Sexy Sadie

Robert Bunter: The White Album is in large part about The Beatles themselves (as indicated by the record's actual title, which is The Beatles). Previous efforts certainly dealt with aspects of the group's real lives, leavened to a greater or lesser degree by poetic lyricism - "Taxman," "I'm Only Sleeping," "Fixing A Hole," even "Penny Lane" and "Strawberry Fields Forever." Still, the two LP's previous to this (Sgt. Pepper's and Magical Mystery Tour) both explored far-fetched alternate identities and messages of universal cosmic significance set in a colorful fantasy world populated by rocking-horse people and marshmallow pies. Now it's 1968 and all of a sudden we've got a stark view of these hairy men's real life backstage after the curtains fall. Plugged-in fans were startled to realize that these songs were about Paul's sheepdog, John's mom, Mia Farrow's sister, Eric Clapton's sweet tooth, and meanwhile Yoko's over here in the corner staring at me. The stripped-down production and minimalist greyscale cover text added to the dour mood. "Sexy Sadie," while graced with an utterly beguiling melody and emotionally affecting Lennon falsetto, remains at its core an airing of dirty, personal laundry.  

Richard Furnstein: Lennon is certainly more direct here than he was in the Technicolor swirl of the 1967 offerings. The stripped-down approach of the Esher Demos provided a dramatic shift from the Eggman filtration system of the psychedelic era. Break out the 120-grit and strip the careless swirls from your instruments. You were resplendent in that madcap frock, but the loose sand-colored hemp shirt and leather necklace suits you well in this new age. The change was welcomed by our beloved Walrus, as he produced his strongest and most unique batch of songs yet for The Beatles. You get the sense that John's songwriting explosion in Rishikesh was his attempt to refocus his creativity to become (if needed) a singular light for the group. All could drink and eat from his expanding mind and desperate claws. He found his muse in Yoko and finally had his fragile ego confirmed in a helicopter ride with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. To think, mankind was given the pure beauty of "Julia” (pay no mind to the creeping figures of Polythene Pam and Mr. Mustard) from fever dreams on a hard Indian cot. Take this brother, may it serve you well.  

 

Robert Bunter: That's a totally accurate description. I'm going to provide a bit of backstory at this point. The Beatles went off to India to study with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, a giggling guru preaching a Westernized, user-friendly form of spiritual meditation for dilettantes and businessmen looking for shortcuts. Typically, John was the most ardent convert of the four, sitting cross-legged in his little hut for hours a day in a fugue state which he later described as a mental breakdown. Of course, being John, that was just his idea of a great time - remember, he'd spent most of the previous two years paralyzed by nightmarish acid-fueled visions. But as hard as he fell for Maharishi's line, it was only a matter of time before the bloom was off the rose for John, who spent most of his too-short life flitting from one God-figure to another (Presley, McCartney, Dylan, Leary, Maharishi, Janov, Rubin), only to renounce them after they failed to deliver what he really needed, which was his parents' love (I left Ono off that list, because that's a more complicated deal). There is no fiercer critic than a former apostle stung by betrayal, and when John got word that Maharishi might not be as high-minded as his sermons had implied (despite vows of celibacy, he was apparently making it with various female students during private "advanced meditation sessions"), he decided to pack up his trunk and storm out. On the car ride back to the airport with George he began to compose a stinging song in his head called "Maharishi," which George persuaded him to re-title "Sexy Sadie."

 

Richard Furnstein: "Sexy Sadie" is a surprisingly tame lyrical put down from the prickly one in the Beatles. Consider the misogynistic and seething tone directed at lovers on Rubber Soul, the contempt directed at the idiotic common people of "Good Morning, Good Morning" nervously scattering the streets playing their miserable roles as workers, and the more pointed loathing featured in the darker rooms in the Imagine LP. It's clear in each of the songs that Lennon was filtering his own self-loathing into a sarcastic and often times cruel view of others. The transgressions of the Maharishi are dismissed as mere technicalities ("you broke the rules" and "how did you know?") and the punishment for his actions are vague and inconsequential ("you'll get yours yet"). It's a much softer view than the arson-as-revenge fantasy interpretation of "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)."

