Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds

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Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds
The Beatles
publication June 1, 1967
length 3 min 28 s
Genre (s) Psychedelic rock
Author (s) Lennon / McCartney
album Sgt.Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds ( English Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds ) is a song by the Beatles , in 1967 on the album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was released.

Recordings

The work on this composition by John Lennon took place from February 28 to March 2, 1967 at Abbey Road Studios . With a production time of three days, the song was finished relatively quickly. The Beatles only used the first session on February 28th to rehearse the piece. The group didn't start recording until the following day. On March 1st, the rhythm track with the intro was created in seven takes , which was played by Paul McCartney on a Lowrey organ (some sources speak of a Hammond organ , but this cannot produce the characteristic bell sound). On March 2, in were overdub process the vocals and the bass and a distorted electric guitar (played by Paul McCartney, who played here one of his interessantesten bass figures) (played by George Harrison added). Lennon / McCartney are named as the copyright holder .

The voices were recorded at a slower tape speed and later accelerated again. This gives them a thin and cutting sound. At 1:32 minutes you can briefly hear a small scrap from an earlier version that was overheard while cleaning the tapes.

This error has been corrected in the newly mixed version on Yellow Submarine Songtrack from 1999.

inspiration

According to Lennon, the song is heavily inspired by Alice in Wonderland :

“The images were from 'Alice in Wonderland.' It was Alice in the boat. She is buying an egg and it turns into Humpty Dumpty. The woman serving in the shop turns into a sheep and the next minute they are rowing in a rowing boat somewhere and I was visualizing that. There was also the image of the female who would someday come save me […] a 'girl with kaleidoscope eyes' who would come out of the sky. It turned out to be Yoko, though I hadn't met Yoko yet. So maybe it should be 'Yoko in the Sky with Diamonds.' ”

“The pictures are from 'Alice in Wonderland'. Alice is in the boat. She buys an egg and it turns into Humpty Dumpty. The woman serving in the shop turns into a sheep, and the next moment they're rowing in a rowboat somewhere. I imagined that. I also saw the girl in front of me who would one day come and save me [...] the girl with the kaleidoscopic eyes who would come out of heaven. It turned out to be yoko, although I didn't know her at the time. Maybe it should be 'Yoko in the Sky with Diamonds'. "

- John Lennon, Playboy 1980

The name of the song

Julian's drawing

The song was based on a drawing by Lennon's son Julian . He had drawn his classmate Lucy O'Donnell and brought this drawing home. Julian explained the picture to his father as "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds". On September 28, 2009, St. Thomas Hospital in London announced that Lucy O'Donnell had died at the age of 46. She succumbed to the autoimmune disease lupus erythematosus .

Association with drugs

Due to the title, which can be abbreviated to LSD ( L ucy in the S ky with D iamonds), and the lyrics, which describe a colorful and dreamy fantasy world, many fans still believe that the song is based on one of Lennon's LSD- Trips. Lennon himself claimed in several interviews that he was not aware of this coincidental correspondence and was only pointed out by others:

"I swear to God, or swear to Mao , or to anybody you like, I had no idea [the title] spelled LSD"

"I swear to God, or I swear to Mao, or whoever you want, that I had no idea that [the title] could be abbreviated to LSD."

- John Lennon : The Rolling Stone Interview 1970

Rumors persist that the title has been boycotted by the BBC because it is associated with drugs. However, the title was broadcast at least once on the BBC on May 20, 1967.

McCartney said in an interview with the music magazine Uncut in 2004 that the music title actually addressed the hallucinogen LSD.

Cover versions

  • In November 1974, a cover version of the piece by Elton John appeared , which conquered number 1 in the US hit parade. When recording the song, a certain “Dr. Winston O'Boogie ”, a pseudonym behind which John Lennon hid himself.
  • In 1987 the band The Hooters released a cover version of this track on the B-side of the single Johnny B.
  • In 2003, Japanese rock musician HYDE covered the song and released it on his single Horizon .

Others

  • The song became the namesake for the most famous skeleton of the pre-humans - the species Australopithecus afarensis (scientific name: AL 288-1; see →  Lucy ) as well as for a white dwarf (star) with the scientific name BPM 37093 , which was found to be The core consists of carbon , the basic substance of diamonds .
  • The song also plays a not insignificant role in the film I am Sam . For example, Sam Dawson, the film's protagonist and Beatles fan, names his daughter Lucy Diamond .
  • In the song Let There Be More Light , which was released in 1968 on the album A Saucerful of Secrets by the British rock group Pink Floyd , the lyrics contain the line “For there revealed in flowing robes, was Lucy in the Sky”.
  • The lyrics of the song Lucy's Eyes by Papermoon from 1994 refer to this piece.
  • The text of the song Yes Sir by the German rap duo Genetikk contains the lines “I see my world constantly through a kaleidoscope. Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds. And I fly after her to grab the little one ”.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b The Dick Cavett Show, September 21, 1971 , accessed June 27, 2016 (incorrectly dated from youtube.com)
  2. ^ Lucy of 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds' fame dies ( memento of October 2, 2009 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on September 28, 2009
  3. ^ The Beatles Songbook (Ed. Alan Aldridge). dtv, Munich 1971
  4. ↑ transcript
  5. ^ John Ezard : BBC and Film Board give order to play down on drug scenes . In: The Guardian , December 29, 1967, p. 3. 
  6. ↑ John Crosby: Little Things Mean a Lot . In: The Observer , June 11, 1967, p. 38. 
  7. ↑ BBC Ban's Song In Beatles Album . In: Washington Post , May 21, 1967, p. A25. 
  8. ↑ Tony Palmer : Pop: Tomorrow and Tomorrow . In: London Magazine , September 1, 1967, p. 73. 
  9. ^ Everett, Kenny (host) (May 20, 1967). Where It's At. BBC Light programs.
  10. ↑ The Weekly Standard : The Truth Behind "LSD" - Could "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" really be about drugs? For Beatles fans, a time of reckoning. , Victorino Matus, June 8, 2004
  11. ↑ BBC : Sir Paul reveals Beatles drug use , June 2, 2004