Recording and mixing "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds"

About

On March 1, 1967, The Beatles recorded the backing track for “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.” They ended up with a reduction mix called Take 8, which had all the instruments on track one.

On this day, March 2, they completed the track during a session that lasted from 7 pm until 3:30 am.

First, Paul McCartney recorded his bass part, while George Harrison contributed his lead guitar part on track four.

During vocals in Indian music they have an instrument called a sarangi, which sounds like the human voice, and the vocalist and sarangi player are more or less in unison in a performance. For ‘Lucy’ I thought of trying that idea, but because I’m not a sarangi player I played it on the guitar. In the middle-eight of the song (‘cellophane flowers…’) you can hear the guitar playing along with John’s voice. I was trying to copy Indian classical music.

George Harrison – From “The Beatles Anthology” book, 2000

Then, John Lennon recorded his lead vocals, with Paul on backing vocals. They taped those onto track two of the tape. To give their voices a slightly higher tone when played back normally, they used frequency control at 45 cycles per second.

John then double-tracked his lead vocals in strategic spots, while Paul added more backing vocals in the choruses. They recorded those onto track three, still using frequency control but at a speed of 48 1/2 cycles per second.

The recording was now complete, and they spent some time mixing the song in mono. They did eleven remixes, which were called Remix Mono 1 to 11. They marked RM11 as the best, but on the following day, March 3, they decided to redo the mono mixing. RM11 was released in the 2017 “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” box set.

We started again on 2 March with both Paul and Ringo playing overdubs. Paul was on the bass as usual. When George added his electric guitar, we recorded his amp through the Leslie loudspeaker — the rotating speaker from the Hammond organ — which gave us a nice swirly sound.

My frugality with the tracks was paying off … I still had two tracks left for the vocals.

The vocals on ‘Lucy’ weren’t recorded at normal speed. The first was recorded at a frequency of forty-five cycles, our normal recording frequency being fifty cycles. In other words, we slowed the tape down, so that when we played it back the voice sounded ten per cent higher: back in the correct key, but thinner-sounding, which suited the song. It gave a slightly Mickey Mouse quality to the vocals. In fact, Paul was also singing on these two tracks, lending John a spot of harmony. I also added the odd bit of tape echo to the voices. The second voice track we recorded at forty-eight-and-a-half cycles per second, to see what that sounded like. ‘Lucy’ has more variations of tape speed in it than any other track on the album.

On top of all those takes that night we also made eleven mono mixes, all of which, including the eleventh mix marked ‘best, we wiped the following day. They just weren’t good enough.

George Martin – From “With A Little Help From My Friends: The Making of Sgt. Pepper“, 1995

We had decided to route George Harrison’s guitar through a Leslie speaker during the choruses, and because that reminded John of the “Dalai Lama” vocal effect we had used on “Tomorrow Never Knows,” Mal was duly dispatched to see if he could find a rope so John could try out his theory and be swung around a microphone. From the wink Mal gave me when he returned some hours later — empty-handed — I suspect that he had spent the evening in the pub instead. He knew how absurd — and potentially dangerous — the request was, and he probably guessed that John would have forgotten all about it by the time he got back, which, of course, is exactly what happened.

Geoff Emerick – From “Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of The Beatles“, 2006

Last updated on January 3, 2024

Songs recorded

Staff

Musicians on "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds"

Paul McCartney:

Backing vocals, Bass

John Lennon:

Lead vocals

George Harrison:

Lead guitar

Production staff

George Martin:

Producer

Geoff Emerick:

Engineer

Richard Lush:

Second Engineer