Written by: Lennon-McCartney
Recorded: 15 August 1968
Producer: George Martin
Engineer: Ken Scott
Released: 22 November 1968 (UK), 25 November 1968 (US)
Available on:
The Beatles (White Album)
Anthology 3
Personnel
Paul McCartney: vocals, acoustic guitar, bass guitar
John Lennon: backing vocals, harmonica, harmonium, six-string bass
George Harrison: backing vocals
Ringo Starr: drums
George Martin: piano
A jokey song about a cuckolded young American man seeking revenge against a love rival, ‘Rocky Raccoon’ was written in India by Paul McCartney in early 1968.
Paul [wrote it]. Couldn’t you guess? Would I go to all that trouble about Gideon’s Bible and all that stuff?
McCartney wrote the song on the roof of the ashram in Rishikesh, with John Lennon and Donovan Leitch also helping out.
‘Rocky Raccoon’ is quirky, very me. I like talking blues so I started off like that, then I did my tongue-in-cheek parody of a western and threw in some amusing lines. I just tried to keep it amusing, really; it’s me writing a play, a little one-act play giving them most of the dialogue. Rocky Raccoon is the main character, then there’s the girl whose real name was Magill, who called herself Lil, but she was known as Nancy.
Many Years From Now, Barry Miles
The song was originally titled ‘Rocky Sassoon’, but was changed by McCartney to make the main character sound “more like a cowboy”.
There are some names I use to amuse, Vera, Chuck and Dave or Nancy and Lil, and there are some I mean to be serious, like ‘Eleanor Rigby’, which are a little harder because they have to not be joke names. In this case Rocky Raccoon is some bloke in a raccoon hat, like Davy Crockett. The bit I liked about it was him finding Gideon’s Bible and thinking, Some guy called Gideon must have left it for the next guy. I like the idea of Gideon being a character. You get the meaning and at the same time get in a poke at it. All in good fun. And then of course the doctor is drunk.
Many Years From Now, Barry Miles
McCartney got the idea for the drunken doctor from a traffic accident he had in 1965.
I did once have an accident in Liverpool where I fell off a moped and busted my lip open, and we had to get the doctor round to my cousin Betty’s house. That was around this same time, when I was twenty-something and going out on the moped from my dad’s house to Betty’s house. I was taking a friend, Tara Guinness. He died later in a car accident. He was a nice boy. I wrote about him in ‘A Day In The Life’: ‘He blew his mind out in a car/He didn’t notice that the lights had changed’. Anyway, I was with Tara and had an accident – fell off my moped, busted my lip, went to Betty’s, and she said, ‘Get a doctor, get a doctor. It needs stitches.So they got this guy, and he arrived stinking of gin. This guy was so drunk. ‘Hello, Paul. How are you?’ ‘Great.’ ‘Oh yes, that’s going to need stitches. I’ve brought my bag.’ So be brings his black bag and now he’s got to try and thread a little needle, a curved surgical needle, but he’s seeing three needles at least.
I think I said, ‘Let us do it.’ And we threaded it for him. I said, ‘You’re just going to do this with no anaesthetic?’ He said, ‘Well, I haven’t got any.’ I think I might have had a slug of scotch or something. He just put the needle in and pulled it round. And then the thread came out and he said, ‘Oh, I’m sorry, I have to do that again.’
So he had to do it a second bloody time, and I was trying not to scream. To be honest, he really didn’t do a marvellous job, and I had this bump in my lip for a good while after. I can still feel it. And I was black and blue and really quite a mess. So I decided to grow a moustache. Then the other Beatles saw it and liked it, so they all grew moustaches too. John got so into it that I think somebody bought him a moustache cup with a little lid that sort of stops the moustache from getting wet when you drink. That’s where I think this ‘stinking of gin’ image came from – from this little painful memory.
The Lyrics: 1956 To The Present
In the studio
The Beatles taped ‘Rocky Raccoon’ during a single session on 15 August 1968. They recorded nine takes of the basic rhythm track, with Paul McCartney on vocals and acoustic guitar, Ringo Starr on drums, and John Lennon on six-string bass guitar.
