So glad you heard the proper version. Another Lennon masterpiece. When this came out, no one had heard anything like it. Lennon wanted to top "Tomorrow Never Knows" and he did.
Lennon certainly put Ringo through the (no pun intended) ringer as a drummer, expecting him to muster up drumbeats for his bizarre psychedelic songs. And fortunately for music fans, he was definitely up to the task.
Nobody plays like Ringo. He is the perfect drummer. He doesn't just play a beat but rather he invents parts for the song that makes it better. Not drum fills, but ear-catching original parts that change along with the structure of the song.
Everybody seems to think they were flowery lazy hippie types when an actuality they were dedicated and driven musicians and masters at their craft and totally blessed. Their music will live on. It's also subjective to individual interpretation. Thank you great reaction as always.
I remember when this song hit the radio. Many DJ's refused to play it, saying it wasn't music and many breaking the record in half on air. Of course, we all loved it. This is one of the songs that helped pop muic leap forward into what we hear today. Brilliant song, one of my favorites!
Lennon's calling card was word play, nonsense lyrics. What he admired in Lewis Carroll. If Lennon had any beef, it was with bad poetry. Words which appear to mean something, but which don't. He was thinking of Bob Dylan.
Same here, even if he was trying to goof on the fans with cryptic lyrics, I still think this is maybe my favorite Beatles song if I had to pick one, both musically and lyrically
Try and imagine as a 12 year old on Boxing Day 1967 settling down in front of the TV ( with your parents 🤣 ) in eager anticipation of this being aired in black and white for the first time . I seem to remember my mum and dad lasted about 10 minutes before they exited muttering " not listening to this rubbish ! " . Enjoyed it so much watched it again a couple of weeks later IN COLOUR !!!
I really can't imagine that because back in the 60s my parents were in their 40s but they absolutely loved the Beatles. We had three pianos in our living room so, on Christmas we'd all jam together. My father, My brother and me. This would be one we'd play together and it was such great fun.
I am the walrus (john said) was an answer to reporters asking: "Paul is the cute one, George is the mystical one, Ringo is the everyday man, so, what are you? ' And he would say "I am the walrus." The two notes in the opening and thru the track is the two notes in a European police siren. No significance: it was on in the background one day. This is like a painting where nonrelated images and ideas are captures and form a collage.
I remember having two reactions when this song came out originally - 1) The fact that it was over 4 minutes long which was very unusual for a single - even the back side of a single. 2) Most of the Beatles fans I knew at the time thought this was incredibly new, innovative, and creative. I couldnt get enough of it - playing it over and over. This is in my top 10 list of most-listened-to Beatles tracks.
Service of a villain, sit me down, father, rescue? No idea. The voices at the end of the song came from a BBC broadcast of the Shakespeare play King Lear, which John Lennon heard when he turned on the radio while they were working on the song. He decided to mix bits of the broadcast into the song, resulting in some radio static and disjointed bits of dialogue. The section of King Lear used came from Act Four, Scene 6, with Oswald saying: "Slave, thou hast slain me. Villain, take my purse," which comes in at the 3:52 mark. After Oswald dies, we hear this dialogue: Edgar: "I know thee well: a serviceable villain, As duteous to the vices of thy mistress As badness would desire." Gloucester: "What, is he dead?" Edgar: "Sit you down, father. Rest you."
Ringo was such a natural musician, this is musical drumming at its best. What does this song need? Ringo. Check out Rain, Hello Goodbye and "a day in the life."
Don't try and figure it out Lee or make sense of it. The song was John's rebuke of people who tried to over analyze his songs. A lot of non sensical gibberish, "Oompa Oompa Stick in in your jumper" It was a TV film. The Shakespeare at the end was a BBC broadcast of King Lear. It has no significance, It was just on the radio and John taped it. Of course some listeners tried to make something out of it cause the walrus was symbolic in the play,
I absolutely love that Ringo is getting the recognition he deserves! Finally I'm seeing it all over videos now. Ringo is the king of drumming. Oh, and Neal Peart.
George Martin (the producer) does a fantastic job with the arrangement and the strings are brilliant. Martin worked easier with McCartney, but Lennon's tunes always forced Martin to go way outside his comfort zone an create some thing really special.
A universe before their time one more aspect of such an innovative band that still stand head and shoulders above any other musician s now and then. Truly Fantastic.
My suggestion is "Here today" by Paul McCartney and "All those years ago" by George Harrison. They both wrote a tribute song for John, shortly after he "passed away". The Beatles really did love each other and these songs gives you a sense of what John ment to them both.
George’s brilliant When We Was Fab is a very cool tribute to Walrus, and the Beatles sound he helped to define. After many decades of loving the Beatles, George is my spirit animal. He speaks directly to my heart in a way that nobody else does. Which isn’t to say that I don’t love John and Paul, and Ringo, but George, well, he’s my guy.
This is one of my top 5 Beatle songs and I'm so happy that you are reacting to the correct version. I hadn't known of your channel when you reacted the first time. After I found you, I started going through your reactions to watch videos I was interested in and had missed. I was so excited to see that you had reacted to this until I started watching the video and realized you did the wrong version. Sorry to say I clicked off of it right away. Another channel I watch reacted to first version that you did and it was just so off putting that I just couldn't listen to it again. They were raked over the coals in their comments about it, but nothing ever came of it. One thing that I really like is that you care about and pay attention to your listeners. Not all reaction channels do.
Imagine a song with lyrics including the words “semolina pilchard”… According to Pattie Boyd, Harrison's wife at the time, the words "semolina pilchard" refer to Sergeant Pilcher of the London Drug Squad, who waged a campaign against British rock stars and underground figures during the late 1960s.
George was the baby of the group and that's how they treated him. He wanted to shred like Clapton and Beck but that really wasn't a Beatles thing. And he was the most deeply spiritual of the Beatles, borne out in his solo work.
If you listen to George as a player, he was never a shredder. He was more about playing the right solo for each song. He loved the concept of improvising and following the chord changes as they occurred. His playing was very soulful and melodic!
