You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)

In late 1969, Apple Records issued a press release stating that a new single by the Plastic Ono Band was due out in early December featuring John and Yoko with "many of the greatest show business names of today."  The B-side, pictured above, was a bizarre piece called What's the New Mary Jane which had been recorded during sessions for the "White Album" in 1968.  Of the other Beatles, only George appeared on that track.  The A-side was a comic concoction called You Know My Name (Look Up the Number) which the Beatles had been working on sporadically for a few years.  The single never came out, probably because the others rightfully felt that these recordings had nothing to do with John's imaginary Plastic Ono Band.

In fact, the Beatles had a great deal of fun working on the song, beginning on May 17th, 1967, a few weeks before Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band took the world by storm.  The boys were already on to their next project, recording a small batch of songs for the soundtrack of an animated film based on their 1966 hit Yellow Submarine.  Producer George Martin was away on holiday resulting in a loose atmosphere as the group laid down fourteen takes of the instrumental backing for what would be known as part one of a multipart number.  Take ten was marked down as being the best, but only for the time being.

Martin was back at the helm on June 7th, and everyone was basking in the glow of the outpouring of rave reviews for Sgt. Pepper.  Upon further listening, take nine was now chosen as the best, and a few overdubs were added including some handclaps.  As other ideas emerged, the session somehow devolved into chaos, leaving nothing useable to add to the basic track at that point. 

On the following evening, however, the creative juices were flowing.  With some invited guests in attendance, the band cranked out four more sections of the song, using the same chord pattern, but in various styles, tempos and with different instruments.  There were twelve takes of part two, four takes of part three, six takes of part four, and only a single take of part five.  One of the guests was Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones, who inexplicably showed up with a saxophone.  Naturally, he was asked to play it for the big finish of part five.  And, for part three, the guests helped to contribute sounds to create a nightclub atmosphere. 

They waited until the following evening, June 9th, to link the five parts of the song together, starting with take nine of part one, choosing the final takes of parts two, three and four, along with the sole take of part five to produce a mono master that was 6'08" in duration.  There were no vocals on the track at this point, nor would there be for quite a while, as all focus now turned to the imminent Our World broadcast, on which the Beatles would represent Great Britain per manager Brian Epstein's arrangement.

Amazingly, almost two full years passed before Lennon remembered to pull You Know My Name (Look Up the Number) out of the EMI vaults to continue work on the track.  The Beatles were at Abbey Road Studios on April 30th, 1969 for a session that was primarily designated for George to overdub a new lead guitar solo on the song Let it Be.  Once this was complete, only John and Paul remained along with assistant Mal Evans to add vocals to what would eventually be the B-side to Let it Be, though no one knew this at the time.  With Chris Thomas in the producer's chair, the old friends had a blast singing the same few lyrics over and over in silly voices, changing from section to section according to the style of the instrumental backing.  Paul was particularly inspired playing the lounge lizard crooner in part three.

After this productive day, the song was once again forgotten until November 26th, 1969, when Lennon decided to pair it with What's the New Mary Jane for the single described at the top of this post.  He had recently told the other Beatles and manager Allen Klein that he was quitting the group following his exhilarating live appearance at the Rock and Roll Festival in Toronto with what was billed as an actual Plastic Ono Band lineup.  John and engineer Geoff Emerick dusted off the old four track mono tape of You Know My Name (Look Up the Number) and made some edits, cutting out sections of parts one and four, and completely omitting part two, until the song was down to a somewhat more manageable length of 4'20".

Though the single was not released, a master copy had been made.  Thus, when the song Let it Be was set to be issued in March of 1970, it was a simple matter to put You Know My Name (Look Up the Number) on the B-side.  Early British copies still had the unissued Plastic Ono Band single's catalog number in the run-out groove, crossed out, in addition to the new catalog number.  Early American copies had a different distinction - the subtitle of the song was erroneously printed on the label as (Look Up My Number).  

You Know My Name (Look Up the Number) did not appear again until the post career British album Rarities.  Though the lineup is substantially different, the American version of Rarities also features the song.  And it closes out the collection Past Masters Volume Two.  

The most interesting re-release of the song, by far, was its inclusion on Anthology 2.  This was the first time the song was ever presented in stereo.  More importantly, this version contained the previously unheard part two, which John had cut from the released version in 1969, as well as reinstating the cut sections of parts one and four.  Curiously, producer George Martin also chose to eliminate bits from some of the familiar sections.  The complete 6'08" version of the song has never been officially released.