Talk:Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (song)/Archive 1

Lyrics

I like those lines at the beginning.

It was twenty years ago today
Sergeant Pepper taught the band to play
They've been goin' in and out of style
But they're guaranteed to raise a smile
So let me introduce to you
The act you've known for all these years
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

The act we've known for all these years are, of course, The Beatles themselves. But, the song—or, at least, the single—was released in 1978. Minus 20 years, that's 1958, the year Paul and George joined John's band, The Quarrymen. Who taught this band to play? Who is Sgt. Pepper? What does this have to do with Paul and George joining John's band?

Or, more likely since the song first came out on the album in 1967 before it was 20 years ago, what happened in 1947? Anything important to The Beatles? I can't find any history about them identified by year before 1967. Other than the member's personal life, their birth dates and stuff.

I don't expect anyone to answer these questions, or think about them, or even read them, let alone notice them; I just wanted to ask them somewhere. Beatles tragodology is a hobby of mine.

--VolatileChemical 01:48, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

You're being too literal, VC. For the purposes of the song, The Beatles weren't The Beatles, but, in fact, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. That is the act you've known all these years, not The Beatles. Forget that the single was released 1978; The Beatles could have had no foreknowledge of that. "Twenty years ago today" had no special significance to The Beatles, but made for a ripping good opening line, and was specifically chosen because Paul, John, George, and Ringo wanted listeners to know straightaway that the group singing to them wasn't the Beatles, but Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Cub Band. StarryEyes 08:21, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Singles

The singles in the info box are a little messed up. I dont know how to go by doing this sorta thig, so could anyone fix it? 216.222.255.113 00:28, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

This song was most deffinately not released in 1967. No Singles were released off of Sgt. Peppers. CharlesMartel 02:37, 9 June 2006 (UTC)Charles Martel

No one said it was released as a single in 1967. It came out on the album in 1967. It was later released as a single in 1978 and then the (cover) version by Paul McCartney and U2 was released as a single in 2005. —Gordon P. Hemsley→✉ 08:39, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

The original 1967 single managed to chart for three weeks in the UK, with a peak position of 63. Unless I'm retarded, or something, thats what somebody said. I'm aware that that chart position is from 78, but it says "1967 single".CharlesMartel 03:30, 10 June 2006 (UTC)CharlesMartel

Oh, you're absolutely right. It turns out it was some uncaught vandalism from February by 212.238.240.118 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log). I've fixed it now. —Gordon P. Hemsley→✉ 19:58, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Infoboxes

This article looks terrible the way it is (with two infoboxes). Maybe we could reduce that fist box into an album listing infobox (like the one I put in "One", for example)? --Kristbg 03:14, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I tried to put the two infoboxes together , with a orange part for the album and a yellow part for the singles.I just can't figure out how to put in the Chart Positions and Single Chronology.Here's the orginal infobox, so you can integrate the missing info.

"Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (song)/Archive 1"
Song

MrGater 11:42, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

There isn't much info in the orange infobox that isn't already on the other one, but I added the album version length to the new infobox. --Kristbg 14:31, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Reprise

I think that Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) deserves to be an artice by itself, the two versions of the song are completely different. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 58.104.26.162 (talk) 09:41, 6 December 2006 (UTC).

Mal Evans

Mal Evans co-wrote the song. 'Nuff said - read the quotes... ThE bEaTLeS aka andreasegde 15:39, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

'Five' or 'Bye!' in the Reprise?

I actually think Lennon says Bye! as McCartney is whooping out the count in. Ian McDonald's Revolution in the Head says so.

Anyone disagree?

GA

Why has this article not been put up for GA? --andreasegde 17:14, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

I have upgraded it to a B-class, although citations are still needed, and the lists will have to be referenced or cut back. --andreasegde 17:52, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Oh what the heck, I have nominated it for a GA. I will work on it over the next few days. (It's number 31 on the GA list, so there is no rush...) --andreasegde 18:57, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

References

They need to be formatted so as to be the same. --andreasegde 04:35, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

I am on it... --andreasegde (talk) 23:34, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

I did more work on the references. I tried to make them as consistent as possible and as complete as possible. For online sources, I visited the page in question and used the title from that page as the title for the citation. In the case of the all caps "SERGEANT PEPPER'S..." BBC News story, the title was all caps on the web page in question, but I changed it to mixed case in the citation based on the comment from the GA reviewer. John Cardinal (talk) 01:09, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Mal Evans Is God

As it stands now, this article makes it seem that Mal Evans—an unknown roadie who had little, if any, musical talent—conceived the concept for the Sgt. Pepper album and wrote the lyrics to its title song. The only evidence comes from the roadie himself, who made these claims in his diary. On the other hand, the two most successful songwriters of the rock/pop era have legal claim to the songwriting credit, and neither ever acknowledged any contribution from Evans. After "Sgt Pepper," Evans had a single co-writer credit, and never distinguished himself further. He was a sometime producer, but his most notable work there ("No Matter What" by Badfinger) was re-produced before it became popular, and it's likely that he got producing credits because musicians in the studio yelled instructions to him in the control room.