@@michaelkeefe8494 Idk, George says he wanted to be an improviser, but he ultimately tended to be a meticulous draftsman-like a student who revises their first draft.
This is one of my favorite Beatles albums, Magical Mystery Tour. It's almost like a greatest hits. For some reason, I don't see it ranked among the best very often. I'm in a minority probably, but I play this album way more than Sgt Pepper.
When you look at the track listing for MMT it compares very well to the other more revered LPs. I think the reason why it isn't higher on most lists is that it wasn't part of the official Beatles "canon" until long after the band broke up. In the UK the songs from the TV film were issued as a double EP (extended play) originally. In the U.S. Capitol Records decided to throw in an additional 5 tracks that had been A or B side singles in 1967. It was only in 1987 that the Beatles catalogue was standardised to include the Capitol L.P. version.
@@thereunionpartyExactly. My thing with Magical Mystery Tour is that even if it hadn't been inducted into the official Beatles' discography after the fact, it was still one of the major, unified, cohesive musical art projects by The Beatles - one which carried huge significance for their career, just like every "proper" album did. That alone is enough for me to include it in their discography for me, whether that be as the UK extended EP or the US album. It being an EP doesn't make a difference to me, because it was still another impeccable Beatles art project, released on wax, as a collection of songs - it just happened to be shorter than most other collections of songs they had released. Why shouldn't it be accepted as part of the canon discography, even if only as an EP? Are only "albums" allowed? At the end of the day, an EP is just a short album!
This is my favorite Beatles album. I grew up with it -- I was not into Rock music as a kid, but this album was so imaginative that my parents basically treated it as children's entertainment for my sister and me. The album is one of my earliest musical memories, which would place it in the very early 1970s, so as far as I'm concerned, the Capitol Records album is canonical.
Lennon's favorite book AS A KID was _Alice in Wonderland_ and he had friends acting out the characters. And he was writing like that as a kid. The drug impacts are blown out of proportion.
The dialogue, at the end, was from a BBC broadcast of Shakespeare' "King Lear" that was broadcast when this was recorded in late Sept'1967. The Mono, and Stereo mixes are quite different. The film of MMT for this song was done at a UK Air Base,....which was later used for a 1985 episode of Doctor Who (just to note)
@@venderstrat I wish I did ! Three cool cats, Three cool cats Are coming up in a beat up car, Spitting up a lift of candy bar Talking on about how sharp they are. Three cool cats.
when George starts to unfold for you, that's special. you should watch the Beatles movies. they're actually good and they showcase their personalities.
Oh, and from this album, another of my favorite Beatles song, Baby Your a Rich Man. It has an Indian vibe and also a funky beat with devastating lyrics!
@@lauraallen55 Laura, we must have very similar tastes! Baby You're a Rich Man was always one of absolute favorites. It was released as the B side of All You Need is Love, and I always thought it was so much better! Have you heard Thomas Dolby's I Love You Goodbye? I think it's one of the most incredible songs ever recorded. My other particular favorite is Just One Victory by Todd Rundgren. It's amazing as well! If you don't know either, having similar taste, I 'd love to hear your take on them!
@@ohfour-seven6228 Hi, sorry to not get back to you before now. I've been really sick for the last 3 days. I'm not much better yet, so will just check in for now. I will get back with you soon though. :) Yes, we do seem to have a lot of the same taste in music!
@@lauraallen55 Laura, so sorry to hear you're not feeling well, I hope you are better soon. And absolutely no worries about getting back to me sooner, that's not a big deal. Just take care of yourself and recover at your own pace. 😃
@@ohfour-seven6228 Aww, thank you. :) Still not back to normal. This has been the worst stomach bug I think I've ever had. ugh. Anyway, I didn't know the Dolby song, but checked it out. Very cool! I did know the Todd Rundgren song, though. Love him. He's absolutely brilliant!
If it matters, George was the youngest of the bunch, the baby of the bunch, and yet strangely he was known as an actual street scrapper in the sense thatat you can be known in the as that as a kid. He desperately wanted to play guitar but his family couldn't afford one, so his dad built him one out of a cigar box and a broomstick and some strings. That's how he got started.
Zappa was even more bizarre. Remember while the Beatles were recording in 4 track, Zappa was using 16 track. And I loved Zappa's parody with the comparison of Zappa's, We're Only In It For The Money, album and the Beatles Sgt. Pepper.
He wrote two of their most popular songs, Something and Here Comes The Sun. The latter is the most-played song on Spotify. George is an incredible artist.
He had no real solo work after 1973. His songs are repetative and way too outdated by now. He stole my sweet lord, he was a mediocre guitarist and an average singer. 😂
@@fitless I guess 1988's Handle With Care doesn't count because he formed the Traveling Willburys to record it? How about his album Cloud Nine? I know Got my Mind Set on You was a cover, but the whole album is great. Anyway, All things must Pass was a better album than any of the other's solo stuff.
Great that you're doing this again. I've often noticed that some of the video performances, while adding good visuals, have the sound quality go south. Machine Gun by Jimi is one good example - there is an incomplete and grainy (colourised I believe) video of that performance that is nice to see, but the sound quality is nowhere near as good as the album version you did. I Am the Walrus, is up there with Strawberry Fields and A Day in the Life I think as their psychedelic peak.
I did hear the original one you posted. So many of these videos Ive never seen, but I did have this album back in the day. I think people just want to have you see the one that was the best of all for your reaction. Since the age of the Internet, I have been able to see so many things that I missed. And I played certain albums/singles on my old non stereo player over and over so much that if there’s one thing different, my brain recognizes it immediately. It’s almost 5 so it’s time…😶🌫️ have a happy evening Lee. The Beatles brought me to your site but all your quality music patrons and reactions keep me here. 🎉
Thanks for the "trip down memory lane" - talk about a double entendre with "trip". This song, and these albums, were definitely a trip. Even tho I have joined your Patreon, I still like to listen to these on UA-cam to keep the algorithm going - we appreciate your discovery of this great band we grew up with.
