I Am the Walrus

Okay, forget that Jim Carrey is now an unhinged lunatic screaming at anything and everything to the right of Bernie Sanders. Money and fame will do that to you. They will do that to you even if you’re not as unhinged and lunatic as Carrey already was by nature. But there was a period in the mid-90s where, by young Hopper’s standards, Mr. Carrey could do no wrong. The dopey, over-the-top face-mugging the camera humor struck a nerve with me, and for a half-dozen of his early movies I never laughed harder. Perhaps early Steve Martin flicks, before he rebranded as a serious actor, rivaled Carrey, but as far as laugh-to-screen-minute ratio goes, I think the younger comedian has the older one beat. At least in the dopey, over-the-top face-mugging humor department.

So in that spirit, the video below absolutely fascinated me, for a solid weekend. I now present it to you to experience.

I’ve been reading a bio of the Beatles on-and-off for a couple of weeks now. They’ve always been in the background of my musical life, and I know all the major stuff, but I’ve never examined them closely, until now. I don’t really have a favorite Beatle, more a composite Beatle: 20 percent George, 30 percent John, 30 percent Paul, and 20 percent George Martin, the Fifth Beatle. I prefer last-three-album Beatles (White Album, Abbey Road, Let It Be) to the psychedelic mid-to-late-sixties Beatles, and both to the Beatlemania mop-top early-sixties Beatles.

Thus, I’ve been watching some Beatles videos on the internet and came across this oddity.

I like John Lennon’s “I Am the Walrus.” It uses all the letters of the musical alphabet, A, G, F, E, D, C, B – I can think of no other song that does so off the top of my head. It’s weird, it has a climactic chorus resolution, it has a crescendo fade out, its lyrics can be interpreted any number of ways. I think I could easily write a dystopian science fiction novella á la Michael Moorcock from the verses.

Jim Carrey performed a version of it on George Martin’s 1998 album In My Life, an album which featured numerous celebrities singing/speaking Beatles covers. I say “performed” because he doesn’t really “sing” it, as you can imagine. I think he attempts to do so on the opening lines, then wisely decides to go a thousand percent into overdriven mania. The deep growly shouting, the mee-mee-mee-mee insane asylum Joker-esque warblings, the foppsy English accent – all had me laughing out loud. I must admit it’s an experience. The man delivers. Or delivered, as this video is 21 years old.

The best part is his proud doofus commentary spoken over the ending fade-out: THERE! I DID IT! I DEFILED A TIMELESS PIECE OF ART! FOR MY NEXT TRICK, I WILL PAINT A CLOWN FACE ON THE MONA LISA …