who says they're a fan of Pepper had better find a way to give a listen to the mono mix of the album if they've never heard it. That's the real version.

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  2. I'm not a big Joe Cocker fan, but I think his version has a lot more emotion and soul to it. And the Beatles' Lucy has a kind of tinny sound, while Elton went nuts with it.

    I used to think Magical Mystery Tour was my favorite album, but as you point out, it's only half an album, as side 2 is a singles collection. Still, track for track, it's probably the best. But I love Abbey Road, especially side two. One benefit with the CD version is the very end of I Want You (She's So Heavy) goes right into the opening notes of Here Comes the Sun, which is a divine transition. Of course, there is no bad Beatles album. There is hardly a bad Beatles song (Mr. Moonlight is a contender, but I think they were goofing around. Same with You Know My Name, Look Up the Number).

    A Day in the Life is fucking brilliant, among the ten best songs they ever recorded, so says I.

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  3. For clarification, here's one man's list of the Top Ten Beatles songs: (in alphabetical order). Others are invited to share there's

    1. A Day in the Life
    2. Eleanor Rigby
    3. For No One
    4. Here Comes the Sun
    5. Hey, Jude
    6. I Am the Walrus
    7. In My Life
    8. Norwegian Wood
    9. Ticket to Ride
    10. Yesterday

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  4. McCartney's bass line in "With a Little Help From My Friends" completely overwhelms for me any of the shortcomings in Ringo's vocal performance. There's also a more soulful cover of "Help!" out there, too (by Ray Charles? Natalie Cole?), but the original was designed to be an upbeat single, so I don't fault it too much.

    And "Lucy" becomes hypnotic when you listen to the dense instrumentation humming along just before Ringo's drum intros to the chorus. I just don't get that from Sir Elton.


    "Mr. Moonlight" still makes me wince. I always liked "You Know My Name" because I thought it was a soundtrack to a skit telling the life story of a pop song, and it's fun picturing them playing it.

    Anyway, wow, Top Ten Beatles songs. That's tough. I used to say "Ticket To Ride," but then last year I worked up the courage to admit "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (reprise)," believe it or not. Maybe I'll start there and see how I do, just off the top of my head:

    1. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (reprise)
    2. Ticket to Ride
    3. Something
    4. In My Life
    5. Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields Forever (a tie for 5)
    7. Lovely Rita
    8. Long Tall Sally (that EP may indeed have been some kind of pinnacle, at least in energetic recording, for the Beatles)
    9. And Your Bird Can Sing
    10. What You're Doing

    I'm looking at this and thinking, wow, that could use a lot of revision. It could take a long long time to get it just right....

    How could I leave out "I Want To Hold Your Hand"? The mono mix of that one really really rocks.

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  5. That's a good list. Of all the cover songs they did, I prefer Twist and Shout to Long Tall Sally. John's vocal is fantastic. I had a tough time leaving I Want to Hold Your Hand off, too.

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  6. Thanks, Jackrabbit. For a little while there I felt like I did in the heady early days of rec.music.beatles. (Does anyone remember USENET anymore?)

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  7. Anonymous5:07 PM

    The Philadelphia Inquirer music critic added his "overrated" opinion to the heap, but he tends to be self-congratulatory when he feels he's going against the establishment. Who cares? It's not my favorite, but I still love it. "She's Leaving Home" impresses me with the tiny details in the song-I always picture it while I listen. And yes,the strings are great. Here's my top ten.
    1. In My Life
    2. Here Comes the Sun
    3. Yesterday
    4. I Am the Walrus
    5. You Can't Do That
    6. While My Guitar Gently Weeps
    7. A Day in the Life
    8. Things We Said Today
    9. Penny Lane
    10. You've Got To Hide Your Love Away

    Number 10 is partly because it's the reason I developed my crush on John. Sigh.

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  8. Yeah, "Things We Said Today." I always like pairing that one up with "If I Needed Someone."

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