There is absolutely a lot more to it than just confounding the critics. Although that's a hilarious aspect of John's personality. It reads like really good modern poetry for the time, and it's a bit like surrealism in art, in that this combination of words put together and the images that go with them evoke all kinds of connected things in the subconscious and in our sense of modern culture. And in fact the Hare Krishna reference was literally followed in The Next Breath by an Edgar Allan Poe reference. When he's talking about the pigs for the second time later in the song, I love how he re-appropriates the adjective "snide" to be a verb. One way to maybe understand the appeal of this even for us little kids on the playground, was kind of like kids today maybe learning rap lyrics or something, but we learned every single phrase from it and even laughed along with the laughs and the sound effects and so forth.
The strange spoken part deep in the mix at the end is from a radio performance of one of Shakespeare's plays. If you want to hear Ringo's finest work, check out the Beatles song "Rain", a brilliant song from the point where they went from being an excellent pop band to becoming a genre-breaking monster. If you want to find out more about George, there's a full-length documentary about him called "Living in the Material World" which is well worth watching.
Good on you for listening to the right version. I only know of one other reactor who bothered to also find the correct version. Shows that you listen to your viewers.
Probably my favourite Beatles song... As a child, Ringo's fill at the start was the first piece of music that made me screw up my face like a rock star (!) TOO COOL
Magical Mystery Tour was also a movie that did not get great reviews. The end is quote from Edger Allen Poe and was used by many, at the time, to search into the 'Paul is Dead' theory - "Oh, untimely death.. Bury my body"
On the critically panned reviews of the "Magical Mystery Tour" movie, Paul McCartney had this to say: "This is the only time the Beatles perform 'I am the Walrus'...shut up!"
This is from an English "poem" we recited as kids in the 60s: "Yellow matter custard, green snot pie, All mixed up with a dead dog's eye, Get a piece a bread and spread it thick, And then wash it down with a hot cup of sick". Those were the days, ha! ha! No wonder we grew up daft! The Beatles lyrics might be confusing to some, but if you're English, you're in the know.
Magical Mystery Tour was a one-off, hour-long made-for-television film. The critics pretty well tore it to shreds. But I think today it plays better as just one of four Beatles films -- the only one which was entirely their creation. It included six original songs, with this one being the best known. The title track is also pretty epic, if you haven't given it a listen.
Re: George Harrison's songs. His best song by far in my opinion was *If I Needed Someone* which benefited by one of Paul's best bass lines ever & perfect vocal harmonies from John & Paul. It's a must listen. I think a lot of reactors are missing it because it wasn't originally on the American version of Rubber Soul, where it belonged. Do check it out!
I always thought Rubber Soul was the album that transformed the Old Beatles into the new Beatles. Back in the early '60s there were the Beatles. Our group in 5th grade at that time were the Cockroaches. Drums, one guitar (me) and horns.
Mystery Tour is a movie. It was hated by the critics and so it was released on TV in England, but never in the states. You should watch it. As a Beatle fan since 1964, I think the movie is a must watch. It is weird. It has no story. It had no script. It was the Beatles making their own movie. Just a series of vignettes that they didn't even try to tie together. This was their LSD period after all.
Crazy the way Paul is talking at the end . All those nuts thinking it was a sign Paul was dead . I love your journey through their amazing careers. You are a joy ‘You may want to watch Rick Rubin’s interview with Paul. From last year . You’ll learn a ton about how songs were written . It’s fascinating. You’ll have a lot of your questions answered . It’s more than worth a watch .
"All You Need Is Love" was Britain's contribution to Our World, the first live global television link, for which the band were filmed performing it at EMI Studios in London on 25 June. The programme was broadcast via satellite and seen by an audience of over 400 million in 25 countries. Lennon's lyrics were deliberately simplistic, to allow for broad appeal to the show's international audience, and captured the utopian ideals associated with the Summer of Love.
You all do realize the original Beatle's record was in MONO. Any Pseudo Stereo version were artificially created later. Any later Stereo mixes were created by Martin. At first they just separated the higher frequencies to put on one side and lower frequencies on the other with midrange frequencies on both.
Back then, it didn’t seem to matter if it was in stereo. Our system was HARDLY a “system”. The best stereo we had back then was bought from Newberry’s with these tiny speakers. We listened to this frontward and backwards a thousand times! “PAUL YOUR DEAD”
@@sgarrett453 Totally agree. And this is the way I first heard it on a transistor radio and a few times in the car's am radio until my dad would say "turn this crap off".
The EP came out in Mono & Stereo in the UK with just the songs from the film on it. The LP came out in the US in Mono & Stereo with extra songs from single releases but wasn't released in the UK as an LP until the late seventies [76 I think]. The film is really a long music video for the songs. For George, check out Here Comes The Sun, While My Guitar Gently Weeps or Something with the Fabs. Once he 'clicks' you'll see what a fantastic songwriter he became. I don't think he ever released a bad solo album but he just put them out there and wasn't too fussed about promoting them. Go through his solo work and I think you'll be blown away at why you've never heard it 🙂 LP is what the British call albums [or used to] - 'Long Player'. The term 'Album' came from the old days where long orchestral releases on 78s came in books ['albums']. Might have been the fact that the UK had Singles [45s] and EPs [Extended Play] so the 'big ones' were LP [Long Play]. There were EPs in the States but they don't seem to have been as big a thing and they often went into Jukeboxes so maybe that's why they became 'albums' in the States as they would have been in the days of 78s.
I think that weird line "I am he as you are me....." was a reference to their first acid trip when they were sitting around a dinner table and had an experience of "ego dissolution" in which they felt no separation between each other. In other words they felt they were "all one". George's description of that night was fantastic. They didn't even decide to try it, their friend secretly put some in their after-dinner coffee.
Clearly an innovative masterpiece. There was NO ONE that was on the edge like the Beatles. Incredibly way way way ahead of their time. Imagine living through every record dropped by them. I did, and it was a short but incredible journey, never to be repeated. So lucky we were.
