A Song about Drugs? The Beatles Ode to LSD? The True Story of Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds

It’s a catchy tune with mind-blowing lyrics and a trippy melody. Despite what the drug-devouring flower power generation speculated, and many still believe, however, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” is not a song about LSD.

“Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” is the third track on the Beatles’ magnificent album Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, which was released in April 1967. That was the beginning of the so-called Summer of Love, when hippies, freaks, and counterculture types were experimenting with all kinds of mind-expanding hallucinogens, including the trip inducing drug lysergic acid diethylamide, or LSD.

To some chemically altered minds,”Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” was a cleverly coded reference to LSD, evidenced by the first letter of each of the key words in the song’s title. Furthermore, believers were convinced that John Lennon’s evocative lyrics and airy vocals were the perfect musical expression of an acid trip. The myth of “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” as the Beatles’ ode to LSD was born.

Each of the Beatles has readily admitted to using acid during this period in their lives, but all of them have denied that “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” was inspired by the drug. The true inspiration for the song, as consistently stated by Lennon, was a drawing made by his then four-year-old son, Julian, depicting a little girl surrounded by twinkling stars. The drawing, Julian explained to his father, was of his schoolmate Lucy O’Donnell, who was floating through the sky among diamonds. Lennon said the image reminded him of Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass, which in turn inspired the lyrics in the iconic Beatles’ song. “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” isn’t, as many believe, a song about LSD. Given the context of the times, however, it’s not inconceivable that Lennon dropped a hit while writing it.

Lyrics to Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds by the Beatles

[Verse 1]
Picture yourself in a boat on a river
With tangerine trees and marmalade skies
Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly
A girl with kaleidoscope eyes

[Pre-Chorus]
Cellophane flowers of yellow and green
Towering over your head
Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes
And she’s gone

[Chorus]
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Ahh

[Verse 2]
Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain
Where rocking horse people eat marshmallow pies
Everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers
That grow so incredibly high

[Pre-Chorus]
Newspaper taxis appear on the shore
Waiting to take you away
Climb in the back with your head in the clouds
And you’re gone

[Chorus]
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Ahh

[Verse 3]
Picture yourself on a train in a station
With plasticine porters with looking glass ties
Suddenly, someone is there at the turnstile
The girl with kaleidoscope eyes

[Chorus]
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Ahh

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