Recording
On the track as recorded and officially released, Lennon plays the main theme on mellotron, accompanied by McCartney and Harrison (both on guitars, plus a later bass overdub) and Starr (on maracas and drums). All four Beatles sing the melody sans lyrics of any kind, and the track fades in an assortment of tape effects created by Lennon and Starr. This released version is identical to that heard on the soundtrack of the Magical Mystery Tour film; the music is accompanied in the film by colour-altered images of landscape in Iceland taken from an aeroplane.
A different version can be found on some Beatles bootleg albums (such as Back-track 1), and features added Hammond organ and strange whistling noises in the early parts of the track. The jazz-influenced ending is also present on this version, which is slightly shorter, clocking in at around 2:08. This coda, which Mark Lewisohn speculated was "seemingly copied straight from an unidentifiable modern jazz record", was in fact played on a mellotron. (In addition to the familiar samples of instruments playing single notes, mellotrons had entire banks of a pop orchestra playing popular styles of music, with optional accompaniment. The piece here was played with the Dixieland Rhythm Mellotron setting.)
Read more about this topic: Flying (The Beatles Song)
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—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
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