Category Archives: The Best Songs

Beatles, The Best Songs

The Beatles 40 best songs: at 33 “We Can Work It out”

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 “In We Can Work It Out, Paul did the first half, I did the middle eight. But you’ve got Paul writing, ‘We can work it out, we can work it out’ – real optimistic, y’know, and me impatient: ‘Life is very short and there’s no time for fussing and fighting, my friend.'”
– John Lennon (All We Are Saying by David Sheff)

“I had the idea, the title, had a couple of verses and the basic idea for it, then I took it to John to finish it off and we wrote the middle together. Which is nice: ‘Life is very short. There’s no time for fussing and fighting, my friend.’ Then it was George Harrison’s idea to put the middle into waltz time, like a German waltz. That came on the session, it was one of the cases of the arrangement being done on the session.”
– Paul McCartney (Many Years From Now by Barry Miles)

 Wikipedia:
“We Can Work It Out” is  written by Paul McCartney and John Lennon. It was released as a “double A-sided” single with “Day Tripper“, the first time both sides of a single were so designated in an initial release. Both songs were recorded during the Rubber Soul sessions.

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Beatles, List, The Best Songs

The Beatles 40 best songs: at 34 “Hello Goodbye”

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“Hello, Goodbye was one of my songs. There are Geminiani influences here I think: the twins. It’s such a deep theme in the universe, duality – man woman, black white, ebony ivory, high low, right wrong, up down, hello goodbye – that it was a very easy song to write. It’s just a song of duality, with me advocating the more positive. You say goodbye, I say hello. You say stop, I say go. I was advocating the more positive side of the duality, and I still do to this day.”
– Paul McCartney (Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now)

So often, simplicity is mistaken for “being easy”. McCartney’s pop jewel is not easy, it is pop-music perfection.  It’s infectious, catchy and clever beyond what initially meets the ear but that’s hard to pull off. Lennon was more than annoyed about this, he was angry about McCartney’s ability to churn out these perfect “pop-ditties”. It happened with this single as it had happened before with Strawberry fields/Penny Lane single. Talk about duality, Lennon and McCartney.

The song belies its simplicity, it sounds like a young man in a hurry. The “calm” lyrics and the insistent  melody, it is a paradox.

It is a masterpiece!

Wikipedia:

“Hello, Goodbye” was released as a single in November 1967, and topped the charts in the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Norway. The song also was a number two hit in both Austria and Switzerland.

Single by The Beatles
B-side “I Am the Walrus”
Released November 24, 1967
Format 7″
Recorded 2 October – 2 November 1967, EMI Studios, London
Genre Pop rock
Length 3:27
Label Parlophone (UK), Capitol (US)
Writer(s) Lennon–McCartney
Producer(s) George Martin

Number of takes: 21
Oct 2, Oct 19, Oct 20, Oct 25, Nov 1 and Nov 2

Written by Paul McCartney.

“Paul marched me into the dining room, where he had a marvellous old hand-carved harmonium. ‘Come and site at the other end of the harmonium. You hit any note you like on the keyboard. Just hit it and I’ll do the same. Now whenever I shout out a word, you shout the opposite and I’ll make up a tune. You watch, it’ll make music’…

‘Black,’ he started. ‘White,’ I replied. ‘Yes.’ ‘No.’ ‘Good.’ ‘Bad.’ Hello.’ ‘Goodbye.’

I wonder whether Paul really made up that song as he went along or whether it was running through his head already.”
– Alistair Taylor (Epstein’s  personal assistant and later the GM of Apple Corps.)

The Beatles – Hello, Goodbye:

“I remember the end bit where there’s the pause and it goes ‘Heba, heba hello’. We had those words and we had this whole thing recorded but it didn’t sound quite right, and I remember asking Geoff Emerick if we could really whack up the echo on the tom-toms. And we put this echo full up on the tom-toms and it just came alive.”
– Paul McCartney
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Beatles, List, The Best Songs

The Beatles 40 best songs: at 35 “I Am The Walrus”

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i-am-the-walrus-cover

“I am the Walrus is one of my favorite tracks – because I did it, of course, but also because it’s one of those that has enough little bitties going to keep you interested even a hundred years later”
– John Lennon (1974)

