The Beatles: Revolver

The Beatles were very versatile when it came to their musical abilities and choices of genre. The group’s initial sound evolved from John Lennon’s former group, The Quarrymen.  Lennon and his band members played a style of music known as “skiffle” which was similar to ragtime/traditional jazz of the early 20th century. The Beatles would add upon their knowledge of skiffle and create “beat music” which was a combination of the aforementioned skiffle, R&B, soul, doo-wop and rock and roll. Their style of dress is considered “mod” or in a modernistic fashion, and their dark tailored suits and mop-top hairdos became culturally and sociologically impactful. The uniformed look would eventually change as the group would grow and individualize themselves from one another, but as the saying goes, “History repeats itself” and a revival of the mod look is slowly coming back.

Around the time their 7th studio album, Revolver, was made; The Beatles were experimenting with LSD and becoming more spiritually enlightened.  Certain songs were influenced by outside sources and later revisited during the creative processes of their album. In a discussion about the song She Said She Said, a contributor to Songfacts.com says, “The song was inspired by actor Peter Fonda, who was dropping acid with John Lennon while they were together at a party at the Playboy Mansion. John was trying to take in the beauty of the girls and the atmosphere, and Peter Fonda was whispering, "I know what it's like to be dead man." John originally wrote it as "He Said He Said" because it did come from Peter, but felt it didn't sound right, so he changed it to She." Another story tells that John Lennon had read a book titled The Psychedelic Experience: A Manuel Based on The Tibetan Book of the Dead, which was written by an American psychologist named Timothy Leary. Lennon wrote the lyrics to Tomorrow Never Knows based off of his findings and ended up creating one of the first songs of the psychedelic era. The Beatles were musically talented and spiritually awoken, and this resulted in one of the most acclaimed albums of all-time.

The Beatles used everything they could to come up with original sounds for Revolver, including non-conventional means such as the studio itself. Effects such as reverb and compression were generated rather oddly. In certain situations George Martin’s assistant Geoff Emerick would stuff a wool sweater in the bass drum to give it a bigger “boom.” Emerick has been quoted as saying; “I stuffed that inside the drum, to deaden the sound. Then we put the sound through Fairchild 600 valve limiters and compressors. It became the sound of Revolver and Pepper really. Drums had never been heard like that before.” As brilliant as these ideas were, it made it increasingly difficult for The Beatles to recreate these sounds during live performances. These were great innovations but not well thought out. Another innovation used by Lennon was Artificial Double Tracking or ADT. Lennon used this technique for doubling his vocals by means of tape delay. While John Lennon was working on vocals, George Harrison was creating modifications for their instruments. Harrison had the idea to play the notes for the lead guitar and the second guitar in reverse order, and then reverse the recording and mix it together. George’s newly attained knowledge of Indian instruments such as the sitar added a worldly element to their psychedelic creations that no one had heard before. Today most of these methods are easily achieved with DAWs, but if not for The Beatles mastering these techniques in the 60’s; we could be much further behind in the technological aspect of music presently.

Revolver is an unbelievable creation and it took a lot of “thinking outside of the box” in order for it to be created. It’s a very spiritual album without being overly introspective. The techniques that were used can be utilized today with greater ease, but having the ability to use them… and knowing how to use them are two different things. The Beatles had the right frame of mind for the task they were undertaking and their creation came out masterfully. I have a greater understanding and appreciation than I have had in the past regarding The Beatles and I’m very interested in checking out the rest of their catalogue, especially Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.