The band committed to making Magical Mystery Tour in early September, after the death of their manager, Brian Epstein. In author Ian MacDonald's description, the slow progress on the recording was indicative of the Beatles' drug intake during this period and, in the case of Lennon and Harrison, their disinterest in McCartney's film project at the time. A glockenspiel part was also overdubbed over the coda.

According to Philip Jones, a friend of the session players, they became so impatient at the lack of activity that Howarth wrote out the score himself. On 3 May, a brass fanfare and other trumpet parts were added in a disorganised session where the four trumpet players, including David Mason and Elgar Howarth, began the evening without a score. The backing vocals were recorded at a far slower speed so that the voices sounded higher when the tape speed was corrected. The following night, McCartney added his lead vocal while Lennon and Harrison sang backing vocals, including the 'Roll up / Roll up for the mystery tour' lines. On 26 April, McCartney overdubbed his bass guitar part and the four band members, together with Evans and Neil Aspinall, added percussion such as maracas, tambourine, cowbell and extra drums Lennon, McCartney and Harrison then taped heavily echoed, vocalised shouts. During reduction mixing of this performance, flanging effect was added to Harrison's guitar part and to the piano over the song's coda. Three takes were required to achieve a basic track, with a line-up comprising McCartney on piano, Lennon on acoustic guitar, George Harrison on lead guitar, and Ringo Starr on drums. Since the song was not complete, much of the time was spent rehearsing before the group attempted a recording. The first session for 'Magical Mystery Tour' took place at EMI Studios in London on 25 April 1967, less than a week after the final sessions for Sgt. Magical Mystery Tour was the equivalent of a drug trip and we made the film based on that. 'Magical Mystery Tour is waiting to take you away,' so that's a kind of drug, 'it's dying to take you away' so that's a Tibetan Book of the Dead reference. We were always sticking those little things in that we knew our friends would get veiled references to drugs and to trips. But it employs all the circus and fairground barkers, 'Roll up! Roll up!', which was also a reference to rolling up a joint.

McCartney himself said about the song:īecause those were psychedelic times it had to become a magical mystery tour, a little bit more surreal than the real ones to give us a licence to do it. There are also interpretations of the lyric as an explicit reference to drugs, since the Beatles were experimenting with acid in those years. McCartney said that he and Lennon expanded the tour to make it magical, which allowed it to be 'a little more surreal than the real ones', and that the song was 'very much in our fairground period'. The lyrics explain in a general way the premise of the film: a charabanc mystery tour of the type that was popular in Britain when the Beatles were young. Kite!' When Evans was unsuccessful, a brainstorming discussion took place in the studio the following day to complete the lyrics. McCartney asked Mal Evans, the Beatles' assistant and former road manager, to search local bus stations for posters with text that could be adapted for the song, in the manner of Lennon's ' Being for the Benefit of Mr. I helped with some of the lyric.' According to Hunter Davies' contemporary account of the recording sessions for the song, McCartney arrived with the chord structure but only the opening refrain ('Roll up / Roll up for the mystery tour'). Maybe I did part of it, but it was his concept.' In 1972, Lennon said, 'Paul. McCartney said it was co-written by the pair. 'Magical Mystery Tour' is credited to Lennon–McCartney, although written primarily by Paul McCartney. Pepper, and includes ringmaster calls, a trumpet fanfare and traffic sounds. The song serves as an introduction to the audience, in the style of McCartney's opening title track to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, and several months before committing to make the Magical Mystery Tour film.

The Beatles recorded the track in April and May 1967, soon after completing work on their album Sgt. The song was written primarily by Paul McCartney and credited to the Lennon–McCartney partnership. It was released on the band's Magical Mystery Tour soundtrack record, which was a double EP in Britain and most markets but an album in America, where Capitol Records supplemented the new songs with tracks issued on the Beatles' 1967 singles. ' Magical Mystery Tour' is a song by the English rock band the Beatles and the title track to the December 1967 television film of the same name.

Magical mystery tour songs