Songs > I Am The Walrus

I Am The Walrus

(Lennon/McCartney)

Song background
"I Am the Walrus" was made up of three distinctly different songs--the first is the beginning of the song, which John was given the idea of by hearing a distant police siren. The second song was about John sitting in his garden at home ("sitting in an English garden..."). The third was a song which was invented after John learned that a teacher was having his students study Beatles songs for meaning. John created the song with nonsense lines such as "elementary penguins", "sitting on a cornflake", and "crabalocker". John later said "Let (the students) work that one out." "I Am the Walrus" is notorious for being one of the first rock songs to use an orchestra. ELO leader and "Free As A Bird" producer Jeff Lynne said that the arrangement of "I Am the Walrus" heavily influenced the sound of his band.

Recording dates

Release dates

November 24, 1967 (UK) ("Hello Goodbye/I Am the Walrus" single)
Novmeber 27, 1967 (US) ("Hello Goodbye/I Am the Walrus" single)
November 27, 1967 (US) (on Magical Mystery Tour)
December 8, 1967 (UK) (on "Magical Mystery Tour" EP)
April 2, 1973 (US) (on 1967-70)
April 19, 1973 (UK) (on 1967-70)
March 22, 1982 (US) (on Reel Music)
March 29, 1982 (UK) (on Reel Music)

Recording notes

Chart performance

Quotes

"The first line was written on one acid trip one weekend. The second line was written on the next acid trip the next weekend, and it was filled in after I met Yoko. Part of it was putting down Hare Krishna. All these people were going on about Hare Krishna, Allen Ginsberg in particular. The reference to "Element'ry penguin" is the elementary, naive attitude of going around chanting, "Hare Krishna," or putting all your faith in any one idol. I was writing obscurely, a la Dylan, in those days.It actually was fantastic in stereo, but you never hear it all. There was too much to get on. It was too messy a mix. One track was live BBC Radio - Shakespeare or something - I just fed in whatever lines came in. (The Walrus itself)'s from "The Walrus and the Carpenter." "Alice in Wonderland." To me, it was a beautiful poem. It never dawned on me that Lewis Carroll was commenting on the capitalist and social system. I never went into that bit about what he really meant, like people are doing with the Beatles' work. Later, I went back and looked at it and realized that the walrus was the bad guy in the story and the carpenter was the good guy. I thought, Oh, sh-t, I picked the wrong guy. I should have said, "I am the carpenter." But that wouldn't have been the same, would it? [Singing] "I am the carpenter...."" - John Lennon, Playboy, 1980
"Let the (expletive)s work that one out." -- John Lennon, referring to groups of students who were analyzing Beatles songs for school

Awards

Anomolies

Other notes

During the "Got one/got one/everybody's got one" chant at the end of the song, John had a live BBC broadcast of Shakespere's "King Lear" fed into the tape. The excerpt (from act four, scene six, lines 249-259) is as follows:

Oswald: Slave, thou hast slain me. Villain, take my purse. If ever thou wilt thrive, bury my body And give the letters which you find'st about me To Edmund, Earl of Gloucester. Seek him out Upon the English party. O, untimely death! Death!
Edgar: I know thee well: a serviceable villain, As duteous to the vices of thy mistress As badness would desire.
Gloucester: What, is he dead?
Edgar: Sit you down, father. Rest you.

Notable covers

Oasis (from the "Wonderwall" single and The Masterplan)
Men Without Hats (from Sideways)
Oingo Boingo (from Boingo)
L.A. Guns (from Greatest Hits & Black Beauties)
Jackyl (from Choice Cuts)