With no expectations of being able to re-create their new music within the confines of their live shows, [75] [101] the Beatles increasingly used outside contributors while making the album. The song's harmonic structure is derived from Indian music and is based on a high-volume C drone played by Harrison on a tambura. For the first time at EMI Studios, the company's four-track tape machines were placed in the studio's control room, alongside the producer and balance engineer, rather than in a dedicated machine room. With Barry Miles as his guide, he became immersed in the nascent British counterculture movement, which soon emerged as the underground. Q placed it at number 1 in its list of the "50 Greatest British Albums Ever" in 2000; [443] [444] four years later, the album topped the same magazine's list "The Music That Changed the World".

The release of Revolver marked the last time that Capitol issued an altered UK Beatles album for the North American market. The book is illustrated with images of handwritten lyrics, tape boxes, and recording sheets, as well as 1966 print ads and extracts from the graphic novel, Revolver 50. Steve Turner likens the Beatles' creative approach in 1966 to that of modern jazz musicians, and recognises their channelling of Indian and Western classical, Southern soul, and electronic musical styles into their work as unprecedented in popular music.Reporting on "Swinging London" for The Village Voice, Richard Goldstein said that, as if in response to the antagonism being shown towards the band in the US, "British youth has flipped completely over the new Beatle album, Revolver. The group's manager, Brian Epstein, had intended that 1966 would then follow the pattern of the previous two years, [6] in terms of the band making a feature film and an accompanying album, [7] [8] followed by concert tours during the summer months.

The Beatles had hoped to work in a more modern facility than EMI's London studios at Abbey Road [37] and were impressed with the sound on records created at Stax Studio in Memphis. In Riley's opinion, aside from underplaying Lennon's contribution, his voice is thereby confined to a "sudden swing to the surreal" at the end of each LP side, which distorts the intended mood across the album. Chris Coplan of Consequence of Sound is less impressed with the album, rating it a "B" and "the black sheep of the Beatles' catalog".He says that, through the band's efforts to faithfully translate their LSD-inspired vision into music, " Revolver opened the doors to psychedelic rock (or acid rock)", while the primitive means by which it was recorded (on four-track equipment) inspired the work that artists such as Pink Floyd, Genesis, Yes and the Electric Light Orchestra were able to achieve with advances in studio technology. The photo was part of a series taken by Robert Whitaker during the filming at Abbey Road on 19 May and demonstrated the Beatles' adoption of fashions from boutiques that had recently opened in Chelsea, rather than the Carnaby Street designers they had favoured previously. The Beatles were presented with gold discs from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), recognising the album as a "million seller", [350] during their 24 August press conference at the Capitol Tower in Hollywood. In place of the Mellotron sample, Ryan and Kehew list a mandolin or acoustic guitar, treated with tape echo.