Last Updated on 27 January 2026 by Massimo M.
On August 5, 1966 Revolver (Parlophone PMC 7009) was released in the UK, considered by many to be the best work of the Beatles
With Revolver, the Beatles radically change their approach to their way of making music by dedicating themselves to new experiments and doing work in 
studio, which with the then new equipment allowed them to best express their creativity, the fulcrum of all their production.
It is no coincidence on August 29 of that year, the Beatles held in San Francisco, at the Candlestick park, the concert that marked the band’s farewell to live performances.
Why did the Beatles decide not to perform live concerts anymore?
There were several reasons that forced them to make this choice. The first is certainly linked to the ever-growing audience that crowded the concerts and which, due to the shouts and thunderous applause, prevented the band from hearing their instruments on stage, also because they were limited by the technologies available at the time.
Furthermore, the band was exhausted by the tight rhythms with which the tour dates followed each other without giving a moment’s respite.
Last but not least, John Lennon’s controversial self-centered manias who, because of his statements, put his life and that of his colleagues in jeopardy. As happened in San Francisco where, due to violent riots in the audience, the group was forced to evacuate the stage under police escort.
The genesis of Revolver
Influenced, on the one hand, by practices for the “widening of levels of consciousness” through the use of LSD, by psychedelic culture and by deepening knowledge of Indian culture and oriental mysticism, and on the other driven by a clear creative rivalry with Brian Wilson, who had given birth in May of that year to Pet Sounds disc within which he had achieved truly revolutionary levels of creativity and experimentation for the time, the Beatles entered studio with the aim of pushing their sound research as far as possible.
So, about 8 months after the release of their latest album, Rubber soul, and after over 300 hours of studio work in the EMI studios in Abbey road the album finally saw the light.
As easily predictable, Revolver quickly climbed the sales charts in the United Kingdom where it remained present for 34 weeks, seven of which were in first place.
Only two singles were extracted from the album, Yellow submarine and Eleanor Rigby which in turn conquered the first place in the charts for several weeks.
The US edition of the album, which was released three days after the official release in the United Kingdom, had the identical cover but the lineup consisted of only eleven tracks. The three songs not included, which were I’m Only Sleeping, And Your Bird Can Sing and Doctor Robert, had already been published in the collection Yesterday and today published only for the US market in June 1966.
This release is the last of the Beatles’ production to present differences between the records published by Parlophone and the corresponding editions edited by the Capitol label for the US market.
Revolver was without any doubt a great leap forward from the point of view of the band’s creativity and previous production.
It was such a revolutionary album that it was fully understood only many years after its publication, containing within itself the roots and inspiration of much of the music that will be produced in the future.
The cover of Revolver
Klaus Voorman, the artist in charge of creating the right image for the cover of Revolver, immediately became aware of this revolution. With tracks like Eleanor Rigby and Tomorrow Never Knows it was impossible not to understand that the Beatles had reached a creative turning point, but the real challenge would have been to transpose all this into a single photo, the visiting card of the album once exhibited in the shop windows and on store shelves.
In the end, Voormann decided to draw from a vast selection of archival images and official shootings of the band to compose a collage with visionary traits that would take place in the thicker and more tousled hair that the stylized Fab Four show off on the cover.
Also in this case it was a hit and the album cover has become one of the most iconic of the entire Beatles discography.
The 2022 remix version of Revolver
In 2022 a remixed version based on a design by Giles Martin (son of George) was released and is different from all other versions. The disc was “worked” with de-mixing technology with proprietary software invented by Peter Jackson. The de-mixing managed to separate all the instruments present in the tape, so as to allow a perfect mix, making the album something unimaginable until today
Track list UK version
Taxman (Harrison) – 2:39
Eleanor Rigby (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:08
I’m Only Sleeping (Lennon-McCartney) – 3:02
Love You To (Harrison) – 3:01
Here, There and Everywhere (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:26
Yellow Submarine (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:40
She Said She Said (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:37
Good Day Sunshine (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:10
And Your Bird Can Sing (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:02
For No One (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:01
Doctor Robert (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:15
I Want to Tell You (Harrison) – 2:30
Got to Get You into My Life (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:31
Tomorrow Never Knows (Lennon-McCartney) – 2:57
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