Norwegian Wood
| "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)" | ||||||
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The 1966 Australian single release of the song, backed with "Nowhere Man"
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| Song by The Beatles from the album Rubber Soul | ||||||
| Released | 3 December 1965 | |||||
| Recorded | 12 and 21 October 1965, EMI Studios, London |
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| Length | 2:05 | |||||
| Label | Parlophone | |||||
| Writer(s) | Lennon–McCartney | |||||
| Producer(s) | George Martin | |||||
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"Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles. It was written by the songwriting partnership of John Lennon and Paul McCartney and was first released on the album Rubber Soul on 3 December 1965. Musically influenced by the introspective lyrics of Bob Dylan, "Norwegian Wood" is a milestone in the Beatles' progression as complex songwriters. In addition, the recordings of studio musicians during the Help! filming sessions, and Ravi Shankar inspired lead guitarist George Harrison to incorporate the sitar into the song.
Although "Norwegian Wood" was not the first song to feature an Eastern-inspired sound in a rock composition, nor is it even the first Beatles track to do so, it is credited as influential in the development in raga rock and psychedelic rock. Not long afterwards, Indian classical music became popularised in mainstream Western society, and several Western musical artists such as the Byrds, the Rolling Stones, and Donovan integrated elements of the genre into their musical approach. Accordingly, "Norwegian Wood" is recognised as a bona fide raga-rock song, as well as fundamental in the early evolution of the genre later regarded as world music.
The song's lyrics are about an extramarital affair that John Lennon was involved in, as hinted in the opening couplet: "I once had a girl, or should I say, she once had me". Though Lennon never revealed whom he had an affair with, writer Philip Norman speculates that it was either close friend and journalist Maureen Cleave, or Sonny Freeman.Paul McCartney explained that the term "Norwegian Wood" was a sarcastic reference to the cheap pine wall panelling then in vogue (e.g. in guitarist Peter Asher's bedroom). McCartney commented on the final verse of the song: "In our world the guy had to have some sort of revenge. It could have meant I lit a fire to keep myself warm, and wasn't the decor of her house wonderful? But it didn't, it meant I burned the fucking place down as an act of revenge, and then we left it there and went into the instrumental."
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