Follow along in the book HERE. Today's song is at #24 and is featured on pages 163-168.
"Happiness Is a Warm Gun"
The White Album
1968
As is usually the case with this type of thing, there's what the audience believes, there's what the artist professes, and there's the truth, squished somewhere in the middle. Adding the complication of this particular endeavor is that the truth is filtered through at least two additional points of view before it reaches Puke on Your Birthday, and so what you're left with is a muddled confusion about what art actually means and how it functions. It's so fucking easy to just say "fuck it" and consider it a great song (which it is—"Happiness Is a Warm Gun" is one of my favorite Beatles tunes), but, ya know, that's not really why we're here.
To parse through it: "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" is maybe a song about drugs, and maybe a song about the idea of and the history of rock 'n' roll, and it is probably a song about both. It could also be a song about nothing except the joy one feels when one hears a good Beatles song. I'd say that the chances of the lyrics "I need a fix" being about heroin are about the same as the lyrics "Lucy in the sky with diamonds" being about LSD (eh... probably 50% chance?). Lennon denies this, of course, but since when are we taking this trickster at his word?
100 Best Beatles Songs surprisingly sheds some light on the argument (whether they intended to or not). Apparently the lyrics in this song were put together at least partially under the influence of acid. According to Beatles press officer Derek Taylor, who similarly took acid with John and some other Beatles associates on the night in question, our songwriter outsourced his half-a-song idea to the crew of friends present, asking them to throw random phrases out. Many of them made the cut, like "velvet hand" (Taylor had been on a date with a girl who wouldn't explain why she wears gloves) and "donated to the National Trust" (apparently referring to the practice of pooping outside of a bank as a form of petty protest).
So drugs are integral to this story, just from the opposite direction, it seems. I wring my hands sometimes about the idea of "myth" and its role in art such as the three-minute pop song, but I would argue that knowing the "truth" about "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" (that being that it is a random word association exercise at its core) is not necessarily to its detriment. Because John Lennon did his part to add to the myth by claiming that this song is "sort of a history of rock 'n' roll." I've always appreciated the fact that this is three songs smashed into one, and while I would question the veracity of the first two sections being indicative of any sort of hallmarks of rock 'n' roll, I do think it's as great a reason as any to justify three different songs combined into one "song" (versus it just being lazy).
As always, it helps that it's a flat-out great fucking song. There's a gradual rise to the song, from mumbly morbid folk rock to a hard-hitting all-caps ROCK song (plus part 2b of the jaunty "Mother Superior" stuff, with a tambourine that always tickles my gonads), and then the doo-wop thing about wanting to shoot a gun, with the tongue-in-cheek "bang bang / shoot shoot" backing vocals sounding like a deranged Brill Building girl group. It all works really well separately and together (and sometimes both at the same time, like how Ringo Starr is purposefully playing a 2/4 rhythm while everyone else is playing 3/4 during the "I need a fix" section). There is a lot to like here, and there are endless depths, depending on how far you wanna go.
Here's how far I'll go with it, especially re: what this song actually means. It's all up to the interpretation of the audience, correct? Well, if that's the case, then here's how I'll interpret it. "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" is a good song made great by the fact that John Lennon would eventually meet his demise at the wrong end of such a warm gun.
I'm not trying to be funny (okay, maybe a little). I really do think it adds volumes of meaning to this song, that there's irony in Lennon sarcastically crooning about how good the caress of a weapon feels after he read the phrase on the cover of a gun magazine, but then also meeting his doom at the hands of the exact same weapon exactly 4457 days after he sang the lines "I know nobody can do me no harm!" in the studio. I'm not saying he was, like, predicting the future or any such nonsense like that. But I am making the argument that songs can retroactively attain meaning. And I'm definitely making the argument that everyone loves "Happiness Is a Warm Gun," and no one is talking about the real reason why (especially the book, which fails to make the connection at all).
It's a mourning song, but secretly, or maybe even unconsciously. That's what I think is going on when people insist that it's about heroin—that it seems dark but you can't really put your finger on why it seems that way—and also when John Lennon himself insisted that it's a lighthearted romp through a musical genre—that's a defense mechanism, as clear as day, even though Lennon would have no way of knowing what he was defending himself from, up until the moment Mark David Chapman raised and pointed the .38 special revolver.
Or... like I said, you could just say this is a good song. Which is totally is.
