r/beatles

Inspired by the Paul McCartney subreddit, I’ve decided to create a place to discuss every Beatles song! I’ll be going in chronological* order every day through the bands extensive catalog, providing the context behind each track and any fun facts I uncover along the way. Feel free to comment below!

*Singles released by the band that were later released on albums will be discussed in correlation with their album release. A few important unreleased/proto Beatles songs will be included as bonus discussions after the official catalog is complete.

While not the main goal of these posts, feels free to rate each song on a scale of 1-10, with one being an abomination, 5.5 being completely average, and 10 being perfection. I will average out the ratings for each song to give a community consensus score.

I Saw Her Standing There, originally titled “Seventeen”, was first thought up after a Beatles concert in Southport by Paul McCartney, likely in late July of 1962. He was inspired by the traditional folk song “As I Roved Out,” in which the male love interest pines over a 17 year old girl, but decides he must remain faithful to his wife (in most versions). Work on the song officially began on October 22nd, when McCartney started creating the arrangements for “Seventeen” at Rory Storm’s house, who shared a band with Ringo Starr from 1960 to early 1962.

Things picked up the following month when John Lennon was introduced to the song. Lennon‘s most famous influence was convincing McCartney to change the opening line of “She was just seventeen, never been a beauty queen“, which later became the iconic “She was just, seventeen, if you know what I mean.” McCartney around this time decided to copy Chuck Berry’s bass riff from his 1961 record “Talkin’ About You”, with McCartney later saying, “I played exactly the same notes as he did and it fitted our number perfectly…. I maintain that a bass riff hasn’t got to be original.”

The song was first debuted December of 1962, in which a bootleg recording of a rehearsal at a Cavern Club performance exists. At this stage, the song was slower, contained a fairly prominent harmonica, and had a few subtle lyric changes from what would appear on the official recording. After more performances over the next few weeks, the tempo picked up, the harmonica was shelved, and the lyrics solidified.

In early 1963, George Martin, the new producer of The Beatles, wanted to capitalize on the growing success of the band (spearheaded by the recent release of “Love Me Do) by releasing a full album (Please Please Me) consisting of popular Beatles concert songs performed in studio. The Beatles recorded the song on the morning of February 11th, 1963 near the beginning of their single-day recording blitz. Nine takes of the song were made, of which take one was deemed best. The opening count-in was from take nine, however, and was later spliced together with the original take. Martin kept the count-in, an unusual practice then and now, to create the effect that this was the beginning of a rocking live concert.

I Saw Her Standing There is often considered to be about Paul McCartney’s early 1960s girlfriend Iris Caldwell (sister of Rory Storm), who he had a volatile relationship with. Some have disputed this, however, with another former girlfriend of McCartney’s, Celia Mortimer. claiming that Paul McCartney shared the song with her in late October of 1962. Both Caldwell and Mortimer were seventeen in 1962, while McCartney was 20.

I Saw Her Standing There has been reviewed as one of the greatest songs of all time by various websites, and is often regarded as one of the best intros to any Beatles album. John Lennon notably played the hit track in a concert of his in 1974, despite his avoidance of playing McCartney-led songs after the Beatles breakup.

OP Score: 9.5/10

Paul has "the warlus was Paul"

Ringo says George's and his own name in Honey Don't

John arguably has The Ballad of John and Yoko, but it's not in the lyrics

I'm going by memory here, so I might be wrong...

Paul McCartney e John Lennon oggi si sono incontrati, la tristezza vera è il fatto che dal 1968 fino al 1975-76 sono tornati amici.

Quando ascolto too many People e how doo you sleep mi fa male, ancora di più quando penso che le ultime parole che John disse a Paul furono...

QUALCHE VOLTA PENSA A ME, VECCHIO AMICO

Watching the “Beatles solo years albums” polls I’ve realised that the song treat her gently/ lonely old people hardly gets any love.
For me it’s one of the best things McCartney has ever written
What do you guys think?

Bob Dylan had a string of failed, acrimonious marriages; the accounts I've read suggest he behaved like a philandering narcissist.

Why don't people ever seem interested in exploring, whereas every thread about John Lennon, we hear about how he was cold to Cynthia?

Hi all - Beatles fan for 28 years. I've read at least 12 books, two trips to Liverpool, and I recently posted about getting busted by Olivia for stalking the back road to Friar Park.

I have a question or thought that I would love to have answered by the community.

The thing I can't wrap my head around is the creative explosion once they signed with Parlophone. At that point they were a group of excellent musicians (except for Best), had played thousands of hours together, and John and Paul had written a ton of songs that had never seen the light of day. They had played and covered hundreds of songs and probably understood how songs work, melody, chorus, chords, etc.

So they show up, they play a couple of covers, and a few originals (Love Me Do, PS I Love You). Martin wants them to record "How Do You Do It", but they say no, release "Love Me Do", it does good but not great. So the best they had that point was that, which was ok but it's not some amazing song I listen to on repeat.

And then....

Over the next few months they write "Please Please Me", "From Me to You", "She Loves You", and "I Want To Hold Your Hand"

Fucking how?

Where did this genius explosion come from? How did they pull this off?

When did Martin realize that they were more than just a group that would write 1 or 2 "good" songs?

This is the part of the Beatles that I can never comprehend. It isn't as if they had all these songs written and no one would hear them and they were waiting to be discovered. They were needed and they just manifested them.

And then it just got better and better. Like way fucking better.

Any one of these songs would be a crowning achievement for a songwriter, but they wrote hundreds of them.

I also struggle with how it was that Lennon and McCartney were so perfectly different yet complementary for each other. And the humility they frequently showed. Like watch the All You Need Is Love broadcast. They are the biggest thing in the world, and they are singing a John song for the entire planet Earth. Paul just sits there and sings backup and plays his bass. He never tries to be in the spotlight, take lead, etc. And similarly, for Sgt Pepper, fucking John Lennon puts on the goofy Pepper costume and stands there and plays the role, or dances down the stairs in Your Mother Should Know.

It's just unbelievable.

Just looking for other's insights into this.

Hi there

What’s the opinions on Goodnight?

This is a beautiful song with a lush production and quite wonderful Ringo vocal which is fitting for this song to close out the White Album for all its chaos and drama this song makes you feel good about this album especially when Goodnight comes after Rev.9 in the track list.

This lush production is really great and the orchestration by George Martin(also plays celesta here) makes the song feel so beautiful when it’s already sung as a lullaby by Ringo.