"A Day In The Life": Words and Background Quiz

Answer: he "saw the photograph"

The complete lyrics are as follows: "I read the news today--oh, boy--about a lucky man who'd made the grade. And though the news was rather sad, I just had to laugh--I saw the photograph." Could John Lennon have been referring to himself? We'll never know.

Answer: he blew his mind out in a car

Some rock critics believe that the unnamed man in the song is really a reflection of John Lennon's own ruminations concerning suicide. However, during the period in which he wrote the song, John was just beginning his relationship with Yoko Ono, and was, by his own admission, happier than he had ever been.

Answer: having read the book

John Lennon is clearly referring to the oft-heard comment concerning films and books: "I just had to see the film, having read the book". His sardonic wordplay was not limited to song lyrics. A collection of his poems and "stories", entitled "John Lennon: In His Own Write" was published in the mid-sixties, appearing briefly on the New York Times Best Seller List.

Another, similar collection of Lennonesque sarcasm soon followed. Of the four members of the Beatles, John Lennon has always received the most attention in regard to his choice of words, some of it negative, such as the public outcry following his 1965 comment that the Beatles were "more popular than Jesus Christ." After having made that impulsive comment, Mr. Lennon tried to clarify it, explaining that he didn't mean to imply that the Beatles were better or more important than Jesus Christ., just that they were more popular in that particular moment in time.

However, teen-agers in America's Bible Belt remained unappeased, and the flames from many subsequent burnings of Beatles albums lit this country's Southern skies.

Answer: woke up, fell out of bed, dragged a comb across his head

According to an interview that John Lennon gave to "Rolling Stone Magazine" in 1971, the bridge to "A Day In The Life" was originally part of an unfinished song that Paul McCartney had abandoned several months before the recording of "A Day In The Life." In retrospect, however, the starkly youthful, unadorned lyrics seem tailor-made to serve as a counterbalance to John Lennon 's darkly cryptic verses.

Answer: seconds flat

The complete line is : "found my coat, and grabbed my hat, made the bus in seconds flat." The following line ends with Paul singing "I went into a dream," lyrics which provide the perfect segue for John Lennon's eerie wail lead-in for the final verse of the song.

Answer: 4,000

In an early 1970's interview, John Lennon said that the reference to the newspaper article about holes in Blackburn, Lancashire was based on an actual article he had read just prior to composing the song.

Answer: Albert Hall

The complete lyric is: "And though the holes were rather small, they just had to count them all, now we know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall." To Americans and other non-Brits, the Royal Albert Hall is probably best characterized as London's version of NYC's Carnegie Hall.

Answer: I'd love to turn you on

"A Day In The Life" came out at the peak of the Beatles' experimentation with hallucinogenic drugs. According to John Lennon, he took his first hit of acid while out on the town with his dentist, who offered it to him. But even though John Lennon was the first Beatle to "drop acid", it was the much more reserved Paul McCartney who first admitted to the press that he had "experimented" with drugs.

Answer: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band won the 1967 Grammy award for "Best Album" and "Best Cover Art". It is also credited with inspiring the Rolling Stones to record "Their Satanic Majesties Request", an unabashed knock-off of Sgt. Pepper's surreal, psychedelic music and themes.

Answer: humming

According to famed Beatles producer, George Martin, John Lennon initially thought that humming would be the ideal ending for the song. As the recording process progressed, however, that idea gave way to one in which crashing piano chords accompanied by a harmonium seemed more fitting as the signature ending to one of the Beatles' most celebrated and critically acclaimed songs.