Tears For Fears did a song called "Sowing the Seeds of Love", which they said was an attempt to make a song like "I am the walrus". They did a perfect job and it was a very powerful song as well. I especially like the roaring drum sounds. It's fun to listen to when you are aware if its Beatles' influence.
Awesome to hear Musician listen to this and take it in for the first time! One of my favourite songs ever, and first time i heard it i was floored…. Incredible song and production and arranging and engineering
Hello. That was my first self-bought single. "I am the Walrus" was actually the B-side and "Hey Jude" was the A-side. But I always preferred the B-side. Greets from Germany
I saw your startlement at the weird stereo effects. You have to remember that nobody was listening on headphones back then -- the stereo effects were from speakers with a few feet of separation, over there on the wall. It was much more common to have parts that were pure left or right, as an effect.
This song was so wild when it came out. I remember putting it on my record player when I first got it, yeah, we had record players before we had sophisticated stereos. I had no idea what I was listening to, lol, but I LOVED IT. We didn't get to see the movie here in the USA till years after it came out. John said he was giving all the people who over analyzed their songs something to chew on, he certainly succeeded. That was a radio broadcast of King Lear playing at the end of the song. The chanting thing near the end, we used to think it said, "Smoke Pot, smoke pot, everybody smoke pot". It didn't, but we liked to imagine that's what it's saying. If you watch the movie, you get to see them play it live more or less, it's the recorded version but there they are, miming along. Damn man, they were such a great group. Thanks for doing this. You're the best!
Chicago was founded in 1967 because of this album and Sgt. Pepper...that's why you hear the first line "I am his, you are his we are his and we are all together " in their song 'South California Purples'...
You must remember a lot of people were sitting around tripping out on acid in 1967 which explains some of the music. I was 10 in '67 and the Beatles were everywhere. From albums to extreme merchandising to young people. My sisters had Beatle lunch boxes back then...
It's so funny, watching your face make the same expression I made when first hearing this song as a child so many years ago! Priceless... great reaction Lee.
This was one of George Martins best pieces of production. Apparently it was his idea to introduce the strings on this track to give the physchodelic feel
"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" was the poem John and friend Pete Shotton used to sing as children. Lewis Carroll's poem, The Carpenter And The Walrus, from John's favourite book as a child, Through The Looking Glass, inspired the song title. The song was written by John Lennon and Pete Shotton.
So glad you heard the proper version. Another Lennon masterpiece. When this came out, no one had heard anything like it. Lennon wanted to top "Tomorrow Never Knows" and he did.
yeah, the new version is trash
Me too! The other versions don't hold a candle to this
Building the groundwork for Revolution 9.
I don't know if this topped that but it's a great tune.
Did he ?
Ringo’s drumming was always perfect for every song
Ringo had a built-in metronome. He was good at keeping the beat steady
So good that he told Paul that Yesterday needed no drumming.
Actually Ringo was having problems with the timing on this song so Paul played the tambourine to help him with it
I had to check that this wasn't my comment.
Lennon certainly put Ringo through the (no pun intended) ringer as a drummer, expecting him to muster up drumbeats for his bizarre psychedelic songs. And fortunately for music fans, he was definitely up to the task.
Nobody plays like Ringo. He is the perfect drummer. He doesn't just play a beat but rather he invents parts for the song that makes it better. Not drum fills, but ear-catching original parts that change along with the structure of the song.
still the most satisfying blend of classical and rock
There's so much going on in this song, I've heard it 1000 times and never get tired of it
Agree ! I started listening to it over and over the day it came out and the years folliowng, and I still listen to the song several times a year.
Everybody seems to think they were flowery lazy hippie types when an actuality they were dedicated and driven musicians and masters at their craft and totally blessed. Their music will live on. It's also subjective to individual interpretation. Thank you great reaction as always.
I remember when this song hit the radio. Many DJ's refused to play it, saying it wasn't music and many breaking the record in half on air. Of course, we all loved it. This is one of the songs that helped pop muic leap forward into what we hear today. Brilliant song, one of my favorites!
🌸 you are absolutely correct, sir....John WAS trying to mess with people's heads.
Lennon's calling card was word play, nonsense lyrics. What he admired in Lewis Carroll. If Lennon had any beef, it was with bad poetry. Words which appear to mean something, but which don't. He was thinking of Bob Dylan.
He messed with his own head too.
Regardless of John's motives, I've always found a certain majesty in this number.
Same here, even if he was trying to goof on the fans with cryptic lyrics, I still think this is maybe my favorite Beatles song if I had to pick one, both musically and lyrically
A Masterpiece of songwriting and arrangement.
Try and imagine as a 12 year old on Boxing Day 1967 settling down in front of the TV ( with your parents 🤣 ) in eager anticipation of this being aired in black and white for the first time . I seem to remember my mum and dad lasted about 10 minutes before they exited muttering " not listening to this rubbish ! " . Enjoyed it so much watched it again a couple of weeks later IN COLOUR !!!
I really can't imagine that because back in the 60s my parents were in their 40s but they absolutely loved the Beatles. We had three pianos in our living room so, on Christmas we'd all jam together. My father, My brother and me. This would be one we'd play together and it was such great fun.
The Beatles didn't shy away from surreal lyrics and musical experimentation.
The Beatles never disappoint
The Beatles are the greatest band ever!
Keep the reactions on the Beatles coming. Much appreciated!
I am the walrus (john said) was an answer to reporters asking: "Paul is the cute one, George is the mystical one, Ringo is the everyday man, so, what are you? ' And he would say "I am the walrus."
The two notes in the opening and thru the track is the two notes in a European police siren. No significance: it was on in the background one day. This is like a painting where nonrelated images and ideas are captures and form a collage.
genegarrett Much in the same way as the Spice girls portrayed themselves
in "GLASS ONION" John says "the walrus was Paul"
@@santanamauricio In a question about that, John said I was feeling kindly towards Paul at the time. He had allowed me to play a solo or something.
