The Beatles - Nowhere Man (1966) HQ

In 1966 cultural change was in a head-on collision with cultural shock. And it was during this period I entered the rather precarious world of middle school ... bad enough for those in their early teens, worse for someone not quite a teen as I was still 11 when the fall semester began and turned 12 a few months later. Now I found myself caught in a rather clumsy balancing act between two forms of music: the world of "serious music" (orchestral, pop instrumental, jazz, and the old big band music) and world of rock music. I was probably the only kid in school who loved Glenn Miller and The Beatles equally.

When asked what my favorite rock hit was during the first half of 1966, there was one in particular that always came immediately to mind: "Nowhere Man" by The Beatles. The guitar work seemed grander and more stylized than anything they had done thus far. And the lyrics seemed to reach out to me in their oddness: "nowhere man, the world is at your command" and "isn't he a bit like you and me?" This was a song that could apply to anyone, it seemed, both in its uncertainty and its promise. Three years earlier I was listening to Little Peggy March on my brand new transistor radio singing about her following the man of her dreams; now it was Beatles I carried with me on the same radio and my first taste of lyrics that were about something other than romance. But however deep the lyrics were, the music was pure beauty like only the Beatles could produce.

The song, in actuality, was written by John Lennon about his suffering a severe case of "writer's block" (the rock songwriter version of it, at least), and how he was a nowhere man getting nowhere with writing a new song. The song then came to him like a vision when he just lied back in his bed and relaxed ... the whole thing. I understand how that goes, having written poetry that way: one or two lines while sitting or walking, then five, ten, twenty stanzas of the stuff when relaxing on the bed. Anyway, 1966 was destined to be the last year The Beatles would perform live concerts. And just like in America over two years before, and Britain three years earlier, the girls were still screaming and fainting as they watched their four favorite rock idols. Yes, Mr. Lennon, the world was indeed at your command!