I Want to Hold Your Hand

The song I Want to Hold Your Hand represents a special moment in the history of the Beatles, and I am not referring to the fact that it was responsible for breaking the band in America.  This was the first release by a rock and roll act to make use of EMI's four-track equipment at Abbey Road Studios, usually reserved for serious classical artists.  After a year of recording on two-track tape, this was considered a high honor for the band that was now making a small fortune for the Parlophone label.

Of course, it was also the song that opened the floodgates in the USA, starting the British Invasion.  Manager Brian Epstein had asked Lennon and McCartney to write a composition with the American audience in mind and, supposedly, they did so.  I've been listening to it for most of my life and I have read much that has been written about it, but I'll be damned if I can hear anything specifically "American" about the song that separates it from their body of work up to that time.  To me, it simply builds on the excitement of the previous single She Loves You and solidifies the sound that was uniquely their own.  In fact, there was nothing else even remotely like it on American radio.  Nothing.

The group had nearly completed the sessions for their second album With the Beatles when they turned their attention to their next single on October 17th, 1963.  They had rehearsed the song in advance, so only a few adjustments were necessary during the seventeen takes that it took to achieve the master.  A very young Geoff Emerick, who was serving as second engineer on this date, reports that John often flubbed the lyrics, thus resulting in so many takes.  All four Beatles overdubbed handclaps onto the number before it was complete.

From its opening moments, I Want to Hold Your Hand is an infectious burst of energy (though less so than its predecessor She Loves You).  Lennon and McCartney kept the lyrics as simple as can be, letting the drive of the performance, particularly their vocal duet, carry the song.  It is John who makes the jump to falsetto each time on the first "hand," then Paul handles the high harmony for the second "your hand."  The quiet bridge is sung in unison the first time through, then in one of their trademark harmonies the second time, each time building to a crescendo on "I can't hide" (or, as Bob Dylan heard it, "I get high").

Pirated copies of the song made their way to radio stations in various US cities, forcing Capitol Records to move the release date from January 13th, 1964 to December 26th, 1963.  The American label also chose the song to open the album Meet the Beatles! which was released on January 20th.  In the UK, it was the group's fifth single and subsequently appeared on the EP The Beatles' Million Sellers in 1965 as well as on the LP A Collection of Beatles Oldies in '66.

The song immediately made its way into their stage act.  Its biggest impact naturally came from  performances over three consecutive weeks on the Ed Sullivan Show in February of 1964.  They continued to play the song throughout that landmark year and then never played it again.

Post-career releases include the Red Album in 1973, 20 Greatest Hits in 1982, Past Masters, Volume One in 1988 and 1 in 2000.  Anthology 1 presents a sonic version from a live television performance for the Morecambe and Wise Show, and On Air - Live at the BBC Volume 2 features a recording for the radio program From Us to You.  On this occasion, the boys overdubbed handclaps as they had on the original record, then applauded their own performance at the end.

More recently, the video collection 1+ has a black and white clip from the Granada Television program Late Scene Extra shot in Manchester and broadcast only days before the single's release in the UK.  The band mimes to the record, with John and George oddly playing acoustic guitars. 

I Wanna Be Your Man

The liner notes for the album With the Beatles written by Tony Barrow state, "Observing the tremendous audience response that Ringo has been getting whenever he sings Boys, John and Paul put their heads together to pen a special new number for their fierce-voiced drumming man.  The result is a real raver entitled I Wanna Be Your Man."

While McCartney had begun writing the song with Ringo in mind, a chance meeting between John and Paul with Mick Jagger and Keith Richard prompted Lennon to finish the song by adding the simple chorus and giving it to the Rolling Stones.  It was this encounter that spurred Mick and Keith to begin writing their own material.  And, while the Stones did record a bluesy version of the song (featuring a great bottleneck guitar part by Brian Jones) and release it as their second single, the Beatles went ahead with their original plan and recorded it as well, opting for a rousing rock arrangement with Ringo as the lead vocalist.

They wasted no time, in fact.  September 11th, 1963, the day after they offered the song to the Rolling Stones, the Beatles recorded a single take.  They returned to the number the following day, laying down takes two through seven before achieving the master.  On September 30th, producer George Martin overdubbed a Hammond organ part, though it required six more takes for him to get it to his own satisfaction.  On October 3rd, Ringo double-tracked his vocal and added maracas to the track, bringing the recording to take fifteen.

The song sits smack in the middle of side two on the UK album With the Beatles.  In the US, the song appeared on the Capitol album Meet the Beatles!  Among the additional releases of the song, the first was on the collection Rock and Roll Music in 1976.  Live at the BBC gives us a great studio take from February 1964 recorded for the program From Us to You, which has a four-bar introduction.  Anthology 1 presents a version recorded for the April 1964 TV special Around the Beatles.  And I have a bootleg of a live performance from the Olympia Theatre in Paris in June of 1965.

Though I Wanna Be Your Man initially replaced Boys as Ringo's vocal spotlight in concert, the two songs would alternate in the set list from time to time, with Honey Don't and Act Naturally occasionally thrown in for good measure.  But it was I Wanna Be Your Man that had the distinction of being performed at the group's final concert in 1966 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco.

I Should Have Known Better

By sheer coincidence, the only two songs that Capitol Records ever chose as alternate B-sides for singles by the Beatles occur back to back in an alphabetical list of the group's output.  Having just covered I Saw Her Standing There (which replaced This Boy as the flip side of I Want to Hold Your Hand here in America), we now move on to I Should Have Known Better.  In this instance, Capitol wanted another song from the film soundtrack on the B-side of A Hard Day's Night instead of Things We Said Today as on the UK single.

I Should Have Known Better was among the songs written specifically for the soundtrack during the group's three week engagement in Paris in January of 1964.  Back at Abbey Road Studios in England on February 25th, the boys began a week of recording sessions before principal photography of the film commenced.  They attempted three takes of this song at the end of the evening session, but the arrangement wasn't quite correct.

On the following afternoon, a full three hour session was required to perfect the number.  Take nine, the first take that John sang without playing harmonica, proved to be the master.  It wasn't until take twenty-two that his double-tracked vocal line and his harmonica part were complete.

The song is featured early in the film as the band joins Paul's grandfather in the luggage compartment of the train and they begin playing cards.  The schoolgirls they have met gather round and the boys soon have their instruments and perform the number.  This sequence, which includes the wonderful Wilfrid Brambell as Paul's grandfather and Patti Boyd as one of the schoolgirls, was actually filmed on a set at Twickenham Film Studios on March 11th.  The song is played again at the concert near the end of the film.  This was shot on March 31st at the Scala Theatre.  Though Paul appears to be singing in both sequences, he does not sing on the recording, as this song was 100% Lennon's.

The tune was naturally included on the album in the UK, as well as on the EP Extracts from the Film A Hard Day's Night.  United Artists released it on the official soundtrack album in the US before Capitol's single appeared.  Capitol considered putting it on the album Something New, but decided against it.  In February of 1970, the song resurfaced on the compilation Hey Jude, an album which supposedly gathered up all of the songs that had not yet been released on a Capitol album.  If so, A Hard Day's Night should have been included in this collection, as well, yet it was conspicuously absent.

The group played I Should Have Known Better for the BBC a few times to promote the film, then brought it back in the fall of '64 as part of their stage act for a tour of Britain.

I Saw Her Standing There

"1-2-3-faw!"  Possibly the most famous count-in of all time.  Many have done it on records since, but producer George Martin decided to open the album Please Please Me with Paul's contagiously enthusiastic yell, signalling a rebirth of rock and roll that has lasted for decades.