The Mal Evans controversy should be covered in a separate section rather than strewn about the article as if it is fact. It is given far too much credence and weight in the present version. John Cardinal (talk) 03:17, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Uhh, John, that's a bit nasty, if I dare say so. This is the article about the song, and if Evans contributed (or not) his story should be told. Keith Badman believed him, and a person's last words are not to be discounted. If Evans is God, then McCartney is no saint, as well as Lennon, who stole Come Together from Chuck Berry, and paid heavily for it. Come to think of it, Harrison also had problems with My Sweet Lord, did he not? Lennon often took Ringo's silly sentences to write songs like A Hard Day's Night (song). Was Ringo credited? I think most definitely not. Evans was on the flight from Africa, and McCartney told the story as was (I have often read that McCartney's memory is not what it was). Evans also claimed that he helped on Fixing A Hole, which fits with McCartney once playing a word game with Alistair Taylor (although I'm not sure if it was him at this very moment) on Hello Goodbye. Are you saying only McCartney has a brain? :)

BTW, using phrases like "an unknown roadie", "who had little, if any, musical talent", "never distinguished himself further", and, "it's likely that he got producing credits because musicians in the studio yelled instructions to him" would be considered as POV without references, as you well know. :) Having been in a studio many times, one can not hear what producers/musicians are saying on either side of the connecting window without talking over the intercom through headphones. That's the purpose of a studio - to eliminate noise from both sides. This article is up for a GA review. Do we really want to send out a message that there is an edit war going on? --andreasegde (talk) 16:59, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

PS, I worked on Mal Evans article, and I firmly believe that there are very few people who loved The Beatles as much as he did. (Would you enjoy a job that entailed buying underpants and socks for the group, as well as being a bodyguard, roadie and friend? He even lived in McCartney's house for a while). His life fell apart after they broke up, and he moved to California to be near John. Why would he lie about one or two songs in his diary? He could have said/lied a lot more, but he didn't. Give him his fifteen minutes, because he gave all he had. --andreasegde (talk) 17:08, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

PPS, If we go down that road, maybe Aspinall is lying about suggesting that Sergeant Pepper should be the compere, and the idea of a reprise? I'm obviously upset about this, as you can tell.--andreasegde (talk) 17:19, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

You may feel strongly about this, but I do, too. I was not trying to be nasty, and I apologize if it seemed that way. I am confident that we can have a civil discussion about this. I will start by responding to a few of your specific comments that aren't specifically related to my objections to the article content. First, I did not start an edit war, as you will note that I did not change the article. I made opinionated statements about Mr. Evans, but I made them on the talk page, not on the article page, and talk page statements don't have to be supported by citations. I have no doubt that Mal Evans loved the Beatles, and from what I can tell, they loved him right back. Yes, they made him do menial tasks, but they certainly considered it part of his job. Remember, he was being paid. He was not a friend who they imposed upon, even though they may have grown to be friends, but he was first an employee.

With regard to recording studios, I've recorded in professional studios and I know how they work. I assumed that people reading my comments would understand that Evans would be wearing headphones to monitor the studio conversation and presumably using a talk-back mic to respond.

With regards to Aspinall, his claim is supported by material approved by The Beatles (the Anthology), and so his claim has the implicit support of McCartney. That's very different from the Evans claim.

For Evans, we only have his diary, and do not accept that as undisputed truth. It may very well have been the truth as Mal saw it, but that doesn't make it so. It is common for two people who participate in an event to describe the event very differently. In the specific case of song authorship, bit players don't receive writing credits, and so if Mal made suggestions for a word or two here or there, he doesn't deserve the credit the article implies now. I agree that his claim should be mentioned in the article, but it is given far too much weight after your recent edits. (Evans claim has been moved into the lead section, and dominates the second section, which has also been moved to the top.)

