It’s twee, certainly, but not winningly McCartney twee. Rising to a Lennon challenge to provide ‘fairground’ accompaniment, George Martin went to town with a kitchen-sink tape collage of calliopes, steam organs, harmoniums and comb-and-paper kazoo-ing that, while clever, lacks warmth. Scoping about for ideas as Pepper’s recording schedule stretched on Lennon eyes fell upon the poster, now hanging on his home studio wall, and basically asset-stripped it for inspiration. Intrinsically steampunk in concept, … Mr Kite! found its lyrical genesis in a Victorian circus poster Lennon discovered in a junk shop. Which only made them hate them even more. However much issue the contemporary listener might take with Paul’s instinctive Tin Pan Alley-isms, whether underground press-favouring blues rock radical, hypothetical milkman-on-his-round or John Lennon himself, they simply couldn’t avoid unconsciously whistling them. Not terrible, but rather more ‘Brian Wilson’s sandpit’ than is healthy.ĭestined to split opinion, even among The Beatles themselves, because while it virtually oompahs along in its archaic music hall manner with McCartney giving it full-beam puppy eyes over an urban nursery rhyme lyric that veritably oozes fondue fromage, it irrefutably employs a bloody good tune while doing it. George Martin’s accompanying harpsichord is pleasant enough, though you can’t help feeling that the only reason they’re deploying a harpsichord here is because they can. Where we find a lightly toasted McCartney contemplating his navel, as THC fingers fumble for a coherent bass-line. A fair enough palate cleanser, but more snippet than credible contender. While not bad for a bumper (the opening title track’s reprise was knocked off at the end of recording merely as an up-beat baffle between GM²’s closing cock-crow and A Day In The Life self-conscious brilliance), Pepper’s stop-gap signature tune reprise can’t realistically compete with the fine-tuned company it’s keeping.
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