I don't think you can take "Within You Without You" and "She's Leaving Home" off the album.
Each song has two arguments to this effect. One is in common, the other is unique to each song.
WITHIN YOU WITHOUT YOU
"Within You Without You" was going to be on
Sgt. Pepper's simply because there was going to be at least one George song on the album. Period. He had
three on
Revolver, and three memorable ones at that (including the album opener), so there is no way he's dropping down to zero for the next album.
You're put in a tricky position because 1967 seemed to be a "weak" year for George as a songwriter. He showed so much promise on
Rubber Soul and
Revolver (one... two... three...), but his mindset at the time didn't seem to mix well with the "Summer of Love" ethos and the whimsical spirit behind
Sgt. Pepper's (or at least the spirit Paul was pushing in controlling much of the album). I don't think cynical songs like "Taxman" or "I Want to Tell You" would have fit with the mood Paul wanted for
Sgt. Pepper's of an old-timey carnival or stage show.
George never seemed as good a fit for the psychedelic era as John and Paul. He really found his footing as a mature songwriter when he made friends with Clapton and got into roots rock.
"Within You Without You" was probably the best song George had that year. It's certainly better than "Only a Northern Song" or a minor track like "Blue Jay Way" that he might have had lying around.
SHE'S LEAVING HOME
"She's Leaving Home" is the emotional core of the album. I can't imagine it without this song right at the heart of it. Here we are, the Summer of Love, 1967, listening to the quintessential album from the summer by the biggest rock group in history, right in the middle of the album, and what shows up?
A slow, tearful bit of chamber music about a young woman leaving home... written from the perspective of her parents, grieving her absence and the disconnect between what they want for her and what she wants for herself but nonetheless professing how much they love her and tried to do their best.
The emotional depth of turning everything about 60s counterculture on its head and having a song like this one, written from the perspective of the Boomers' Silent Generation parents, is almost unfathomable. And it's not critical of them. It's entirely sympathetic to the plight all parents have in loving their children but invariably seeing some things differently than them. It breaks my heart every time I hear it played.
You can't cut it.
The only other contemporary song I can think of that does something like this of similar depth is "
Tears of Rage" by Bob Dylan and Richard Manuel of the Band. The album doesn't work without it.
BOTH
"Lovely Rita" and "Good Morning Good Morning" are fine psychedelic songs, but their production is relatively... tame... by the standards of
Sgt Pepper's (even if adventurous by the standards of the time and even now). They're weird and trippy but not unique. "Within You Without You" is more adventurous for using Indian studio musicians to play an Indian pop song as George sings the lyrics over the top. And I already mentioned "She's Leaving Home" is a wonderful bit of baroque pop for relying on a string orchestra and not rock instruments. Yes, the Beatles had done something like that before with "Yesterday" (minus an acoustic guitar underneath) and "Eleanor Rigby," but it just fits so well on such an experimental album. They win the production argument handily.
Hence why I cut the former two and saved the latter two.
You have to cut one John song and one Paul song else it ends in a fistfight.
Eventually repackaging those songs as B-sides to these singles...
"Strawberry Fields Forever" b/w "Lovely Rita"
"Penny Lane" b/w "Good Morning Good Morning"
...works just fine.