McCartney's rocker was known as Seventeen when the Beatles recorded it on February 11th, 1963.  They knew the song well, as they had already been playing it in their stage act for a few months, and they nailed it on take one.  But Martin thought they could do better, so he pushed them to repeat it several more times.  A few of these takes broke down as the boys, who were still relatively new to working in the studio, lost concentration, prompting Paul's strong count-in to rally the group before take nine.  When reviewing the takes, Martin opted for take one, but he made sure to edit the take nine intro onto the beginning, thereby creating the illusion of the live album he had wanted to make all along.  Though most of the album stayed true to the live-in-the-studio aesthetic, this song did feature one overdub.  All four Beatles gathered at the microphones to add handclaps to the number throughout.

In addition to opening their first British album, the song also opened the Vee-Jay album Introducing the Beatles in the US, but someone at Vee-Jay thought the count-in was left in accidentally, so only the "Faw!" is heard on the American album.  Once Capitol Records was persuaded to finally release a single by the group, the label chose to replace I Want to Hold Your Hand's UK B-side This Boy with this early rocker.  Capitol also put the song (with the count-in intact) on the album Meet the Beatles!

For proof that the band was playing the song before they officially recorded it, one need look no further than the many releases of the Star Club tapes from Hamburg.  The performance is from December 31st, 1962 and, unlike much of that evening's lackluster work, it is spirited both vocally and instrumentally.

Several versions are available from late 1963, a time when manager Brian Epstein kept the boys on a grueling schedule just as they were on the cusp of unimaginable fame.  Live at the BBC features a live performance from the program Easy Beat while On Air - Live at the BBC Volume 2 presents a recording made a month earlier for the program Saturday Club.  Perhaps the best live version is from a Swedish broadcast recorded in late October which can be found on Anthology 1.

The EP Free as a Bird, released in conjunction with the Anthology series, presents the complete take nine starting with the count-in by Paul that Martin used for the master.  What this take and all of the other versions reveal is that George's guitar solo was never set.  He improvised each time, yielding many shaky results.  The group did not maintain this practice for very long once they became recording artists, preferring carefully crafted solos which were faithfully recreated in concert.

This was the last song John Lennon ever performed on stage, joining Elton John at Madison Square Garden in 1974 and introducing it as being by "an old estranged fiance of mine called Paul."  It was originally released as the B-side of the single Philadelphia Freedom.

A personal connection to this song occurred for me during the summer of 1997 when a young, fresh out of college actor named David Harbour told me that he didn't care for the Beatles because you couldn't dance to their music.  Shortly thereafter, we were at a nearby bar and, when the local band began playing I Saw Her Standing There, nearly everyone in the room jumped to their feet and began dancing.  I couldn't resist the chance to lean over to David and say, "No, you can't dance to the Beatles!"

I Need You

"Recording" the song in the film Help!

1965 is the year in which George Harrison began writing his own compositions for the remainder of his career as a member of the Beatles.  He had previously only had one solo composition recorded by the group - Don't Bother Me on their second album With the Beatles in '63.  He did produce a demo of a song called You Know What to Do at the final session for A Hard Day's Night in 1964, but it remained forgotten until the Anthology series in the 1990's.

When it came time to record a fresh batch of songs for their second film, Harrison boldly showed up with two contenders - You Like Me Too Much and I Need You.  Director Richard Lester chose the latter number as George's spotlight.

The recording of I Need You began on February 15th, 1965, after the group had first worked on songs by John and Paul.  Producer George Martin actually kept personal handwritten notes of this particular session which reveal that John played drums as Ringo tapped on the back of an acoustic guitar.  George played another acoustic guitar and Paul played bass.  It only took this lineup five takes to get it right.  All overdubs were added on February 16th, including George's double-tracked lead vocal, occasional harmony vocals by Paul, backing vocals by George, John and Paul, plus Ringo playing cowbell during the bridges.

The most interesting overdub was George's lead guitar work played with the assistance of his newest toy.  At the time, it was referred to as a tone pedal, but it soon became popularly known as a wah wah pedal.  George liked the effect it produced so much that he used it a second time later in the day on John's song Yes It Is.

In the film Help!, the boys are pictured supposedly recording the song out in the wind on Salisbury Plain with tanks and troops all around protecting them from those who want to steal Ringo's ring.  I find the incongruity of seeing the peace-loving band surrounded by weapons of war shocking even today.  They are, by the way, miming with their usual instruments, with Ringo on drums and John on his electric guitar.  After this, they never performed the song again during the remainder of their career.

I Need You appears on both the UK and US versions of the album Help!  It later surfaced only one more time on the collection Love Songs in 1977.

I Me Mine

George Harrison auditioned several songs for consideration by the Beatles during the Twickenham Film Studios portion of the Get Back project in early January of 1969.  John and Paul showed little interest in any of them.  Such was the case with I Me Mine when George first played it for Ringo (who would at least listen) describing it as a "heavy waltz."  Paul did take the time on this occasion to learn the chords and join in, but John simply grabbed Yoko and waltzed around as the others played.  The song did not resurface when the sessions moved to the Apple Studios in Savile Row later in the month.

A year later, the rough cut of the documentary contained footage of John and Yoko dancing to the song.  It suddenly became necessary to include the number on the soundtrack album which would accompany the release of the film.  By this time, John had officially (but secretly) quit the group.  It thus fell to George, Paul and Ringo to tackle the assignment.  Since the Twickenham sessions had only been filmed and not properly recorded, an entirely new version of the song was required.

They reported to Abbey Road Studios on January 3rd, 1970 to begin what would become the final song attributed to the group during their career.  Unlike most of the other songs on the Get Back album assembled by Glyn Johns, this one would have numerous overdubs, thus lacking the live in the studio feel of the original project.  George played acoustic guitar while singing a guide vocal, Paul played bass and Ringo his drum kit.  It took sixteen takes to arrive at the master.  The atmosphere was relaxed as they sometimes jammed between takes and George delivered a mock press statement addressing John's absence.  "You all will have read that Dave Dee is no longer with us..."

Among the overdubs, George played a stinging electric guitar and added more acoustic guitar, and Paul played an electric piano and a Hammond organ.  Plus George recorded his lead vocal before he and Paul added some harmony vocals.  The entire song was only 1'34" in duration.  George Martin produced the session, giving the finished product to Glyn Johns for his second attempt at compiling a Get Back album.  As with his first effort, this was rejected by the Beatles.

In March, George and John recruited American producer Phil Spector to see if he could put together a suitable album.  Spector rather cleverly extended I Me Mine by editing the master just before the final line of the song and repeating the bridge and the second verse, bringing the running time to 2'25".  On April 1st, with Ringo present and participating, Spector added an orchestral arrangement by Richard Hewson to the recording.  This is the version on the Let It Be album.

The original recording can be found on bootlegs of the second Get Back album.  This is also more easily available on Anthology 3, including George's witty press statement.  The 2003 collection Let It Be...Naked features the song without Spector's orchestra, yet it retains his extension of the song.

This ode to the ego has never been one of my favorites, but George himself thought highly enough of the number it that he used its title for his autobiography.    

I Feel Fine

As the Beatles worked on their fourth album at sporadic sessions in 1964, they had a few contenders for their next single among the songs recorded.  Two moody, downbeat numbers, No Reply and I'm a Loser, were under consideration until the relentlessly cheery Eight Days a Week emerged as the frontrunner on October 8th.  An extremely productive session on October 18th yielded the eventual winner, however, with another sunny burst of optimism entitled I Feel Fine.

