The Banned Beatles Classic John Lennon Says Was Inspired by His Son’s Drawing—and Not Psychedelics

Of all the songs that the BBC banned during the heyday of The Beatles, this particular ban is the most understandable. At the very least, it’s understandable in the context of the 1960s and what was considered taboo at the time.

This particular song that the BBC banned was “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds” from The Beatles’ 1967 album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.

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“Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds” is one of the Fab Four’s most recognizable songs of their career. It was also one of their most thinly veiled references to the psychedelic drug LSD. The title of the song spells out “LSD”. The lyrics also make poetic connections to the substance, too.

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The BBC Ban of “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds” by The Beatles Was Understandable at the Time

“Picture yourself in a boat on a river / With tangerine trees and marmalade skies / Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly / A girl with kaleidoscope eyes” are just a few of many obvious references in the song.

Mentioning a psychedelic drug in a song wouldn’t make most people blush nowadays. Still, the BBC was pretty strict about banning such songs in the 1960s. One could listen to the lyrics of “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds” and think it’s a simple, innocent song about a girl named Lucy.

John Lennon even fought back at the allegations that the song was about doing drugs. He said that the song was simply inspired by a picture his son Julian drew that portrayed his friend Lucy in a childlike surreal manner.

Lennon also said that the song was about his future wife, Yoko Ono.

“It was purely unconscious that it came out to be LSD,” said Lennon. “Until somebody pointed it out, I never even thought of it. […] The imagery was Alice in the boat. And also the image of this female who would come and save me. This secret love that was going to come one day. So it turned out to be Yoko, though, and I hadn’t met Yoko then. But she was my imaginary girl that we all have.”

We don’t really doubt that Lennon was honest about the song’s initial inspiration. However, it’s clear that the song is a very poetic (and musically sound) ode to the psychedelic substance that he and the rest of the band regularly engaged in. Regardless of what the BBC and more conservative listeners thought of the song at the time, it’s still a legendary piece of work by The Beatles today.

Photo by Michael Ochs Archives

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