Lastly, I am not trying to deny Mal Evans his 15 minutes of fame, but surely whether or not he gets those 15 minutes is not an issue for WikiPedia. John Cardinal (talk) 18:51, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Response

• "Remember, he was being paid". I'm not sure if you know the background to his story. He wasn't just a normal employee. He was personally involved in every day-to-day decision, even if he did not express (or was not allowed to express) his own viewpoint. (He probably did, but that's my POV.)

• "He was not a friend whom they imposed upon". Yes, they did - above and beyond the call of duty. He was on-call at any hour of the day or night, and he is quoted as saying so. "I would get requests from the four of them to do six different things at one time and it was always a case of relying on instinct and experience in awarding priorities. They used to be right sods [bastards] for the first few days until they realised that everything was going to go smoothly and they could get into the routine of recording... Then I would find time between numerous cups of tea and salad sandwiches and baked beans on toast to listen to the recording in the control room.[3]" This wasn't a nine-to-five job, it was 24/7. (He had a wife and a child at the time as well..)

• Aspinall's claim/statement has nothing to with songwriting and credits. It was just an idea, which had nothing to do with the lyrics.

• "It may very well have been the truth as Mal saw it, but that doesn't make it so". If you are in a room with someone and they ask you to contribute lyrics/ideas/sentences when writing a song, then you should be credited. Are you suggesting that he was not of sound mind? Why should he lie? He could have said that he contributed lyrics to any of The Beatles's songs, but he didn't. Only two.

• It's not what he said, but what he could have said. He didn't. He didn't even finish his book, and he could have told numerous stories about The Beatles, could he not? My point is this: Why would an "ex-employee" not "tell-all" about them? Everybody else has. He was a "good egg" as they say, although slightly dumb, in my opinion, but that is my POV.

• It's not what he claimed - which I believe to be true - but him showing his loyalty by not "dishing the dirt" on The Beatles to make money, as many others did.

• There is an english phrase that I quite like, which is, "Put up or shut up". Keith Badman (who is referenced) stated what he heard. Do you have any references that Evans was confused during his time with The Beatles?

• Wikipedia should state the truth, as I think it sometimes does, which is different from many urban legend/fancruft pages. Evans' contribution should be here, because it's not anywhere else, apart from a few newspaper reports.

• My final point is this: Are you calling Evans a liar? --andreasegde (talk) 19:31, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

"Put up or shut up?" Whose being nasty now?

Evans was paid, and so he was an employee. There can be no dispute about that. Why you think The Beatles should have sought his opinion on every decision is beyond me. Does his loyalty mean that he could provide valuable legal advice, for example? Does his loyalty make him an expert on electronics, or finance, or whatever?

He was hired as a roadie and became a sort-of personal assistant between tours. If they chose to call him in the middle of the night, or tell him six different things to do at once, then they were just acting the way bosses do sometimes. It's happened to me and millions of other people. If Evans didn't like the arrangement, he was free to seek employment elsewhere.

I don't understand your comments about him not writing a tell-all book. Who cares? How is that relevant? We are not starting a Mal Evans fan club here. I appreciate that he was loyal, but it has no bearing on whether or not he co-wrote the lyrics to this song.

I don't understand your Aspinall response above. You brought up Aspinall and questioned why I didn't dispute his claim. I told you why.

Regarding the rest of your comments about whether Evans' claim is the "truth" or not... We will never see eye to eye. You have read the claim from Evans diary and you have read Badman. You accept them as truth, but I don't. I approach the whole matter very differently, and I don't accept either side as "truth". Instead, I treat it as evidence. If you don't understand the distinction, I can't help you much, but I will offer this made-up scenario.

One day, two people are in a room, and they spend most of the the day there together. The next day, each is asked (separately) what they were doing. One says, "Paul and I were writing the lyrics to Sgt. Pepper together." The other says, "I was hashing over the lyrics to Sgt. Pepper. Mal was there and told me what he liked and didn't like."

What's the truth? Is Mal lying? Is Paul? In your world, it must be one or the other.

I am not claiming that the description above is accurate. It's an example that I am using to try and illustrate a point.

I am not saying (as you seem to imply, despite clear evidence to the contrary) that I want Evans' claim removed from the article. I think his claim should be given less weight because we have only his words as evidence and the circumstantial evidence is not on his side.

If you can't stay on-point, I won't be able to discuss this with you further. I haven't changed the article, and won't, so you have already won, if that is your goal.

