Tune In

by Mark Lewisohn

  Here at the session, George probably didn’t seem responsible for it at all. As involved as he was behind the scenes, he wasn’t in the studio to personally inflict this humiliation; Ron Richards was in charge, and they had work to do. The red form says they were expected to record two “sides” in these 105 minutes, although—given the abbreviated duration and the fact that only one number was required—this could have been an error. Either way, the objective was to record a B-side, and the song selected was “PS I Love You.” It isn’t known who chose it, but its recording commandeered the first part of the session.

  For the second and last time at Abbey Road, the Beatles recorded solely in mono, though it seems they played everything live in this session, instruments and vocals together. “PS I Love You” was completed by take ten (some were probably false starts or breakdowns), with John’s Jumbo Gibson plugged into an amp, George playing his Gretsch, Paul the bass, and Andy White on drums. Ringo shook a pair of maracas. As Richards would recall, “Ringo was sitting next to me in the control box, not saying anything, so I said ‘Go and play the maracas’ and off he went to do it. He stood next to Andy and the drum microphone picked up his sound.”53

  “PS I Love You” was a good piece of work, with a particularly imaginative vocal arrangement—Paul singing lead, and John and George chiming in on certain words, tricky parts they’d worked out in the Cavern rehearsals. It was well crafted, catchy and performed with confidence, making for an effective and beguiling B-side. They were finding their stride.

  This showed again when they went for a second number. The session had started at 5PM, not 4:45, so time was especially tight when they turned their attention to “Please Please Me,” now in its new, uptempo arrangement. A short, focused period of rehearsal came first, giving engineer Norman Smith time to adjust the microphones and mixing-desk settings, for Andy White to get acquainted with the rhythm—it included a number of fills—and for Ron Richards to properly attend to his A&R functions, tidying up the composition where necessary. He made one such change to the lead guitar part, which repeatedly riffed the melody and vocal line. “George was playing the opening phrase over and over and over throughout the song,” Richards would recall. “I said, ‘For Christ’s sake, George, just play it in the gaps!’ ”54

  This first-known recording of “Please Please Me”—preserved on acetate disc—was by some distance the most exciting and dynamic work the Beatles had done in the studio so far. It isn’t known how many takes they did before the one labeled “best,” but into a fast-flowing two minutes they crammed a chocolate box of hooks, licks, flicks and tricks, their ingenuity overflowing. A flurry of short verses is sung strongly and in challenging harmony by John and Paul, there are ascending chords, descending chords, appealing vocal crescendos and falsettos, and everything is given heightened impetus by fast doubled guitar chords. “Please Please Me” was a complex density of clear ideas, and well executed—John again used the Jumbo Gibson plugged into his Vox amp, George played the Gretsch, Paul added an inventive bass line, and Andy White did a good job. Ringo had no audible role in the recording.

  “Please Please Me” was so good that, here and now, the possibility was floated that it become the B-side of “Love Me Do”—this is shown by the existence of the acetate. However, while the new arrangement was strong, it retained too many rough edges to go out just yet, needing more studio time than this session had. There was also an overwhelming feeling inside the Parlophone office to get the Beatles record out. This business had been dragging on for months and there was no desire anywhere for yet another quandary, yet another delay.

  With the session coming to an end, Ron Richards suggested another remake of “Love Me Do,” thinking they might improve on the previous week. It was completed quickly, with John pulling the harmonica from his pocket for the only time this late afternoon, and Richards getting Ringo to stand next to his usurper and play tambourine—and so hog the microphone that his tapping went down louder than Andy’s beat. This now third EMI version of “Love Me Do” was an impressive job, confident and competent, but (apart from a slightly quicker tempo) in no material sense different from what was laid down the week before. As Ringo would rightly point out, Andy White didn’t do anything he hadn’t done. George used his Jumbo Gibson this time, not the borrowed guitar, and it was probably done entirely live because there are no handclaps in the middle-eight. By the end of the session they’d cut three songs in 105 minutes—less than the time it took them to labor through “Love Me Do” seven days earlier.55

  At last, the Beatles’ first Parlophone record could be issued. The coupling would be “Love Me Do” and “PS I Love You,” which George Martin greatly resented being forced to issue, didn’t expect to succeed, and would aid with little support. The release date would be Friday, October 5—and, as Ringo was relieved to discover within the next two or three weeks, the chosen version of “Love Me Do” was the one with him on drums, not Andy White. It was the better of the two recordings, but George Martin and Ron Richards could never remember if they selected it on purpose or in error.‖