Onto the master, take nine, The Beatles added another bass and drum track. Lennon then overdubbed a harmonica part, George Martin played the honky-tonk piano solo, and Lennon, McCartney and George Harrison contributed backing vocals.
The rejected take eight was included on Anthology 3 in 1996. The opening lyrics are significantly different from the final version:
Rocky Raccoon, he was a fool unto himself
And he would not swallow his foolish pride
Mind you, coming from a little town in Minnesota
It was not the kind of thing that a young guy did
When a fella went and stole his chick away from him.
According to Mark Lewisohn, the lyrics underwent a number of changes throughout the session:
For a song recorded and completed so quickly, Paul was surprisingly uncertain of the lyrics, formulating them as he went along and leaving the following rejected ideas in his wake: “roll up his sleeves on the sideboard”; “roll over, Rock… he said ooh, it’s OK doc, it’s just a scratch and I’ll be OK when I get home”; “This here is the story of a young boy living in Minnesota… f**k off!”; and “move over doc, let’s have none of your cock”. As Paul himself later said, between takes, “I don’t quite know the words to that verse yet!”
on the harmonies at the end is that a females voice that i hear ?
yes, rumor is that it was linda McCartney
It can’t be Linda because he was still with Jane Asher then
I don’t know about Linda at this point, but by the mid July Jane had already announced that she and Paul were no longer together. This session took place a month later.
Jane broke off the engagement in July when she found Paul in bed with Francie.
I wonder if Jane had any desire to shoot off the legs of her rival? Sorry, I couldnt resist. lol
Listen carefully. The female voice on the song is Yoko Ono. You can hear her voice on other songs, most notably on “Bungalow Bill.”
I’ve long preferred the Anthology 3 version (Take 8), mainly because of McCartney’s accidental comingling of “smelling” and “stinking” after the instrumental, after which he just rolls with it:
The doctor came in
Sminking of gin (laughs) ‘Sminking?’
And proceeded to lie on the table
He was really sminking of gin
And it did him in in the end
Poor doc!
Meantime, back on the table
(Still makes me laugh every time I listen to it.)
“The doc walked in”, instead of not “came in” 😉
Txs for reminding me about the Anthologies!
The clever rhyming in this song is hilarious. (fancy-Nancy, etc.)
I love it, despite Paul’s rather weak, jokey American accent – a source of much amusement to my friends and I (who are also from the UK), whom, as kids would often say to each other “rocky din’ lach thacht!”, with the last two words in raw scouse… I guess you had to be there 😉
that female voice is Linda Eastman
The only Beatles’ song i can think of with the honky-tonk piano, just another one of those unconventional instuments featured on the White Album.
The piano playing at the very end of “Tomorrow Never Knows” sounds very honky-tonk or close to it anyway.
You Never Give Me Your Money also has a honky tonk piano.
I believe those honky tonk piano parts were played by Nicky Hopkins. Sounds so much like his playing.
Its george martin
Don’t Pass Me By
Once again (and completely overlooked) is the use of recording the piano at “half-speed” in order to create the chimey piano tone upon playback at normal speed. This would also explain the death-defying speed that George Martin achieved in his performance. It was an actual “tack” piano (possibly an upright) unlike the Boogie Woogie double-speed grand on “You Never Give Me Your Money” and the more famous use of double-speed piano – the baroque influenced solo on “In My Life.” To confirm the use of recording a piano at half speed, listen to a normal piano when slowed down to half it’s speed. It will have no clarity or dynamics. The piano (at half-speed) on all three of these songs not only has clarity, but you can now hear subtle mistakes (nuance) that are completely covered up when played back at normal speed.
I want to know if Rocky Raccoon dies. Is it obvious that he does? I wish not. One of my favorite Beatles song. I saw Paul from the front row in 2008!
Well the answer to that question might be found be answering this question – how much help did Gideon’s bible give to poor Rocky’s revival?
Congratulations
This music has inspired a legenday music here in Brazil, called ” Faroeste Caboclo” by the band Legião Urbana
I’ve always loved Paul’s story songs, and this is definitely no exception. I especially enjoy the humor he threw in there. Considering how great most of the White Album is, I still can’t say if I think this is a highlight, but I do really enjoy it.
