Talk:Revolution 9

There's actually a satanic message in this song
On a part of this song (played backwards) you can clearly hear a woman say "Satan, look at me, please".

You can check it yourself, personally I hate this song in anyway.


 * Oh nos! freshacconci talk talk  14:19, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Who recorded this song??
In the text I find "it was primarily the effort of John Lennon. George Harrison, Ringo Starr, and Yoko Ono made small contributions, while Paul McCartney did not actively participate in the track's creation." In another web page McCartney is credited for playing the piano in the opening.. And Ono is not credited. So what is correct? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Special:Contributions/ (talk)

There is no evidence that Ringo Starr participated in the recording process. Likewise, there is no evidence that: 1. The piano introduction to "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" is present. 2. Excerpts from "Honey Pie" and "Martha My Dear" are present. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 123.243.227.208 (talk) 04:10, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Add McCartney as a writer
Whoever is in charge of this article should add McCartney as a writer. Your article says McCartney wrote the "can you take me back where I came from, Brahma can you take me back ..." section, which ended up as the beginning of Revolution 9. Even though McCartney did not write it for that purpose. I can hear Lennon's voice singing it, does anyone know if the piano for that part was taken fron the McCartney recording of that song fragment, or was it Lennon playing? In any case, if your article is correct McCartney is a co-writer. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.10.28.237 (talk) 15:54, 15 October 2010 (UTC)


 * The article says that "Can you take me back" was one of two unrelated segments between "Cry Baby Cry" and "Revolution 9". Most sources do not consider it part of "Revolution 9". It was recorded many weeks after final mixing of "Revolution 9". In the Barry Miles book (see References) on page 499, McCartney is quoted as saying (about Lennon and "Revolution 9"): "He went off and made that without me." The piano player isn't known with certainty; it's sometimes assumed to be either Lennon or from an archived recording. By the way, Wikipedia articles are not owned. –Mainstream Nerd (talk) 23:47, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

George Harrison
Why would he contribute to this song only to later join forces with Paul, Ringo, and George M. to try and keep it off the album? --Ian911299

In the Musician article from 1992, George said that he and Ringo chose the sounds for the sound collage, including the famous "number nine" voice loop, but that would be highly unlikely, since a) he didn't compose the piece and b) he wasn't even present for the tape compilation sessions, where John and Yoko assembled the loops. Another anecdote that would lend credence to this is John saying in his 1970 interview where he had all the tape loops, fed them onto one basic track, fetching classical tape upstairs and just chopping the tapes up, reversing them, etc., so George was probably misremembering, because none of The Beatles had 100% flawless memories - nobody does - so I can safely dispel his claim as false. Ringo also had no direct participation in Revolution 9 and neither did Paul. 110.174.89.118 (talk) 10:13, 15 April 2018 (UTC)


 * I think you're both slightly wrong. Firstly, are you sure Harrison attempted to block its inclusion on the White Album? I've read widely on the Beatles and it's the first I've heard of this. Every source I've come across says McCartney was very anti the track, and Martin always wanted the album scaled down to a single LP anyway. (Harrison, like McCartney, didn't think "Revolution 1" was right for a single – is that where the "joining forces" idea comes from, albeit for the wrong track and the wrong format?) Perhaps in hindsight he thought Rev 9 shouldn't be included – because, much later, he said the White Album might have been better as a single album. Either that or, back in 1968, maybe he thought ditch the eight-minute "Revolution 9" so that "Not Guilty" and "What's the New Mary Jane" could have a place.


 * Harrison was definitely involved in creating the piece. Lennon's failing to mention him in a post-Beatles interview is hardly unusual – he wasn't exactly renowned for giving credit to his former bandmates, especially if Ono was beside him in the interview (and in that infamous 1970 interview of all occasions). Ono herself has acknowledged Harrison's contribution, eg in Scorsese's Living in the Material World documentary. What adds to the plausibility of Harrison's involvement, I believe, is that he'd been searching through tapes in EMI's sound archive for his Wonderwall piece "Dream Scene", some months before. So, as a more patient and methodical person than Lennon, he could well have earmarked some interesting sounds for later use. He also participated in recording "What's the New ..." with Lennon and Ono, of course. JG66 (talk) 04:09, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

Football Chants
The recordings aren't of soccer chants, but of (American) football chants, and I'm changing the page accordingly. I consider myself an afficionado of both sports, and while I have heard the chants of "hold that line" and "block that kick" used in many an American football game (particulary at the high school and college level, where chanting is much more common), I've never heard them once used in a soccer game, in any league, any country, any level. I suppose you could conceivably chant "block that kick" for penalty shots, but I can't even conceive of a situation in which "hold that line" would make any sense at all! Of course, the accents of the chanters are clearly American, and this should tip you off, too. But to lay the matter to rest, see this handy-dandy list of American football cheers. If anyone can find a list of soccer cheers that includes "block that kick" and "hold that line", feel free to change it back.


