“I would like to just list what we did and what The Stones did two months after on every f*ckin' album,” he related to Rolling Stone magazine in 1970. When we weren't in the studio, we were in bed.” “ I roll a stoney / Well, you can imitate everyone you know” has been explained as his annoyance that The Rolling Stones were prone to steal ideas from The Beatles. “It was at the beginning of my relationship with Yoko and I was very sexually oriented then. “ You can penetrate any place you go” brings to mind John's state of mind at this point in his life. Some of them do and some of them don't.I'm singing about me and my life, y'know, and if it's relevant for other people's lives, that's all right."Īlthough the lyrics in the verses of “Dig A Pony” were self-described as “fun with words” and “nonsense,” it appears that certain phrases did have meaning to John, as disjointed as they may have been. You take a bunch or words and throw 'em out and see if they have any meaning. It's like throwing the I Ching or something, you just see what happens. You just take words and you stick them together. ' Radiate' and ' syndicate' - she (Yoko) wrote that. Curt asked, "Remember that one, ' You can radiate everything you are, you can penetrate anywhere you go, syndicate.?' You weren't thinking of anyine in particular when you were singing all of that?" John replied, "How could I have been thinking of you, man? That was just having fun with words. After he was discovered sleeping on John's property, he was brought over to meet his idol and question him. To illustrate how many avid music listeners tend to ascribe meaning into lyrics when there really isn't any, American Vietnam veteran Curt Claudio had been writing letters to John Lennon in 1971 and announced that he would be coming to the singer's Tittenhurst Park home in Ascot in May to ascertain whether the lyrics to "Dig A Pony," and others, were somehow written about him. His lyric “I dig a skylight” evolved into “I did a groundhog” before he fell upon “ I do a road hog.” “It had to be rougher,” John argued. “I just make it up as I go along,” John stated during the January 1969 rehearsals for “Dig A Pony.” As for discarded lyrics, Lennon explained that “'I con a Lowry' didn't sing well.It's got to be d's and p's, y'know,” “ dig a pony” apparently being a better choice. Its author never cared to explain them, so their importance apparently shouldn't be too much of a concern for us.
There's quite enough contained in its melody, arrangement and delivery to entertain the listener, despite the song's unusal words. Whatever the case, the finished lyrics for John's composition “Dig A Pony” are left quite ambiguous and open for interpretation, if one feels impelled to interpret it at all. However, once a composer gets used to hearing a spurious lyric sung repeatedly, the temptation is often to just keep it. Lennon flippantly suggested “ attracts me like a cauliflower” for George's song, something he could insert there for the time being so he didn't get stuck, the intention being for this to be replaced at a later time. “Just say whatever comes into your head each time.until you get the word,” he explained to George when asked for help composing lyrics for his song “ Something” in early 1969. While this is probably true, we should also keep in mind John's process for songwriting, especially concerning lyric writing. As musicologist Ian MacDonald explains in his book “ Revolution In The Head,” certain Lennon songs display “inconsequential fun with a lyric celebrating counter-cultural claims that society's old values and taboos were dead, that life was a game and art a free-for-all, and (especially) that words meant whatever the hell one wished them to.” When considering John's later Beatles songs, such as “ I Am The Walrus,” “ Cry Baby Cry” and “ Come Together,” the randomness of the lyrics suggest that the author possibly didn't have any intended interpretation in mind at all. The lyrical content found in songs like “ And Your Bird Can Sing” and “ Tomorrow Never Knows” made many faithful Beatles fans scratch their heads, not to mention Lennon's contributions to the “ Sgt. This is especially evident in John Lennon's output from 1966 onward.
As The Beatles' career progressed, as everyone knows, their songwriting changed dramatically.