In 1967, the Beatles created their undisputed masterpiece, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. This is the Beatles’ mescaline record. It’s a radically different departure from anything that had come before. He created a world of his own, a world of sounds and sound textures never heard before. Its very form was radical in that it had no singles, no gaps between individual songs, sound effects, enough of the overall theme to be considered an early form of concept record, and even a weird beat at the end.
The world of Sgt. Pepper’s was a brightly colored one and reflected or led the world from a gray-suited existence with black-and-white television, magazines, and even movies to one of Technicolor movies, color photos in magazines, color television, and the acceptability of Adult men to choose clothes. in colors other than black, gray, brown, or navy blue.
Songs on Sgt. Pepper’s include the metaphor for an acid trip, Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds, another surreal-sounding song about a carnival (as a metaphor for a psychedelic experience?), Being For The Benefit Of Mister Kite, and a song with an instrumental interlude that is the sonic interpretation of astral projection or “traveling” or going “into a dream”, A Day in Your Life.
Once again, as with Love You To on Revolver, George Harrison delved into Indian music and this time he not only relied on sound to convey a sense of spirituality, but the lyrics matched on Within You Without You.
Paul McCartney was accused of writing a song about hard drug use with Fixing A Hole, but fans tended to get carried away, although there’s no denying that Ringo claims he “gets high with a little help from my friends.”
An undeniable psychedelic masterpiece, Sgt. Pepper’s is still just the Beatles’ mescaline. The full force of his journey was yet to come.
Magical Mystery Tour is the Beatles’ acid trip album. Substitute the word “travel” for the word “tour” in the title and you’ll have a better representation of what this record is really about. Like a true psychedelic experience, this album was not planned but simply developed. One side of the US release is the soundtrack to the Beatles’ TV special EP which premiered on the BBC on the English holiday of Boxing Day. The second side is a collection of his recent singles. Taken one at a time over the course of the previous year, the individual songs may not have seemed so strange, but placed side by side, their uniqueness is what gives them their continuity. You couldn’t plan this.
Side one begins with the introduction to the “tour,” which promises to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience, even if no one can tell you exactly where you’ll go or what you’ll do. It’s a mystery.
The Fool On The Hill has been interpreted as being about American politics, but clearly the fool is someone who simply isn’t focused on the same reality as those watching. Another travel metaphor.
The instrumental, Flying, could be the soundtrack to anything, but it’s titled “Flying,” which could refer to traveling through the sky, dreaming, or again, as a synonym for stumbling.
George’s Blue Jay Way has none of your East Indian sounds, but it sounds stoned nonetheless.
John Lennon’s two great psychedelic masterpieces are on Magical Mystery Tour; I am The Walrus and Strawberry Fields forever. Taken as two individual singles released at different times of the year, they spread their power but packaged together on the single album guarantees Magical Mystery Tour the Beatles’ most psychedelic album yet and the LSD finale to their psychedelic trilogy.
