Getting better all the time?
'Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band' was the soundtrack to the already fading Summer of Love
by Jeffrey Lee Puckett
The Courier-Journal

The Beatles were absolutely spent in late 1966, having barely survived the crushing demands of Beatlemania for three bone-jarring years.

In retrospect, it's almost staggering to think about what they accomplished in those three years given the enormous pressures: They starred in two films; recorded "Rubber Soul" and "Revolver," two of the finest albums in rock 'n' roll history (not to mention four other albums); and released "Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields Forever," pop's perfect single.

Their Christmas present to themselves in late 1966 was to quit touring and dedicate themselves only to making albums. They began recording "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" on Dec. 6.

"Because we'd finished touring, the people in the media were starting to sense that there was ... too much of a lull and therefore it created a vacuum, so they could bitch about us now and sort of say, 'Oh, they've dried up,'" Paul McCartney said in a recent Rolling Stone interview. "But we knew we hadn't. It was kind of cool because behind the scenes we knew what we were making. We knew we were very far from drying up. Actually, the exact opposite was happening."

You could say that.

"Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," released 40 years ago this week, galvanized popular culture. It was a soundtrack to the already fading Summer of Love, hailed as a psychedelic concept album that challenged what rock 'n' roll albums were and could be. Many consider it the most influential rock album in history, if only for its production techniques, album art and cultural impact.

That poses an interesting question on this hallowed anniversary: After four decades, does "Sgt. Pepper's" hold up musically or just as an influence, an artifact of production?

The album was certainly innovative. Many of the recording techniques, some introduced to the world via The Beatles, had never been used on this scale. The scope of instrumentation was also outlandishly ambitious. It was the first acknowledged concept album, although it had a couple of precedents and actually has no concept (but that's nit-picking). And its art design was wildly influential, in part because it was the first album to have its lyrics printed on the back cover.

"Sgt. Pepper" was released on June 1, 1967, in the United Kingdom and on June 2 in the United States. It's often been said that the world stopped to listen as the album played in every record store, nightclub, restaurant and home.

Dave Marsh, co-founder of Creem magazine and a major player among American rock music writers, was 17 when "Sgt. Pepper's" was released. Marsh, who is currently writing a book about "The Beatles' Second Album," talked about his reaction to "Sgt. Pepper's" in an e-mail.

"I remember being fascinated with it that evening, getting a copy, taking it home, pretending I liked it for however long it was (two years, three) till I became a rock critic, and then coming out about how dull it is when I had the chance," he wrote. "Most of it is dull.... I'd not rank 'Pepper's' at the bottom of my favorite Beatles albums list, but it wouldn't miss by miles.

"It wasn't because I was more into the Stones, though. It was because I couldn't figure out what it was supposed to be about, how meter maids related to LSD. I knew all the playing was good — I supposed it was good, anyway. I just didn't care — that's really always been my problem with it. ... You know, I probably would have said even then that it wasn't as good as the latest Temptations single or Otis Redding album. Which, as I recall, was 'Dictionary of Soul,' and, therefore, it wasn't."

Marsh makes some good points, with which few would agree, but in some ways "Sgt. Pepper's" sounds better than it actually is. It's a sonic marvel with a handful of brilliant songs balanced by the mundane — "A Day in the Life" up against "Lovely Rita," or "She's Leaving Home" versus "When I'm 64." But if "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" had been included as originally planned, we'd be having a different conversation.

Or not.

"'Sgt. Pepper' has been hailed time and time again as the greatest album ever recorded, and a cultural landmark, so I guess it's just a bit underrated," offered Mark Beyer, co-founder of The Rigbys, a Beatles tribute band based in Louisville. Beyer has worshipped The Beatles for decades.

"Let's add genius, groundbreaking, and throw in masterpiece. To this day, (the) creativity with sounds, textures and musical imagery go unmatched by musicians, producers and engineers that have tenfold the technology."

