Recording "Magical Mystery Tour" #1

About

In April of 1967, Paul McCartney spent two weeks vacationing in the United States before boarding a flight back to London on April 12. During the flight, he borrowed a notepad from a stewardess and defined a rough plan for a Beatles television film.

Upon returning to London, the first order of business was to complete the mixing process for the soon-to-be-released “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” album. Paul also introduced the “Magical Mystery Tour” project to the other Beatles for their approval, although a working schedule had yet to be established.

On the evening of April 25, from 7 pm until 3:45 am, the Beatles began working on the theme song for “Magical Mystery Tour,” which was still unfinished at this point. The majority of the session was spent rehearsing the track extensively, with Paul guiding the group from the piano before proper recording began.

When they arrived at the EMI studios at 7.30 one evening to record ‘Magical Mystery Tour’ all they had was the title and a few bars of the music. […] Paul played the opening bars of ‘Magical Mystery Tour’ on the piano, showing the others how it would go. He gestured a lot with his hands and shouted ‘Flash, Flash,’ saying it would be like a commercial. […]

They leaned round the piano while Paul was playing, going over and over the opening. Paul told Mal to write down the order of how they would do the song. In a very slow schoolboy hand, Mal wrote down the title and got ready for Paul’s instructions. Paul said Trumpets, yes they’d have some trumpets at the beginning, a sort of fanfare, to go with ‘Roll Up, Roll Up, for the Magical Mystery Tour.’ Mal had better write that line down as well, as it was the only line they’d got. Paul told Mal to write down DAE, the first three chords of the song. Mal sucked his pencil, waiting for more of Paul’s inspired words, but nothing came.

From “The Beatles – The Only Ever Authorised Biography” by Hunter Davies, 1969

The group recorded three takes of the backing track, with Paul on piano (fed through a Leslie speaker), John Lennon on acoustic guitar, George Harrison on electric guitar, and Ringo Starr on drums. Take 3 was deemed the best, and five reduction mixes (Takes 4 to 8) were then done to reduce the recording from four tracks to one.

The instruments were then set up and they got ready to record the backing, which as usual was to be the first track they would do. […] It took a couple of hours to work out the first backing track and get it recorded. After it was done, Paul went up to see George Martin in the control room. Paul had the track played back to him, again, and again. […]

From “The Beatles – The Only Ever Authorised Biography” by Hunter Davies, 1969

During the recording session, the group also created a tape loop of traffic noises from EMI’s sound effects collection “Volume 36: Traffic Noise Stereo“, which they added to the song during a final mixing session on November 7, 1967.

I did that leaning over a bridge on the M1 moterway. It was a quiet day, a Sunday, because that was the only way one could capture the sound of individual vehicles. On any other day all I would have had was a mass of traffic noise.

Stuart Eltham – From “The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions” by Mark Lewisohn, 1988

The first track to be recorded for Magical Mystery Tour was the title song, and everyone was quite up for that session, which began, as usual, late in the evening. There was a long period of rehearsal punctuated by discussion about the various scenes they wanted to shoot for the film. Paul’s vague concept — and it was quite vague at that point — was to have the four Beatles and a group of actors pile onto a coach, destination unknown, in emulation of the “bus trip to nowhere” that was so popular in England in the fifties and sixties —really just an excuse for an extended booze-up on wheels. Finally, a backing track was laid down, with Paul thumping away on the piano. Once that was done, Richard raided the EMI archives and found a tape of transportation effects recorded on location by Stuart Eltham, which I put into a loop, complete with the sounds of busses whizzing by in glorious stereo, panning from right to left.

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

Work on “Magical Mystery Tour” continued the following day.

Last updated on April 30, 2023

Songs recorded

Staff

Musicians on "Magical Mystery Tour"

Paul McCartney:

Piano

Ringo Starr:

Drums

John Lennon:

Acoustic guitar

George Harrison:

Electric guitar

Production staff

George Martin:

Producer

Geoff Emerick:

Engineer

Richard Lush:

Second Engineer