“‘Walrus’ is just saying a dream – the words don’t mean a lot. People draw so many conclusions and it’s ridiculous… What does it really mean, ‘I am the Eggman’? It could have been the pudding basin for all I care. It’s not that serious.”
– John Lennon (1980)

Wikipedia:

“I Am the Walrus” is a 1967 song by the Beatles, written by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. The song was featured in the Beatles’ 1967 television film, as a track on the associated double EP Magical Mystery Tour and its American counterpart LP, and was the b-side to the number 1 hit single “Hello, Goodbye.” Since the single and the double EP held at one time in December 1967 the top two slots on the British singles chart, the song had the distinction of being at number 1 and number 2 simultaneously.

It was done in 17 takes, on Sep 5, 6, 27 and 28.

Single by The Beatles
A-side “Hello, Goodbye”
Released 24 November 1967
Format 7″ single
Recorded 5 September 1967, EMI Studios, London
Genre Psychedelic rock
Length 4:33
Label Parlophone
Writer(s) Lennon–McCartney
Producer(s) George Martin

Basically the original songtrack of I am the Walrus set to video footage from MMT and Beatles Anthology. Sharp-eyed male viewers might notice a couple of (not so small) enhancements from elsewhere in the MMT footage, and even a guest appearance by that well-known English eccentric Vivien Stanshall:

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Beatles, List, The Best Songs

The Beatles 40 best songs: at 37 “I Want To Hold Your Hand”


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“They were doing things nobody was doing. Their chords were outrageous, just outrageous, and their harmonies made it all valid.”
– Bob Dylan

“We wrote a lot of stuff together, one on one, eyeball to eyeball. Like in ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand,’ I remember when we got the chord that made the song. We were in Jane Asher’s house, downstairs in the cellar playing on the piano at the same time. And we had, ‘Oh you-u-u/ got that something…’ And Paul hits this chord [E minor] and I turn to him and say, ‘That’s it!’ I said, ‘Do that again!’ In those days, we really used to absolutely write like that — both playing into each other’s noses.”
– John Lennon (Playboy)

“‘Eyeball to eyeball’ is a very good description of it. That’s exactly how it was. ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’ was very co-written. It was our big number one; the one that would eventually break us in America.”
– Paul McCartney (Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now by Barry Miles)

This is the song that made America pay attention, and kick-started the “British Invasion”. It is the essential Beatles -63 pop song (ok, along with She Loves You). When released in USA,  750,000 copies were sold in the first 3 days, 10,000 copies were sold each hour in New York!

Wikipedia:

Single by The Beatles
B-side “This Boy” (UK), “I Saw Her Standing There” (US)
Released 29 November 1963 (UK), 26 December 1963 (US)
Format 7″
Recorded 17 October 1963, EMI Studios, London
Genre Rock, pop
Length 2:24
Label Parlophone (UK), Capitol (US)
Writer(s) Lennon–McCartney
Producer George Martin

“I Want to Hold Your Hand” is a song by the English rock band the Beatles. Written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, and recorded in October 1963, it was the first Beatles record to be made using four-track equipment.

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Beatles, List, The Best Songs

The Beatles 40 best songs: at 38 “Taxman”


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“I had discovered I was paying a huge amount of money to the taxman. You are so happy that you’ve finally started earning money – and then you find out about tax.

In those days we paid 19 shillings and sixpence (96p) out of every pound, and with supertax and surtax and tax-tax it was ridiculous – a heavy penalty to pay for making money. That was a big turn-off for Britain. Anybody who ever made any money moved to America or somewhere else.”
– George Harrison (Anthology)

Wikipedia:

“Taxman”
Song by the Beatles from the album Revolver
Released 5 August 1966
Recorded 20–22 April, 16 May
and 21 June 1966,
EMI Studios, London
Genre Hard rock, psychedelic
Length 2:39
Label Parlophone
Writer George Harrison
Producer George Martin

“Taxman” is a song written by George Harrison released as the opening track on the Beatles’ 1966 album Revolver. Its lyrics attack the high levels of progressive tax taken by the British Labour government of Harold Wilson.

The Beatles – Taxman:

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