Song of the Day 10/28: The Beatles, “A Day in the Life”

“A Day in the Life” wasn’t directly inspired by this photograph of Tara Browne’s Lotus, which appeared in London newspapers on Dec. 19, 1966, the day after the Guinness brewery heir crashed into a truck at high speed. At the end of the first verse John Lennon sings that he saw the photograph, but the story that triggered the lyric appeared a month later, Jan. 17, 1967, in a Daily Mail article about a custody battle over Browne’s children.

The same Jan. 17 paper carried a report on the number of potholes in the roads of Blackburn, which Lennon turned into the final verse. Paul McCartney, who sings the middle section, also collaborated on other lyrics (Lennon said the line “I’d love to turn you on” came from Paul) and he said he didn’t connect the verse to Tara Browne at all. Then again, he wasn’t the one who read it in the newspaper.

The closing number on “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” quickly became the most celebrated song in the band’s catalog, its surreal atmosphere and avant-garde orchestral crescendoes expanding the possibilities of what a pop song could aspire to. David Crosby was among the first to hear it.

I was high as a kite. … They sat me down; they had huge speakers, like coffins with wheels, that they rolled up on either side of the stool. By the time it got to the end of that piano chord, man, my brains were on the floor.”

Considering that the original is the product of hours of studio experimentation, it might be surprising to learn that several artists have covered it. One of the first was jazz guitarist Wes Montgomery, who in 1967 was dabbling in smooth jazz, in what turned out to be a successful attempt to woo a mainstream audience.

The Beatles had stopped performing live by the time Sgt. Pepper was released, so they never tried to do it in concert, but others have. Rock guitarist Jeff Beck, like Montgomery, plays it as an instrumental.

Jam-band faves Phish have covered the tune in concert dozens of times, usually as an encore.

When Neil Young played it in Hyde Park in 2009, he was joined by McCartney himself for the middle section. Young didn’t have an orchestra for the final crescendo, but he does manage to give a literal meaning to “shredding.”