Sgt. Pepper was The Beatle’s eighth album. (Photo: Archive)
It was #1 in the UK for 27 weeks. (Photo: Archive)
Paul McCartney taught of Sgt. Pepper’s concept on a flight back to London from Kenya in November 1966. (Photo: Archive)
McCartney decided he wanted to write a song about a military band in the Edwardian era. (Photo: Archive)
When the band started recording the album in the legendary Abbey Road Studio Two, the first songs they wrote were “Strawberry Fields Forever”” and Penny Lane”. (Photo: Archive)
The songs were released as a double side A in February 1967, but they failed to reach #1 in the U.K. (Photo: Archive)
That’s why the band’s manager Brian Epstein decided not to include them on the LP. (Photo: Archive)
After recording the song “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”, it was decided the whole album would be written as if it was played by another band, giving The Beatles a chance to experiment with their sound. (Photo: Archive)
It took five months to record the whole album. They finished on April 21, 1967. (Photo: Archive)
One of the artist to co-design the album’s cover was Sir Peter Blake, whom also helped to design Band Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas” and Live Aid poster. (Photo: Archive)
The other designer was Blake’s wife, Jane Haworth, who later became a women’s rights activist. (Photo: Archive)
The concept for the cover was to make the band wear music band’s uniforms, taking a picture with the crowd after the concert in a park. (Photo: Archive)
Each one of The Beatles, including Haworth, Blake, and the gallery owner Robert Fraser, were asked which character they wanted to include on the cover. (Photo: Archive)
John Legend suggested Adolf Hitler and Jesus. They both where rejected. (Photo: Archive)
Some people questioned the absence of Elvis Presley on the cover, to which Paul McCartney said “he was too important” and way above everyone else to be included. (Photo: Archive)
To create the iconic cover, Blake and Haworth glued 57 life-sized pictures of the characters in black and white. Haworth later painted them by hand. (Photo: Archive)
The image also included four wax Beatles, borrowed by Madame Tussauds’ museum in London. (Photo: Archive)
A series of mannequins finished the set, including a Shirley Temple doll wearing a “Welcome the Rolling Stones” sweater. (Photo: Archive)
Maw West initially refused to appear on the cover, but he later agreed when he received a letter by The Beatles asking for his permission. (Photo: Archive)
Blake and Haworth won a Grammy in 1968 for their work with the album’s cover. (Photo: Archive)
“Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” is part of the “500 greatest albums” list by the Rolling Stone. (Photo: Archive)
Producer George Martin showed his musical skills on the album, playing a harpsichord on “Fixing a Hole”, a harmonium on “Being for The Benefit of Mr. Kite”, and a hohner pianet on “Getting Better”. (Photo: Archive)
The Beatle’s first album, Please Please Me, cost around $500 to produce. “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” final cost was over $32,000. (Photo: Archive)
The BBC banned some of the album’s songs on their radio stations, including “A Day In The Life”, for its lyrics “I’d love to turn you on”. (Photo: Archive)
They also banned “Being For the Benefit of Mr. Kite”, for its lyrics “Henry the Horse”, a double meaning for heroine. (Photo: Archive)
“Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds” was also banned because people believed the songs acronym meant LSD. (Photo: Archive)
John Lennon denied the reference and said the song was inspired by a drawing his four-year-old son Julian made for him. (Photo: Archive)
The ovation sounds between “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” and “With A Little Help From My Friends” were recorded from a Beatle’s concert in the Hollywood Bowl. (Photo: Archive)
Till this date, this is the third best-selling album of all time in the UK. Number on is Queen’s Greatest Hits, and the second is Gold: ABBA Greatest Hits. (Photo: Archive)
All songs on the album were written by Lennon and McCarteny, apart from Within You Without You, written by George Harrison. (Photo: Archive)
“Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” was the best-selling album in the world during the 60’s. (Photo: Archive)
On June 1, 1967, the Liverpool quartet made history when they released “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. The innovative production transformed the 60’s and 70’s musical panorama. Proof of this is that The Beatle’s eighth album 50th anniversary is on the news all around the world.
With only 13 songs, Paul, John, George and Ringo reinvented their whole careers. Sgt. Pepper’s so called concert sold over 39 million copies, and so, The Beatles won eight Grammy Awards, “the best album of all times” title by the Rolling Stone Magazine, and an eternal standing ovation.
These are 31 facts about The Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”. Surely there is something you don’t know yet!