I love the anthology version….probably because I’m from Minnesota. whatever, this is amazing, Paul knows how to rock.
I am a Liverpudlian and John, Paul, George and Ringo grew up close to where I grew up. Regardless of this fact, i had never heard this song before in my life until this weekend just gone when i was skiing in New Jersey and happened to have the good fortune of sharing the ski lift with a hansone if not rugged looking fellow called Eric, also from New Jersey, who was singing it on our way up the mountain. When he said it was a Beatles song i damn near fell off the lift!!
Some wonderful subtle wordplay in this song…
“I’ll be better, doc, as soon as I am able”: An amusing tautological statement if we read ‘able’ as ‘healthy’.
“To help with good Rocky’s revival”: On the face of it, ‘revival’ means ‘recovery’, but at the same time, it’s a wordplay on the phenomenon of a religious revival (e.g., when a religion which was out of fashion comes back into fashion, this is a “revival”).
Gee, I always thought it was “I’ll be better, doc, as soon as I am Mabel.” 😉
I’m surprised John played so many things on the song when once again, he was seething with contempt for it.
John loathed many good things ?????
Was this the last time John played harmonica on a Beatles song?
Yes, it was.
I’ve been to your grave Pablo, it’s in the grounds of Leeds University
I can’t think of a later one.
All Together Now was released after it in JAN ’69 but recorded 12 May 1967.
Didn’t Ringo sing the beginning part? “Now somewhere in the Black Mountain Hills of Dakota”
One of the first songs I ever learned on the guitar when I was about 12, I got my neighbour, John Renbourn, to show me how to play it, I think he hated the song too. I still love it though.
No it was Paul singing the intro. For some reason I thought it was Ringo.
Of course it was Paul – he was just singing in a fake Western American accent – and he wrote the song.
Are you sure John overdubbed the harmonica? The instrument appears on the Anthology version, and the session has John playing six-stringed bass live; I think there’s a slight discrepancy here, as this claims that the harmonica was an overdub, but there’s no reason to believe the band would add a harmonica overdub on a take they weren’t going to use. I think either John played harmonica live with the bass, or someone else played harmonica/the six-string bass. Pretty small potatoes here, but I think we have a mystery!
The overdubs mentioned are a bass and drum track, so this implies that Paul clearly overdubbed his own bass part.
I love the many “American” or “cowboy” references in this song.
1. Talking blues
2. Accent
3. Honky tonk piano
4. black mining hills of Dakota
5. Rocky Raccoon
6. guy (I don’t think they use that word in England too much)
7. “his woman”
8. saloon (In England they are called “pubs”)
9. Gideon’s Bible. I think they are only in the U.S.- put in hotel rooms. I imagine the Beatles got a big laugh when they stayed at US hotels and there was always a bible there.
10. gun. (In Great Britain, owning a gun is a very big deal. I understand that if you have one, they send a SWAT team to retrieve it! Beatles must find the US very gun-happy).
11. “shoot off the legs”. Violent US
12. called herself Lil; known as Nancy (Sounds like a Western)
13. hoedown. That’s like an American square dance, although my sister says that is a euphemism, and that they were in the next room making love.
14. showdown. Americanism?
15. revival. A pun on religious revival vs. recovering from gunshot. However, Protestant religious revival meetings are a uniquely American phenomenon. Probably Beatles found that amusing or interesting too.
“in the next room at the hoedown” I always heard the harmonica break after that line as bed-springs squeaking up and down.
Paul used hoedown because he needed a rhyme for showdown and vice versa.
John used the word “guy” in “Run For Your Life”. (I’m a Wicked guy)
In the American west, a saloon was called a saloon.
Revival is the rhyme for Bible.
Paul used “woman” in”Getting Better”, also. (I used to be cruel to my woman)
The lyrics are “Black Mountain Hills of Dakota” not black mining hills.
I’ve listened to this song hundreds of times and I still hear “black mining hills”!
Then I would suggest you make an appointment with an audiologist soon. It’s absolutely “Black Mountain Hills”.
To go with the cowboy motif, Paul should have had Rocky riding into town rather than walking.