 * You're almost certainly correct since the crowd sounds were taken from the Elektra Sound Effects album set which was produced in the U.S.


 * I too can confirm the Elektra Sound Effects connections. ( Originally issued as six seprate albums, later conveniently sold as a vinyl six disc box set.) Not only was the "Football Chant" used , but numerous other effects from the set are used as well.75.104.162.82 (talk) 00:53, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Paul is dead.
I've played it backwards with friends and "number nine" does indeed sound like "turn me on dead man", though in a creepy sort of half-distorted way. You kind of have to adjust to hear it that way, but then it pops out at you, like those 3-D pictures that you have to focus on just right to see the image. It's enough of a non-coincidence that I always assumed that it was calculated, or at least a found object that the Beatles knowingly used.

I don't see how the "Paul is dead" thing can be called debunked. On Sgt. Pepper's, for example, there are so many clues that it looks certain that this was all a cool thing the Beatles cooked up, and their denying it to the bitter end is just part of the cool thing. Not a hoax exactly, just a prank that they let the fans in on by letting out info through "back channels." Of course, Paul couldn't be "dead" after they broke up because he wanted to have a career, but why should they ever fess up and spoil it all? But there are too many clues and weirdnesses to deny that there was a stealth "Paul is dead" campaign at least from Sgt. Pepper's to Abbey Road.JimmyTheSaint 21:57, 24 October 2005 (UTC)


 * It can be debunked because Paul isn't dead. Wow. That was tough. -Silence 05:46, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
 * what is the referent of your "it"? the point of the comment is clearly that the clues are real, not Paul's death. as the poster said, it's "not a hoax exactly, just a prank." the poster plainly asserts that the Beatles knowingly pulled this prank, so it's not a hoax that can be debunked. perhaps the confidence in which people proceed to dis and miss the obvious is a symptom of the kind of gullible seeing what you want to see that makes real hoaxes possible.


 * The PID history is summarised at http://www.recmusicbeatles.com/public/files/faqs/pid.html. The Beatles had nothing to do with it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.214.85.234 (talk • contribs)


 * Let's look at your two main points. First, that the "number nine" recording is actually a backwards message. This is ridiculous. If it was true, then the "creepy, half-distorted" audio was the original recording, and the man saying "number nine" was really backwards audio. If you can make a sound that played backwards sounds like a crisp British accent, I'll be impressed. Backward message mentions a study in which subjects could find non-existent messages in backwards audio, but only if they were given the message to find. Think; did anyone tell you that there was supposed to be a backward message?


 * Second, you claim that there are a plethora of clues. Frankly, most of the album cover "clues" are meaningless. You can interpret the covers any way you want. For example, look at the mannequins of the young Beatles on the Sgt. Pepper cover. All of them are looking down- except John. Sounds to me like the Beatles arranged it that way so that fans would think John had died and been replaced by an impostor. Deltabeignet 07:07, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

There's so much imagery in Beatle albulms, especially Sgt. Peppers, that almost any concieveable idea could be gleaned from it. And additionally, "backwards messages" are completely unreliable.--MafiaCapo 04:24, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

LOL I can't believe there are people who vehemently deny that there was a "Paul is dead" marketing hoax going on with the release of a number of Beatles albums. All you have to do is keep an open mind and listen carefully to the "hidden" messages. One of the Beatles clearly says "I buried Paul" near the end of their song Strawberry Fields Forever. It's undeniable. It is not certain, but likely, that the words "number nine" recorded in this song are pronounced in a way as to make it sound like "turn me on dead man" when played backwards. I just listened to the whole song in reverse (uploaded by a YouTube user) and you can clearly hear a number of disturbing messages with the volume up high. I can't be sure that this upload is legit, but I'll bet it is. It sounds like what I heard as a young man, including the repeated "turn me on dead man" portion. I just didn't think at the time to turn up the volume and listen for other messages. 74.81.231.254 (talk) 18:48, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

I wrote the prior paragraph almost six years ago. Not long afterward all the videos on YouTube demonstrating the "Paul is dead" audio were disabled -- reportedly due to "copyright infringement" -- and new ones were posted that had a different release of the song. On those, the "p" sound in Paul had been changed to an "s" sound. The original sounded like "Aw... bury... Pau..." whereas the new ones sounded like "Aw... bury... Sau...." (By "..." I mean fading off.) This was done apparently so that it could be imagined as saying "cranberry sauce." In addition to that, all the independent postings of the audio have disappeared. It seems that the Beatles later became ashamed of their hoax and took steps to eliminate the one "hidden" clue that could not be mistaken for something innocent. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.248.251.73 (talk) 23:42, 30 March 2019 (UTC)

this song scares the crud out of me
yeah....

