 While Lennon and Harrison supplied harmonies beside McCartney's lead vocal, no Beatle played on the recording; instead, Martin arranged the track for a string octet, drawing inspiration from Bernard Herrmann's 1960 film score for Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho".In Riley's opinion, "the corruption of 'Taxman' and the utter finality of Eleanor's fate makes the world of "Revolver" more ominous than any other pair of opening songs could.