"When I'm Sixty-Four" is a song by the English rock band The Beatles, written by Paul McCartney (credited to Lennon-McCartney) and released on their 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. McCartney wrote the song when he was about 14, probably in April or May 1956, and it was one of the first songs he ever wrote. The song was recorded in a key different from the final recording; it was sped up at the request of McCartney to make his voice sound younger. It prominently features a trio of clarinets (two regular clarinets and one bass clarinet) throughout.
Recording:
The Beatles recorded two takes of the song on 6 December 1966, during one of the first sessions for the as-yet-unnamed album that became Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Martin produced, supported by engineers Geoff Emerick and Phil McDonald. McCartney overdubbed his lead vocal onto take two without the other Beatles present on 8 December. On 20 December, McCartney, Lennon and George Harrison overdubbed backing vocals and Ringo Starr added the sound of bells.
Martin made two reduction mixes (takes three and four) with the latter best. On 21 December, session musicians Robert Burns, Henry MacKenzie and Frank Reidy overdubbed two clarinets and a bass clarinet onto take four. Emerick later explained, "The clarinets on that track became a very personal sound for me; I recorded them so far forward that they became one of the main focal points." Martin recalled, "I remember recording it in the cavernous Number One studio at Abbey Road and thinking how the three clarinet players looked as lost as a referee and two linesmen alone in the middle of Wembley Stadium." On the same day, Martin remixed the song for mono three times, although this was only a demo version. He made four new mono mixes on 29 December.
On 30 December, unsatisfied with all of these attempts, McCartney suggested speeding up the track to raise it by around a semitone from its original key of C major to D♭ major. Martin remembers that McCartney suggested this change to make his voice sound younger. McCartney says, "I wanted to appear younger, but that was just to make it more rooty-tooty; just lift the key because it was starting to sound turgid." Martin, Emerick and Richard Lush made the sped-up remix from take four on 17 April 1967. Musicologist Michael Hannan comments on the completed track: "The rich timbres of the clarinets give the mix a fuller, fatter sound than many of the other tracks on the album."
Release:
The song was nearly released on a single as the B-side of either "Strawberry Fields Forever" or "Penny Lane". It was instead held over to be included as an album track for Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Everett comments that the protagonist of "When I'm Sixty-Four" is sometimes associated with the Lonely Hearts Club Band concept, but in his opinion the song is thematically unconnected to others on the album.
According to author George Case, all of the songs on Sgt. Pepper were perceived by contemporary listeners as being drug-inspired, with 1967 marking the pinnacle of LSD's influence on pop music. Some fans viewed the lyric "digging the weeds" from "When I'm Sixty-Four" as a possible drug allusion. In August 1967, The Beatles Book published an article discussing whether the album was "too advanced for the average pop fan". One reader complained that all the songs except "Sgt. Pepper" and "When I'm Sixty-Four" were "over our heads", adding, "The Beatles ought to stop being so clever and give us tunes we can enjoy."
"When I'm Sixty-Four" was included in the Beatles' 1968 animated film Yellow Submarine. It was also used over the opening credits of the 1982 film The World According to Garp.
Giles Martin remixed the song for inclusion on the album's 50th anniversary release in 2017. Martin mixed the song from the original tapes rather than their subsequent mixdowns. Take 2 of the song was included as a bonus track on the deluxe edition.
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