Thursday 3 December 2009

The Beatles



In Humanities 202, we learned a few things about the Beatles and were asked to write a paper analyzing a particular Beatles song.

The Beatles: Taxman

“Taxman” was written by George Harrison and was released as the opening track on the album Revolver in 1966. It was written during the later phase of their career, when their lyrics were becoming deeper and full of meaning rather than sappy meaningless like many of the lyrics they had written in their early stages. It is said that Revolver is where Harrison came to the fore of the band because not only did he write three songs on the album but was honored with the album opener. This proved that George could now write songs as good as John Lennon and Paul McCartney.

The lyrics of “Taxman” confront the Progressive tax the government was taking from the Beatles. Harrison said, “‘Taxman’ was when I first realized that even though we had started earning money, we were actually giving most of it away in taxes.” Because the Beatles’ high income, they were placed in the top tax bracket in the United Kingdom, which made them liable for a 95% supertax.

The musical structure of the song adheres mostly to traditional rock, using an electric guitar. There is a steady and strong beat that adds an element of subtle anger into the song. It is rather upbeat as well. Most of the tracks on Revolver have an electric guitar-rock sound, in contrast to their previous folk-rock album Rubber Soul. The lyrics of “Taxman” have a slight sarcastic tone as they talk about the tax collector taking all of their money. By recording this song, the Beatles were sending a political message to the government, opposing the ridiculous taxes that were being charged. They even include background vocal references to “Mr. Wilson” and “Mr. Heath,” referring to the leaders then of the Labour party and Conservative party, the two largest parties in British politics.

The poetry of the lyrics is pretty literal; “There’s one for you, nineteen for me” refers to the 95% tax that they were actually being charged. Yet they are also comedic, referring to unrealistic items to be taxed such as your own feet. I believe that the Beatles were upset about giving so much of their money away so they wrote a song, but they also knew that it would appeal to everyone that has ever worked has been taxed and there is and always will be a taxman. There are parts of the song that imply that the government finds excuses to create more taxes. “If you get to cold I’ll tax the heat, if you take a walk I’ll tax your feet” entails that the government will keep coming up with new things to tax and soon everything will have a tax.

I chose this song because I’ve related to it lately. This summer I had my first real job and until then I never realized how much money the government really takes! I earned about nine dollars an hour but when I factored taxes into it, I probably only earned around seven dollars or less. It was hard to expect a certain amount of money and receive much less. I believe part of the reason the Beatles were so popular was because so many of their songs related to the general public.



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