Agreed, its the creepiest song I heard. The first time I listened to it I got so freaked out I couldn't finish it and had to skip it.

I love this song! I think it's awesome! --Ian911299

Lol, you and the millions of other kids who bought this album in the 60s bro

Yeah, creeps me out too. TheContralto 04:10, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

I was actually born in 1989 and bought this album in 2005, and I love almost every song on it! Including this one and Wild Honey Pie --Ian911299

Wild Honey Pie is great, but this isn't as good. In the old days of cassettes I would have the whole of Rev.9 run, but with cd's I usually skip this one and go straight onto the classic Savoy Truffle. 74.65.39.59 22:46, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

man, i totally agree, wild honey pie is one of my favorites but this one freaks me out too much to even listen to the rest. i dont know if i can handle this song normally, let alone backwords...

i must admit, this song is creepy, but i think its pretty cool how when he says "number nine" it switches from one ear on a headphone to another, anyone else notice that?

My friends, who are supposedly huge Beatles fans, hate this song. But it is one of my favorites from the album. It's cool, it's odd, and yes, it's creepy as heck! What's not to love? Now, if only Paul would release "Carnival of Light". Such a pity that George wouldn't let him put it on Anthology 3! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.225.128.152 (talk) 23:21, 8 January 2009 (UTC)
 * And in response to the previous comment, that's the beauty of stereo sound recording! Whenever a part of the song travels to the other ear, I follow the path with my eyes each time. Sounds weird, but try it some time, and it will stick with you!  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.225.128.152 (talk) 23:31, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree. The first song I heard this song, I nearly threw up. Then I couldn't sleep. I want The White Album, but with a song as terrible as this, maybe I should think twice. Mjfan98 (talk) 16:39, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

okay, so I was done listening to the backword version of this song....
Can anybody CONFIRM that, this is, indeed the backward version of dis song?
 * Just stick it in Windows Sound Recorder and reverse it to see.Mr.hotkeys 01:26, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

What?
What does it mean in the middle of the song when a man says,"Take this brother, may it serve you well"? And what is the choir singing?El benderson 17:39, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
 * I think the man is referring to a gun. If you listen, it sounds like there is a gun being cocked after he says this.

I didn't want to listen to the whole song so i skipped over a few parts and I noticed some screams. and I was just wondering if maybe it has to do with Lennon's scream in the very begining of Revolution? i'm pretty sure it may just be a coincidence but I just wanted to check.

The true precursor to noise rock?
what do you think?

Monty Python connection
The 3rd episode of Flying Circus (with the theme "How to recognise different types of trees from quite a long way away") has the voice-over "Number 1: The Larch" frequently repeated throughout. MP's FC started in '69, so it's not much of a stretch to suggest it's a reference. - AlKing464 10:37, 17 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Fellow Python fan here ... erm ... no. The Python sketch is based more on grade school educational slide shows, of a much earlier era. Children were show slide shows on all sorts of subjects , trees , flowers ,animals , etc. Oft times the slide mechanism would jam , and you'd get repeats. ( Although , the teachers , who would speak the descriptions of the images from a book , probably wouldn't repeat the information , they'd probably curse under their breath as they tried to un-jam the slide projector. ). If there was a Beatles connection , at the very least , Eric Idle would've claimed it by now!75.104.162.82 (talk) 01:06, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

satanic message?
people say this track has a satanic message. couldn't we get maybe some sources about that, since some people apparently believe that?

music concrete
The text states "influenced by the musique concrète styles of Karlheinz Stockhausen and John Cage" - however neither Stockhausen nor Cage were exponents of musique concrète, it was originated by Pierre Schaeffer at the RTF Studios in Paris. Stockhausen was interested in "Elektronische Muzik" and Cage in indeterminicy. Please check this on the electronic music pages. The text should be edited to reflect that musique concrète was a development of Schaeffer. 203.173.147.98 10:22, 26 May 2007 (UTC)


 * That is true. Also Iannis Xenakis was a huge expositor of Music Concrete. Indigocat (talk) 06:45, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

Voice of NY Yankees
The voice who keeps saying "Number 9..." almost certainly is Yankee public address announcer Bob Sheppard. 216.179.123.146 00:44, 6 June 2007 (UTC)


 * The article states it is from an EMI examination tape. Page 307 of the Beatles Anthology book quotes Lennon from 1970 saying it "was an engineer's voice" and that "the voice was saying: 'This is number nine megacycles.'" I agree with you insofar as it would be interesting to find out the man's name. Richard K. Carson 02:45, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Contradiction in section about Charles Manson
The article states that Vincent Bugliosi "came up with the theory" regarding Charles Manson making the connection to Revelation 9, but the next paragraph states it as fact that Manson made the connection. StaticElectric 02:44, 15 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Bugliosi never came up with any theory. He simply exposed Manson's theory. BillyJack193 (talk) 19:27, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:The White Album.jpg
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BetacommandBot 03:52, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

"Song"?
Is Revolution 9 really properly described as a "song"? It would not seem to conform to any definition of the term I've been able to find. I propose "recorded composition".