It was a literal burst of electronic feedback that heralded the continuous riff that runs throughout the song.  Chief composer John Lennon had actually been playing that riff between takes of Eight Days a Week ten days earlier.  He now played it in tandem with George Harrison, creating an almost nonstop wave of energy that carries the song along with Ringo's Latin-tinged drum pattern.  The lyrics are as lightweight as can be, yet they cannot detract from the sheer joy of this recording.

It took nine takes before John and George could play the best version of their guitar duet.  John gave up trying to sing after take one, which was also in a key too high for him to sing comfortably.  His double-tracked lead vocal was recorded as an overdub, as were Paul and George's backing vocals and George's guitar solo.  What is most remarkable is that this was achieved in the middle of a day in which the group completed work on eight songs.

Stories abound as to how the feedback was "discovered" and used as the opening moment of the song.  Some say that it was accidental while most agree that it was preplanned.  Whatever the truth is, Lennon was always proud enough to proclaim that it was the first deliberate use of feedback on any recording..."before Hendrix, before the Who, before anybody."

The single was a worldwide number one.  In the US, it was simultaneously released as part of the album Beatles '65.  In the UK, it later appeared on the EP The Beatles' Million Sellers and the album A Collection of Beatles Oldies.  Post career releases include the Red Album, 20 Greatest Hits, Past Masters and 1.  A live version from Blackpool Night Out appears on Anthology 2.  The group also recorded the song for BBC Radio on November 17th, 1964.  While this version appears on Live at the BBC, a sequence from On Air - Live at the BBC Volume 2 reveals just how difficult it was to replicate the feedback opening at that session.

The song became part of the group's stage act for the remainder of their performing days, right up to their final concert at Candlestick Park in 1966.

On November 23rd, 1965, the Beatles reported to Twickenham Film Studios to shoot promotional videos for several of their hit singles for worldwide distribution.  This was done to lessen the need to make live television appearances all of the time.  Two videos were shot of I Feel Fine.  The first had the boys miming to the song as they fooled around with some exercise equipment.  The second (pictured above) showed them eating fish and chips while barely pretending to sing along.  Manager Brian Epstein was unhappy with the second video, so obviously shot during what should have been a break, and it was never aired.  Happily, both versions are now available on the collection 1+.

I Don't Want to Spoil the Party

When I began my research for this entry, I was surprised to learn from a few different sources that this song was originally conceived as a vehicle for Ringo to sing.  Since he had found a comfortable niche in the rockabilly genre with his recording of Matchbox earlier in 1964, this makes sense.  Yet, though the lyrics did have a hangdog feel about them that might have fit his persona, they were actually so downbeat that Lennon wound up keeping the song for himself.

The song was written during the group's North American tour of 1964.  Though the bulk of the credit for the composition goes to Lennon, McCartney certainly aided him in the process.  The recording took place at Abbey Road Studios on September 29th, the first session following the tour.  It required nineteen takes before the master was achieved, and only five of those takes were complete from start to finish.

John accompanies himself on acoustic guitar as he sings the lead vocal.  Paul plays bass and adds a high harmony vocal throughout the bridges of the song.  He and George also sing some occasional backing vocals in the verses.  The distinctive sound of the recording (and, indeed, of much of the album Beatles for Sale) comes from George's Gretsch Tennessean electric guitar, creating that twangy rockabilly feel.  The only overdubs featured Ringo on tambourine during the bridges and John double-tracking a low harmony for the verses.

In the US, Capitol Records withheld the song from the December 1964 album Beatles '65, instead choosing to use it as the B-side of the single Eight Days a Week, released in February of 1965.  While the A-side went to number one on the charts, I Don't Want to Spoil the Party peaked at number thirty-nine.  Both songs later appeared on the compilation album Beatles VI, released in June of that same year.

The group never played the song live, nor did it ever resurface on any of their post-career compilations.  Its country and western roots were validated, however, in 1989 by Rosanne Cash, who recorded a cover version that went to number one on the Billboard country chart.

I Call Your Name

John Lennon listed this among the very first songs he ever wrote when he got a guitar and formed a group in 1957.  When he and Paul McCartney became a hot songwriting duo in 1963, their manager Brian Epstein encouraged them to donate some of their songs to other Liverpool groups under his management.  This served a dual purpose - it would bring more money into the Lennon/McCartney music publishing partnership plus it would bolster the careers of the other acts in the Epstein stable.

At some point in time, John added a middle eight to this early number before handing it over to Billy J. Kramer.  Kramer recorded it as a B-side to go along with another Lennon composition Bad to Me in June of 1963.  While Bad to Me went to number one in the UK, I Call Your Name got little recognition.

For some reason, this song came to Lennon's mind when the Beatles were completing the soundtrack recordings for A Hard Day's Night on March 1st, 1964.  After nailing Long Tall Sally in one live take, the group turned their attention to I Call Your Name, requiring seven takes before they had a keeper.  John then double-tracked his lead vocal and Ringo added a cowbell as an overdub.

The song was mixed for mono on March 3rd and given to the producers of the film, so it seems to have been in the running for the soundtrack at this point.  Another mono mix on March 4th saw producer George Martin edit take five of the instrumental break into the middle of take seven.  This became the standard procedure for all subsequent mixes.  The first stereo mix was not made until March 10th.  These two mixes were given to Capitol Records in the US for The Beatles' Second Album released on April 10th.  Due to this early release, the song had now probably been dropped from the soundtrack.

A new mono mix was prepared on June 4th.  This was used on the EP Long Tall Sally released on June 19th in the UK.  Only three days after this release, on June 22nd, I Call Your Name was among the songs newly mixed for stereo for the UK album A Hard Day's Night.  Had it been added, it would have brought the number of songs on that album up to the usual complement of fourteen.  Perhaps since it had already been released, it did not make the lineup.

The boys performed the song exactly one time for the BBC program Saturday Club.  This was recorded on March 31st, ten days before its initial release in the US and months before its appearance on the Long Tall Sally EP in Britain.  Sadly, this performance was not chosen for either of the Live at the BBC collections.  The song's original recording was included on the Rock and Roll Music compilation in 1976.

The Beatles' recording of the song is unusual for the instrumental break, which becomes one of the first known attempts by a white group to play ska.  The form was hardly known outside of Jamaica at the time, but Blue Beat Records were starting to appear in the UK.  Even at this early stage of their recording career, the Beatles were always on the lookout for new sounds and influences.  They did not succeed at capturing the proper off-beat style of playing here, and the change in rhythm was probably puzzling to fans.  In retrospect, it was merely an indicator of just how far they were willing to go. 

I Am the Walrus

On September 5th, 1967, the Beatles reported to the studio for the first time since the death of their manager Brian Epstein.  They had already met only days after his untimely death and had decided to carry on with the Magical Mystery Tour project as soon as possible in order to keep themselves occupied.  Following the practice that had been established for their two feature films A Hard Day's Night and Help!, the natural order of business was to record a batch of new songs for the soundtrack before principal photography was scheduled to begin.

To date, there were just two songs earmarked for the film - the title tune and Your Mother Should Know, both by McCartney.  Now, John Lennon brought in his sole contribution for the TV movie, apart from the group instrumental Flying and some incidental music.  This otherworldly composition began simply enough as a droning wordgame to confound those who were constantly digging for deeper meaning in the lyrics of the band's songs.  Of course, the Beatles themselves had unwittingly encouraged those who did so by printing the words of all the Sgt. Pepper songs on the back of that album earlier in the year.