My final point is this: Are you calling McCartney a liar?

John Cardinal (talk) 04:37, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

I didn't read all of your response (because I have no desire to engage in a war of words) but my answer to your question, "Are you calling McCartney a liar?", is this: Yes, and that he also said that Stuart Sutcliffe was "really cool" in Hamburg (as he said on the Anthology DVD) but he hated him (had a fist-fight with him) and was jealous of Lennon's friendship. Do you know how driven and insecure McCartney really is? His music is wonderful, but the man has very deep insecurity problems, and wants to be the best (and loved). Read between the lines.

I will now leave this article, so someone else will have to take it through the GA review (or remove it from the list). I don't like arguments (because the truth will out) and I dislike the idea that The Beatles were all super-heroes, and could do no wrong. They were "a good little Rock n Roll band" (as McCartney and Lennon both said) but human beings as well. If you want to put Evans' claim into a different section, by all means, do so. I wash my hands of it... --andreasegde (talk) 01:39, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

If you don't want to edit in a collaborative environment then I can't stop you; you can take your ball and go home. I disagreed with how the article was changed and raised the issue on the talk page which is how WP is supposed to work. John Cardinal (talk) 02:38, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

You, Mr. Cardinal, thought writing "Mal Evans Is God" and insulting him was really top-notch humour or sarcasm; I am not sure which. You then throw in a snide comment about taking one's ball home. The problem, Mr. Cardinal, is that this article is now your ball, and you have to take it home through its GAR. Go for it, Mr. Cardinal; show us what you can do. Of course, you could back off by making some caustic remark about what WP is, or is not, but that would only mean one thing where I was brought up: "All mouth and no trousers". Have fun. --andreasegde (talk) 13:12, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

The Beatles were Evans boss. You are not mine. I don't have to do anything with this article. I do what I can and I don't need or want instructions from the likes of you.

Re: "All mouth and no trousers". That's evidently your version of "top-notch humour", and you are oh-so clever, aren't you! I bet you are really a stand-up comic moonlighting here on WP. Do you have a fan club I can join?

How you can get so upset about this when I didn't even change the article is beyond me. My goal was to engage you (and possibly other editors) in a discussion about how the Evans claim would be portrayed in the article, and to come an acceptable compromise. Unfortunately, you are like a spoilt child. When you can't get your own way, you throw a tantrum and run home to mommy. You should grow up and accept that people can differ about article content.

I am guilty of insulting Mal Evans, and I accept that criticism. The article changed dramatically in a way that I thought was inaccurate, and that influenced my original edit here. John Cardinal (talk) 15:01, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

GA

I thought this might be useful:

"Ringo's Billy Shears. Definitely. That was just in the production of Sgt. Pepper. It just happened to turn out that we dreamed up Billy Shears. It was a rhyme for "years" . . . "band you've known for all these years . . . and here he is, the one and only Billy Shears." We thought, that's a great little name, it's an Eleanor-Rigby-type name, a nice atmospheric name, and it was leading into Ringo's track."

Roling Stone interview --andreasegde (talk) 11:49, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

GA Review

GA review (see here for criteria)

---

I enjoyed reading this article but the citations are a bit rough. I'll place this on GA Hold for seven days.

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS):

   some non sequitur sentences: i.e. they don't follow from the previous sentence.

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

   The citations need to be copy edited and expanded.

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

   I think they are OK.

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

   Good luck improving the article

Some little problems with this article are the citations. For example Note 30 is all caps "SERGEANT PEPPER'S 40th ANNIVERSARY". Another is a copy editing problem within "Release" section: the sentence "At one point in 1976, there were 23 Beatles singles in the UK top 100." seems to be a bit of a non sequitur. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 22:12, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

I meant this to be an (informal) GA review, so I'll move it down here:

1. The contrast in "feel" between the opening and the reprise isn't really conveyed in the article. The opening is welcoming; the reprise is harder, grittier, with a different guitar tone in play. The difference between the songs the two are leading into may account for this.
2. Why are the 'LOVE' and 'Cover versions' sections underneath 'Live versions'? They aren't all live.
3. "Cover" is a hopeless cliché that drives me nuts in WP, and really is untruthful in this case (Hendrix was playing tribute to the Beatles' latest work, not trying to get a hit from it himself). Just say "subsequent versions" or something.
4. The McCartney tours rendition consists of the main song, a long instrumental jam, then the reprise. This needs to be described better, especially in terms of describing the jam's structure, and add what live albums or films have included this. From shows I've seen it's one of the more popular numbers, although you'd need a source that says this.