  The Beatles and Brian may not have realized that EMI’s obligation to them was now ended. Their contract required Parlophone to record a minimum of six sides, and six had been done, the titles inscribed in a ledger at EMI’s Hayes offices: 1, “Besame Mucho.” 2, “Love Me Do.” 3, “PS I Love You.” 4, “Ask Me Why.” 5, “How Do You Do.” 6, “Please Please Me.” Adjacent to the last of these, in a column headed “Balance of Guarantee,” was written the word “Complete.” The Beatles didn’t appreciate just how important it was that “Love Me Do” did well: their first record could have been their last.

  George Martin was aware of the contract situation … and he was on their side. He now knew the Beatles, liked them, and believed their unusual “group sound” could get them a hit—provided they recorded the right song. Success surely wasn’t going to happen with “Love Me Do,” but that would soon be behind them and he’d make sure they fared much better with its follow-up.

  The Beatles were standing at the foot of a new ladder, in the knowledge they had a core of popularity in northwest England to give them a good leg up. They’d also succeeded in getting their own songs used, Lennon-McCartney numbers on both sides of the record. Soon after that latest Abbey Road session, Brian received from Ardmore and Beechwood a single-sided sheet of paper that was the publishing agreement for “Love Me Do” and “PS I Love You.”

  It was made out in Brian Epstein’s name—“for and on behalf of ‘LENNON/McCARTNEY’ ”—and gave to EMI’s music company, in perpetuity, “the full copyright for all countries.” It wasn’t a rip-off contract more than any other, it was a template agreement—the industry-standard “10:50:50” deal—in which the specific details were added by typewriter. Ardmore and Beechwood agreed to pay the composers 10 percent of the retail price on sheet music sales (after the first five hundred copies), 50 percent of the publisher’s receipts from the sale of records that contained either song (known as mechanical rights), and 50 percent of royalties received from any subpublishing deals outside the UK. The usual token sum, a shilling, was paid as an advance against the first royalties; standard agreements like this gave publishers no options on the writers’ future compositions; and, for reasons unknown, the document was backdated to September 7, 1962.

  There were ten preprinted clauses in all, but Brian got Beryl Adams to type an eleventh, two colliding lines squeezed into the narrow space above his signature (which she then witnessed):

  11. That were [sic] sheet music, records, publicity etc is concerned credit will be given to “LENNON/McCARTNEY.”

  Brian showed the contract to John and Paul in his Falkner Street flat, still being used by John and Cyn. In such surroundings took place an informal meeting of great consequence, because it was here that John and Paul agreed to solidify their old teenage pact to credit their songs jointly, irrespective of contribution—a deal that gained a second dimension in autumn 1962: they’d
also share the money. Songwriting was about to start generating them a revenue stream distinct from the Beatles’ group income; they didn’t know how much, but agreed to divide it evenly. Historically, joint-songwriter agreements enumerated splits of 90:10, 85:15, 80:20, 75:25, 67:33 and every other fiddly fraction down to 50:50, but John and Paul went halves all the way, closeness and ambition shared and matched. Decided with the purest of motives and best of intentions, this accord reached in a Liverpool 8 flat in September 1962 would have lasting ramifications.

  There was only one proviso: they agreed that the order of the song’s credit would indicate its principal author. They’d continue to work on songs together, one bringing his ideas to the other, but where John was main creator, it would be Lennon-McCartney, and where Paul was main creator, it would be McCartney-Lennon. The credit for 50:50 collaborations would be decided if and when there were any (there’d been none since 1958). Accordingly, as “Love Me Do” and “PS I Love You” were mostly Paul’s songs, Brian took a pen to the Ardmore and Beechwood contract and amended part of the inserted clause:

  11. That were [sic] sheet music, records, publicity etc is concerned credit will be given to “LENNON/McCARTNEY” “McCARTNEY/LENNON.”

  The meeting then broadened out, leading to the discussion of a long-term agreement where Brian would become manager and agent for John Lennon and Paul McCartney as songwriters. Here and now, the three agreed to all the outline terms, after which Brian gave David Harris instructions to prepare a contract. The lawyer was currently drafting the pukka management agreement between Brian and the Beatles, to run five years from October 1; this second agreement—the tripartite one, John and Paul with Brian—would begin the same date and run for three.