_I am the walrus (john said)_
*But* he left another clue for us all... ;)
@@santanamauricio Maybe he only wanted to make still more confusing.
IMHO, the fadeout here foreshadows the build-up in "A Day In The Life".
A Day In the Life came out first.
I remember having two reactions when this song came out originally - 1) The fact that it was over 4 minutes long which was very unusual for a single - even the back side of a single. 2) Most of the Beatles fans I knew at the time thought this was incredibly new, innovative, and creative. I couldnt get enough of it - playing it over and over. This is in my top 10 list of most-listened-to Beatles tracks.
Service of a villain, sit me down, father, rescue? No idea.
The voices at the end of the song came from a BBC broadcast of the Shakespeare play King Lear, which John Lennon heard when he turned on the radio while they were working on the song. He decided to mix bits of the broadcast into the song, resulting in some radio static and disjointed bits of dialogue.
The section of King Lear used came from Act Four, Scene 6, with Oswald saying: "Slave, thou hast slain me. Villain, take my purse," which comes in at the 3:52 mark. After Oswald dies, we hear this dialogue:
Edgar: "I know thee well: a serviceable villain, As duteous to the vices of thy mistress As badness would desire."
Gloucester: "What, is he dead?"
Edgar: "Sit you down, father. Rest you."
Ringo was such a natural musician, this is musical drumming at its best.
What does this song need? Ringo.
Check out Rain, Hello Goodbye and "a day in the life."
Among The Beatles' best.
Even 57 years later!
Ooh… don’t 😂
Don't try and figure it out Lee or make sense of it. The song was John's rebuke of people who tried to over analyze his songs. A lot of non sensical gibberish, "Oompa Oompa Stick in in your jumper" It was a TV film. The Shakespeare at the end was a BBC broadcast of King Lear. It has no significance, It was just on the radio and John taped it. Of course some listeners tried to make something out of it cause the walrus was symbolic in the play,
For ME, this is their greatest artistic achievement.
Amazing
I absolutely love that Ringo is getting the recognition he deserves! Finally I'm seeing it all over videos now. Ringo is the king of drumming. Oh, and Neal Peart.
So glad you went back and did the right version
A simple but perfect groove for the song
And that's what he did, play for the song.
"Let the f*ckers figure that one out." -- John Lennon, 1970.
Awesome....
George Martin (the producer) does a fantastic job with the arrangement and the strings are brilliant. Martin worked easier with McCartney, but Lennon's tunes always forced Martin to go way outside his comfort zone an create some thing really special.
A universe before their time one more aspect of such an innovative band that still stand head and shoulders above any other musician s now and then. Truly Fantastic.
"Oompah, Oompah, Stick it up your jumper". Its a very old UK saying: it doesn't mean too much apart from showing contempt for something.
I A/B'd this single so many times I lost count, wearing out a phonograph needle was a real thing back then..a classic
My suggestion is "Here today" by Paul McCartney and "All those years ago" by George Harrison. They both wrote a tribute song for John, shortly after he "passed away". The Beatles really did love each other and these songs gives you a sense of what John ment to them both.
George’s brilliant When We Was Fab is a very cool tribute to Walrus, and the Beatles sound he helped to define. After many decades of loving the Beatles, George is my spirit animal. He speaks directly to my heart in a way that nobody else does. Which isn’t to say that I don’t love John and Paul, and Ringo, but George, well, he’s my guy.
@ronbock8291 he's already done it
...the Joker laughs at you...' line is a nod to the Batman 60's show. It was showing on TV whilst John was writing this song.
It's so funny that John's song inspirations came from everywhere because he was so tuned into everything. What a mind he must have had!
It helps having a genius composer!
This is one of my top 5 Beatle songs and I'm so happy that you are reacting to the correct version. I hadn't known of your channel when you reacted the first time. After I found you, I started going through your reactions to watch videos I was interested in and had missed. I was so excited to see that you had reacted to this until I started watching the video and realized you did the wrong version. Sorry to say I clicked off of it right away. Another channel I watch reacted to first version that you did and it was just so off putting that I just couldn't listen to it again. They were raked over the coals in their comments about it, but nothing ever came of it. One thing that I really like is that you care about and pay attention to your listeners. Not all reaction channels do.
Imagine a song with lyrics including the words “semolina pilchard”… According to Pattie Boyd, Harrison's wife at the time, the words "semolina pilchard" refer to Sergeant Pilcher of the London Drug Squad, who waged a campaign against British rock stars and underground figures during the late 1960s.
George was always called "the quiet Beatle" and he really blossomed/matured and claimed his own voice w Abbey Road contributions+ his solo career.
George was the baby of the group and that's how they treated him. He wanted to shred like Clapton and Beck but that really wasn't a Beatles thing. And he was the most deeply spiritual of the Beatles, borne out in his solo work.
If you listen to George as a player, he was never a shredder. He was more about playing the right solo for each song. He loved the concept of improvising and following the chord changes as they occurred. His playing was very soulful and melodic!
@@betsyab121 you hear him in get back talking about wanting to do more but you're right, even in his solo work he was never a shredder...
@@michaelkeefe8494 Idk, George says he wanted to be an improviser, but he ultimately tended to be a meticulous draftsman-like a student who revises their first draft.
This is one of my favorite Beatles albums, Magical Mystery Tour. It's almost like a greatest hits. For some reason, I don't see it ranked among the best very often. I'm in a minority probably, but I play this album way more than Sgt Pepper.
When you look at the track listing for MMT it compares very well to the other more revered LPs. I think the reason why it isn't higher on most lists is that it wasn't part of the official Beatles "canon" until long after the band broke up. In the UK the songs from the TV film were issued as a double EP (extended play) originally. In the U.S. Capitol Records decided to throw in an additional 5 tracks that had been A or B side singles in 1967. It was only in 1987 that the Beatles catalogue was standardised to include the Capitol L.P. version.
