Forty years ago, On June 1st 1967, the Beatles released Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. It is generally considered the greatest album ever recorded. I agree. It's hallowed place in the history of popular music is assured.
I agree with the critics. But not because of the critics. I heard Sgt. Pepper's as a little kid. As a tiny tiny. It was presented to me as the epitome of experiment; of musical exploration itself. I rediscovered it in 11th Standard, when my musical odyssey really began.
Happy Birthday Sgt. Pepper! Here is my circus interpretation of the album!
1. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band: Sgt. Pepper's Band play the music at a psychedelic circus. Their curtain raiser hints at the possibilities, while assuring the customers of their money's worth. Crunchy guitars.
2. With A Little Help From My Friends: Ringo's version is the real deal. Joe Cocker can wave his paraplegic arms all he wants. The humour resides here. The melody springs from Lennon-McCartney. The ringmaster wins the hearts of the public - with a little help from his friends.
3. Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds: The quintessential psychedelic adventure, in gaudy technicolor, with "newspaper taxis" and of course, "the girl with kaleidoscope eyes". A childlike wonder creeps through the crowd, as the tent becomes a portal..
4. Getting Better: I resonate with this song. It is the song of the optimist: "Man I was mean but I'm changing my scene, and I'm doing the best that I can." What more can any one do? Life is good!
5. Fixing a Hole: Daydreaming about house maintenance as only Paul McCartney can. The hole lets the rain in, and it "stops my mind from wandering, where it will go...oh!" The janitor's dream perhaps?
6. She's Leaving Home: Ethereal, sad, eternal. The ancestor of Radiohead's "Exit Music (For a Film)" perhaps? Maybe she runs away to the circus? "Fun is the one thing that money can't buy."
7. Being for the Benefit of Mr Kite: We are reminded that we are still under the Big Top, and a circus is underway! The flipping curly delirium of the trapeze is brought into frabjous fruition, thanks to an antique poster and some Lennon whimsy! "Messrs K and H assure the public their production will be second to none!" There's a merry-go-round in there. Somewhere.
8. Within You Without You: First song on Side B. In a side tent at the circus, an eastern guru of some sort expounds the secrets of life itself, which goes on "within you, and without you."
9. When I'm Sixty-Four: A young man promises eternal love behind one of the tents. He could "be handy, mending the fuse, when the lights have gone."
10. Lovely Rita: She checks the parking meters, but she's hot in that uniform, in a groovy Sixties kind of way.
11.Good Morning Good Morning: A man loses it, wandering into the city to submit to temptation, and hear barnyard noises.
12. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Herat's Club Band (Reprise): The circus announces is last act, and the crowds are drawn back under the big top.
13. A Day in the Life: the audience is submitted to a celebration of the mundane; a cacophonic crescendo leads to the upper floor, where a cigarette is lit. Oh boy...