100 Best Beatles Songs surprisingly sheds some light on the argument (whether they intended to or not). Apparently the lyrics in this song were put together at least partially under the influence of acid. According to Beatles press officer Derek Taylor, who similarly took acid with John and some other Beatles associates on the night in question, our songwriter outsourced his half-a-song idea to the crew of friends present, asking them to throw random phrases out. Many of them made the cut, like "velvet hand" (Taylor had been on a date with a girl who wouldn't explain why she wears gloves) and "donated to the National Trust" (apparently referring to the practice of pooping outside of a bank as a form of petty protest).
So drugs are integral to this story, just from the opposite direction, it seems. I wring my hands sometimes about the idea of "myth" and its role in art such as the three-minute pop song, but I would argue that knowing the "truth" about "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" (that being that it is a random word association exercise at its core) is not necessarily to its detriment. Because John Lennon did his part to add to the myth by claiming that this song is "sort of a history of rock 'n' roll." I've always appreciated the fact that this is three songs smashed into one, and while I would question the veracity of the first two sections being indicative of any sort of hallmarks of rock 'n' roll, I do think it's as great a reason as any to justify three different songs combined into one "song" (versus it just being lazy).
As always, it helps that it's a flat-out great fucking song. There's a gradual rise to the song, from mumbly morbid folk rock to a hard-hitting all-caps ROCK song (plus part 2b of the jaunty "Mother Superior" stuff, with a tambourine that always tickles my gonads), and then the doo-wop thing about wanting to shoot a gun, with the tongue-in-cheek "bang bang / shoot shoot" backing vocals sounding like a deranged Brill Building girl group. It all works really well separately and together (and sometimes both at the same time, like how Ringo Starr is purposefully playing a 2/4 rhythm while everyone else is playing 3/4 during the "I need a fix" section). There is a lot to like here, and there are endless depths, depending on how far you wanna go.
Here's how far I'll go with it, especially re: what this song actually means. It's all up to the interpretation of the audience, correct? Well, if that's the case, then here's how I'll interpret it. "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" is a good song made great by the fact that John Lennon would eventually meet his demise at the wrong end of such a warm gun.
I'm not trying to be funny (okay, maybe a little). I really do think it adds volumes of meaning to this song, that there's irony in Lennon sarcastically crooning about how good the caress of a weapon feels after he read the phrase on the cover of a gun magazine, but then also meeting his doom at the hands of the exact same weapon exactly 4457 days after he sang the lines "I know nobody can do me no harm!" in the studio. I'm not saying he was, like, predicting the future or any such nonsense like that. But I am making the argument that songs can retroactively attain meaning. And I'm definitely making the argument that everyone loves "Happiness Is a Warm Gun," and no one is talking about the real reason why (especially the book, which fails to make the connection at all).
It's a mourning song, but secretly, or maybe even unconsciously. That's what I think is going on when people insist that it's about heroin—that it seems dark but you can't really put your finger on why it seems that way—and also when John Lennon himself insisted that it's a lighthearted romp through a musical genre—that's a defense mechanism, as clear as day, even though Lennon would have no way of knowing what he was defending himself from, up until the moment Mark David Chapman raised and pointed the .38 special revolver.
Or... like I said, you could just say this is a good song. Which is totally is.
BEATLES TRIVIA: Here's some quick superlatives for you. Paul McCartney said that this was his favorite song on The White Album. George Harrison said that this was his favorite song on The White Album too. No word on Ringo Starr, though I'm sure he was just happy to be there. Nancy Reagan said that this was her least favorite song on The White Album. But Stephan said (or rather, implied via the blog) that this was his favorite song on the Across the Universe soundtrack.
BETTER BEATLE: But is it my favorite song on The White Album? That's a good question. In 2018, I gave you the definitive PoYB ranking of all 30 songs (so #2 "Dear Prudence" and #1 "Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except for Me and My Monkey" are today's de facto Better Beatle in a tie), but I don't know. That top four (these, along with "Sexy Sadie") are all just so fucking good. I'll keep it as is for now, and we'll see if anything changes once I list to the #1, #2, and #4 songs 100 times in a row respectively for their columns (at #63, #82, and #37).
NEXT TIME: "Free as a Bird" is at #25, and we're going to publish that song's write-up on this Thursday morning, 11/2/23. True Beatles fans are gonna know why this song on this particular morning is such a delightful coincidence of timing.
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