How The Beatles’ ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’ Was Meant to Be Romantic

The Beatles‘ “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” is one of the most unusual songs in the canon of pop music. John Lennon thought it was a love song. He also felt he should have given it a different title.

The Beatles’ ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’ was about John Lennon’s dream girl

During a 1980 interview in the book All Are Saying: The Last Major Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, John discussed the origin of “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.” “The images were from Alice in Wonderland,” he said. “It was Alice in the boat. She is buying an egg and it turns into Humpty Dumpty. The woman serving in the shop turns into a sheep and the next minute they are rowing in a rowing boat somewhere and I was visualizing that.” For context, these images are from Through the Looking-Glass, the sequel to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

“There was also the image of the female who would someday come save me — a ‘girl with kaleidoscope eyes’ who would come out of the sky,” he said. “It turned out to be Yoko, though I hadn’t met Yoko yet. So maybe it should be ‘Yoko in the Sky with Diamonds.’”

John dismissed the widely-held theory that the tune was about LSD. “The imagery was Alice in the boat,” he said. “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.”

The Beatles didn’t make the song sound romantic at all

The Beatles released many songs about love. Some of them were upbeat rock ‘n’ roll songs, such as “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” “Can’t Buy Me Love,” and “I Feel Fine.” Others were pretty ballads, like “If I Fell,” “Something,” and “The Long and Winding Road.” In addition, they put out tracks that were about love in the non-romantic sense, including “The Word,” “All You Need Is Love,” and “The End.”

Those songs have varied sonic textures. However, almost all of them feel like love songs. However, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” doesn’t sound like a love song. It’s too strange. To compare it to some other hit songs from the 1960s, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” is closer to Strawberry Alarm Clock’s “Incense and Peppermints” than Frank Sinatra’s “Strangers in the Night.”

Other artists took ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’ in stranger directions

Like most Beatles songs, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” has inspired many covers. Interestingly, none of them seem to make the track more romantic. The most famous was Elton John’s version, which topped the Billboard Hot 100. The “Bennie and the Jets” singer made “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” weirder than the Fab Four did. His rendition even has a reggae breakdown! However, it doesn’t sound any bit more romantic than the original. 

Miley Cyrus also put out a cover of “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” which is even more psychedelic than the one from Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. It’s an earsore. It’s about as amorous as a stress nightmare.

“Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” was romantic to John and nobody else.