@@thereunionpartyExactly. My thing with Magical Mystery Tour is that even if it hadn't been inducted into the official Beatles' discography after the fact, it was still one of the major, unified, cohesive musical art projects by The Beatles - one which carried huge significance for their career, just like every "proper" album did.
That alone is enough for me to include it in their discography for me, whether that be as the UK extended EP or the US album. It being an EP doesn't make a difference to me, because it was still another impeccable Beatles art project, released on wax, as a collection of songs - it just happened to be shorter than most other collections of songs they had released. Why shouldn't it be accepted as part of the canon discography, even if only as an EP? Are only "albums" allowed? At the end of the day, an EP is just a short album!
Magical Mystery was one of my earliest owned Beatles products. Had the singles in the little sleeve and booklet courtesy of my parents
This is my favorite Beatles album. I grew up with it -- I was not into Rock music as a kid, but this album was so imaginative that my parents basically treated it as children's entertainment for my sister and me. The album is one of my earliest musical memories, which would place it in the very early 1970s, so as far as I'm concerned, the Capitol Records album is canonical.
@@Johnny_Socko Same - thanks mum and dad!
Lennon's favorite book AS A KID was _Alice in Wonderland_ and he had friends acting out the characters.
And he was writing like that as a kid.
The drug impacts are blown out of proportion.
Now we're talking 🎶🍻
A Goo Goo Ga Joob to you Lee, on this fine morning.
As to you, my good sir.
The dialogue, at the end, was from a BBC broadcast of Shakespeare' "King Lear" that was broadcast when this was recorded in late Sept'1967.
The Mono, and Stereo mixes are quite different.
The film of MMT for this song was done at a UK Air Base,....which was later used for a 1985 episode of Doctor Who (just to note)
George Harrison was one cool cat.
Do you own a vinyl record of Three Cool Cats?
@@venderstratyes! From an LP ‘Silver Beatles’, recorded, it says, early 1961. I think it’s an audition demo.
@@venderstrat I wish I did !
Three cool cats,
Three cool cats
Are coming up in a beat up car,
Spitting up a lift of candy bar
Talking on about how sharp they are.
Three cool cats.
At least two
when George starts to unfold for you, that's special.
you should watch the Beatles movies. they're actually good and they showcase their personalities.
Oh, and from this album, another of my favorite Beatles song, Baby Your a Rich Man. It has an Indian vibe and also a funky beat with devastating lyrics!
That’s on my request list!
@@lauraallen55 Laura, we must have very similar tastes! Baby You're a Rich Man was always one of absolute favorites. It was released as the B side of All You Need is Love, and I always thought it was so much better! Have you heard Thomas Dolby's I Love You Goodbye? I think it's one of the most incredible songs ever recorded. My other particular favorite is Just One Victory by Todd Rundgren. It's amazing as well! If you don't know either, having similar taste, I 'd love to hear your take on them!
@@ohfour-seven6228 Hi, sorry to not get back to you before now. I've been really sick for the last 3 days. I'm not much better yet, so will just check in for now. I will get back with you soon though. :) Yes, we do seem to have a lot of the same taste in music!
@@lauraallen55 Laura, so sorry to hear you're not feeling well, I hope you are better soon. And absolutely no worries about getting back to me sooner, that's not a big deal. Just take care of yourself and recover at your own pace. 😃
@@ohfour-seven6228 Aww, thank you. :) Still not back to normal. This has been the worst stomach bug I think I've ever had. ugh.
Anyway, I didn't know the Dolby song, but checked it out. Very cool! I did know the Todd Rundgren song, though. Love him. He's absolutely brilliant!
This song grew on me so much that it's now my second favorite Beatles song.
What is first?
@@marxlover100 A Day In The Life. What's your favorite?
@@TodayImMaking Seriously, just about ALL of them! It's hard to pick just one song.
@@marxlover100 I know what you mean but I just forced myself one day. LOL
If it matters, George was the youngest of the bunch, the baby of the bunch, and yet strangely he was known as an actual street scrapper in the sense thatat you can be known in the as that as a kid. He desperately wanted to play guitar but his family couldn't afford one, so his dad built him one out of a cigar box and a broomstick and some strings. That's how he got started.
Beatles. Ground breakers. One hill after another. Imagine people hearing that in 1967.
Zappa was even more bizarre. Remember while the Beatles were recording in 4 track, Zappa was using 16 track. And I loved Zappa's parody with the comparison of Zappa's, We're Only In It For The Money, album and the Beatles Sgt. Pepper.
I love this channel so much. So much to watch ❤ you make my day every time. I love the beatles so much ❤
"Sitting in an English garden" .... amazing part if you have phones on.
George blossomed as a song writer in the last two or three years of the Beatles, and for my money, he had the best solo work of the four of them.
George has the best post-Beatles career IMHO
He wrote two of their most popular songs, Something and Here Comes The Sun. The latter is the most-played song on Spotify. George is an incredible artist.
He had no real solo work after 1973. His songs are repetative and way too outdated by now. He stole my sweet lord, he was a mediocre guitarist and an average singer. 😂
@@fitless I guess 1988's Handle With Care doesn't count because he formed the Traveling Willburys to record it? How about his album Cloud Nine? I know Got my Mind Set on You was a cover, but the whole album is great. Anyway, All things must Pass was a better album than any of the other's solo stuff.
Great that you're doing this again. I've often noticed that some of the video performances, while adding good visuals, have the sound quality go south.
Machine Gun by Jimi is one good example - there is an incomplete and grainy (colourised I believe) video of that performance that is nice to see, but the sound quality is nowhere near as good as the album version you did.
I Am the Walrus, is up there with Strawberry Fields and A Day in the Life I think as their psychedelic peak.
Yes this was a TV film afterall with very little if any professional oversight in its creation.
I also think the videos detract if you want to have a pre-MTV experience with a pre-MTV song
@@johnnyparis10 True, except The Beatles kinda invented MTV
And yes that's Jimi on the cover of Sgt. Peppers.