In his book Here, There and Everywhere, engineer Geoff Emerick reports that producer George Martin found the song bewildering when Lennon first played it for all to hear, uttering, "What the hell do you expect me to do with that?"  The mood did not improve once they began working on the basic track.  Sixteen takes were necessary (and only five of them were complete) before they yielded a decent master.  After just a few takes, Paul abandoned his bass and grabbed a tambourine to help the usually-reliable Ringo maintain a steady beat throughout.  Emerick relates that Martin wondered aloud in the control room why John was playing the electric keyboard instead of Paul, as Lennon made numerous mistakes.

Things went better on the following night, September 6th, as Paul added his bass part and John recorded his amazing lead vocal.  Anthology 2 presents take sixteen from September 5th with only John's vocal overdub from this date.  This allows us to hear George Harrison's minimal electric guitar in the clear, which turned out to be his only work on the track.  At this point, George Martin took away a copy of the recording to try and figure out what kind of arrangement he could possibly come up with to augment the song.  As usual, his input turned out to be exceptional. 

In the meantime, however, most of the filming of Magical Mystery Tour took place, including the sequence for I Am the Walrus.  Though Paul directed much of the film, this was definitely John's baby, and it remains one of the best sections of the finished product, serving today as a perfect example of the promotional films of the psychedelic period.

On September 27th, a sixteen piece orchestra spent the afternoon session recording George Martin's ingenious score, which once again incorporated the sliding strings that he had first used in support of George Harrison's Within You Without You months earlier.  The evening session was even more inventive, as sixteen members (eight boys and eight girls, according to the standard notation of the time) of the commercial group the Mike Sammes Singers sang many strange backing vocal parts arranged for them by Martin and Lennon.

At the all-important mono mixing session on September 29th, Lennon finally got to add the live radio feed he wanted to the second half of the recording.  He unknowingly settled on a BBC broadcast of Shakespeare's King Lear.  As this was mixed live into the song, it created difficulties when the stereo mix was done on November 6th.  The equipment of 1967 made it impossible to separate the radio signal and so, from the moment that that signal was introduced, the sound is in mono, though it moves from speaker to speaker thus causing a unique effect.

Though the song was part of the Magical Mystery Tour soundtrack, it was also chosen to be the B-side of the single Hello Goodbye.  In addition to Anthology 2, the song can also be found on the Blue Album, the American version of Rarities and Reel Music.  

Honey Pie

Among the songs that were demoed by the Beatles in May of 1968 was this tune by Paul McCartney that sounds as if it came right out of an old fashioned Hollywood musical from the 1930's.  Anthology 3 presents an edited version of Paul's Honey Pie demo, allowing us to listen in on the fun.  This demo was recorded at George Harrison's house in advance of the group moving into the studio to begin work on what turned out to be a sprawling double album.

The work on this album stretched out for months before the song finally resurfaced on October 1st at a session booked at Trident Studios in London.  All four Beatles were in attendance, and they obviously spent much of the session rehearsing the number before committing it to tape, as official documentation indicates that the master was take one.  The lineup for this take has Paul on piano, John on lead guitar, George on bass and Ringo on drums.

On the following day, Paul overdubbed his lead vocal and added a lead guitar part to the song's intro section.  And two days later, on October 4th, five saxophones and two clarinets performed producer George Martin's period-perfect arrangement.  The final touch was created by having Paul's line "now she's hit the big time" in the intro treated to sound as if it were playing on a scratchy old 78 rpm record.  All of the work on these subsequent days was done at Trident Studios, as well.

The "White Album" proved to be the most eclectic of the group's career, surpassing even Revolver in that respect.  And McCartney's compositions in particular spanned the widest range of styles, with this song certainly responsible for a good portion of that range.

This was the last album by the Beatles to be mixed for mono, and the mono mix of this song is notable for adding a few more measures of John Lennon's brief guitar solo.  George Harrison later praised this solo, saying, "John played a brilliant solo on Honey Pie - sounded like Django Reinhardt or something."

Honey Don't

To a man, the Beatles were big fans of rockabilly star Carl Perkins, composer of the seminal hit Blue Suede Shoes.  As they became worldwide stars in their own right, they naturally found themselves in situations where it became quite easy for them to meet their longtime idols.  Such was the case in May of 1964 when they made the acquaintance of Perkins at a party in London.

The group had been performing several of Perkins' songs in their stage act for years in Liverpool and Hamburg.  Ringo wasted no time in asking the rock and roll legend for permission to record his songs and Perkins reportedly gave the boys the choice of anything in his entire catalog.  Shortly thereafter, he attended the June session which saw Ringo sing the lead vocal on his composition Matchbox.

Later that same year, the group was finishing up work on their fourth album Beatles for Sale.  George had already sung the lead vocal on the Perkins tune Everybody's Trying to Be My Baby, but Ringo had yet to record his vocal outing for the album.  On October 26th, 1964, they turned to the Perkins songbook one last time for Honey Don't.  It only required five takes with George on lead guitar, John on acoustic guitar, Paul on bass and Ringo on drums and at the microphone before they had the master.  Ringo overdubbed a tambourine and the song was quickly complete.

Though the song was stuck in the middle of side two on Beatles for Sale in the UK, Ringo had many fans in America, so Capitol featured it prominently at the start of side two on the US album Beatles '65.  The label also made it the lead track on the final US EP 4 by the Beatles, released in February of 1965.

Yet the song had always been sung by John, not Ringo, in the band's stage act.  The 1994 collection Live at the BBC allows us to hear the way it used to be from a September 1963 broadcast on Pop Go the Beatles.  I have stated in an earlier post that I prefer Ringo's version - I feel the song actually suits his personality better - and I stand by that statement.  On Air - Live at the BBC Vol. 2 presents a November 1964 performance from the program Top Gear with Ringo on lead vocal.

The song briefly stayed in the group's live repertoire, most notably for the duration of Another Beatles Christmas Show at the Hammersmith Odeon at the end of '64.

Hold Me Tight

This is easily one of my least favorite tracks by the Beatles, and I am not alone in that assessment.  The song has rarely fared well with critics, either, though Dave Rybaczewski makes a strong case for it in his in-depth look at the composition, claiming it as a great step forward for McCartney as a songwriter.  The members of the band seem to have had mixed feelings about it, since they were keen to record it on two different occasions, yet it never figured prominently in their repertoire, though they did reportedly play it live for a few years. 

The group first attempted to record Hold Me Tight during the marathon session of February 11th, 1963, which yielded most of the tracks for the first album Please Please Me.  After thirteen takes, a decision was made to splice parts of takes nine and thirteen together for the master.  Ultimately, this track was considered unnecessary and left off of the album.

Later in the year, on September 12th, the boys revived the song in the studio while working on their second album.  They began with take twenty on this occasion and, including overdubs of backing vocals and handclaps, had a new master by take twenty-nine.  This version was released on With the Beatles in the UK and on the first Capitol album Meet the Beatles! in the US.

For me, the simple, repetitive guitar phrase quickly wears out its welcome, not unlike the one on the unreleased song If You've Got Trouble.  And, while this composition may pre-date Lennon's It Won't Be Long, which opens the album With the Beatles, I find Lennon's use of call-and-response much fresher and more exciting than that employed by McCartney in this number.  Finally, the choice to have the song grind to a halt merely serves to emphasize the amount of effort it took to churn out such a lackluster piece.

