Further to my post of yesterday, here is a really fascinating deconstruction of the final chord of A Day in the Life - perhaps the most meaningful one minute of sound in all of pop history. As most of us know - well, I did from somewhere - the final chord is an auditory amalgam of the same chord played simultaneously on several different pianos by several different groups of people - with a kind of "buzz" sound added to the mix to boost the bass. In the last five minutes or so of this video you actually get to hear the component parts. This kind of technical manipulation was almost unheard-of in 1967, and in itself was a stroke of genius perhaps invented or implemented by George Martin. The original ending was going to be one note. Thank God someone re-thought THAT idea!
If you listen very carefully to that legendary final chord, as it slowly decays you can hear a chair squeaking. Others have heard the air conditioning system at Abbey Road Studios, though personally I can't. Given that playback is now much improved in clarity, people are still finding sounds in it, and to everyone's dismay, it turns out the recording equipment was turned off BEFORE THE END OF THE CHORD. It was still vibrating ever-so-subtly, but the truth is no one could pick it up even in playback. It was finished, wasn't it? SURELY it was finished, it had to be! No, it was not. It may have gone on vibrating for another 30 seconds, but we will never know.