I did hear the original one you posted. So many of these videos Ive never seen, but I did have this album back in the day. I think people just want to have you see the one that was the best of all for your reaction. Since the age of the Internet, I have been able to see so many things that I missed. And I played certain albums/singles on my old non stereo player over and over so much that if there’s one thing different, my brain recognizes it immediately. It’s almost 5 so it’s time…😶🌫️ have a happy evening Lee. The Beatles brought me to your site but all your quality music patrons and reactions keep me here. 🎉
Same here!
Thanks for the "trip down memory lane" - talk about a double entendre with "trip". This song, and these albums, were definitely a trip. Even tho I have joined your Patreon, I still like to listen to these on UA-cam to keep the algorithm going - we appreciate your discovery of this great band we grew up with.
There is absolutely a lot more to it than just confounding the critics. Although that's a hilarious aspect of John's personality. It reads like really good modern poetry for the time, and it's a bit like surrealism in art, in that this combination of words put together and the images that go with them evoke all kinds of connected things in the subconscious and in our sense of modern culture. And in fact the Hare Krishna reference was literally followed in The Next Breath by an Edgar Allan Poe reference. When he's talking about the pigs for the second time later in the song, I love how he re-appropriates the adjective "snide" to be a verb.
One way to maybe understand the appeal of this even for us little kids on the playground, was kind of like kids today maybe learning rap lyrics or something, but we learned every single phrase from it and even laughed along with the laughs and the sound effects and so forth.
“See how they snide” - brilliant yes
Reminds me of e.e. Cummings. Anyone lived in a pretty how town with up so floating many bells down.
I really love this song song. Again a masterpiece. 🎶🎶🎶
The strange spoken part deep in the mix at the end is from a radio performance of one of Shakespeare's plays. If you want to hear Ringo's finest work, check out the Beatles song "Rain", a brilliant song from the point where they went from being an excellent pop band to becoming a genre-breaking monster. If you want to find out more about George, there's a full-length documentary about him called "Living in the Material World" which is well worth watching.
Fantastic chord structure in this song, especially in the intro. All major chords.
Good on you for listening to the right version. I only know of one other reactor who bothered to also find the correct version. Shows that you listen to your viewers.
They're all great friends and we're always making jokes and messing with each other. Hilarious.
Probably my favourite Beatles song... As a child, Ringo's fill at the start was the first piece of music that made me screw up my face like a rock star (!)
TOO COOL
Magical Mystery Tour was also a movie that did not get great reviews. The end is quote from Edger Allen Poe and was used by many, at the time, to search into the 'Paul is Dead' theory - "Oh, untimely death.. Bury my body"
On the critically panned reviews of the "Magical Mystery Tour" movie, Paul McCartney had this to say: "This is the only time the Beatles perform 'I am the Walrus'...shut up!"
"yellow matter custard, dripping from a dead dog's eyes". 😅 There was some hoohah over this line back in the day.
This is from an English "poem" we recited as kids in the 60s:
"Yellow matter custard, green snot pie,
All mixed up with a dead dog's eye,
Get a piece a bread and spread it thick,
And then wash it down with a hot cup of sick".
Those were the days, ha! ha! No wonder we grew up daft! The Beatles lyrics might be confusing to some, but if you're English, you're in the know.
Much better than the outtake version!
We all thought he was describing an acid trip,the full 8 hour mindblown journey full of colours. (They were very strong in those days)
Magical Mystery Tour was a one-off, hour-long made-for-television film. The critics pretty well tore it to shreds. But I think today it plays better as just one of four Beatles films -- the only one which was entirely their creation. It included six original songs, with this one being the best known. The title track is also pretty epic, if you haven't given it a listen.
Re: George Harrison's songs. His best song by far in my opinion was *If I Needed Someone* which benefited by one of Paul's best bass lines ever & perfect vocal harmonies from John & Paul. It's a must listen. I think a lot of reactors are missing it because it wasn't originally on the American version of Rubber Soul, where it belonged. Do check it out!
I will keep that in mind because I’m very keen on “figuring” George out since he continues to escape my mind 😂😂
Walrus!
@@L33ReactsYou've REALLY got to listen to "It's All Too Much" written by George. On the Yellow Submarine album, it's my favorite Beatles song!
I always thought Rubber Soul was the album that transformed the Old Beatles into the new Beatles. Back in the early '60s there were the Beatles. Our group in 5th grade at that time were the Cockroaches. Drums, one guitar (me) and horns.
My favorite is I Need You.
Mystery Tour is a movie. It was hated by the critics and so it was released on TV in England, but never in the states. You should watch it. As a Beatle fan since 1964, I think the movie is a must watch. It is weird. It has no story. It had no script. It was the Beatles making their own movie. Just a series of vignettes that they didn't even try to tie together. This was their LSD period after all.
Crazy the way Paul is talking at the end . All those nuts thinking it was a sign Paul was dead . I love your journey through their amazing careers. You are a joy ‘You may want to watch Rick Rubin’s interview with Paul. From last year . You’ll learn a ton about how songs were written . It’s fascinating. You’ll have a lot of your questions answered . It’s more than worth a watch .
Loving your Beatles journey. "There's no where you can be that isn't where you're meant to be, it's easy." All you need is Love.
"All You Need Is Love" was Britain's contribution to Our World, the first live global television link, for which the band were filmed performing it at EMI Studios in London on 25 June. The programme was broadcast via satellite and seen by an audience of over 400 million in 25 countries. Lennon's lyrics were deliberately simplistic, to allow for broad appeal to the show's international audience, and captured the utopian ideals associated with the Summer of Love.
I wouldn’t call the lyrics simplistic at all. I would call them simple though. Simple is all that’s needed at times. :)
@@lauraallen55 Absolutely!
@@Turtledove2009 I think a lot of people don't realize that simplistic means treating a complex issue as if it's simpler than it is.
It wasn't a tv show. MMT was almost like a home movie the Beatles filmed to promote the album.
