What was the impact of SGT PEPPER at the time it was released?

Where were you?

 

"In truth, the song [A Day in the Life] was far too intense musically and emotionally for regular radio play. It wasn't really until the Eighties, after Lennon's murder, that "A Day in the Life" became recognized as the band's masterwork."

Didn´t know that!

100 Greatest Beatles Songs »

 

I still don't consider it to be the band's masterwork by a long shot. In fact, I'd say that 4 or 5 of those songs in that top ten qualify more as the band's masterwork.

 

It was heralded as the masterpiece that it was and still is. Great numbers of listeners, critics, and other recording artists hailed it as an album that revolutionized the album as an art form and raised the bar. It received high praise from Leonard Bernstein. Among its highly influential innovations was that it was the first studio album with segues rather than spaces between the songs. The Beatles had the rare gift of being radically experimental and commercially accessible at the same time; a delicate balance that few could pull off. While it wasn't the first concept album per se, it was the first album to be referred to as a concept album. The term was coined to describe the album. When I first got it in 1967, I played it straight through, reading the lyrics on the back cover, stopped long enough to catch my breath, and played it straight through again. There had never been anything quite like it before.

 

Lyrically, the Beatles were profoundly influenced by Dylan (Before Dylan, most pop/rock songs were all about romantic love). I wouldn't call all of their lyrics poetry, but some of them do rise to that level, notably "Eleanor Rigby", a character sketch on the level of E.A. Robinson. Several of their songs, including some of their love songs, actually hold up well on the printed page without the music. Others are simply song lyrics that need the music to complement them.

 

Why should its eclecticism be considered a flaw? "When I'm 64", "She's Leaving Home", and "Fixing a Hole" brought the sophisticated melodies and intricate chord progressions of Broadway show tunes into the pop/rock world, and other songs proved they could still write catchy pop songs ("A Little Help From My Friends") and tough rockers ("Good Morning Good Morning"). The Beatles never stuck exclusively to basic rock'n'roll, although they could play it with reckless abandon when they wanted to).

 

Not all of it is rock'n'roll and not all of it was meant to be, but some of it definitely rocks, most notably the title song and Reprise, plus "Good Morning,Good Morning." For those who think the Beatles should have stuck exclusively to basic rock'n'roll, the band they're looking for is AC/DC (I would say the Stones, but even the Stones deviated from their nitty-gritty sound on occasion).

 

Actually the American version of Rubber Soul, released 2 years before Pepper, also had no singles on it. "Nowhere Man" was a single in the US, but was not included on the American Rubber Soul.

 

If I were to rate songs for eclecticism, I would give props to Macca for those Pepper songs as well as George's 'Within You Without You' which is a true piece of 'world music'. Just one problem...none of those songs are very good IMO.

 

I remember thinking, next time I play this I have to be high.

 

A Siberian prison cell ...

 

And while you are at it, you may as well watch the Magical Mystery Tour film. Because you definitely need to be high for that one --- even Speilberg was high when he saw it...

 

Took me a while to get a liking for it. I thought it was just a mish-mash of toss=off fillers at first. At that stage of my life nothing but Dylan mattered. Lots of appreciation for it now - great production and a hell of a lot of work went into it.

 

I was 13 years old on its release. What I most remember today is not so much the songs or lyrics, but the sound of the album. Nobody had ever heard anything like it. It was like aliens landing and announcing, with the attention of the entire world, "this is the sound of your future."

 

Dark Side Of The Moon..was the next biggie mind expander.

 

Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds stuck out on my first hearing.

 

I was born the day after...

 

I remember hearing it at my local rink shack in Saskatoon, that's universal enuff for me.

 

What's the name of the documentary which that scene was taken out of? I remember watching it around 2011 on YouTube and I specifically remember that clip, but I never been able to remember the name of the documentary or find the full version ever again.

 

The so-called "Heartland". Fremont/Omaha Nebraska.

 

True.
It's the same as seeing The Beatles on Ed Sullivan.
If you weren't alive at the time and paying attention, you really cannot understand the impact and the feeling.

The summer of 1967 was really a nice time to be alive musically in most of America.
Sgt. Pepper was literally the soundtrack of that summer in my life.
I have older siblings so we had that album and many others.
Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass, Jefferson Airplane, The Doors, The Stones were played heavily in our house but if you were listening to AM radio Pepper was in constant rotation and we loved every bit of it.
Pepper was just on another level and as always in their career as a band, they set the standard by which all other bands were measured and really never measured up to with the possible exception of Surrealist Pillow.
But they didn't have the history that The Beatles and other bands had obviously.
This is one thing that to me has been overlooked, but Grace Slick was a huge deal to my sister and her friends.
So good looking, model stylish and really powerful. We guys liked Grace too.
Not that the other band's music wasn't brilliant but The Beatles were well, The Beatles.
Every single thing they did was so right, so new, so undeniably good & cool that not liking them meant you were mentally damaged.
That was a real landmark that stood alone.
More of The Monkees was certainly a big deal but far more with my sister & her friends than with the guys of that age.
To us then The Monkees were good just not on the same level or even close.
In hindsight and really in a few months after they saturated everything even to young kids like us, The Monkees were nothing.

 

I don't know what the documentary was but the Dick Clark show snips originally came from the full American Bandstand episode that used to be up in full on youtube until this past year. I haven't seen it lately. On the full DC interview with the teens after the full screening of both Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields, there are more interesting comments. One kid says something to the effect that the Beatles now (1967) look like his grandparents (or something). There are also other comments as to the kids not liking the new music changes. When you view the entire episode and hear the other non-Beatles tunes being played during the course of the show... and watch the kids dancing..... you get a real good larger picture of what......some..... people were experiencing then.

At Penny Lane's release, I liked the tune, but I didn't have the same feel of excitement I had say, two and a half years earlier. Just my opinion. There had been an incredible new universe of tunes and records released in the past year (beginning of 66 to beginning of 67). Massive massive numbers of incredible records imo. The Beatles were still around and I still respected them. But you know, I just wasn't in to them much any more. Penny Lane/Strawberry didn't change that for me. I didn't much care what they looked like then... I'm sure I was looking diff than 64 too . By the time Pepper came out five months or so later (after the DC episode), I was further gone on to other musical galaxies.

 

You didn't know that because 'A Day In The Life' has always been considered one of the Beatles' masterworks. It was played on the radio... A LOT! That quote is a little off-the-mark.

 

Yes, I always felt that American fans really got short-changed with Beatles album releases- firstly, with all those butchered mish-mash titles like 'Meet The Beatles', 'Beatles VI' etc, and then even when the U.S releases fell in sync with the U.K ones, tracks were still being excised at the whim of the record company, as occurred with Help!, Rubber Soul and Revolver.

But I must say that I am extremely impressed that you could appreciate Eleanor Rigby at the tender age of eight

 

Fantastic post, mongo. Great call on Jefferson Airplane's Surrealistic Pillow too. Every time I hear 'Coming Back To Me' it gets stuck in my head for days. Magnificent melancholy. Sorry for going OT.