Taxman
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The word taxman is used to personify tax collection agencies such as the Inland Revenue in the United Kingdom.
"Taxman" is the title of a song by The Beatles, appearing on the Revolver album. George Harrison, in a tongue-in-cheek manner, impersonates a taxman on the song.
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Taxation leads to inspiration
Harrison was inspired to write "Taxman" when he discovered how much he was earning after accounting for taxes. Apparently each Beatle kept only six pence out of every pound sterling they earned. As Harrison said, "'Taxman' was when I first realized that even though we had started earning money, we were actually giving most of it away in taxes. It was and still is typical." The reason for this was that due to how much the Beatles were earning, they were in one of the top tax brackets in the United Kingdom. In a 1984 interview with Playboy magazine, fellow Beatle Paul McCartney agreed with Harrison's depiction of the circumstances surrounding the writing of "Taxman": "George wrote that and I played guitar on it. He wrote it in anger at finding out what the taxman did. He had never known before then what could happen to your money."
Harrison got some assistance in the lyrics from fellow Beatle John Lennon, who wrote a few one-liners on the song for him. In 1980, Lennon recalled in an interview with Playboy magazine, "I remember the day he [Harrison] called to ask for help on 'Taxman,' one of his first songs. I threw in a few one-liners to help the song along because that's what he asked for. He came to me because he couldn't go to Paul [McCartney]. Paul wouldn't have helped him at that period. I didn't want to do it. I just sort of bit my tongue and said OK. It had been John and Paul for so long, he'd been left out because he hadn't been a songwriter up until then."
One quirk in the lyrics was Harrison's throwing in the names of then Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Harold Wilson and Edward Heath (a future Prime Minister). Harrison pulled no punches in his bipartisan bashing — Wilson and Heath were both the leaders of the British Labour Party and British Conservative Party, respectively.
In 1987, Harrison stated that he had been pleased McCartney agreed to play the guitar on "Taxman": "I was pleased to have Paul play that bit on 'Taxman.' If you notice, he did like a little Indian bit on it for me."
The release, and after
The song was eventually released on Revolver; although Lennon and McCartney had always been the more prolific songwriters, they made allowance for a few Harrison songs on each album the Beatles released, in much the same way they would attempt to ensure at least one album track always featured drummer Ringo Starr's singing.
On the song, Harrison sings as if he is the taxman, who is depicted as a malicious man looking for ways to rob people of their money, with lines like "If you try to sit, I'll tax your seat". The taxman tells the listener to appreciate that he is not left empty-handed: "Should five percent appear too small / Be thankful I don't take it all". The song closes with the taxman declaring that the listeners are enslaved by him: "And you're working for no one but me."
"Taxman" featured in Harrison's concert repertoire even after the Beatles had dissolved; on his tour of Japan in 1991 with Eric Clapton, "Taxman" was on the set list. "It's a song that goes regardless if it's the sixties, seventies, eighties [or] nineties," Harrison declared. "There's always a taxman."
References
- Fricke, David (Dec. 5, 2001). George's Greatest Moments (http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/_/id/5940010/georgeharrison?pageid=rs.ArtistArticles&pageregion=mainRegion). Rolling Stone.
External links
- Lyrics (http://letssingit.com/beatles-taxman-5kmp2hf.html)
- Alan W. Pollack's Notes on "Taxman" (http://www.icce.rug.nl/~soundscapes/DATABASES/AWP/t.html)
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