Magical Mystery Tour

I think everyone knows that this year is the fiftieth anniversary of The Beatles' classic album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. I wrote about it's fortieth anniversary ten years ago. But The Beatles released another album in 1967 that I think is better than Sgt. Pepper, even though it is not a true album, but half a film score and half a collection of singles.

Magic Mystery Tour was released in November of '67. The Beatles had made a movie of that title, which is almost completely unwatchable, and written some songs for it. Those occupy side one, but what to do about side two? (In Britain, it was released as EPs, which were not popular in the U.S.). So side 2 was a gathering of singles that had not appeared yet on an album. This is where the album soars.

I have a special attachment to this record because it is one of the first albums I bought with my own money. I was about 13, and earned money mowing my grandfather's lawn. He paid me four dollars, and I felt rich. I went to Crowley's department store (department stores used to have record departments, some still do) and bought it. I remember the moment to this day.

Side one kicks off with the title song, a rollicking introduction to the film and an okay song by Beatles standards. Then comes Paul's "Fool on the Hill," which Robert Christgau called the worst Beatles song ever (even worse that "Mr. Moonlight?") I'll admit the lyrics are horrible, but I don't think it's terrible. It is indication of how much the mellotron had become part of their instrument case.

Then comes the oddity "Flying," which is unique in a couple of ways: it is an instrumental, and it is credited to all four Beatles. It has a small charm to it. Following "Flying" is George's "Blue Jay Way,' which despite it's eerie sound is a straightforward tale of how he was waiting for a friend (Derek Taylor) to arrive at his rented house in the Hollywood Hills while he was struggling with jet lag. When I was taking a Hollywood tour we came across the street and I asked the tour guide about it. He said the signs were stolen all the time.

Next up is one of Paul's songs that John derided as "Granny music," "Your Mother Should Know" (it has the distinction of being the final song if you list their songs in alphabetical order--they never wrote a song beginning with Z). Paul loved old music hall-style songs, witness "Honey Pie," and "Maxwell's Silver Hammer." It's fine, but nothing great.

Then comes a song that ws in the movie, but also a single, "I Am the Walrus." What does it say about me that this is my favorite Beatles' song? I wrote a paper about it in college. Mostly it is nonsense, in the vein of Lewis Carroll, whom John loved. The opening riff was taken from the sound a British police car siren makes. The song is sort of an alphabet soup of random words--John was amused that professors were giving courses on Beatle lyrics, so he challenged them to figure this one out. Some of the lines have meaning, such as "Element'ry penguin singing Hare Krishna," which a knock on that cult. But what to make of "Semolina pilchard, climbing up the Eiffel Tower?" Semolina, I learned way back when, is a kind of wheat, and pilchard is a fish.

The end of the song includes singers making mock laughter, and snatches of a BBC radio production of King Lear. Did John just turn on the radio to record whatever was on? As I wrote in my paper almost forty years ago, King Lear was Shakespeare's play about madness. And the line, "O, untimely death" would have a poignant meaning in 1980 when John was murdered.

Side 2 is the singles side. The A-side of "I Am the Walrus" was "Hello Goodbye," which is basic Paul but highlighted by the coda, which I believe was inspired by something called a "Tyrolean cadence." This is followed by perhaps the album's greatest masterpiece, "Strawberry Fields Forever." This was John's favorites of his, and an allusion to his youth when he and his mates played near an orphanage called Strawberry Fields. Paul wrote the somber introduction, and then John wrote the somewhat cryptic lyrics: "Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see." The orchestration of this song, with strings, bongos, and brass, plus great drumming by Ringo, make it one of the best Beatle recordings of all time. And that spasm of music at the end, in which we hear John say something--some say it's "I buried Paul," John says it was "Cranberry sauce." They always maintained a mystery about themselves.

Next up was Paul's bit of nostalgia, "Penny Lane," which is a real street in Liverpool (another place where street signs kept getting stolen) that does have a "shelter in the middle of the roundabout." The song is completely charming--I could listen to it over and over again, and is one of Paul's best vocals. It does have one line that invites philosophical musing: "The pretty nurse is selling poppies from a tray. If she feels as if she's in a play, she is any way."

The penultimate song is "Baby, You're a Rich Man," which has an Indian flavor, courtesy of a keyboard sounding like an oboe. It's one of those songs that John and Paul stitched together--Paul had the chorus, John was working on the "How does it feel to be one the beautiful people," which was a shout out to the hippies in Haight-Ashbury.

The album ends with "All You Need Is Love," one of The Beatles most iconic songs. It was written for a television show, and they were asked to write something with a simple message. Today it might seem trite and naive to think "All you need is love," but there's a sweet optimism to it. The Beatles lip-synched to the record on TV, accompanied by a live orchestra and several big names in rock, like Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, and Keith Moon in the chorus. There are several cameos of other songs--it starts with "La Marseilles" and in the coda we hear "All Together Now," "Yesterday" "She Loves You," and the song some credit to Henry VIII, "Greensleeves."

I've heard this record hundreds of times, and I listened to it on repeat in the car (my new school is a slightly longer drive, so I get to hear more music). So I spent more time listening to the instruments, and especially Ringo's drumming. He was such an underrated drummer. He hardly ever got a drum solo (I can only think of one, in "The End") but had an uncanny feel for a song. His drumming on "Blue Jay Way" and "Strawberry Fields Forever" matches up with any of the other great drummers of the day. He did not get a song to sing on this record, but his presence is very much felt.