 

The "one sunny day the world was waiting for a lover" part is the only time that Lennon really reflects on his own insecurity and his never-ending search for a guru who can show him the light. This songwriting trick was first mined in Lennon’s first golden period, the soundtrack to A Hard Day’s Night. As you ably tracked, Lennon was an orphaned soul searching for parental approval. Lennon is uncharacteristically guarded when he reflects on his pull to the Maharishi and his teachings, summarizing the arrival of the guru into his shattered world as an inevitability. An upper on a sunny day, ensuring all were sufficiently turned on. Who could resist the pull of this force? Lennon suggests they were all playing fools. He clearly hasn't learned a damned thing. 

 

Robert Bunter: Well I'll tell you one thing he'd learned - how to use the basic building blocks of the primal/crucial 1950s rock and roll chord changes which had ignited his childhood to construct something menacing and strange enough to suit the dark and complex man he'd grown into by 1968. The most obvious example is the terrifying "Bang-bang, shoot-shoot" coda on "Happiness Is A Warm Gun," but harmonically, "Sexy Sadie" is cut from the same cloth as "I'm So Tired." In both cases the chord changes are close enough to evoke the familiar, comforting yearning of straight doo wop, but John adds interest and malice with descending chromatic movements. Have you ever listened to Ronettes 45s while under the influence of mind-altering drugs? Well, John probably did, and "Sexy Sadie" is probably what they sounded like. 

 

Richard Furnstein: It’s interesting that John seemed most comfortable when he could lean on this teddy boy origins and toss a few joker chords around a well-worn Spector skeleton. Maybe he wasn’t the towering genius with clouds in his eyes and a blueprint for eternal peace. Perhaps he was nothing more than a wiry fiend, knocking out piles of amazing songs in the lingering flatulence of his Rishikesh tent because he couldn’t just goof out on zonk pills and stare at a television. Of course, Beatles experts (like me!) will tell you he was somewhere between the two extremes. Those same experts will then play you a demo version of “Out The Blue” from the Mind Games album and tell you it’s a disgrace that the Lennon Trust hasn’t released every second of music that this Godhead has created. Seriously, that tune could be on the White Album, Bunter!

Robert Bunter: The only "Lennon Trust" that I recognize is my trust that you will inevitably bring the conversation back to that soggy Lennon solo offering. Of course it sounds like it could have been on the White Album, poor John was reworking the moves he stole from Donovan. I've had to listen to you babble about that sadsack blues sludge for decades now. Welcome back to the blog, dear readers. I'm already tired of talking to this guy. 

She Came In Through The Bathroom Window

Robert Bunter: Wonderful. Just wonderful! The medley on side two of Abbey Road stands tall as one of the very best things the Beatles ever did, and the fact that “She Came In Through The Bathroom Window” is actually one of its second-tier songs just points to what a ridiculously abundant smorgasbord they were serving up at this late stage. This track is a prime-cut slab of vintage organic grass-fed Beatles music meat in every way. Many observers (and the band members themselves) have noted that Abbey Road was conceived as a swan song; one last mind-bending encore before the curtain fell on their otherworldly career. At some level, they knew they didn’t have far to go to the finish line. After the at-times-uninspired Get Back/Let It Be project (which Rolling Stone called a “cardboard tombstone”), the group (especially Paul) wanted to rally the troops for one last home run. As much as I wish history had played out differently, it’s not difficult to see that the prospect of their imminent breakup focused their energies and helped them emerge from the sullen, grouchy torpor that had been enveloping them. I think you can hear that energy on “She Came In Through The Bathroom Window” and the Abbey Road medley as a whole.  