You all do realize the original Beatle's record was in MONO. Any Pseudo Stereo version were artificially created later. Any later Stereo mixes were created by Martin. At first they just separated the higher frequencies to put on one side and lower frequencies on the other with midrange frequencies on both.
Back then, it didn’t seem to matter if it was in stereo. Our system was HARDLY a “system”. The best stereo we had back then was bought from Newberry’s with these tiny speakers. We listened to this frontward and backwards a thousand times! “PAUL YOUR DEAD”
Was going to say... you can argue over a few tracks sounding better one way or the other, but mono is by far the only proper way to hear Walrus.
@@sgarrett453 Totally agree. And this is the way I first heard it on a transistor radio and a few times in the car's am radio until my dad would say "turn this crap off".
Such a fun song
Remember, this was made in 1967, 1967, 1967. 57 years ago.... amazing sound for that time.
The EP came out in Mono & Stereo in the UK with just the songs from the film on it. The LP came out in the US in Mono & Stereo with extra songs from single releases but wasn't released in the UK as an LP until the late seventies [76 I think]. The film is really a long music video for the songs. For George, check out Here Comes The Sun, While My Guitar Gently Weeps or Something with the Fabs. Once he 'clicks' you'll see what a fantastic songwriter he became. I don't think he ever released a bad solo album but he just put them out there and wasn't too fussed about promoting them. Go through his solo work and I think you'll be blown away at why you've never heard it 🙂 LP is what the British call albums [or used to] - 'Long Player'. The term 'Album' came from the old days where long orchestral releases on 78s came in books ['albums']. Might have been the fact that the UK had Singles [45s] and EPs [Extended Play] so the 'big ones' were LP [Long Play]. There were EPs in the States but they don't seem to have been as big a thing and they often went into Jukeboxes so maybe that's why they became 'albums' in the States as they would have been in the days of 78s.
Thank you for listening to the correct version... there was a reason why this was the one they released.
One of my top favourite Beatles songs! I love Lennon's songwriting - all over the map!
Great reaction Lee, thanks.
I think that weird line "I am he as you are me....." was a reference to their first acid trip when they were sitting around a dinner table and had an experience of "ego dissolution" in which they felt no separation between each other. In other words they felt they were "all one". George's description of that night was fantastic. They didn't even decide to try it, their friend secretly put some in their after-dinner coffee.
Dentist friend, Dr. Robert!
This is a great album Lee. Very trippy, always pushing the boundaries, they were. The Fool on the Hill should be next. Thanks Coquina and Lee
One of my favorite Beatles tracks in 2027 I'll still be listening to this song if I'm still alive , if I'm gone I'll jam on it with John and George
"Ringo's snare is sacred!" Dude, you're awesome.
Haha thank you 😂👍
Clearly an innovative masterpiece. There was NO ONE that was on the edge like the Beatles. Incredibly way way way ahead of their time.
Imagine living through every record dropped by them. I did, and it was a short but incredible journey, never to be repeated. So lucky we were.
Tears For Fears did a song called "Sowing the Seeds of Love", which they said was an attempt to make a song like "I am the walrus". They did a perfect job and it was a very powerful song as well. I especially like the roaring drum sounds. It's fun to listen to when you are aware if its Beatles' influence.
Al Stewart did the same with Terminal Eyes
Awesome to hear Musician listen to this and take it in for the first time! One of my favourite songs ever, and first time i heard it i was floored…. Incredible song and production and arranging and engineering
Hello. That was my first self-bought single. "I am the Walrus" was actually the B-side and "Hey Jude" was the A-side. But I always preferred the B-side. Greets from Germany
I thought Revolution was the B side of Hey Jude. x
@@angie1243 perhaps it varied from country to country
@@gerhard_mammuth It probably did. Beatles forever!
I saw your startlement at the weird stereo effects. You have to remember that nobody was listening on headphones back then -- the stereo effects were from speakers with a few feet of separation, over there on the wall. It was much more common to have parts that were pure left or right, as an effect.
That would be called, "True Stereo." Very few records today are in True Stereo.
The avante garde influence is also on display in this song. They seemed to throw everything at this song!
This song was so wild when it came out. I remember putting it on my record player when I first got it, yeah, we had record players before we had sophisticated stereos.
I had no idea what I was listening to, lol, but I LOVED IT.
We didn't get to see the movie here in the USA till years after it came out.
John said he was giving all the people who over analyzed their songs something to chew on, he certainly succeeded.
That was a radio broadcast of King Lear playing at the end of the song.
The chanting thing near the end, we used to think it said, "Smoke Pot, smoke pot, everybody smoke pot". It didn't, but we liked to imagine that's what it's saying.
If you watch the movie, you get to see them play it live more or less, it's the recorded version but there they are, miming along.
Damn man, they were such a great group.
Thanks for doing this. You're the best!
Chicago was founded in 1967 because of this album and Sgt. Pepper...that's why you hear the first line "I am his, you are his we are his and we are all together " in their song 'South California Purples'...
Magical Mystery Tour was a made for TV movie, not a "TV show." Pretty crummy too. But hey, it was the Beatles so we watched it
We watched it because THE MUSIC WAS GREAT
What a fun song : )
You must remember a lot of people were sitting around tripping out on acid in 1967 which explains some of the music. I was 10 in '67 and the Beatles were everywhere. From albums to extreme merchandising to young people. My sisters had Beatle lunch boxes back then...
You do a great job... musical understanding and emotional empathy.
It's so funny, watching your face make the same expression I made when first hearing this song as a child so many years ago! Priceless... great reaction Lee.
This was one of George Martins best pieces of production. Apparently it was his idea to introduce the strings on this track to give the physchodelic feel
Ringo's grip on the groove is relentless. Spare but perfect fills. Those looped background vocals are like percussion instruments.
"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" was the poem John and friend Pete Shotton used to sing as children. Lewis Carroll's poem, The Carpenter And The Walrus, from John's favourite book as a child, Through The Looking Glass, inspired the song title.
The song was written by John Lennon and Pete Shotton.