In its lyrical themes, the album marks a radical departure from the Beatles' past work, as a large majority of the songs avoid the subject of love. According to Reising and LeBlanc, the lyrics on this and the band's later psychedelic records capture the psychedelic culture's belief in the truth-revealing qualities of LSD over the illusions of bourgeois thinking; reject materialism in favour of Asian-inspired spirituality; and explore the overlap in meaning between a "trip" and travelling, resulting in narratives in which time and space become blurred. Where the songs do present as love songs, the authors continue, love is often conveyed as a unifying force among many, rather than between two individuals, or as a "way of life".