Jaxon Swain, songwriter and bassist for Louisville's The Ladybirds, loves the album but is a bit more restrained about it.

"It's an album you think of in terms of influence, the way it's produced and recorded," he said. "The album probably wouldn't be what it is if not for the other things about it. It's definitely a great Beatles album, but I like 'Revolver' and even 'The White Album' better."

"Sgt. Pepper's" was hailed critically in the straight press and adopted by the counterculture as a sign of the times. It also impacted radio in unforeseen ways.

Lee Abrams, senior vice president and chief programming officer for XM Satellite Radio, was working at an AM station in Miami when the album was released. Because there wasn't a single, and because it was a new Beatles album, they played every cut.

"It was certainly the first album in rock where a single was irrelevant," Abrams said.

The influence of "Pepper's" on radio was lasting, Abrams said. It helped open the door for more counterculture artists to get airtime -- "It was kind of the birth of the underground reaching the masses," he said -- and longer songs such as "A Day in the Life" continued the format-busting work that Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" had begun two years earlier.

More significantly, the production and stereo effects on "Pepper's" sounded so bad on AM radio, Abrams said, that the album was actually an influence on the further development of free-form FM rock stations.

"It really helped foster the stereo age, which created the need for FM," Abrams said. "We finally could listen to these songs on the radio and have it sound as good as our stereos."

You'll be listening to "Sgt. Pepper's" a lot if you go to this weekend's courier-journal.com Abbey Road on the River festival, held through Monday at Belvedere Festival Park in downtown Louisville. The highlight might be tonight's re-creation of the album using identical instrumentation (9 p.m., main stage).

Beyer and The Rigbys will also contribute by continuing to perform the album's first three songs sequentially in honor of the anniversary, but some of their celebrating will be done offstage.

"As musicians," he said, "we will probably reflect on how lucky we all are to have been given this brilliant and wonderful gift from John, Paul, George and Ringo."

10 Things You Might Not Know... about 'Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band'

1 The album was recorded in 129 days. (Axl Rose has been working on "Chinese Democracy" for nearly 15 years.)

2 She's Leaving Home" is slower on the stereo version of the album; it's heard at its original speed only on the hard-to-find mono pressings of the LP.

3 The mono version of "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" has a flange effect on the vocals, making it sound more surreal and dreamlike.

4 George Martin and his assistant engineers essentially co-wrote "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite" by creating the sound collage of calliopes and organs.

5 Original overseas pressings end with a dog-torturing tone followed by an endless loop of gibberish in the run-out groove.

6 Most of the album's alleged drug references are actually not. Henry the Horse isn't heroin. He's a horse.

7 "Sgt. Pepper's" was the first rock album to win the Grammy for album of the year.

8 The suits worn by the band on the cover were designed by Manuel Cuevas (who also designed the electric-light cowboy suit for El Roostars singer Andy Brown).

9 Ringo did not select a single figure for inclusion on the album cover, which was meant to represent the band's heroes.

10 The only Beatle on "Within You Without You" is George Harrison, the song's author. The other musicians are Indian.

The Beatles according to My Morning Jacket's Jim James

"Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" was among the first records that My Morning Jacket's Jim James owned. That explains a few things.

"My mom got me my first CD player, along with a fresh copy of 'Sgt. Pepper's,' 'Rattle and Hum' and 'Into the Great Wide Open,' by (Tom) Petty. The year before that, she had gotten me two cassette tapes -- Janet Jackson's 'Rhythm Nation' and Richard Marx's 'Repeat Offender.' I guess she could tell I was getting weirder.

"Easy to say, though 'Rhythm Nation' is the jam, 'Sgt Pepper's' blew my eighth-grade mind, and out of all those records I got, it is the only one I still listen to.

"Listening to those 'Pepper's' songs now, they will always sound new. They will always be fresh. The Beatles will be looked upon as 'classical music' when the aliens come to get us all."

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