Richard Furnstein: Yes, little child. That sound you hear is pure love. The Abbey Road medley was The Beatles flashing their considerable tools one last time. George sounds particularly healthy on this track; his guitar shimmering and gliding with expert precision. Ringo is having tons of fun here: shaking his tambourine as a tribute to hated thronethief Andy White and adding a shattering accent beat in the second verse. Paul delivers this perfect blessing of a song through his genius uterean mind. I'm not sure what John was doing. Does he play that crisp acoustic guitar? Was he just having the junkie shakes in the canteen with Mal Evans? 

Robert Bunter: I think I can hear John on the lovely “Aaaaaah” backing vocals, but that’s not the point. I hear Lennon all over this track in terms of his influence on Paul McCartney. This song has nary a trace of the maudlin sentimentality or cuteness that sometimes mars Paul’s work. His oblique, cryptic story of thieves, strippers and crooked cops seems to emerge from the same crazy town inhabited by the bizarre cast of Lennon characters we just met in “Polythene Pam” and “Mean Mr. Mustard.” The plot of this story never really adds up, but the irresistible, happy-go-lucky momentum of the song evokes a series of car chases, wisecracks and hilarious near-miss escape scenes. The McCartney-figure who appears throughout the Abbey Road medley on tracks like “Bathroom Window” and the second part of “You Never Give Me Your Money” (“out of college / money spent … all the money’s gone”) could be played by Bruce Willis – he’s a rambler, a gambler and a low-down dirty scrambler, sliding through life on a smirk and a dream, but underneath it all there beats a heart of pure gold. The McCartney/Bruce Willis character is counterbalanced by the wistful, philosophical, sincere Paul persona of “Golden Slumbers” and “You Never Give Me Your Money.” Meanwhile, all of the various Paul-figures are counterbalanced and complemented by Lennon’s stoned philosopher (“Because”), creepy deviants (“Mustard,” “Pam”) and gentle tropical hymnody (“Sun King”). At times the medley offers sincere, heartbroken commentary on the rise, fall and dissolution of the Beatles, but these heavy moments are lightened with a typically Beatlesian procession of wacky characters and Everymen. Maybe the girl who came in through the bathroom window is actually the young runaway from “She’s Leaving Home,” a few years older and with some new “tricks” up her sleeve, on the run from a series of parking tickets issued by Lovely Rita. Maybe Mean Mr. Mustard is the same pervert with the mirrored boots from “Happiness Is A Warm Gun.” Are you with me on this, Richard?

There was a real John Lennon who ate food and changed guitar strings, but at the same time there is and will always be a “John Lennon,” endlessly shape-shifting who exists solely in the minds of our brothers and sisters the world over.

Richard Furnstein: You just gave me genuine shivers. I always thought it was the girl from "She's Leaving Home" as well! Returning home to face her parents after her adventures in Eastern thought and increasingly underwhelming sexual intercourse with A Man From The Motor Trade (Bruce?). It's the most unlikely cameo to appear late in this Beatles story. Surely, the lovely Desmond from "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da," the flawed entertainer that is Billy Shears, or even the anonymous paperback writer would have been a more popular returning character. Yet, it is that lonely, lost girl that crawls back into this grand picture. "Once there was a way to get back homeward," our narrator (Paul) would later observe. She found her one chance out of the champa degenerate lifestyle that was all surface flash and false promises of freedom ("didn't anybody tell her?"). Is she home to stay? Will the familiar sights and sounds of home comfort her?

Here, fair Robert. Are you with ME on this? The girl, the perverts, and the mawkish Billy Shears were all manifestations of The Beatles psyche. The Beatles themselves were heading homeward with the Abbey Road medley. They were packing up their playthings, these manifestations. However, is it the home of Abbey Road Studios, brotherhood, and further sonic explorations or is it a return to childhood freedoms, reliable marital sex, and comfort foods (Ringo's mythical Heinz beans)? We're still guessing.

