“He can sleep almost indefinitely, is probably the laziest person in England,” was how journalist Maureen Cleave summarised Lennon’s napping habits. “‘Physically lazy,’ he said. ‘I don’t mind writing or reading or watching or speaking, but sex is the only physical thing I can be bothered with any more’.” (Faroutmagazine)
John's love affair with his bed can be detected in a good number of songs he had composed during his career, most notably his lazily drifting “I'm Only Sleeping” from The Beatles' “Revolver.”This is a excerpt from Beetlesbook.com, to read all click here.
John's “great political gesture was the bed-in, which was done partly for its humor value, partly because, on some level, bed must have appeared to Lennon a much more sensible place to be than Vietnam, and partly because he just liked being in bed. His first solo single, 'Give Peace A Chance,' is one of the few classic songs actually recorded in bed...Like many artistic people who rise late, work late, and value their sleep perhaps a little too much, Lennon was mad for his bed.”
During the recording of ‘I’m Only Sleeping’, the tape playback was accidentally threaded in backwards, causing the recorded parts to be played in reverse. The band became fascinated with the sound, leading Harrison to compose a backwards solo for the song.
I'm So Tired Songwriting History"I wrote it in India," John stated in 1980. "I couldn't sleep. I'd been meditating all day and then I couldn't sleep at night. We were not supposed to leave the room because of this thing about staying in one room for five days. So I was so tired I couldn't get to sleep. That's it."
John had already begun to forge a strong friendship with Yoko Ono before they left for India. He was with his wife Cynthia on this trip, but he was missing Yoko These thoughts show up prominently in the lyrics, him addressing Yoko directly: “My mind is set on you. I wonder, should I call you, but I know what you would do. You'd say I'm putting you on...I'd give you everything I've got for a little piece of mind.”
“'So Tired' is very much John's comment to the world,” Paul writes in the book “Many Years From Now,” adding, “and it has that very special line, 'And curse Sir Walter Raleigh, he was such a stupid git.' That's a classic line and it's so John that there's no doubt that he wrote it. I think it's 100 per cent John. Being tired was one of his themes, he wrote 'I'm Only Sleeping.' I think we were all pretty tired but he chose to write about it.” Actually, “Sir Walter Raleigh,” the man known for popularizing tobacco in England, was referred to by John as a “get,” which is the Liverpool version of the popular British insult “git”
Recording History
As mentioned above, John recorded a demo version of "I'm So Tired" at George Harrison's 'Kinfauns' home in Surrey on May 28th, 1968 on an Ampex 4-track machine. The Beatles met on this day as well as the following day to record demos of the songs they'd recently written in preparation for them officially recording the songs in EMI Studios, these sessions beginning on May 30th.
John plays acoustic guitar and double-tracks his vocals on this demo, Paul also being heard adding some “woooo”s here and there as well as someone adding some strategic tambourine hits in the latter half of the song. This demo recording is substantially longer than the finished version, John repeating the first verse after the third verse is sung as well as adding yet another additional verse followed by a third chorus.
This final verse, undoubtedly intended to be used for a solo of some kind, included the following ad libbed vocal recitation from John for the time being: “When I hold you in your arms, when you show me each one of your charms, I wonder should I get up and go to the funny farm.” The first phrase of this recitation ended up becoming a striking feature of another of John's “White Album” songs, namely “Happiness Is A Warm Gun.” This demo of “I'm So Tired” ends with five repeats of the phrase “I'd give you everything I've got for a little piece of mind” instead of three on the finished recording, this followed by John stating “I'll give you all I've got, Derek!,” possibly addressed to press officer Derek Taylor who may have been present at 'Kinfauns' on this day.
Paul on vocals, him humorously imitating John's singing. After the line “get myself a drink, no, no, no,” Paul adds “lay off the booze, boy!”
