Editing The Beatles (album) (section)

==Background==
{{See also|The Beatles in India}}

By 1968, the Beatles had achieved commercial and critical success. The group's mid-1967 release, ''[[Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band]]'', was number one in the UK for 27 weeks, until the start of February 1968,<ref>{{cite web| url=http://www.officialcharts.com/artist/_/Beatles| title= The Beatles" > "Albums" > "The Beatles" > "Chart Facts| publisher=[[Official Charts Company]]|access-date=31 May 2017}}</ref> having sold 250,000 copies in the first week after release.{{sfn|Everett|1999|p=123}} ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' magazine declared that ''Sgt. Pepper'' constituted a "historic departure in the progress of music – any music",<ref>{{cite magazine |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] |date=27 September 1967 |page=128|title=Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band}}</ref> while the American writer [[Timothy Leary]] wrote that the band were "the wisest, holiest, most effective avatars (Divine Incarnate, God Agents) that the human race has ever produced".{{sfn|Schaffner|1978|p=82}} The band received a negative critical response to their television film ''[[Magical Mystery Tour (film)|Magical Mystery Tour]]'', which aired in Britain in December 1967, but fan reaction was nevertheless positive.{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=224}}

[[File:Kinfauns George Harrison house.jpg|thumb|The songs that appear on ''The Beatles'' were demoed at [[George Harrison]]'s home, [[Kinfauns (Surrey)|Kinfauns]], in May 1968.]]
Most of the songs for ''The Beatles'' were written during a [[Transcendental Meditation]] course with [[Maharishi Mahesh Yogi]] in [[Rishikesh]], India, between February and April 1968.{{sfn|Norman|1996|pp=322, 340}}{{sfn|Schaffner|1978|pp=95, 111}} The retreat involved long periods of meditation, conceived by the band as a spiritual respite from all worldly endeavours – a chance, in [[John Lennon]]'s words, to "get away from everything".{{sfn|Beatles|2000|p=281}} Lennon and [[Paul McCartney]] quickly re-engaged themselves in songwriting, often meeting "clandestinely in the afternoons in each other's rooms" to review their new work.{{sfn|Spitz|2005|p=752}} "Regardless of what I was supposed to be doing," Lennon later recalled, "I did write some of my best songs there."{{sfn|Beatles|2000|p=283}} Author [[Ian MacDonald]] said ''Sgt Pepper'' was "shaped by [[Lysergic acid diethylamide|LSD]]",{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=220}} but the Beatles took no drugs with them to India aside from [[cannabis (drug)|marijuana]], and their clear minds helped the group with their songwriting.{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=244}} The stay in Rishikesh proved especially fruitful for [[George Harrison]] as a songwriter, coinciding with his re-engagement with the guitar after two years studying the [[sitar]].{{sfn|Leng|2006|pp=34, 36}} The musicologist [[Walter Everett (musicologist)|Walter Everett]] likens Harrison's development as a composer in 1968 to that of Lennon and McCartney five years before, although he notes that Harrison became "privately prolific", given his usual subordinate status within the group.{{sfn|Everett|1999|p=199}}

The Beatles left Rishikesh before the end of the course. [[Ringo Starr]] was the first to leave, less than two weeks later, as he said he could not tolerate the food;{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=243}} McCartney departed in mid-March,{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=244}} while Harrison and Lennon were more interested in Indian religion and remained until April.{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=244}} Lennon left Rishikesh because he felt personally betrayed after hearing rumours that the Maharishi had behaved inappropriately towards women who accompanied the Beatles to India.<ref name="Giuliano">{{cite book |last1=Giuliano |first1=Geoffrey |author-link=Geoffrey Giuliano |last2=Giuliano |first2=Avalon |title=Revolver: The Secret History of the Beatles |edition=Hardcover|year=2005|publisher=John Blake|isbn=978-1-84454-160-7|page=126}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=Lennon Remembers|page=27|publisher=Verso, W.W. Norton & Co.|last=Wenner|first=Jann|author-link=Jann Wenner|year=2000|orig-year=1971|isbn=1-85984-376-X|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ymjy06WZnd4C&q=%22lennon+remembers%22+maharishi&pg=RA1-PA27|quote=Yeah, there was a big hullabaloo about him trying to rape Mia Farrow or trying to get off with Mia Farrow and a few other women, things like that.}}</ref> McCartney and Harrison later discovered the accusations to be untrue{{sfn|Miles|1997|p=429}} and Lennon's wife [[Cynthia Lennon|Cynthia]] reported there was "not a shred of evidence or justification".{{sfn|Miles|1997|p=427}}{{efn|Harrison later repaired his friendship with the Maharishi in the [[Natural Law Party]].{{sfn|Miles|1997|p=429}}}}

Collectively, the group wrote around 40 new songs in Rishikesh, 26 of which would be recorded in rough form at [[Kinfauns (Surrey)|Kinfauns]], Harrison's home in [[Esher]], in May 1968. Lennon wrote the bulk of the new material, contributing 14 songs.{{sfn|MacDonald|1997|p=244}} Lennon and McCartney brought home-recorded [[Demo (music)|demos]] to the session, and worked on them together. Some home demos and group sessions at Kinfauns were later released on the 1996 compilation ''[[Anthology 3]]''.{{sfn|Doggett|2009|p=208}} The whole set of Esher demos was released in the remixed 50th anniversary deluxe edition in 2018.<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/the-beatles-revelatory-white-album-demos-a-complete-guide-629178/everybodys-got-something-to-hide-except-for-me-and-my-monkey-2-629287/|title=The Beatles' Revelatory White Album Demos: A Complete Guide|magazine=Rolling Stone|date=29 May 2018|accessdate=7 December 2021}}</ref>
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