Robert Bunter: We’ve really gotten to the bottom of the whole thing. When the Beatles sang about fictional characters, they were really singing about themselves. Yes. But when they sang about themselves (“Yer Blues,” “Fixing A Hole,” “Strawberry Fields Forver,” “Hey Jude”, etc.), weren’t they actually singing about fictional characters in some final sense? After all, who is “John Lennon”? What is “Paul McCartney”? Names on an album sleeve? Pictures on a screen? Beautiful voices etched into vinyl and the world’s communal heartspace? They were (and are) real human men with birthdays, nose hair, foibles and underpants, but they are also collective constructs. There was a real John Lennon who ate food and changed guitar strings, but at the same time there is and will always be a “John Lennon,” endlessly shape-shifting (the smirking moptop in a grey suit suddenly morphs into a bearded walrus with granny glasses or a colorful Yellow Submarine cartoon character) who exists solely in the minds of our brothers and sisters the world over.

Richard Furnstein: Will they someday be nothing more than mythical creatures? Will our children's great grandchildren watch the Ed Sullivan appearance and think "That Paul McCartney sure is doing a great Paul McCartney"? Did The Beatles actually exist before they existed? Etches in a cave or spirits in the cauldron. It's an exciting prospect albeit totally depressing (citation: Julian Lennon's Valotte album). The Beatles were the dopey cartoon versions and they were those flawed mortals--recording useless electronic sounds for side projects, getting shafted by false prophets (The Maharishi, Magic Alex), and, yes, breaking up. It had to be this way. They died for all of our sins.  

Robert Bunter: Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue with that; I'm right and I will be proved right.

Dear Prudence

Robert Bunter: "Dear Prudence" is the Lennon songwriting persona at his most loveable. He's not bewildering, demented, or sardonic, or violent, or self-important (he'll give us a dose of all that soon enough on the White Album's next track, "Glass Onion"). The ultimate central message of the Beatles to Earth (awaken from the slumber of ego and everyday life to the universal spirit of peace and love that fills and surrounds us all) is delivered in simple human terms. No grand pronouncements or political slogans; just the infectious joy of a young child asking his female friend to come and play outside. The whole thing is so lovely that I can feel my heart swelling up now as I write this. Songs like this are why so many people feel an almost religious sense of awe about the Beatles in general and Lennon in particular. It's perfect because it embodies the always-valid artistic adage "Show, don't tell." Even without the lyrics, the gorgeous melody evokes sunsets, ocean waves, swirling galaxies, smiling babies, infinite skies and capital-L Love. I'll tell you what, if I was Prudence Farrow I would have crawled right the hell out of that goddamn meditation chalet and gone outside to play with my friend John Lennon. Oh look, there's Ringo! Let's all have some rice. My heart is exploding.

Richard Furnstein: Bingo. Childhood memories would guide many of John's most successful and endearing songs, but "Dear Prudence" brings John's childlike view of the world (read: emotionally stunted and extremely stoned) to adult human relationships. And it doesn't get any more adult than a spiritual vacation in India with Mike Love, Mia Farrow's dumpy sister, helicopter rides with the Maharishi, and (presumably) sexual escapades in the jasmine and sandlewood mist. So, while John pleas for Prudence to "Come out and play" seem sweet, keep in mind that the landscape was terrifying (elephants) and John was probably trying to push some blue windowpane on the poor girl. "I'd love to turn you on," he once told the world. "Dear Prudence" seems to be a mission statement to turn on one person at a time. It's hard to deny John this time, this song is surely one of his greatest.

Robert Bunter: I see what you mean, Richard. There are lots of adult complexities here. After all, joyful children don't write brilliant melancholy pop anthems to express themselves, they just run around and smile. We're listening to a grown man, perhaps mourning what is lost by attempting to recapture it. Lennon later admitted that he was almost suicidally depressed during the seemingly happy and mellow Rishikesh retreat. By so beautifully evoking the ecstasy of childhood, John leaves an overwhelming impression of sadness. I think this may be one of the saddest songs the Beatles ever wrote (up there with "You Never Give Me Your Money," "For No One," "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," "A Day In The Life" and "Junk," if we're counting outtakes). I'm eager to start discussing the musical brilliance of this track, but as I listen repeatedly, I keep filling up with tears. I remember my black and gold bicycle, the creek at the corner of Elm Creek and Ewing, a pretty girl who just moved into town, a pocketful of promises. Facebook just showed me photos of her son's third birthday party. How the hell am I supposed to write about bass lines and tom-tom fills? Jesus Christ. I'm crying.

