I Am the Walrus : A Subversion of Meaning

(1)

Megan Dufault MU 324 – The Beatles

Dr. Craig Russell

(2)

Amidst hundreds of Beatles songs, ‘I Am the Walrus’ stands out as one of the Beatles’ “most remarkable recordings.”1_{Though much of the lyric resulted from John’s experiences with}

drugs, the song is not simply an acid trip in musical form. Amazingly, ‘I Am the Walrus’ synthesizes nonsense imagery, a mood of silliness that marked the Beatles’ Mystery Tour, a 16-piece orchestra, and even Shakespeare, to form a single innovation in sound. Largely an attempt by John to subvert poetic conventions and expectations of song meanings, ‘I Am the Walrus’ lives on in pop culture as one of the most intriguing Beatles songs ever recorded.

The song’s disjointedness attributes to the fact that John combined three unfinished songs to form one. The first took inspiration from John’s hearing a distant police siren at home in Weybridge, and it started with the words ‘Mis-ter c-ity p’lice-man,’ which he fit to the rhythm of the siren. The second song was about John at home in his garden, and the third talked of sitting on a corn flake. Pete Shotton claims that a letter from a student at the Quarry Bank School provided the motivation to combine the three song ideas: in the letter, which was sent to Stephen Bayley and passed on by him to John, a student announced that his English teacher at the Quarry Bank School was having the class analyze Beatles songs. John was so amused that he decided to confuse such people by writing a song with seemingly meaningless and incoherent clues.2

Some of the lyrical inspiration comes from an old English playground rhyme, which John asked Shotton to remind him of. The nonsense lyrics are obvious inspiration: “Yellow matter custard, green slop pie, All mixed together with a dead dog’s eye, Slap it on a butty, ten foot thick, Then wash it all down with a cup of cold sick” becomes John’s “Yellow matter custard, dripping from a dead dog’s eye”. Next, John made up nonsensical images and words (“texpert, crabalocker”) and added words he wrote down during an acid trip. He combined all these into the

1

Mark Lewisohn, The Complete Beatles Chronicle (London: Hamlyn, 2003), 262.

2

(3)

three songs he’d started. John’s frustration with those who overanalyzed his songs is apparent in what he reportedly said to Shotton after he completed the song: “Let the fuckers work that one out.”3

The song’s recording began on September 5, 1967, the first Magical Mystery Tour recording session. The recording for the album began a few days before the September 11th filming of the movie; the recording and filming then intertwined through October.4_{The recording}

process continued on and off throughout September as George Martin worked on imitating the array of images and wordplay. In addition to using the Beatles themselves, Martin incorporated violins, cellos, horns, a clarinet, and a 16-voice choir. He even added lines from Shakespeare’s King Lear on a BBC broadcast.5

In the recording session lasting from 7 pm to 1 am, the Beatles lay down 16 takes of the song, five of which were actually complete. The takes from this session included the basic rhythm track of bass guitar, lead guitar, an electric piano and drums, and also an overdub of a mellotron. We no longer have the first three takes, as the tape was wound back to the beginning and recorded over during the session. Martin added the rest of the components in later sessions.6

The Beatles also oversaw a rough mono mix of the song for acetate-cutting purposes.7

The next day, September 6, saw the reduction copy of the song. The four-track take 16 was mixed down to be take 17. Onto this track, Paul overdubbed more bass, Ringo overlay more drums, and John recorded the lead vocals.8_{After this, four mono mixes were made, and the}

fourth one (the only complete version) was marked ‘best’. This early remixing was so that

3

Steve Turner, A Hard Day’s Write (Dubai: Carlton Books, 1999), 146.

4

Mark Lewisohn, The Beatles Recording Sessions (New York: Harmony Books, 1990), 122.

