The song Bob Dylan called an out-of-body experience: “It transports you”
Bob Dylan has spent his entire life figuring out the meaning behind a great song. As much as he has tried to put together a masterpiece whenever he sits down to write, there are just as many times when he tries to twist around his usual narrative to find something that he may not have ever heard before. Dylan was focused on lyrics before anything, but he knew great melodies when he heard them, and The Beatles’ ‘Taxman’ knocked him over when he first heard it.
Then again, The Beatles wouldn’t have had the opportunity to spread their wings as much were it not for Dylan. Throughout their moptop days, John Lennon, in particular, was known for being envious of Dylan’s talent, wishing he had the opportunities to stretch himself like Dylan was around the times of The Times They Are A-Changing.
While the Fab Four occasionally wrote Dylan-esque songs on tracks like ‘You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away’, they always had a far more eclectic taste than everyone else. Even when rock progressed every other month in 1966, the group could keep up with anyone on albums like Rubber Soul, which was so good that Brian Wilson was convinced to match its power on The Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds.
That was them toying with the raw songwriting, but Revolver was the opposite side of that coin. The songs were still fantastic, but you could also appreciate the massive amount of overdubs on the record, from the backwards guitars throughout ‘I’m Only Sleeping’ to the psychedelic headtrip on ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’.
The album also kicks off amazingly well with ‘Taxman’, featuring Harrison singing some of the most caustic lyrics on his guitar. Despite Paul McCartney taking the solo for the track, Harrison was already showing himself to be an incredible songwriter, writing about the unjust practices happening in the tax industry.
Even though Dylan had gone miles above everyone else in his sphere, he felt some spiritual uplift from Harrison’s piece, recalling in his book, recalling, “A great song follows the logic of the heart and stays in your head long after you’ve heard it, like ‘Taxman’, it can be played with a full orchestra score or by a strolling minstrel, and you don’t have to be a great singer to sing it. It transports you, and you feel like you’re levitating. It’s close to an out-of-body experience.”
That out-of-body experience might also come down to the harmony at play here. Harrison was first putting his knowledge of Indian scales to good use, staying on one chord throughout the entire verse before giving the listener a little bit of rest in the chorus break.
Considering the group had spent the first half of their career writing exclusively about love, the fact that Harrison dared to take on real-world issues felt like it was pulled out of Dylan’s playbook. Dylan had tremendous respect for what The Beatles had done in the past, but ‘Taxman’ feels like the middle ground between the group’s melodic side and their more serious subject matter.
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