"Whose birthday is it?"
#4: The drugs don't work
The version of Sgt. Pepper's that came out in South East Asia, Malaysia and Hong Kong did not feature With A Little Help From My Friends, Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds or A Day In The Life. They were replaced for fear their lyrics could be interpreted as drug-related. Instead, three tracks from the Magical Mystery Tour album were used: The Fool On The Hill, Baby You're A Rich Man and I Am The Walrus.
#5: Old at heart
Astonishingly, Paul wrote When I'm Sixty Four about his dad Jim at the age of just 16. It was a track the band used to play around with at The Cavern Club if the amps failed.
#6: Backing vocals
That echoing voice you can hear counting the middle of A Day In The Life? It's only roadie Mal Evans. The band asked him to count the measures in a gap in the tape during recording the song's first orchestral build-up. The alarm clock before "Woke up, fell out of bed" was Evans' way of showing the end of the gap!
The fab two - and some other bloke
#7: More days in a life
The aforementioned A Day In The Life is apparently about Tara Browne - a friend of John's and a well-known socialite. Browne, an alleged user of hallucinogenic drugs, was killed in 1966 after driving his Lotus Elan through a red light and into a van. John sings: "The lucky man who made the grade... he blew his mind out in a car."