Richard Furnstein: I'm right there with you. The lyric "The clouds will be a daisy chain so let me see you smile again" suggest the clear air and direction of a child's summer morning. John knocks us over the head with that lyric and then the angelic voices of George and Paul lift the trees and poppy from the Easter fields, suspending the season's bliss in a perfectly blue sky. No wonder you are feeling the feminine drops on your face, my dear friend.

I'll say this: the arrangement on this song is perhaps the greatest in the entire Beatles catalog. John holds steady with his delicate appregi, a figure that would haunt later compositions "Look At Me" and "Out The Blue." George is all quicksilver beauty on the lead guitar. And Paul? Well, Paul's bassline is perfect in every way and he delivers my single favorite drum part on any Beatles song. I'm sorry, Ringo. I will always love you, but I'm sure the Heinz and toast felt heavy in your stomach when you heard Paul's prizefighting rope-a-dope from 2:50 to 3:32. That's 42 seconds of complete destruction on Ringo's drum kit! I've played that part back a million times in my life and I'll never understand how he did that. It's one killer roll and then a triumphant pulse past the finish line, into the collapsing leaves of the willow tree in your mind.

John knocks us over the head with that lyric and then the angelic voices of George and Paul lift the trees and poppy from the Easter fields, suspending the season's bliss in a perfectly blue sky.

Robert Bunter: Ha! That really hits home. I'm just going to toss out a few insights here and hopefully curb my impulse to rhapsodize about this amazing song for hours on end. Okay: that fingerpicking pattern was taught to John in India by Donovan. Here's how that little episode went down:

Donovan is lightly tickling a clumsy melody by the banks of the Ganges. "Wot's that, then, Don?" "Well, Johnny, they call it 'fingerpicking.' You just take yer plectrum and throw it away! The fingers do the work. Put your thumb here, then do a little diddle-de-de with your other two phalanges, ey wot? There, that's the trick, isn't it? Now you've got the hang. Isn't this a beautiful day?" And then John was like, "Thanks, Donovan. You'll have to excuse me, I'm going to go write "Julia" and "Dear Prudence" and "Look At Me." It's a shame about your lack of talent; so utterly inferior. What's that tune you were working on? The one about pooping in space?" And then Paul was like, "Fingerpicking, huh? Listen to this!" and he plays "Blackbird." The score? Beatles infinity, Donovan zero. Sorry. I guess you should have kept the secret of fingerpicking to yourself, you scurvy Scottish freak.

Okay, a few more quick things: the background vocals don't even sound like the Beatles. Listen to those "round round rounds" and "ahhhhhs" on the bridge. It's creepy, they sound like weird old men. Next: this song has the best slow burn of any Beatles track, and that includes "Hey Jude." It starts out like delicate sun-pillows but in the space of three and a half minutes it transforms into a total headbanger, then gently touches down right where it started, just like "Back In The USSR" before it. Finally, I'd just like to add that I'm plagued by doubts and terrified of the future.

Richard Furnstein: We'll get through this together, pal. I just wanted to add that this may be the best production on any Beatles song. Sure, George Martin treated the mustache and epaulettes era with more care and gadgetry, but I really love the full and direct approach on "Prudence." The White Album was intended to be rough and ready, but "Dear Prudence" seems like a different type of beast. The song's beautiful production matches the sunlit and freckled faces that pepper its lyric. I'm not sure if The White Album ever quite matches this perfect combination of song, performance, and recording. And, you know what? That's alright with me.

Robert Bunter: [silence]