The Beatles’ ninth studio album “The Beatles”, more commonly referred to as “The White Album,” was released on November 22, 1968, to an eager audience. The stark white album cover with the band’s name embossed in black was a conscious departure from the vibrant colors of the previously released “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”.
The band’s songwriting was evolving along with the world, and the collection of 30 songs featured John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr branching into a variety of musical styles. The album, primarily written at a Transcendental Meditation course, was recorded at a tenuous time for the band as relationships became strained and band members quarreled over creative differences. The same tensions continued throughout the following year, leading to the eventual break-up of the Beatles in April 1970.
But despite the growing tension within the band, The Beatles reached number one on both United States and British pop charts and is hailed by some music critics as one of the best albums of all time. Test your Beatles fandom and see if you learn anything new! Here are a few facts you might not know about “The White Album”:
Martha, my dear dog
In 1997, McCartney revealed that the album’s ninth track “Martha My Dear” was actually written about his pet Old English sheepdog of the same name. According to FeelNumb.com, McCartney said Lennon was amazed after seeing him act so lovingly toward his dear pet, adding he had never seen him act like that before. McCartney said, “It’s only when you’re cuddling around with a dog that you’re in that mode, and she was a very cuddly dog.”
Eric “Candy Cavity” Clapton
The song “Savoy Truffle” was written with the sole purpose of poking fun at a fellow rocker. George Harrison was hanging out with Eric Clapton, who at the time, was suffering from numerous cavities and needed dental work. But despite having a perpetual toothache, Clapton was always eating chocolates. According to BeatlesInterviews.org, Harrison wrote the song after Clapton was told to quit eating sweets. Harrison said, “So as a tribute I wrote ‘You’ll have to have them all pulled out after the Savoy truffle.’ The truffle was some kind of sweet … just candy, to tease Eric.”
Happiness was a warm puppy
“Happiness Is a Warm Gun,” read the headline in a gun magazine, a play on Peanuts’ cartoonist Charles Schulz’s 1962 bestselling book Happiness Is a Warm Puppy. Lennon said, “I thought it was a fantastic, insane thing to say. A warm gun means that you just shot something,” Rolling Stone Magazine reports. Recording the song required two nights and over 70 takes, but McCartney has called it one of his favorite tracks from that album.
Where was Ringo?
During the recording of The Beatles, Ringo Starr quit the group for two weeks, foreshadowing the fate of the band. Starr was feeling like an outsider more than ever, and he let his band mates know. In Anthology, Starr recalled, “I felt I wasn’t playing great, and I also felt that the other three were really happy and I was an outsider.” UltimateClassicRock.com writes that Ringo escaped to an Italian island on a yacht he borrowed from a friend. The band would soon send him a telegram expressing their love and asked that he please come back. Upon returning, he was greeted by flowers on his drum kit arranged to spell “Welcome back, Ringo.”
Bob Bonis wasn’t working with The Beatles any longer when The White Album was being recorded. Rather, he had the privilege to serve as the band’s U.S. Tour Manager for all three American tours between 1964 and 1966 (as well as the Rolling Stones’ first five trips stateside). During his time with these bands and with his Leica M3 camera always at the ready, Bonis captured rare, candid, historically important and often iconic moments of the stars as they rose to fame.
These photographs are available for the first time as strictly limited edition, fine art prints, from The Bob Bonis Archive at BobBonis.com. Each photograph is hand numbered, estate embossed, and comes with a Certificate of Authenticity from the GRAMMY Museum® at L.A. LIVE. Click here to buy your very own piece of rock history (or give one as a gift for a Beatles fan you know).