"Baby, You're a Rich Man" was originally released a b-side to "All You Need Is Love" in the summer of 1967.
Everything was still fine with the group; Brian Epstein was alive and they had been revelling from the success of their then new album "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band". Yep, things were going strong. Probably better than ever before.
The band then decided to start work on "Magical Mystery Tour", in those sessions this song was recorded. The actual thing started out as two separate ideas that Lennon and McCartney had, the former with the aforementioned quote at the top and the latter with the "Baby, You're a Rich Man" chorus. With a few tweaks and shape ups, they ended up with the song that you and I enjoy today.
Apparently at the very end of the song when everyone is singing the chorus, John sings 'baby, you're a rich fag jew' in reference to their manager Brian Epstein who was a homosexual... and Jewish. I can't hear it, it's probably just a rumour. Thinking on the lyrics now, it may be that the song is about him - but that's for discussion.
It's very groovy, with smooth bass playing by Paul and a clavioline by John which makes those random noises in the intro and during the verses. The highlight for me is at the end when the song picks up pace, everyone's shouting the title at the top of their voices and the song fades out. Everyone sounds so happy and we all know that they wouldn't be that way for much longer, but that particular part makes me want to be in the studio with them.
You know the video for "Hello, Goodbye" when everyone starts dancing? This is the audio version is that.
It's also something that makes me want to have more songs on The Beatles Rock Band. Can we have more songs on that game? Probably not.
Until tomorrow.
Jamie.
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