composition as a "memorable" track. In one of the few unfavourable reviews for Sgt. Pepper, Richard Goldstein, writing in The New York Times, said the song was "remarkable" musically and a highlight of the album, yet he considered the lyrics "dismal" and full of "the very clichés the Beatles helped bury". Allen Evans of the NME found the "deep, rich rhythm" of the tabla "most appealing", although he bemoaned that it was difficult to decipher the lyrics "because they merge with the sitar music so closely". According to the Beatles' official biographer, Hunter Davies, writing in 1968, some contemporary reviewers speculated that the burst of laughter at the end of "Within You Without You" was inserted by Harrison's bandmates to mock the song. Davies corrected this misconception, saying: "It was completely George's idea." In a review published five months after the release of Sgt. Pepper, Hit Parader considered that the album had not endured as well as the Beatles' previous works, and opined: "Harrison has produced a soothing, sinuous, exotic sound for 'Within You Without You'. But even though his repetitious recitation of elementary Far Eastern philosophy is probably intended to reflect the infinity of the universe, it soon becomes a bit monotonous. The laughter at the end seems to be deflating the pretentiousness of the lyrics." Retrospective assessment The song has continued to invite widely diverse opinions. Among the most unfavourable assessments, author and critic Tim Riley, writing in 1988, dismissed "Within You Without You" as "directionless", adding that it was difficult to conceive how "lines such as 'Life flows on within you and without you' were taken seriously". He also said that the song was "the most dated piece on the record ... [and] could easily have been left off with little to no effect" on the album. In a 2009 review, Alex Young of Consequence of Sound grouped it with the "major clunkers" on Sgt. Pepper. Conversely, Ian Inglis considers the song to be "absolutely central to the form and content" of its parent album, and Ian MacDonald views it as the "conscience" of Sgt. Pepper and "the necessary sermon that comes with the community singing". Musicologist Russell Reising writes that Harrison's song provides the exception on Sgt. Pepper, where the Beatles otherwise "retreated lyrically into predominantly banal, occasionally schmaltzy, and often trivial vignettes". Author and critic Kenneth Womack terms it "quite arguably, the album's ethical soul".