Revolver catches The Beatles mid-transformation, trading Beatlemania's gleam for studio alchemy. George Martin and Geoff Emerick's techniques—tape loops, backwards guitars, automatic double tracking—turn pop songs into sonic experiments. Eleanor Rigby strips away guitars entirely for stabbing strings, while Tomorrow Never Knows dissolves into drone and rhythm.

Harrison's sitar work and caustic Taxman prove his emergence as songwriter, though Lennon and McCartney still dominate with their competing visions of psychedelia and English vignettes. The album legitimised the recording studio itself as instrument, permanently altering rock's ambitions.