In an interview which appears at the beginning of Mark Lewisohn's book The Beatles: Recording Sessions, Lewisohn asks Paul about a number of songs.  When he mentions this one, Paul has little memory of it (and the interview was published in 1988), calling it a "work song."  He does say that it is "a bit Shirelles," which I find intriguing.  A girl group singing the same tune with a more interesting arrangement than a chugging guitar riff might be enjoyable.

After its release, the song has not surfaced again.  Not only did the group never choose to record it for any of their numerous BBC sessions, it has also never made the cut for any official post-career compilation.

Hey Jude

Paul McCartney had been dominating the A-sides of most Beatles singles since 1966, but John Lennon had high hopes when the group recorded the fast version of his song Revolution in the summer of 1968.  He figured there was simply no way that the others could deny his screaming rocker as the logical choice for the next A-side...until Paul played him his latest composition.  Not only did the usually-combative Lennon yield the prime position to his partner's song, in interviews he always spoke of Hey Jude with nothing but the highest regard as being one of McCartney's greatest achievements.

Paul famously got the idea for the song while driving over to visit Cynthia Lennon, as encouragement to young Julian whose parents were going through a bitter divorce.  The genius of the lyric is that it is universal in its appeal, so much so that John thought the words were addressed to him, urging him to go out and get Yoko.  Once Paul changed Jules to Jude, because he thought it sounded better, the original inspiration for the song was effectively masked.

The Beatles spent two full sessions merely rehearsing the song with the tape rolling on June 29th and 30th at Abbey Road Studios.  Actual recording did not begin until June 31st at a new studio in London called Trident, which the group was eager to work at because it had eight-track capabilities.  With Paul on piano, George on electric guitar, John on acoustic guitar and Ringo on his drum kit, they only recorded four takes after so much rehearsal the previous two days.  As it turned out, take one was the best.

On August 1st, still at Trident, Paul overdubbed his bass part and added his superb lead vocal, with an absolutely inspired performance during the coda.  John provided a skillful harmony vocal in places, and he and George sang backing vocals.  Even Ringo joined in for the "Na na na" chorus.  A thirty-six member orchestra then reported to the studio and played one of producer George Martin's simplest arrangements.  They, too, were then recorded joining in vocally for the extended chorus.

The Trident tape proved problematic when mixing began back at Abbey Road, but with the assistance of Geoff Emerick, who had recently quit working with the group due to increasing tensions, engineer Ken Scott salvaged the two days of work.  Still, there is no denying that this record sounds quite unlike any other in the band's catalog, especially in the early part of the song.

On September 4th, the group reported to Twickenham Film Studios to make promotional clips for Hey Jude and Revolution.  This happened to be Ringo's first day back at work, as he, too, had quit the band in the interim.  Two very similar variations for Hey Jude featured David Frost introducing the group before they mime to the record, though Paul sings a new live vocal, in front of an orchestra and surrounded by a huge gathering of fans, who join in the chorus.  Both versions of this film, directed by Michael Lindsey-Hogg, can be viewed on 1+.

Aside from being one of the group's most successful singles (and that is saying quite a lot), Hey Jude also served as the title track of a 1970 American compilation album.  It naturally was included on the 1973 Blue Album.  While it is featured on both the 1982 UK and US albums 20 Greatest Hits, the US version is notorious for being clipped short at around the five-minute mark to help preserve the fidelity of the vinyl record.  Anthology 3 gives us the opportunity to hear one of the early rehearsals from June 29th, 1968.  Other appearances of the song include Past Masters Volume Two in 1988 and the worldwide smash album 1 in 2000.

Hey Bulldog

Following the wishes of the Beatles, manager Brian Epstein had made sure in early 1967 that their participation in the animated film Yellow Submarine would be minimal.  All that was required of the group was to give the producers four new songs to debut with the feature.  By the start of 1968, the film was nearing completion, yet only three original songs had been delivered for inclusion in the story.  Meanwhile, the Beatles were so happy with what they had seen of the film that they agreed to shoot a live action sequence for the end of the movie in January, even miming to McCartney's number All Together Now.

On February 11th, 1968, an opportunity presented itself to add a fourth song into the mix, late though it was.  The Beatles happened to be in the studio to shoot a promotional clip for their latest single Lady Madonna.  Rather than pretend to be playing that song, they chose to actually make a recording while being filmed.  And, for the occasion, Lennon had this fun little piano-based rocker which would end up serving both purposes.

It took ten takes to get the best backing track, with John on piano, George on guitar, Ringo on drums and Paul shaking two tambourines.  Moving on to overdubs, Paul played a bass line, George added a stinging electric guitar solo and Ringo played an additional drum part.  The highlight for the film crew featured John and Paul standing at a single microphone to record their vocals, which turned into a free for all during the extended fade out.  It was Paul's barking at this point that lead to the song's title becoming Hey Bulldog.  One final overdub saw John double-tracking his lead vocal in a few places.

Once this film was edited, it looked for all the world as if the group was actually recording Lady Madonna, even though John was seen playing piano instead of Paul.  It easily fooled everyone at the time.  Years later, in 1999, the footage was re-edited and matched back alongside Hey Bulldog to promote the re-release of Yellow Submarine on VHS and DVD.  Both of these promotional clips can be viewed in the collection 1+.

A sequence utilizing the song was added to the film Yellow Submarine, but British fans thought the movie was overlong, prompting the producers to cut the sequence before the film made its American premiere.  It has since been restored in subsequent re-releases of the feature.

As for the song itself, it was a highlight of the 1969 soundtrack album Yellow Submarine.  It was one of the few late-career songs featured on the 1976 compilation Rock and Roll Music.  And, naturally, it is on the 1999 Yellow Submarine Songtrack.  A rare treat is the mono version of the song, available only on The Beatles in Mono box set.

Her Majesty

Ever since I first read of this song's placement at the end of the album Abbey Road in Mark Lewisohn's book The Beatles: Recording Sessions, it has become one of my favorite stories of the group's career.  For such a brief song snippet, the tale surrounding it is rather long and complex.

On July 2nd, 1969, Paul McCartney arrived at the studio first, as was his custom.  He had this little ditty running around in his head and took the opportunity to get it down on tape.  Playing an acoustic guitar, it only required three takes before he was satisfied.  He thought that the song might fit nicely in the long medley that he and producer George Martin were planning, so it was set aside for just that purpose.

By July 30th, every song earmarked for the medley was in some state of production and a rough mix of the proposed running order was assembled for a listening session.  Remarkably, the songs were already laid out in the exact order that we would come to hear them - with one exception.  Her Majesty was placed between two John Lennon compositions, Mean Mr. Mustard and Polythene Pam.  Upon hearing it in that position, Paul felt that his quick acoustic number killed the flow, so he told second engineer John Kurlander to cut it out of the tape and throw it away.

Of course, Abbey Road Studios engineers were instructed to never throw anything away.  Kurlander thus stuck about 20 seconds of leader tape onto the front of the song and attached it to the end of the medley so it would not get lost.  The next time Paul heard the medley, he was surprised to hear his song suddenly play after a long silence.  What made it sound even more surprising was the fact that Kurlander's rough edit began with the final crashing chord of Mean Mr. Mustard.  And it cut off before the final chord of Her Majesty, which makes it seem as if it had been done by design, since the other side of the album ends with a hard edit of I Want You (She's So Heavy).