5

6

7

8

(4)

acetate discs could be cut, since there was much more work to be done on the song. On

September 16, a copy of the song was made for Gavrik Losey, the assistant to Magical Mystery Tour’s producer Denis O’Dell, so that the Beatles could mime to it during the shooting of the film sequences.9

September 27 saw the overdubbing of the orchestral and choir elements of the song; George Martin conducted 16 instruments to his own score in studio one: eight violins, four cellos, a contra bass clarinet, and three horns. Later during the same day, Martin brought in 16 male and female members of the Mike Sammes Singers, who did session and television work as well as their own records. The choir was told to make various laughing noises (“ho-ho-ho, hee-hee-hee, ha-ha-ha”), sing “Oompah, oompah, stick it up your jumper!” and “Got one, got one, everybody’s got one,” and also make shrill whooping noises. John was delighted with George’s work.10

Much of the recording process was marked by spontaneity. According to Paul, a Paul Jones session was going on in another Abbey Road studio at the time of the ‘I Am the Walrus’ recording. Because one could patch in to other people’s echo chambers, the Beatles considered nicking Paul Jones’ echo and sticking it into ‘I Am the Walrus’.11_{Though they didn’t actually do}

this, the September 29 recording session was marked with spontaneity nonetheless—largely because John took an active role in the remix session.12_{It was his idea to record a live feed from}

the radio onto one half of the master version.13_{John happened upon a live broadcast of}

Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of King Lear. Lines from Act IV Scene VI can be heard toward the

9

10

11

12

13

(5)

end of the song.14_{Because of the difficulty with incorporating the mono mix containing this feed,}

the stereo version of the song slips into mono about 2 minutes in, once the radio sounds come in (during the lines “Sitting in an English garden”) and onwards.15

Of course, discussing the lyrics of ‘I Am the Walrus’ is a bit difficult (and perhaps ironic), since John never really intended the song to mean much. Explaining the song, he commented that “‘Walrus’ is just saying a dream—the words don’t mean a lot. People draw so many conclusions and it’s ridiculous. I’ve had my tongue in cheek all along.” John also claimed that he was writing “obscurely, à la Dylan, never saying what you mean but giving the

impression of something, where more or less can be read into it. It’s a good game.” John felt that

if Dylan could get away with stringing random images together, he could too.16

‘Walrus’ would become just one of the many Beatles songs that was overanalyzed, misheard, and misinterpreted, fueling some of the ‘evidence’ for the Paul is Dead conspiracy. To further confuse listeners, John later went on to say that “the walrus was Paul” in his song “Glass Onion.”17

Despite the nonsensical words of the song, we can draw some conclusions about the lyrical content. The first line of the song, “I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together,” embodies John’s idea of humanity as connected, that we are all one. The walrus in the song comes from the Lewis Carroll poem ‘The Walrus and the Carpenter.’ John admitted that he didn’t realize until years later that the walrus of the poem is the ‘bad guy,’ or that Lewis Carroll was making a statement against capitalism—he didn’t concern himself with what was “really meant” by a work, like people did with the Beatles’ songs. He simply liked the image of the walrus in the garden. However, John realized that the song inevitably took on a meaning of its

14

15

16

Brian Roylance, ed. et al., The Beatles Anthology (San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2000) 273.

17

“I Am the Walrus,” Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. (15 May 2006), 16 May 2006 <http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/I_Am_the_Walrus>.

(6)

own: “We all just presumed that because I said ‘I Am the Walrus’ that it must mean ‘I am God’ or something. It’s just poetry, but it became symbolic of me.”18

The ‘elementary penguin’ that chants Hare Krishna is John’s criticism of Allen Ginsberg, who, at the time, went around chanting the Hare Krishna mantra at public events.19_{John believed}

it naïve of Ginsberg to simply go around chanting the mantra, putting his faith in one idol.20

