What is the radio sample in the Beatles song “I Am the Walrus”?

Dylan’s songwriting style is known to have greatly influenced the Beatles’ 1965 album. Rubber coreparticularly Lennon’s song “Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown).” Despite Dylan’s derision, the album was a huge success and a turning point for the Fab Four. The Beatles followed their nose into the psychedelic era and soon found themselves at the forefront of an artistic revolution that was inextricably linked to the hippie worldview.

Although Lennon’s famous protest rallies and primal scream projections were yet to come, the psychedelic era brought many bizarre themes to the Beatles’ catalog. Alongside straightforward songs like “All You Need Is Love” and “With A Little Help From My Friends,” there were unprecedented classics like the compositionally progressive “Tomorrow Never Knows” and the lyrically confusing “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!”

Somewhere in the midst of this madness, which was largely the product of Lennon’s wonderfully eccentric mind, was born “I Am The Walrus”. The Beatles released the song in 1967 as part of the soundtrack to their television film Magical Mystery TourThe song also served as the B-side to McCartney’s “Hello, Goodbye”, much to the chagrin of Lennon as the song’s main writer.

Lennon reportedly wrote “I Am The Walrus” to confuse his listeners. You don’t have to be Timothy Leary to assume that LSD might have had an influence on the song. “The first line was written during an acid trip one weekend, the second line during another acid trip the next weekend, and it was added after I met Yoko,” Lennon recalled in Everything we sayto the beginning: “I am him, as you are him, as you are me / And we are all together.”

The inspirational song is a patchwork of vivid imagery and wild ideas, raising questions like: “What’s an egg man?” and “What does he mean by ‘walrus’?” But the BBC’s decision to ban the song from the airwaves didn’t include any questions. Clearly concerned about its general mad influence on the younger generation, they took aim at the song for its risqué line: “Boy, you’ve been a naughty girl, you’ve let your knickers down.”

Despite all the oddities in the lyrics, the song became a hit with audiences because of its catchy yet inventive composition. Lennon’s lead vocals are double-recorded, allowing for a strange echo effect, while strings, mellotron and brass highlight an unconventional chord progression that came about as a result of Lennon splicing three different song ideas together.

In the outro, Lennon leaves the listener with a final creative embellishment. In September 1967, Lennon heard a broadcast of William Shakespeare’s King Learironically, on the BBC Third Programme on the radio. He decided to record some lines from Act IV, Scene 6, in which the Earl of Gloucester says, “Well, good sir, wh—,” whereupon Lennon stopped the tape and later inserted a clip of Edgar: “…poor man, tamed by fortune… what a pity…”

As the song plays, Lennon interrupts a long section of dialogue that includes Oswald, whom Edgar kills. “Slave, you have slain me. Villain, take my purse. If you ever want to succeed, bury my body and give me the letters you find about me,” announces Oswald, whose voice was provided by John Bryning. The role of the Earl of Gloucester was voiced by Mark Dignam, while Philip Guard played Edgar.