Perhaps he did that to show that Rocky is sort of a.. Loser?
This lists “backing vocals” by George and John. What part of the song has backing vocals?
In the “Gideon checked out, and he left in no doubt” section.
‘To Help With Good Rocky’s Revival’ at the end.
One of the best
It’s fun and it almost works but one of the tunes that proved the White Album should have been one LP, not a double
If the White Album had been reduced to only one LP, this track was good enough to have made the cut.
Anyone know the throw-away line at the end after “to help with good Rocky’s revival?”
I wonder too, and I hope someone provides a reliable answer to this. A high school friend (in 1972 or so!) claimed that after listening to the song a million times with headphones, the line is “definitely” “I’m sorry Rocky that you’re shot.”
This COULD be right, but I can’t make it out– even after listening a million times with and without headphones over the decades. Our circle of friends argued a lot about this at the time, and it stuck in my mind. I’d still love to find an authoritative answer.
Thank you very much for what I will consider to be the definitive answer. Sure fits the meter and the lyrics. I will now sing it loud and proud when I bathe my grandkids like I did my kids.
Still is and always will be one of the most memorable songs they did. I’m 64 and sing it to myself on every motorcycle ride. Don’t ask me why.
No shame in that! It’s a great song, one of my favorites from the White Album.
I complained that there were no songs with my name, Nancy. Then I found out about Rocky Raccoon. I was shocked when I heard the lyrics to this song. My dad called me miss mcgillicuddy when I was a kid, named me Lillian but my mom called me Nancy. Everyone knows me by that Nancy today. Gave me the chills! Kinda weird.
As a life-long Dan, I too am gratified to have a cameo appearance in a Beatle song!
I complained that there were no songs with my name, Nancy. Then I found out about Rocky Raccoon. I was shocked when I heard the lyrics to this song. My dad called me miss mcgillicuddy when I was a kid, he named me Lillian but my mom called me Nancy (not on my birth cert). Everyone knows me by Nancy today. Gave me the chills! Kinda weird.
Were radio stations playing any White Album songs back in 68-69? I don’t think they were where I lived at the time in Arkansas. My intro to Rocky Raccoon was an NBC-TV Flip Wilson sketch with Andy Williams singing while Flip played Rocky for laughs.’
“Melanie Haber? Audrey Farber? Susan Underhill? BETTY JO BIALOSKY. I hadn’t heard that name since college. Everyone knew her as Nancy. It all came back to me like a hot kiss at the end of a wet fist.”
Quote from Firesign Theatre’s The Continuing Adventure of Nick Danger 3rd Eye
Bravo to the Firesign Theatre cite! That album contains several references to Beatles’ songs and is most clever.
forgive me, my friends.
Despite the one or two entertaining moments in the song,
I skip this track whenever I play the CD.
One thing I don’t get is how John can be so judgmental of this
song, then release drek like ‘Bungalow Bill’. I guess its just John
being John.
I had always understood this to be a Dylan parody. Which is especially funny because the Dylan song “Lily, Rosemary, and the Jack of Hearts” is like the full-length version, but did not come out until 1974, as if Dylan was responding to it.
The female vocal could be Francie Schwartz. She was at some sessions with Paul before Linda
is no one going to mention the fact that he was impersonating bob dylan in the beginning? it’s apparent when he mentions a small mining town in Minnesota in the anthology version.
So did McGill/Lil/ Nancy stay with Dan?
The definition of Granny Sh*t. Quite possibly the dumbest intro in Rock n Roll history from a major band. I’ve skipped this song so many times that I forgot it was on the White Album. Revolution Take 20 should have replaced it. Not Guilty should have replaced it! Sour Milk Sea…!
Lightweight Macca foreshadowing Wings.
Then I guess you should just listen to your TaylorSwift and ignore this. The rest of us can enjoy a little fun and humor now and then (don’t get me started on that one..)
I know absolutely nothing about harmonicas but I was wondering if the harmonica played here was the same one John played in earlier songs like I Should Have Known Better and others. I imagine it wasn’t the same one but I was just curious about that.
I love this crazy thing! I think it’s clever and it makes me laugh. It doesn’t have to be one of their masterpieces for me to appreciate it!