It was 50 years ago today … actually, it was 50 years ago last Thursday. You would think that a documentary celebrating a big anniversary of the Beatles’ defining album would go out, if not on the actual day, then at least before, rather than two days afterwards. And that’s about all I can find wrong with the brilliant Sgt Pepper’s Musical Revolution with Howard Goodall (BBC2, Saturday).
I thought I knew Sgt Pepper quite well. I can sing along, and know some of the stories: Paul’s surprisingly generous reaction to a parking ticket from Lovely Rita, John’s circus poster that inspired Being for the Benefit of Mr Kite!, George’s adventures in the wonderland of Indian culture and Hinduism. But what I knew didn’t even scratch the surface.
Goodall makes an archaeology analogy when he is unpicking the four pianos of Penny Lane (not on the album, but recorded as part of the Sgt Pepper sessions). And that’s what he does: he digs away, brushing at the delicate bits, uncovering it layer by layer, then explaining it expertly. This isn’t any old site, though, a muddy field with a few coins and broken bits of pot. Because of the quality of the treasure, and its influence, and the stories, it is the Best Dig Ever. Tutankhamun, basically. What can you hear in there, Howard? Wonderful things!
Four pianos is a lot? Pah! The last sound on the record, the triumphant final E major chord of A Day in the Life has seven, played by eight people (Paul and Ringo doubled up, presumably because Ringo couldn’t be trusted with his own piano). Plus an electric organ and a harmonium. Their decaying tails were recorded separately, then the life of the sound extended by mixing desk fader so that it resonates on and on, like the influence of the record itself.
There is a fair amount of button-pressing and knob-twiddling, such as how one take of Strawberry Fields was welded to another, faster one (easy now, of course) by manipulating the electricity supply. And the creation of the giant avant-garde orchestral glissando that introduces one of A Day in the Life’s two personae to the other.
There is some music theory, too, counterpoint and modulation, put into practice to make it mean something. Goodall also explores the outside influences and inspirations that went into the record. John and Paul’s childhoods, their families, Lewis Carroll, Little Richard, JS Bach, the news, stories in the papers, the 60s … and not just their own glamorous, colourful 60s, but the bleaker, sadder 60s of She’s Leaving Home.
Goodall is not just a musical archaeologist, then, he’s playing history teacher, too, with a special interest in social history. And more than anything, he’s simply a massive fan.
That’s another lovely thing about Sgt Pepper’s Musical Revolution: they – the Beatles – are in it. It is Peppered with snippets – studio audio outtakes, Ringo showing up at Abbey Road in time for tea – a cheeky reminder of who we’re dealing with.
Of course, you did what I did: put the record on immediately afterwards. And there was so much new to listen to, even though you’ve heard it 4,000 times before.
Cardinal (BBC4, Saturday) starts with a bleak, frozen landscape, icy trees from above, a man on a snowmobile. And then the discovery of a body, a hand emerging from the ice in an old mine. Everything is saying Nordic noir … Oh, except for Detective Lise Delorme, when she opens her mouth. “You’re not answering your phone,” she says, in English, to Detective John Cardinal, who is asleep in his car. They are – Cardinal is – Canadian. Scanadian maybe, almost as if they said: hey, we’ve got snow, grim landscapes and grumpy cops, we can do that too (though really it is based on Giles Brunt’s novel Forty Words for Sorrow).
The body, when it emerges encased in a block of ice, is particularly – unnecessarily? – grim. That’s not you, is it, David Blaine? ’Fraid not, it’s a missing young girl. John (handsome, rude, has issues, got taken off the case) is put back on it, because he is also a half-decent cop. And, although he’s not happy about it (or about anything, to be fair), Lise will play his Unwanted Sidekick. Ah, but she’s also undercover, keeping an eye on him. There is an element of AC-12 about it, too – Line of Yukon? (Actually, it’s Ontario.)
Intriguing enough so far, although this is the Guardian, so obviously I’d be taking it more seriously, and enjoying it more, if it had subtitles.