The Beatles were always fond of embracing happy accidents, and this was no exception.  Early pressings of the album did not even list the song on the back cover, making it a surprise for fans, as well.  This unexpected little delight even serves to undercut the grandiose finale, much like George Harrison's decision to put some laughter after his serious number Within You Without You on Sgt. Pepper.

Bootlegs have given fans the chance to hear the song as originally recorded, including the simple final chord, which is buried under the opening of Polythene Pam on the album, and minus the crashing chord left over from Mean Mr. Mustard.

Here, There and Everywhere

This exquisitely beautiful ballad by McCartney was one of the last songs to be recorded for the album Revolver.  Paul wrote it out by the pool at John's house only days earlier, and had it almost finished by the time he played it for John. 

The first session for the recording of the song was on June 14th, 1966.  Paul chose to play rhythm guitar himself, alongside George on lead guitar and Ringo on drums.  Four takes were attempted, but only the final one was complete.  With producer George Martin coaching them, John, Paul and George then gathered around a microphone and sang the gorgeous block harmonies.  This version was slightly faster than the finished product as we know it.

On June 16th, they began anew on the slower version, using the same instrumentation for the basic track.  Paul sang a guide vocal on this day as he, George and Ringo recorded takes five through thirteen.  With the final take as the best, John, Paul and George recorded a new set of block harmonies, overdubbing them a second time for a fuller effect.  George also decided to double-track his lead guitar passage and Paul added his bass line.  Finally, Paul sang his delicate lead vocal, which was subjected to vari-speed to make it sound a bit higher on the record.  Paul chose to double-track his vocal on June 17th, featuring some very subtle variations in the third verse.

The song has long been one of Paul's personal favorites.  Many fans and critics consider it to be his finest composition, and even the highly-critical John Lennon had nothing but admiration for the piece.

It was a natural for inclusion on the 1977 compilation Love Songs.  And it was among the handful of Beatles songs that Paul chose to re-record for the soundtrack of his 1984 film Give My Regards to Broad Street.  Though the Beatles never played it live, Paul has added it to the set list a few times over the years on various tours.

The Real Love EP from 1996, which was a tie-in to Anthology 2, presents take seven of the basic track.  Since the instrumental performance is almost identical to that on the master, Paul's guide vocal stands out as the most interesting feature of this selection.  To augment this spare production, the backing block harmonies are brought in for the final verse.

Here Comes the Sun

Tired of the tension-filled meetings that were becoming the norm in the business of running Apple, George Harrison took a break from the Beatles one sunny spring day in 1969 and visited the home of his good friend Eric Clapton.  Sitting in the garden, guitar in hand, inspiration struck and one of his finest compositions was born.

It is no small irony that Harrison was reaching his peak as a songwriter during the waning days of the group's career.  At the same time, he was finally developing his signature sound as a guitarist, settling on a simple, fluid style that became instantly identifiable for the rest of his life.

Sadly, John Lennon once again played no part in the recording of a Harrison composition.  Initially, he had good reason, as he was recuperating from an automobile accident, yet even when he was available for later sessions of work on the song, he did not participate.  Only George, Paul and Ringo gathered at Abbey Road Studios on July 7th, 1969 to record the basic track.  With Paul on bass and Ringo on drums, George played an acoustic guitar and sang a guide vocal until he was happy with take thirteen.  He then re-recorded his acoustic guitar part before calling it a day.

June 8th saw George record his lead vocal, then double-track backing vocals with Paul's assistance.  A week later, on July 16th, a session was devoted to adding a series of handclaps at various points in the song.  By this time, John Lennon was back but, as stated above, he did not join in.  George also reportedly overdubbed a harmonium part.  On August 4th, a stereo mix of the song was prepared so George could decide what else could be added to the recording.

The next new overdub was an additional guitar part recorded on August 6th.  This included the forgotten lead guitar solo discovered by Dhani Harrison and the Martins - George and Giles - in 2012.  It's well worth the time searching for the video of this remarkable discovery on YouTube.  Yet another guitar line was added on the 11th.

The two Georges - Harrison and Martin - collaborated on the orchestral overdub added on August 15th.  It was the last of five songs to receive a George Martin arrangement on this long day, but the assembled musicians saw it through to their mutual satisfaction.  Finally, on August 19th, George played his Moog synthesizer to put some finishing touches on the recording.

The result was a pastoral delight which instantly became one of Harrison's most popular compositions.  It was chosen to open side two of the album Abbey Road, a very prominent position.  George played it at the Concert of Bangladesh in 1971, alongside Pete Ham of the group Badfinger.  And, in 1976, he appeared on Saturday Night Live and played the song with host Paul Simon.

Though the song made the cut for the Blue Album in 1973, it has hardly surfaced on any other compilations. 

Helter Skelter

Paul McCartney has always stated that he wanted to one-up The Who after reading Pete Townsend describe his band's latest offering as the dirtiest and most raucous song ever recorded.  Yet the three takes of Helter Skelter first recorded by the Beatles on July 18th, 1968 do not back up that claim.  Anthology 3 presents the first four and a half minutes of take two (take one was 10'40", take two was 12'45" and take three ran 27'11" - the longest take ever by the group) and reveals it to be swampy, slow and deliberate, despite some passionate singing from Paul.  Even if one of these takes had been subjected to overdubs, it is hard to imagine it even approaching the version we have all come to know.

On September 9th, the boys returned to the number and began that version.  This just happened to be the first day of producer George Martin's holiday from the protracted sessions for the double album.  That left 21-year-old Chris Thomas in the producer's chair and gave the lunatics the opportunity to take charge of the asylum.  And, by all accounts, the Beatles were clearly under the influence of various substances that evening.  The proof is in the pudding.

Takes four through twenty-one featured Paul on rhythm guitar, George on a distorted lead guitar, John on piano and Ringo pounding away on his drum kit.  Paul persuaded the engineers to push the sound equipment past its normal limits and then some, capturing as much noise as possible.  The final take proved to be the best.  Good thing, too, because Ringo's hands were actually bleeding after that take, prompting his famous cry of, "I've got blisters on my fingers!"  Paul then recorded his screaming lead vocal, as George reportedly ran around the studio with a flaming ashtray on his head.

Overdubs were all added on the following night of September 10th.  These included an occasional, more prominent lead guitar part played by Paul, a thumping bass from John, backing vocals by John, George and Paul, and squealing saxophone from John and an equally amateurish trumpet attempted by assistant Mal Evans.  The resulting cacophony was everything Paul had been hoping for.

The mono mix of the song was made on September 17th while Chris Thomas was still nominally producer, though McCartney was probably present.  It ended at the 3'36" mark - long before the band came crashing to a halt.  It was not until work on the album was nearing completion on October 12th that the stereo mix was prepared.  By this time, George Martin was back at the helm and an old trick that the group had used on Strawberry Fields Forever was revived.  The song faded out completely, slowly came back to full volume, started to fade again then quickly came back up for the chaotic conclusion, including Ringo's scream.  This brought the total time of the track to 4'29".

The "White Album" was released in late November of 1968 in both mono and stereo in the UK, but it was only available in stereo in the US.  Helter Skelter did not appear again until 1976 on the Rock and Roll Music compilation.  In the US, it was also the B-side of a single released a week ahead of that album.  American fans finally got to hear the truncated mono mix of the song on the US version of Rarities in 1980.  And the slow rendition I refer to at the beginning of this entry surfaced on Anthology 3 in 1996.

Help!

