During the mid-1960s, The Beatles’ influence on rock and roll reached its tipping point. Although the band may have had to leave the touring life because of how much it took out of them to play music no one would hear, the next phase of their musical evolution saw them setting up shop in the studio, creating songs that were musical works of art as opposed to throwaway pop. While the band would make great strides whenever they entered the studio, John Lennon was not impressed by one of their first masterpieces.
When looking at the band turning the studio into an instrument, their start began while they were still making the rounds on the road. Between selling out thousands of venues, The Beatles would find inspiration in going into Abbey Road Studios, creating songs that were never supposed to be reproduced live on albums like Rubber Soul.
After spending time expanding their creative consciousness, the band would go even further on Revolver, featuring their first trips into psychedelia. Not including any of the album in the live setlist, the sounds of songs like ‘Eleanor Rigby’ and ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ would be impossible to recreate in a live setting, complete with the most forward-thinking instrumentation used on a pop recording until that point.
By the time the group had a chance to breathe in 1966, they started to wonder what else they could do in the studio. Rather than bringing their shows to the masses worldwide, though, Paul McCartney devised the idea for a fictional band, crafting an album that told a story from start to finish with wild genre experiments.
Although not every member was on board with the concept, Sgt Peppers would become one of the band’s most celebrated endeavours, marrying together psychedelic rock, show tunes, and hard rock under one roof. While the entire body of work marked a peak for the ‘Summer of Love’, which was fast approaching, Lennon thought that the entire album wasn’t anything special.
When talking to engineer Geoff Emerick, Lennon recalled that the album was one of the low points for him. In the book Here There Everywhere, Emerick recalled Lennon trying to convince the engineer not to leave during the making of The White Album, saying, “We need you, man, you can’t just walk out on us in the middle of an album. I mean, everyone always says what a great record Pepper was, even though I think it’s the biggest load of shit we’ve ever done.”
Although Lennon may have been harsh in his assessment of the album, it is also home to some of the greatest songs he would ever write, like ‘Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds’ and ‘A Day in the Life’. While Lennon would recall the latter as one of his most significant collaborations with McCartney, it was becoming clear that his writing partner was steering the ship as well.
Since most of the ideas for the concept were drafted by McCartney, Lennon would occasionally discuss being behind the rest of the band, only being told to write songs once McCartney already had his compositions figured out. Lennon and McCartney may have been the foundational pieces of The Beatles, but Sgt Pepper marks the moment when Lennon’s early group domination began to shift.
