Pop Song 365 of 500 'Whiter Shade of Pale' Procol Harum 1967

Pop Song 365 of 500 'Whiter Shade of Pale' Procol Harum 1967

Keith Reid got the title and starting point for the song at a party. He overheard someone saying to a woman, "You've turned a whiter shade of pale", and the phrase stuck in his mind. The original lyrics had four verses, of which only two are heard on the original recording. The third verse has been heard in live performances and more seldom the fourth. Claes Johansen, "deals in metaphorical form with a male/female relationship which after some negotiation ends in a sexual act". Tim de Lisle, who remarks that the lyrics concern a drunken seduction, which is described through references to sex as a form of travel, usually nautical, using mythical and literary journeys.

I was trying to conjure a mood as much as tell a straightforward, girl-leaves-boy story. With the ceiling flying away and room humming harder, I wanted to paint an image of a scene. I wasn’t trying to be mysterious with those images, I was trying to be evocative. I suppose it seems like a decadent scene I’m describing. But I was too young to have experienced any decadence

We skipped the light fandango
Turned cartwheels 'cross the floor
I was feeling kinda seasick
But the crowd called out for more
The room was humming harder
As the ceiling flew away
When we called out for another drink
The waiter brought a tray
And so it was that later
As the miller told his tale
That her face, at first just ghostly
Turned a whiter shade of pale
She said, "There is no reason
And the truth is plain to see"
But I wandered through my playing cards
And would not let her be
One of sixteen vestal virgins
Who were leaving for the coast
And although my eyes were open
They might just as well have been closed
And so it was that later
As the miller told his tale
That her face, at first just ghostly
Turned a whiter shade of pale
And so it was that later
As the miller told his tale