As I wrote this morning, just glancing at this album art gives me the willies. What villain designed it**? Peter effing Max, that’s who.
This fall of ‘67 album was conceived and recorded under the influence of spiritual psychedelic enlightenment and Maharishi meditation.
What was happening within was Godly and cosmic (or do I mean cosmic and Godly?), but what emerged were lightweight McCartney anthems like “The Fool on the Hill”, “Hello Goodbye” and “Your Mother Should Know” plus “Blue Jay Way,” another of Harrison’s draggy, downish scold songs. I’ve avoided this album like the plague for many decades, although “Baby You’re a Rich Man” and Lennon’s “I Am The Walrus” (“Everybody’s fucked up”) are keepers.
Friendo: “MMT is the worst Beatle album? It has ‘Strawberry Fields’, ‘Penny Lane’, ‘Baby, You’re a Rich Man’…the whole second side is great.”
HE to Friendo: “’Penny Lane’ and ‘Strawberry Fields’ were hatched in early ‘67 — pre-“Pepper” singles. The creative fires were crackling hot at that time. Not so much in the late summer and fall of ’67.”
** The album cover(s) were designed by the German-born Jewish American artist Peter Max, who is renowned for his “cosmic brownies” art style of the 1960s. The front cover of both versions features all four Beatles dressed in animal costumes, with signature Peter Max-style psychedelic graphics and typeface. The Capitol Records LP version retains the image, but includes extra graphics as a border to create space for the names of all 11 songs on the album.
Paul McCartney — Hippopotamus
John Lennon — Walrus
George Harrison — Rabbit
Ringo Starr — Chicken