For the Beatles, 1965 mirrored 1964 in many ways, especially during the first half of the year.  Once again, songs had to be written and recorded in advance for the soundtrack of a feature film, then the filming itself was begun and, suddenly, in the midst of it all, a title was decided and a new song had to be written and recorded.  And, in both years, it was John Lennon who quickly wrote a song to order.  McCartney did play a substantial role in the arrangement of the song, particularly with the ingenious backing vocals, but the lyrics were pure Lennon.  Not only did they express a very real cry for help at that point in his life, but they remained among his all-time personal favorites.

The recording was relatively straightforward and was accomplished in a single four-hour session on April 13th.  Take nine was the best rhythm track.  By the time overdubs were complete, the number of official takes had reached twelve.  The few overdubs included all vocals, plus Ringo playing a tambourine and George's descending guitar phrases.

Unlike A Hard Day's Night the year before, there were still a few weeks left in the shooting schedule of Help!  Thus, a black and white sequence of the group performing the song was filmed for the opening credits.  The tune is heard again at the end of the film during the final battle on the beach in the Bahamas.

In his excellent in depth article on the song, Dave Rybaczewski may have solved a long-standing mystery.  A session on May 24th at CTS Studios in London for post sync work on the film possibly involved some re-recording of the vocal parts of the song.  This could account for the different mono and stereo vocal versions available.

In addition to its release as a single and the title track of the soundtrack album, the song was also part of the 1966 compilation A Collection of Beatles' Oldies in the UK.  In the US, Capitol Records chose to open its version of the soundtrack album with a short burst of Ken Thorne's score for the film leading into the title song.  This oddity was actually kept for the American version of the Red Album in 1973.

Help! next surfaced in a live version from August 29th of 1965 on the 1977 release The Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl.  Capitol put the rare mono mix from the single on its Rarities album in 1979.  This was followed by the stereo mix on Reel Music in 1982 and on both the US and UK versions of 20 Greatest Hits in that same year.  Anthology 2 in 1996 gave us the very first live performance of the song from Blackpool Night Out on August 1st, 1965 with John giving a wry introduction, then forgetting some of his own lyrics.  And, of course, the song appears on the worldwide bestseller 1 from 2000.

On November 23rd, 1965, the group met at Twickenham Film Studios to shoot videos for all of that year's singles to be distributed for promotional purposes, thus eliminating the need to appear live on numerous television programs.  The video for Help! shows the boys sitting in a row on a plank between two sawhorses.  John, Paul and George have their guitars and mime singing and playing while Ringo sits at the back holding an open umbrella.  Fake snow falls during the final verse, much to George's surprise and Paul's delight.  This was broadcast on BBC's Top of the Pops on Christmas Day and Boxing Day.  It is now available on the collection 1+.

Hello Goodbye

As the year 1967 drew to a close, the Beatles were still learning how to manage their own affairs following the death of Brian Epstein.  They negotiated a deal to have their film for television Magical Mystery Tour broadcast by the BBC on Boxing Day and its accompanying soundtrack would be released a few weeks in advance of that date.  A year-end single was also expected, and one of the soundtrack songs such as The Fool on the Hill or even the title track would have easily sufficed for that purpose, but Paul McCartney had another song in mind.

On October 2nd, with all of the Magical Mystery Tour songs either complete or nearing completion, the group began work on a composition then known as Hello Hello.  Take fourteen, the final take of the basic track, was best.  The line-up for this take featured Paul on piano, John on organ, George shaking a tambourine and Ringo on drums.  The group did not return to the song until October 19th, at which time they added numerous overdubs including two lead guitar lines from George (much of this was deleted from the final version, but it can be heard on Anthology 2), a lead vocal from Paul, backing vocals and handclaps from John and George, plus maracas played by Ringo.

The following evening, October 20th, two viola players were added to the track.  This was yet another of those infamous sessions where Paul and producer George Martin had not worked out anything in advance, so the musicians waited as Paul and Martin huddled at a piano and figured out what they wanted them to play.  The work on the track concluded with Paul adding a preliminary bass line on October 25th and a second on November 1st.

Though the song contained very simple (many would say simplistic) lyrics, it proved to be a huge number one hit.  Much of its appeal comes from the fact that it displays the full array of production elements common to that psychedelic year of 1967 - many layers of sound, multiple instrumental and vocal variations from verse to verse - but mostly because of the irresistibly-catchy coda, which was always referred to as the Maori finale.  This was reportedly in place right from the very first take of the song.

The Beatles were now in the habit of making films to promote their latest single.  Having just made a film without a professional director, Paul decided that he could take the reins once more for this task.  On November 10th, they met at the Saville Theatre, still owned by Epstein's NEMS Enterprises, to shoot three versions of the song for worldwide distribution.

The boys stand onstage in their traditional concert positions and pretend to perform the song, one time in their Sgt. Pepper costumes.  George and John look bored and disconnected until several dancing girls in grass skirts join them for the Maori finale.  The second film is much like the first except that they wear their own clothes and there is a different backdrop.  The third film combines outtakes from the other two, and includes some hilarious dancing by the boys, particularly John.  There are also a few glimpses in the films of the group wearing their old 1963 collarless jackets and waving at the camera.

The Musicians' Union ban on miming prevented any of the films from being shown on British TV, even after George Martin produced a mix of the song without the violas to accompany them.  The version with the Sgt. Pepper uniforms was shown in the US on CBS's Ed Sullivan Show and ABC's Hollywood Palace.  The BBC did film the group working on the edit of Magical Mystery Tour and combined that with various other footage to promote the single on Tops of the Pops.

While the song was never intended to be part of Magical Mystery Tour, the Maori finale is heard during the end credits of that program.

A Hard Day's Night

In entries from previous years, I have told the story of how producer Walter Shenson and director Richard Lester heard this phrase late in the shooting stage of production and decided that it would be the title of the film, then told Lennon and McCartney that a song of that title would be required.  When Lennon came in with this composition only twenty-four hours later, a recording session was hastily booked for the evening of April 16th, 1964.

Geoff Emerick was serving as second engineer on that date, and in his book Here, There and Everywhere, he relates that Richard Lester was also present in the booth.  It was Lester in particular who pushed for something big to open both the song and the film, resulting in the famous crashing chord.  He also wanted something "dreamy" to close out the number as it segued into the main action of the story.  Though his suggestions (or rather, demands) were realized, his presence on producer George Martin's turf was not exactly welcome according to Emerick.

On Anthology 1, we hear take one from that session, a sloppy performance, yet one that shows most of the elements already in place.  Take nine proved to be the keeper and overdubs were quickly added, including double-tracked vocals from John and Paul, plus bongos and a cowbell played by Ringo.  The trickiest overdub was the instrumental break played simultaneously by George Martin on piano and George Harrison on guitar.  The entire session lasted only three hours, and this after a true hard day's work shooting sequences running from police for the film.

This  session happened so late in the production process that there was only one week of principal photography left and no plans were made to show the group performing the song in the script.  It was used, instead, to open and close the film, playing at the top under the main titles during the mad rush at the train station, and under the closing credits as the helicopter takes off and still frame shots of the boys fill the screen.

The song's many releases include both a single and the lead track of the album A Hard Day's Night in the UK.  In the US, it was a single on Capitol Records and the title track of the soundtrack album on the United Artists label (George Martin's instrumental version from the score also appeared on this album).  It next appeared on the 1966 compilation A Collection of Beatles' Oldies in Britain.  Of course, it was on the 1973 Red Album (the cardboard insert on early copies of the American version claimed the song appeared on the Capitol Help! album - well, kinda.  The instrumental track Another Hard Day's Night features it in an arrangement by Ken Thorne played on Indian instruments).

