The Beatles Bible

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Written by: Lennon-McCartney-Harrison-Starr
Recorded: 5 January 1967
Producer: George Martin
Engineer: Geoff Emerick

Unreleased

John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Ringo Starr: vocals, organ, guitar, tambourine, effects, loops

Possibly the most sought-after unreleased Beatles track, Carnival Of Light was an experimental composition recorded in January 1967.

An early excursion into the world of avant garde music, which would culminate more than a year later with the release of John Lennon's Revolution 9, Carnival Of Light was led by Paul McCartney, and taped in a single day during the Penny Lane sessions.

In 1966 McCartney had a piano painted in psychedelic colours by the design team Binder, Edwards and Vaughan. McCartney met David Vaughan through a mutual friend, Tara Browne, the Guinness heir whose death partly inspired the lyrics of A Day In The Life.

The Million Volt Light and Sound Rave

In December 1966 Vaughan asked McCartney to contribute a recording for two events, to be promoted by the designers in the Roundhouse venue in Camden, London, on 28 January and 4 February 1967. The events were variously known as The Million Volt Light and Sound Rave or the Carnival of Light Rave.

Although McCartney was in the early stages of recording the Sgt Pepper album, he agreed to make a recording for Vaughan. In spite of this, Vaughan wasn't entirely impressed with the results:

I asked Paul to do it and I thought he would make more of it than he did; I thought this was a vehicle for him, if anything was. My trouble is, I expect everybody to drop everything. I forget other people have got things on.

The events also featured taped contributions by Unit Delta Plus, a collective whose members included Delia Derbyshire and Brian Hodgson from the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, and fellow electronic music pioneer Peter Zinovieff.

Of all The Beatles' recordings, relatively little is known about Carnival Of Light. It came to light in 1988, with the publication of Mark Lewisohn's The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions.

The recording was described by Barry Miles, a long-term friend to Paul McCartney, and the writer of his authorised biography. Miles reportedly played a part in the genesis of the recording.

The tape has no rhythm, though a beat is sometimes established for a few bars by the percussion or a rhythmic pounding on the piano. There is no melody, though snatches of a tune sometimes threaten to break through. The Beatles make literally random sounds, although they sometimes respond to each other; for instance, a burst of organ notes answered by a rattle of percussion. The basic track was recorded slow so that some of the drums and organ were very deep and sonorous, like the bass notes of a cathedral organ. Much of it is echoed and it is often hard to tell if you are listening to a slowed-down cymbal or a tubular bell. John and Paul yell with massive amounts of reverb on their voices, there are Indian war cries, whistling, close-miked gasping, genuine coughing and fragments of studio conversation, ending with Paul asking, with echo, 'Can we hear it back now?' The tape was obviously overdubbed and has bursts of feedback guitar, schmaltzy cinema organ, snatches or jangling pub piano, some unpleasant electronic feedback and John yelling, 'Electricity'. There is a great deal of percussion throughout, again much of it overdubbed. The tape was made with full stereo separation, and is essentially an exercise in musical layers and textures. It most resembles The Return Of The Son Of Monster Magnet, the twelve-minute final track on Frank Zappa's Freak Out! album, except there is no rhythm and the music here is more fragmented, abstract and serious. The deep organ notes at the beginning of the piece set the tone as slow and contemplative.

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