Tag: Peter Blake

Thanks to Dave who published this on TurnTable Talk. This time the subject was more of rock’s arty album covers…well of course I had to pick this one.

I’ll never forget buying the Sgt Pepper album. I bought it in 1977, 10 years after it was released, and I played it constantly. I remember opening it and finding this cool sheet of cardboard that contained a cutout mustache, paper pins, Sgt stripes, a cool photo of the Beatles, and Sgt Pepper himself! Thinking back…it’s cool that they included these 10 years after the release date. Here is what a 10-year-old Max found in the album. I wore that mustache for days.

I would venture to say that Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band is probably the most famous album by anyone. Personally, I never thought it was their best, but I know many Beatles fans who do think that. If they had added “Strawberry Fields Forever” and “Penny Lane” (which most bands would have done) and maybe dropped “Lovely Rita” and “When I’m 64”, then I would have probably considered it the best. Now, after saying that…I like both of those songs, don’t get me wrong. “ Lovely Rita” as a 10-year-old caught my attention. I think Revolver is very hard to beat and that is their best album artistically…personally as most of you know I have a soft spot for “The White Album” and that is my personal #1.

Sgt. Pepper’s is their most ambitious artistic statement, I think, but I listen to Revolver more often, I think it has higher replay value to me anyway. That is like comparing a great work of art by your favorite painter – you love both but see something else in one so it’s very subjective. As far as packaging… now that is where Sgt Pepper knocks it out of the park.

For really the first time on a massive scale, an album was like a work of art. The Beatles standing as Sgt Pepper’s band with a massive audience behind them. Beside them includes the younger Beatles and behind includes everyone from WC Fields to Lenny Bruce. John wanted Jesus and Hitler on the cover but was talked out of it by Sir Joesph Lockwood, the chairman of EMI.

It was designed by artists Peter Blake and Jann Haworth. The cover features the band members dressed in colorful, military-style outfits standing in front of a collage of life-sized cardboard cutouts of famous people. Surrounding The Beatles are cutouts of various cultural icons, artists, actors, musicians, and other notable figures. Some of these include Bob Dylan, Marilyn Monroe, Marlon Brando, Karl Marx, and Oscar Wilde.

There are five people still alive who were on the cover as of right now. Bob Dylan (top right), Dion DiMucci (smiling blond guy above and to the left of Lennon), Larry Bell (between Lennon and Starr), and obviously Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr.

The cover cost approximately £25,000 ((equivalent to £573,000 in 2023)) to produce, which was a significant amount for an album cover at the time. In comparison, most album covers in the 1960s typically cost around £50. The high cost was due to the elaborate design, the custom-made costumes, the creation of the collage with life-sized cutouts, and the use of wax figures borrowed from Madame Tussauds.

The Beatles recorded their debut album Please Please Me in a remarkably short amount of time. The entire recording process for the album took approximately 9 hours and 45 minutes of studio time. Now let’s fast forward five years from 1962 to 1966-67. The Beatles used up to 700 hours of recording time to record Sgt Pepper. The reason why is because they wanted more tracks than just four. They connected two four-track machines together and recorded the album. That wasn’t done all of the time, and they experimented as they went. This album is one of the most important in music history if only because of the newer recording techniques and how far music advanced because of it.

Going off different memories of the albums by people who were there by the time. Some of them said that all you had to do was walk down a UK street and you would hear it from the windows. It was massively popular and peaked at #1 on the Billboard Album Charts, #1 in Canada, and #1 in the UK in 1967. It also peaked at #1 on the Billboard CD charts in 1987 when it was re-released.

The following year The Band changed the course of music in some ways. they released Music From The Big Pink and influenced a generation. Bands started to play more earthy, more roots-oriented music. The Beatles did that by recording the rootsy “White Album”.

To close out…Sgt. Pepper was a game changer. Not one single was released from the album…it does need to be listened to as a whole.

A Day In The Life

I read the news today, oh boy
About a lucky man who made the grade
And though the news was rather sad
Well, I just had to laugh
I saw the photograph

He blew his mind out in a car
He didn’t notice that the lights had changed
A crowd of people stood and stared
They’d seen his face before
Nobody was really sure if he was from the House of Lords

I saw a film today, oh boy
The English Army had just won the war
A crowd of people turned away
But I just had to look
Having read the book
I’d love to turn you on

Woke up, fell out of bed
Dragged a comb across my head
Found my way downstairs and drank a cup
And looking up, I noticed I was late
Found my coat and grabbed my hat
Made the bus in seconds flat
Found my way upstairs and had a smoke
And somebody spoke and I went into a dream

I read the news today, oh boy
Four thousand holes in Blackburn, Lancashire
And though the holes were rather small
They had to count them all
Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall
I’d love to turn you on