The 1977 album The Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl features the song in a live performance from 1965.  It surfaced in 1982 on the compilation Reel Music and on both the US and UK versions of 20 Greatest Hits.  It was even included as part of the novelty single The Beatles' Movie Medley released in conjunction with the Reel Music album.  Another novelty occurred during a BBC performance from July of '64 when the piano part was very obviously dropped in from the single since George Martin was not present at the radio session.  This is available on the 1994 Live at the BBC collection.

The song was naturally included on the 2000 worldwide bestseller 1.  And on the more recent 1+, a video from French television shows group performing the song in concert on June 20th, 1965 in Paris.

Happiness is a Warm Gun

Lennon and McCartney had stitched unfinished and unrelated songs together to complete both A Day in the Life and Baby You're a Rich Man in 1967.  Lennon took the process a step further in 1968 by joining three different song snippets of his own to create Happiness is a Warm Gun.

When the Beatles gathered at George's house in May of that year to record demos before beginning work on their next album, Lennon only had the middle section written, as heard on Anthology 3.  He strums an acoustic guitar and sings the "I need a fix" verse, adding a "Yoko Ono no, Yoko Ono yes" part which would not be included in the full version months later.

The sessions for the double album stretched out for so long that it was not until September 23rd that work began on this song, which by now had all three sections in place.  It took much of the evening for John to teach the tricky time changes to the group, yet they still managed to put forty-five takes on tape before wrapping up for the day.  They picked up the next evening and reached take seventy before rewinding the tape and listening to what they had.  Take fifty-three was chosen as the best for the first two sections and take sixty-five was best for the final part of the song.

Overdubbing was done on September 25th, the third consecutive night of work on the number.  The band members had played their usual instruments on the basic track, so they now added organ, piano, a second bass line, tambourine and all of the vocals.  Reportedly, Paul even plays a tuba which just happened to be lying around the studio.

All of this was done with young Chris Thomas sitting in as producer during George Martin's absence from these sessions.  The mono mix was even completed before Martin returned from his extended holiday.  The stereo mix, on the other hand, was one of the last to be made for the album.  This was done under Martin's supervision on October 15th.

Lennon later referred to this song as a "history of rock and roll" reflected in the distinct styles of its three sections.  McCartney loved this track, and it no doubt influenced him a year later when he conceived the idea of stringing together a series of unfinished songs for the long medley on Abbey Road.  He has even continued this practice of combining unrelated song fragments on numerous piecemeal compositions from his solo career.      

Got to Get You into My Life

In 2015, a letter written by George Harrison to American DJ Paul Drew in 1966 surfaced and revealed that the Beatles had considered going to Memphis, Tennessee to make their next album at Stax Records.  Of course, it never came to pass but, if it had, the sound and content of Revolver would no doubt have been quite different from what we now know.  There is one song on that album, however, that seems to have been inspired in part by the Soulsville sound - Got to Get You into My Life.

McCartney's ode to marijuana succeeds in masquerading itself as a love song.  One has to really read between the lines of the lyrics to uncover his true intent, but the words are not the selling point of this number in any case.  It is Paul's soulful delivery and the overall drive of the track that make this yet another high water mark on what may be the group's best album.

When they began work on the track on April 7th, 1966, it had a distinctly different feel from that finished version.  Anthology 2 gives us take five, which was considered best at the time.  It has a one note drone on an organ played by producer George Martin, simple drumming by Ringo, backing vocals by John and George, and a lead vocal by Paul that is completely unlike his singing on the master.

Takes six through eight recorded on the following day show that Paul had rethought how to perform the basic track.  Take eight was the keeper, featuring John on rhythm guitar and George playing a part on his lead guitar which the horn section would ultimately play instead.  A few days later, on April 11th, the glorious guitar flourish near the end of the song was added for the first time.  In his book The Beatles: Recording Sessions, Mark Lewisohn does not indicate who plays this part, but many believe that it is Paul's work and not George's.

The group did not return to the track until May 18th, by which time Paul had decided that a brass section was required to fill out the sound.  Session men playing two tenor saxophones and three trumpets experienced what many others would in the coming years, as Paul sat at a piano and George Martin translated his ideas into an arrangement while the musicians waited.  This was also the first time that engineer Geoff Emerick put microphones in the bells of the instruments to capture their sound as never before.

Once the session players had successfully completed their job, Paul recorded his sensational lead vocal.  A mono mix was done on this day, burying John and George's original guitar parts in the process (though they are still present).  Paul overdubbed another chiming guitar line on June 17th, making a new mono mix necessary.  This was done on June 20th, while also doubling the brass section by double-tracking it just slightly out of sync.  Curiously, the stereo mix done on June 22nd does not have this doubling effect.

After the group's career, the song was released as a single in the US in 1976, one week ahead of its appearance on the compilation album Rock and Roll Music.  This single reached number seven on the Billboard chart - an impressive feat considering that disco was all the rage at the time.

Good Night

Julian Lennon claims that he did not know that his father had written this lullaby for him until he was being interviewed for Steve Turner's 1994 book A Hard Day's Write.  I'm not sure how this is even possible since any serious Beatles fan could have told him this information after the release of John's final interview with Playboy in 1980.  In any case, the song is an anomaly, both for Lennon as a songwriter and for the group as a recording entity.

This is not to say that Lennon was incapable of writing tender songs.  He wrote many as a member of the Beatles and in his solo career, but none of them received the schmaltzy treatment lavished upon this number.  When Paul and producer George Martin ridiculed Phil Spector's orchestra and chorus for The Long and Winding Road in 1970 as being over the top and unlike anything the Beatles had ever done before, they clearly had short (or selective) memories.

The entire group gathered along with George Martin on June 28th, 1968, to work on the song, which John had decided would be sung by Ringo, though Paul and engineer Geoff Emerick say that John sang a beautiful version on a demo tape to help Ringo learn it.  Anthology 3 gives us a marvelous glimpse into the process as Martin sat at the piano and everyone present gave the drummer some encouragement and tips on how to sing the simple, lovely tune.  For the proper takes on this day, John accompanied Ringo on acoustic guitar until take five was deemed to be the best.

On July 2nd, Ringo re-recorded his lead vocal and Paul and George overdubbed backing vocals onto the track.  Martin then took a tape copy home so he could write his accompaniment for orchestra and choir.  This is where Lennon sabotaged his own song by instructing the producer to, "Arrange it like Hollywood.  Yeah, corny," according to Nicholas Schaffner in his 1978 book The Beatles Forever.

July 22nd was the date for the orchestral overdub session in the large Studio One at Abbey Road.  Twenty-six musicians and eight members of the Mike Sammes Singers performed Martin's arrangement.  After they were finished, Ringo stayed behind to re-record his lead vocal yet again, as this was now a complete re-make of the song.  John, Paul and George thus do not appear on the track.

Good Night closes the sprawling double album The Beatles in a strange yet satisfying manner.  Though Lennon admitted in 1980 that the strings were "possibly over-lush," there is no denying that his tune is quite lovely.  It is very revealing, however, to compare the two songs written for Julian Lennon at this tumultuous time in his young life as his parents were getting divorced.  John treats his son like a child and presents him with this lullaby while McCartney treats him like an equal and writes him an anthem for the ages in Hey Jude.