Jgm (talk) 20:30, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism
I looked this song up and got this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Revolution_9&oldid=219151817

I reverted it. --Particleman24 (talk) 20:40, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Backward song snippets?
Every I hear Revolution 9, I swear that I can hear parts of Strawberry Fields Forever and other songs mixed in. Can anyone shed some light on my question, please? 71.225.128.152 (talk) 23:34, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Simpson...again????
Oh boy, yet another Simpsons reference crammed into an unrelated article. It adds nothing, I repeat, nothing to an understanding of the song and is no more relevent than the lists of trivia that are routinely deleted on Wikipedia.70.91.35.27 (talk) 21:56, 9 February 2009 (UTC)Tim

Which references adds something?
It's a valid reference. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.18.94.203 (talk) 13:17, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

musique concrète
Is this consensus description for the song? Because following the link, I don't find a description that really comes close to what R9 is. I've heard it described as a sound collage, which fits better, but my own preference (as mentioned here some time ago) would be simply be "recorded composition". I will wait for discussion here before changing. Jgm (talk) 23:45, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I went ahead and made the change, linking the term farther down in the lead, and requesting a citation for the bald claim of influence. Looking back, the change in description was made about a year ago by an anonymous editor (prior to that it was "sound collage", prior to that it was "song").  Jgm (talk) 17:46, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Personally I think that 'Sound Collage' is a very accurate description. Indigocat (talk) 06:47, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

'Backmasking'
According to backmasking, the term refers to a message deliberately recorded backwards, this is not the case in this 'song' 83.70.255.135 (talk) 02:24, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

Profanity Use
The first time I heard this song, I couldn't hear the conversation. However, I knew that part had profanity. Near the middle of the song, there is a part that says something like "joining the fucking navy". I never knew that part was there, then I looked up the lyrics. Mjfan98 (talk) 16:42, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

It says "join the bloody navy. " —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.10.28.237 (talk) 15:46, 15 October 2010 (UTC)


 * This is true, but there is a use of "Cheeky bitch" at the beginning Namealreadytak (talk) 02:46, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

New reference
Published 2017: Lennon on Lennon, a collection of interviews (not the Rolling Stone of PLayboy interviews, though). I added a quote in the "Interpretation" sub-section.--Daveler16 (talk) 16:07, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

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Prisoner connection?
For the final episode of the TV series The Prisoner, the Beatles allowed "All You Need is Love" to be used during a couple of scenes. At about the 30 second mark of "Revolution 9" (as timed from a Youtube upload), a piece of reversed music is heard which strongly resembles the theme music to The Prisoner. Is it known if this was intentional or a coincidence? The final episode of The Prisoner, which features the Beatles song, first aired in February 1968, well before R9 was recorded. 23skidoo (talk) 17:40, 1 April 2022 (UTC)

Addition of info on Stockhausen lectures
I have changed the Development section to include information on how the Beatles knew about Stockhausen and Hymnen. This was told to me by my brother-in-law, conductor Gary Brain. Gary had been sent on a NZ government scholarship first to Berlin, where he played under Von Karajan, and then to the Covent Garden Orchestra. He was in London when the lectures were given on Stockhausen. Although he did not say that he attended the lectures himself (I got the impression he had not - probably he was in London too late), he later in NZ gave a series of school concerts throughout the country where he introduced children to the music of Stockhausen. It should be noted that Stockhausen had invited John Cage to lecture in Cologne in 1968; later rival 'Cage schools' and 'Stockhausen schools' were to grow up in the latter half of the 20thc. Gary played me Kontakte from D.G.'s 1974 'Stockhausen's Greatest Hits (the Hymnen section on this album is very like Revolution No.9), Messiaen 'et Expecto', and Penderecki's 'Threnody', which was a part of the NZ School Certificate syllabus. After hearing Kontakte I rented the only Moog 12 in NZ for a weekend from a music shop in Auckland, and these later, most especially Stockhausen, influenced my decision to later become a composer under the name My Melbourne Down.

This is Stockhausen's 'Trans' (1971). It certainly knocks hell out of The Beatles!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9lUZR6_N1w

Indigocat (talk) 06:31, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Cool. Any sources?--TangoTizerWolfstone (talk) 21:41, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

Take 20 or Take 18?
The 50th Anniversary version of The Beatles includes a bonus track that seems to match up with the description that this article refers to as 'Take 20' of "Revolution". However, this track is listed as 'Take 18' on the re-release. I think there should be some sort of note noting this development in the release history of the song. HMJohnsen (talk) 03:17, 22 October 2023 (UTC)