The ‘eggman’ supposedly refers to Animals’ singer Eric Burton who was known to break eggs over women as he made love to them, inducing his colleagues to call him the ‘egg man.’ According to Marianne Faithful, ‘semolina pilchard’ refers to Det. Sgt. Norman Pilcher, a policeman widely known to target pop stars for drug possession.21_{Walter Everett suggests that the ‘eggheads’ and}

‘expert textperts’ are the Quarry Bank lecturers.22

The silly ‘goo goo goo joob’ line may have been inspired by the ‘googoo goosth’ seen in James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake. Lennon was familiar with Joyce, but it’s debatable whether he actually took this line from the novel. A similar line (“koo koo ka choo”) is found in Paul Simon’s “Mrs. Robinson,” written the same year.23

John also makes reference to previous Beatles songs—namely, his own Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds. The pigs and policemen fly “like Lucy in the Sky.”24_{Also, “see how they run”}

recalls Paul’s “Lady Madonna.” Rain and sunshine, both mentioned in the song, had already been dealt with in previous Beatles recordings. Thus, the song seems to be an amalgamation of not only random images but recycled ones. Lewisohn writes of “those utterly bizarre lyrics

18

19

20

21

22

Walter Everett, The Beatles as Musicians: Revolver through the Anthology (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 135.

23

“I Am the Walrus,” Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. (15 May 2006), 16 May 2006 <http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/I_Am_the_Walrus>.

24

Walter Everett, The Beatles as Musicians: Revolver through the Anthology (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 133.

(7)

which meant nothing and yet, somehow, formed a picture which either fascinated or disturbed the listener. Or both.”25_{While the words don’t necessarily make sense on paper, they combine to}

form a greater feeling of absurdity that continues John’s exploration of identity through song and through his use of LSD.

The album Magical Mystery Tour fared much better than the film, which was a critical failure.26_{Still, some reviewers weren’t so keen on the some of its songs: Ned Rorem, in his}

review of the Beatles’ songs, wrote that ‘I Am the Walrus’ “seems a bit worrisome, more contrived, less ‘inspired’ than anything hitherto...the final effect becomes parody of self-parody, the artist’s realist danger.”27_{I do not agree with the idea that the song is too “contrived.” Lennon}

didn’t set out to do or mean anything with the song: the song took shape not only during John’s acid trips and the actual writing process but all the way to the very last recording and editing session, demonstrating that it was, indeed, a work of inspiration. Mark Lewisohn had more positive things to say about the song, calling it “one of the most peculiar but fascinating and superb Beatles recordings.” Speaking about the sounds on Magical Mystery Tour as a whole, George Martin explained that though some were “bloody awful,” others were “brilliant.” He specifies that “‘I Am the Walrus’ was organised—it was organised chaos. I’m proud of that.”28

Somehow, despite the disjointed nature of the song, it works. I’m still not sure what I personally ‘get’ from the song; I simply like how it sounds, which is valid, given the nature of the song and how John intended it to be. The myriad of instruments and random sounds along with the timbre of the song somehow still fit together, demonstrating its ability to keep us interested “even a

25

26

27

Elizabeth Thomson, ed. et al., The Lennon Companion (New York: Schirmer Books, 1988), 109.

28

(8)

hundred years later.”29_{Today, nonsense lyrics and bizarre imagery aren’t that unconventional,}

but it’s important to realize the Beatles’ contributions to rock in this area.

29

(9)

Bibliography

Everett, Walter. The Beatles as Musicians: Revolver through the Anthology. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

“I Am the Walrus.” Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 15 May 2006. 16 May 2006 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Am_the_Walrus>.

Lewisohn, Mark. The Beatles Recording Sessions. New York: Harmony Books, 1990. Lewisohn, Mark. The Complete Beatles Chronicle. London: Hamlyn, 2003.

Roylance, Brian, ed. et al. The Beatles Anthology. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2000. Thomson, Elizabeth, ed. et al. The Lennon Companion. New York: Schirmer Books, 1988. Turner, Steve. A Hard Day’s Write. Dubai: Carlton Books, 1999.