The Mal debate is dispiriting. Wasted Time R (talk) 16:47, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Conclusion

GA fail. The criteria for a Good Article can be found at Wikipedia:What is a good article?. This article fails on criteria 1(a): the prose is not clear. The text does not follow the Principle of least astonishment. For example, the very first sentence in the body of the text is this:

On the flight back to England from Nairobi after a holiday in 1966, Evans innocently asked McCartney what the letters “S” and “P” stood for on the pots on their meal trays, and McCartney explained that it was for salt and pepper, which led to the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band concept, as well as the song, although McCartney denies that Evans came up with the name.

Not only is that a sentence with a lot of 'comma clauses', it presumes a great deal of knowledge prior. In this one sentence, too much is assumed and too many arguments are presented: we have a vague 'origin' of the song name and we have a vague dispute. Who is Evans? For that matter, who is McCartney and is the reference to Nairobi significant. Now, McCartney might be obvious but he could have a tiny bit of backgound. Of course, the article does not fall on this one sentence but it is an example of a general problem. On the whole, the article is interesting and I wish everyone well in taking the time to write it. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 16:13, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree that there are too many comma clauses, and I agree (in general) that the prose of the article could be made more clear. On the specific point of adding even a tiny bit of background on McCartney, I don't think that is a good idea. He is identified as the writer of the song in the first paragraph of the article, and that reference is a wikilink (of course). If we add any description here, it will be redundant with information available elsewhere (his article, The Beatles article, etc.). A little redundancy is OK, but remember that McCartney is the writer or co-writer of hundreds of notable songs. If all those articles need that tiny bit of identifying info to achieve GA status, that's no longer tiny. If the reader wants to know more about McCartney beyond what is described here (the specifics related to the song), they click the link... — John Cardinal (talk) 19:47, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

I understand what you're saying about McCartney and you may be correct. However, I should point out that what you call the first paragraph of the article has become - through that mysterious process of Wikipedia policy making - the section called the lead: seeWP:Lead. The lead is now supposed to summarize the entire article and should contain no unique information. In other words, things in the lead have to be repeated in the body of the text. This article is OK and is much better than a lot of what is on Wikipedia. It just doesn't meet a set of criteria for 'Good Article' as that criteria exists today. Some re-writing here and there to make things clearer and I think this article would easily be GA. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 20:49, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Message to John: It would be wonderful if you cleaned the problems on the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (song) and put it up for GA again. Please do it (said in a nice way :) I'm busy on the Lennon article, which has more problems than I thought. --andreasegde (talk) 23:43, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

What to do about Mal?

Andreasegde and I have agreed not to keep sniping at each other—we fight hard, but make up fast—and so the dispiriting part of the disagreement should be behind us. Andreasegde has suggested that splitting the Mal info into a separate section would be hard to do. I think doing so would reduce the overall weight of his claims, which was my goal before, but I am willing to give that up and leave the article essentially as it is. I would like to make a few changes here and try to reach a balance (IMO) between the two positions. Two examples:

• Change "Evans never received royalties and was not given more than his £38-a-week wage" to "Evans never received royalties." His wage isn't relevant to the claim, and its presence in the article makes it seem like Macca, the other Beatles, and Epstein deliberately underpaid him. (I actually have no idea what £38-a-week would buy in 1966 but 38 of anything doesn't seem like much and I suspect other readers would think the same thing.) In any case, what he was paid would be more relevant in the article on Mal and not here.

• Change "McCartney denies the accusation that Evans came up with the name" to "McCartney denies that Evans came up with the name." Removing "the accusation" tones down the dispute. With "the accusation" there, I get a mental picture of a barrister in the high court (wig and all) berating a sweating, red-faced McCartney, trying to push him to a confession that he was the other shooter on the grassy knoll. (I admit my imagination might be over active!)

I'll re-read the Mal info pretty closely before I make any changes and so there may be more changes than what I described above. In any case, I will try to make changes that do not dramatically reduce Evans claims and don't require big changes to the structure of the article.

I won't act on this until later today and so if anyone has comments about it in the next few hours, please rock on. John Cardinal (talk) 13:49, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Go for it John. Sounds like good editing to me. (To tell the truth, after putting a lot of stuff in an article, I can't see the wood for the trees. Fresh eyes are always welcome.)--andreasegde (talk) 16:16, 13 December 2007 (UTC)