Paul McCartney’s vision for “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”

On November 6, 1966, Paul McCartney set off on a weeklong road trip through France. On November 12, he met his roadie, Mal Evans, in Bordeaux. They planned to drive to Spain to visit John Lennon on the set of his film, “How I Won the War.” However, they learned along the way that filming had moved on and John was already back in London. Disappointed, Paul decided to book a safari trip to Kenya on the spot.

In Kenya, they were joined by Paul’s girlfriend, Jane Asher. On November 18, they spent their final night in a YMCA in Nairobi before flying back to London.

During the flight, Paul got the idea that The Beatles would record their new album, not as The Beatles, but under the disguise of an imaginary band named “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.”

We were fed up with being the Beatles. We really hated that fucking four little mop-top boys approach. We were not boys, we were men. It was all gone, all that boy shit, all that screaming, we didn’t want any more, plus, we’d now got turned on to pot and thought of ourselves as artists rather than just performers. There was now more to it; not only had John and I been writing, George had been writing, we’d been in films, John had written books, so it was natural that we should become artists.

Then suddenly on the plane I got this idea. I thought, Let’s not be ourselves. Let’s develop alter egos so we’re not having to project an image which we know. It would be much more free. What would really be interesting would be to actually take on the personas of this different band. We could say, ‘How would somebody else sing this? He might approach it a bit more sarcastically, perhaps.’ So I had this idea of giving the Beatles alter egos simply to get a different approach; then when John came up to the microphone or I did, it wouldn’t be John or Paul singing, it would be the members of this band. It would be a freeing element. I thought we can run this philosophy through the whole album: with this alter-ego band, it won’t be us making all that sound, it won’t be the Beatles, it’ll be this other band, so we’ll be able to lose our identities in this.

Me and Mal often bantered words about which led to the rumour that he thought of the name Sergeant Pepper, but I think it would be much more likely that it was me saying, ‘Think of names.’ We were having our meal and they had those little packets marked ‘S’ and ‘P’. Mal said, ‘What’s that mean? Oh, salt and pepper.’ We had a joke about that. So I said, ‘Sergeant Pepper,’ just to vary it, ‘Sergeant Pepper, salt and pepper,’ an aural pun, not mishearing him but just playing with the words.

Then, ‘Lonely Hearts Club’, that’s a good one. There’s lot of those about, the equivalent of a dating agency now. I just strung those together rather in the way that you might string together Dr Hook and the Medicine Show. All that culture of the sixties going back to those travelling medicine men, Gypsies, it echoed back to the previous century really. I just fantasised, well, ‘Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’. That’d be crazy enough because why would a Lonely Hearts Club have a band? If it had been Sergeant Pepper’s British Legion Band, that’s more understandable. The idea was to be a little more funky, that’s what everybody was doing. That was the fashion. The idea was just take any words that would flow. I wanted a string of those things because I thought that would be a natty idea instead of a catchy title. People would have to say, ‘What?’ We’d had quite a few pun titles – Rubber Soul, Revolver – so this was to get away from all that.

Paul McCartney – From “Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now” by Barry Miles, 1997

Another story explained that the Beatles met a sergeant named Randall Pepper during their 1966 visit to Toronto, which led Paul to wear an OPP (Ontario Provincial Police) badge on the cover of the “Sgt. Pepper” album.

From Alan Cross (ajournalofmusicalthings.com):

Details are murky, but one story is that Paul was gifted the [OPP] patch by an OPP officer at Malton Airport (Now Pearson International) in August 1965 when the Beatles were in town to play two shows in one day at Maple Leaf Gardens.

Another tale suggests it was given to John Lennon by an Ontario cop in 1966. Still another story says that the patch was one of four given to the Beatles by an OPP corporal at the airport on September 8, 1964, as the Beatles waited to board a chartered flight to Montreal. According to Piers Hemmingsen’s The Beatles in Canada (RED), the corporal’s name was Glenn Hickingbottom. […]

Rewind to the morning of August 17, 1966, one year to the day from when Paul possibly received his OPP patch.  The Beatles flew into Toronto International Airport from Philadelphia. The band was met by their local security detail. Leading the squad was an OPP officer from Aurora, Ontario, a conservative sort who didn’t like how young people were growing their hair down over their eyes. Young men, he believed, should always be clean cut. He wasn’t a fan.

Over the next 24 hours, this officer and his men were responsible for keeping the Beatles safe between the airport, their suites at the King Edward Hotel and Maple Leaf Gardens. They played two shows that day, the first at 4 pm and the second at 8:30 pm. In between, there was a press conference back at the hotel.

This cop was there for it all, making sure the band was safe. He was also tasked with ensuring didn’t do (read: smoke) anything illegal.

The pressure on the security detail was intense. Not only did they have to deal with throngs of fans, but in 1966, rock’n’rollers were still viewed with nervous suspicion.  The OPP didn’t want these British ruffians causing any embarrassing trouble. Meanwhile, the Beatles were suspicious of any kind of authority and bristled at the idea of constant security, despite needing to stay safe from crazy fans.

Neither side need be concerned. The OPP officer and the Beatles got along extremely well. Despite their haircuts and their distasteful music, the cop was charmed by the band’s humour and attitude. The Beatles seemed to be amused by him, too.

A weird mutual respect quickly developed. By the time they parted on the morning of August 18, they were almost friends. The Beatles also thought this officer had a rather cool name:  Sgt. Randall Pepper. […]

As far as Sgt Pepper’s family knows, Paul dug out the OPP patch he’d received in 1965 (1964? 1966?) and had it sewn onto his costume as a “thanks-for-being-so-cool-and-not-letting-us-get-busted” shout-out to their police friend in Canada.

Sgt. Pepper—the real one—was flattered, but didn’t make a big deal of it, especially after he got into a spot of bother from his supervisors who thought he might have slipped Paul an official police patch. “We do not give official OPP property to anyone, especially filthy rock’n’rollers!”

From Alan Cross (ajournalofmusicalthings.com)

PAUL McCARTNEY returned to London this week from a nine-day holiday in Kenya. He is pictured above with the moustache and slightly shorter hair he used towards his disguise. Also back in London this week after a visit to New York is recording manager George Martin. The Beatles may begin recording this weekend for their next single and (film) album.

From New Musical Express – November 26, 1966

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