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Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!

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"Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" is a song recorded by the English rock band the Beatles for their eighth studio album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967). It was written and composed primarily by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney.[5][6]

"Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!"
Sheet music cover
Song by the Beatles
from the album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Released26 May 1967 (1967-05-26)[1]
Recorded17, 20 February, 28, 29, 31 March 1967
StudioEMI, London
Genre
Length2:37
Label
SongwriterLennon–McCartney
ProducerGeorge Martin
Audio sample

Most of the lyrics came from a 19th-century poster advertising an appearance of Pablo Fanque's Circus Royal at Rochdale. "Mr. Kite!" was one of three songs from Sgt. Pepper that were banned from BBC radio, supposedly because the phrase "Henry the Horse" combined two slang words for heroin.[7][8] Lennon denied that the song had anything to do with heroin.[9]

Background

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The circus poster from 1843 that inspired the song

Lennon purchased the original "Mr. Kite" poster in a Sevenoaks antiques shop on 31 January 1967, while the Beatles were filming promotional material for "Strawberry Fields Forever".[10] He claimed years later to still have the poster in his home.[11] "Everything from the song is from that poster", he explained, "except the horse wasn't called Henry."[12] (The poster identifies it as "Zanthus".) The song also changes the location of the performance from Rochdale to Bishopsgate.

The lyrics detail the evening's programme, consisting of a series of acrobatic tricks performed by Messrs. Kite and Henderson. Using a trampoline, Mr. Kite is to fly "over men and horses, hoops and garters"[a] and lastly "through a hogshead of real fire". The Hendersons, meanwhile, will dance and sing, and Mr. Henderson will undertake "ten somersets". Finally, Henry the Horse will dance the waltz.

Mr. Kite is believed to be William Kite, who worked for Pablo Fanque from 1843 to 1845. Mr. Henderson was John Henderson, a wire-walker, equestrian, trampoline artist, and clown. While the poster made no mention of "Hendersons" plural, as Lennon sings, John Henderson did perform with his wife Agnes, the daughter of circus owner Henry Hengler. The Hendersons performed throughout Europe and Russia during the 1840s and 1850s.[14]

"Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" is credited to Lennon–McCartney, but Lennon said he had written it entirely himself.[11] In 1977, when shown a list of songs Lennon claimed to have written (including "Mr. Kite!"), McCartney disputed only "In My Life".[11] In his 1997 memoir, however, he claimed to have co-written the song.[5] In a 2013 interview with Rolling Stone magazine, he recalled spending an afternoon with Lennon writing the song based on the poster, saying that "the song just wrote itself".[6] Pete Shotton, however, in his book John Lennon: In My Life, also remembers Lennon writing the song alone.[15]

Recording

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One of the most musically complex songs on Sgt. Pepper, "Mr. Kite!" was recorded by the Beatles on 17 February 1967 with overdubs on 20 February (organ sound effects), 28 March (harmonica, organ, guitar), 29 March (more organ effects) and 31 March.[16] Lennon wanted the track to have a "carnival atmosphere", and told producer George Martin that he wanted "to smell the sawdust on the floor".[17] In the middle eight bars, several recordings of fairground organs and calliope music were spliced together in order to satisfy this request. In a 1968 interview, Martin recalled that he achieved this "by playing the Hammond organ myself and speeding it up".[18] An attempt was made to find a 19th-century steam organ for hire in London, to enhance the carnival atmosphere effect, but to no avail.[19] After a great deal of unsuccessful experimentation, Martin instructed recording engineer Geoff Emerick to chop the tape into pieces with scissors, throw them up in the air, and re-assemble them at random.[17]

Before the start of the first take, Lennon sings the words "For the benefit of Mr. Kite!" in a joke accent, then Emerick announces, "For the Benefit of Mr. Kite! This is take one." Lennon immediately responds, "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!". The exchange is recorded in The Beatles Recording Sessions[10] and is audible on track eight of disc two of Anthology 2. The original recording can also be heard during the loading screen for the song if it is downloaded in the 2009 video game The Beatles: Rock Band.

Although Lennon once said he was "just going through the motions" and "wasn't proud of" the song,[20] in 1980 he described it as "pure, like a painting, a pure watercolour".[12] AllMusic stated, "The Beatles and Martin pulled out all the stops to make a layer of sound that was only possible to create in the recording studio [...] resulting in a sound both redolent of the circuses of bygone days, and as avant-garde as anything in rock music."[3]

Personnel

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Notes

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  1. ↑ According to a catalogue of Britishisms found in Beatles lyrics, "'hoops' are probably the staves used to reinforce a hogshead or barrel; used in this sense, 'garter' may also be a circlet of some material through which a performer jumps."[13]

Hoops are standard equipment used by acrobats to jump through. A garter is a ribbon that is jumped over. [22]

Citations

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  1. ↑ Everett 1999, p. 123. "In the United Kingdom Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band...was rush-released six days ahead of its official date, June 1."
  2. ↑ Wybenga, Eric (2011). Dead to the Core: An Almanack of the Grateful Dead. Random House.
  3. 1 2 Unterberger, Richie. "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite! - The Beatles - Song Info". AllMusic. Retrieved 6 December 2021.
  4. ↑ McIver, Joel (2015). "The Kinks - "Sunny Afternoon". In Dimery, Robert (ed.). 1001 Songs You Must Hear Before You Die. New York: Universe. p. 174.
  5. 1 2 Miles 1997, pp. 318.
  6. 1 2 Vozick-Levinson, Simon (25 July 2013). "Q&A: Paul McCartney Looks Back on His Latest Magical Mystery Tour". Rolling Stone. Retrieved 27 July 2013.
  7. ↑ Kenneally, Tim. "The Beatles’ ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band': 50 Things You Probably Didn’t Know: From producer George Martin’s biggest regret to a masked, X-rated message, an exhaustive look at the Beatles’ 1967 classic," The Wrap (June 1, 2017).
  8. ↑ James. "10 Things You Didn't Know About... Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," Archived 8 February 2022 at the Wayback Machine HMV (25 May 2017).
  9. ↑ Goodden, Joe. Riding So High: The Beatles and Drugs (Joe Goodden, 2017).
  10. 1 2 Lewisohn 1988, p. 98.
  11. 1 2 3 "Lennon–McCartney Songalog: Who Wrote What" (PDF). Hit Parader. Vol. Winter 1977 [reprint of April 1972], no. 101. pp. 38–41. Retrieved 6 June 2017.
  12. 1 2 Sheff 2000, p. 183.
  13. ↑ Somers, Harold. "BRITGUIDE---an introduction to Britishisms in the Beatles' Lyrics" (July 1, 1993).
  14. ↑ Turner, Steve (2005). A Hard Day's Write. United Kingdom: Carlton Books. p. 128. ISBN 978-0-06-084409-7.
  15. ↑ Shotton, Pete; Schaffner, Nicholas (1983). John Lennon: In My Life. Stein & Day Pub. ISBN 081286185X.
  16. ↑ Lewisohn 1988, pp. 98, 99, 105–106.
  17. 1 2 Lewisohn 1988, p. 99.
  18. 1 2 Gilliland 1969, show 45, track 3, 6:22.
  19. ↑ Emerick 2006.
  20. ↑ The Beatles 2000, p. 243.
  21. 1 2 3 Howlett, Kevin (2017). Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (50th Anniversary Deluxe Version) (book). The Beatles. Apple Records.
  22. ↑ Arrighi, Gillian. The Bastard Child: A New Reading of British Circus History, Nineteenth Century Theatre and Film (vol. 53:1). https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/17483727261433581

Sources

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