Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds & Getting Better
This is an article in our long running series of articles trying to rate realistically The Beatles level of quality, dealing specifically with two songs from the album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds
Picture yourself in a boat on a river
With tangerine trees and marmalade skies
Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly
A girl with kaleidoscope eyes
Cellophane flowers of yellow and green
Towering over your head
Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes
And she’s gone
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Ah
Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain
Where rocking horse people eat marshmallow pies
Everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers
That grow so incredibly high
Newspaper taxis appear on the shore
Waiting to take you away
Climb in the back with your head in the clouds
And you’re gone
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Ah
Picture yourself on a train in a station
With plasticine porters with looking glass ties
Suddenly someone is there at the turnstile
The girl with the kaleidoscope eyes
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Ah
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Ah
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
You know I always thought you drifted past the flowers with a girl so incredibly high, as is usual with a mondegreen my lyric is better.
This is another Beatles Childrens song, song taken from a Children’s book. The previous album
had Yellow Submarine. Definitely belongs in a playlist of the world’s greatest children’s music and unfortunately feels cringey to put it there because everybody knows ooh it’s about how they liked to take that LSD you know!!
Who should do this song — maybe Jovanotti — he’s got sort of a “I should have been a writer of songs for children” vibe going on, which in Italian, being one of the Great Children’s Songs Cultures, is not a put-down.
The song has of course been covered by lots of people, it’s almost like everybody likes singing about psychedelics!
OK but anyway if we can get past the stupid corny acronym for LSD which is totally 100% what they were doing (it was not a coincidence no matter what people claimed) — the lyrics are great.
This is actually one of the problems for both McCartney and Lennon as song writers, they did not have any idea or stop on it when they were being unintentionally corny. I don’t think Harrison was ever corny, not even with Taxman sounding like Batman which all evidence supported he didn’t know about or intend , and while Ringo Starr can be corny he is never unintentionally so. If Ringo is corny it is because he means it.
Out of them all Lennon has it worst, because when he’s being corny, like making the title of the song an acronym for a drug your describing taking — he acts like he thinks he’s being insanely profound and clever.
So this song has one problem, that is it about LSD and the name is a stupid acronym for LSD and you can just picture Lennon being all smug singing it — look at me, being a genius — neener, neener, neener.
Getting Better
It’s getting better all the time
I used to get mad at my school (no, I can’t complain)
The teachers who taught me weren’t cool (no, I can’t complain)
You’re holding me down (ah-ah)
Turning me ‘round (oh-oh)
Filling me up with your rules (fool, you fool)
I’ve got to admit it’s getting better (better)
A little better all the time (it can’t get no worse)
I have to admit it’s getting better (better)
It’s getting better
Since you’ve been mine
Me used to be angry young man
Me hiding me head in the sand
You gave me the word, I finally heard
I’m doing the best that I can
I’ve got to admit it’s getting better (better)
A little better all the time (it can’t get no worse)
I have to admit it’s getting better (better)
It’s getting better
Since you’ve been mine
Getting so much better all the time
It’s getting better all the time
Better, better, better
It’s getting better all the time
Better, better, better
I used to be cruel to my woman
I beat her and kept her apart from the things that she loved
Man, I was mean but I’m changing my scene
And I’m doing the best that I can (fool, you fool)
I admit it’s getting better (better)
A little better all the time (it can’t get no worse)
Yes, I admit it’s getting better (better)
It’s getting better
Since you’ve been mine
Getting so much better all the time
It’s getting better all the time
Better, better, better
It’s getting better all the time
Better, better, better
Getting so much better all the time
This song always strikes me as being ok, but nothing better than that. I quite enjoy it but on the other hand I could do without it entirely.
I want to say it should be covered by Brooks & Dunn but then I realized I’m supposed not to be a jerk in these articles.
So what band or artist does this remind me most of, Madness, I guess it’s a particularly British song to my taste.
Of course lots of people have done covers, including Smash Mouth which is the American band you get to do a Madness impression if you have a description of who Madness is on a tiny slip of paper but don’t actually know anything about them.
This article was written by IG Agent 19.
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