It's common enough observation in the world of film; no sooner does a Hollywood blockbuster start to clean up at the box office then a slew of low budget look-a-likes trading on a similar riff arrive to suck up any spare cash available from punters who mistake it for quality from the same stable. Thus, for every 'Jaws' there's an 'Orca Killer Whale', Tintorera', 'Barracuda', 'Piranha' etc that repeated a main theme to greater and lesser effect (great deal less in some cases) and trade off the good will generated by their source. I get a similar feeling every time I hear 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale', or at least I do whenever I take time to listen to the lyrics. With an organ motif borrowed from a Bach countermelody and a set of lyrics from the back of someone's neck (but more of that later), quintessential sixties song 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale' has beguiled, bewitched and bloody annoyed from that day to this. Its been asked many times before: 'what's it all about?' But from where I'm standing there's no need to call in the Scooby Gang just yet - Messer's Reid, Fisher and Brooker from the band had evidently been paying close attention to Dylan's vintage 1966 output and, with the man himself in temporary exile, 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale's pile up of random, unconnected imagery plays out as a gap filling shot at a home-grown 'Desolation Row' or 'Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands'.
That it falls short is mainly down to a misapprehension that mysterious and half baked are the same thing: even at his most obtuse, Dylan's talent is to thread together words and phrases within a parameter and on a line from A to C with enough space between to let the listener - and to let the listener want to - fill in their own point B. Take "The ghost of electricity howls in the bones of her face"* - I have no idea what Dylan actually had in mind when he wrote that, and chances are that Dylan didn't either, but the startling imagery is such that it doesn't matter; the words are like play-doh for the mind and I've long since shaped them into my own personal interpretation that does not depend on their literalness.
And I didn't pull out that Dylan quote at random either, the very pay off of 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale's chorus namechecks it quite shamelessly ("That her face at first just ghostly, turned a whiter shade of pale"). Yet whenever I hear the sixth form cleverness of that line or (for example) "We skipped the light fandango" I just shrug my shoulders. Because there's nothing there to care about. And that's because in contrast, 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale's lines each come with a full stop - they describe their own self contained tale on a flat plain with scant scope for a dimension for individual interpretation until the puzzlement only applies to the song as a whole. Ironically, I think that's why 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale' has endured - rather than agonise over what it means, it presents little more than a blank canvas
Of course, outside of some avant garde installation, a blank canvas does not make for particularly good art, but luckily 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale' comes with a nice frame in the shape of Matthew Fisher's woozy organ (which, again, recalls Al Kooper's work on Dylan's 'Blonde On Blonde') and Gary Brooker's vocal of sorrow that gives meaning via its ambience rather than anything literal, with that clever Bach steal giving it a timeless quality. Depending on your mindset, 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale' can be celebratory or elegiac, a song of celebration or a comfort when you're down. An open door for everyman that perhaps unlocks not just why it can be loved and hated, but also why it's endured far better than almost every other number one from this year. Not bad for a Dylan knock-off.
* from 'Visions Of Johanna'.
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