  Eleven months later, interviewed on BBC-tv, Paul described his and John’s songwriting “as a sort of sideline,” but it was always more.56 The reality is that, from October 1, 1962, unstoppable twin energies—the Beatles, and Lennon-McCartney—were running strong, together and separate, side by side and neck and neck, parallel missions that intertwined, mutually reinforcing.

  Three copies of the Lennon and McCartney draft agreement (this was the name order as typed, but it represented no hierarchy) were sent out by Harris on September 10, one for each party, and its terms were barely altered before the finalized contract was presented for signatures. John and Paul—“The Composers”—agreed to appoint Nems Enterprises Ltd. as their sole and exclusive manager and agent until September 30, 1965, on a 20 percent commission. The document said nothing about the name order—Lennon-McCartney or McCartney-Lennon—and it would never be put into writing.

  It isn’t clear what George and Ringo knew of this second contract, or if they knew—neither would ever intimate knowledge of it in any public forum. By carving up the songwriting, John and Paul were effectively excluding them from this source of income. In the natural scheme of things, whenever they brought a song to the group, everyone would chip in with suggestions, George in particular contributing solos and other ideas, and this would continue—but he’d receive no credit or reward for it. Paul would explain the decision: “It was an option to include George in the songwriting team. John and I had really talked about it. I remember walking up past Woolton Church with John one morning and going over the question: ‘Without wanting to be too mean to George, should three of us write or would it be better to keep it simple?’ We decided we’d just keep to two of us.”57

  It was from around this time—possibly right now, though probably not—that George perceived a subtle shift in the Beatles’ chemistry. On stage, he was still singing as many songs as John and Paul, and they remained the closest bandmates imaginable, a strong all-for-one-and-one-for-all, but, as George would put it, “An attitude came over John and Paul of ‘We’re the grooves and you two just watch it.’ They never said that, or did anything, but over a period of time …”58

  By September there had never been so many self-written songs in the Beatles’ set. Though they still weren’t doing “Please Please Me,” there was “Love Me Do,” “PS I Love You,” “Ask Me Why,” “Tip of My Tongue” and two other new ones. The first was “I’ll Be On My Way,” a Hollyesque number from Paul’s harvest of ’59. Then, it was a sweet melody written on his old Zenith, but not much more; now it was developed into a Beatles group number, inspired by the new sound of the Jumbo Gibsons. John played one here, while George came up with a middle-eight solo on his Gretsch and incorporated into a new intro the magical E-augmented chord from Goffin-King’s “Don’t Ever Change.” Though John sang lead vocal with Paul, side by side in harmonized duet, he never liked “I’ll Be On My Way,” and revealed this when they got to the line “this way will I go”—he pulled a crip face and hunched himself Quasimodo-like around the microphone. Paul had no choice but to ride the laughter.59

  The second new song, “Hold Me Tight,” was another McCartney-Lennon—Paul’s contributions to the partnership were easily outnumbering John’s. He’d remember them developing it together in the front parlor at Forthlin Road, and also that it was “a failed attempt at a single.” “Please Please Me” and “Tip of My Tongue” had been written with an EMI session in mind but “Hold Me Tight” was possibly the first time one of them wrote specifically for a 45. It never made it. There’s no information about what the song sounded like at this point, but it was probably similar to the recording made a few months later, a frenetic piece with a pulsating bass line, a tempo to match the newly fast “Please Please Me” and a vocal arrangement that was, as Paul would describe it, “A bit Shirelles.”60

  In 1958, the notion of “Lennon and McCartney” came from Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Loewe and the other songwriting duos of renown, but by September 1962 it was much more Goffin and King, the young New York husband-and-wife team whose songs, all post-1960, John and Paul revered like no others. They were of the same generation, lyricist Gerry Goffin born the year before John, musician and singer Carole King born four months before Paul. Goffin and King had mastered the difficult balance of craftsmanship and commerciality, writing songs that made listeners buoyant and happy even when the words weren’t obviously so. In these vital respects, their influence on the music of Lennon and McCartney—especially the songs of the next couple of years—would be pronounced. John could not have made the connection or aspiration any clearer when he said (in 1971), “When Paul and I first got together, we wanted to be the British Goffin and King.”61

  In September, the Beatles put a sixth Goffin-King song into their set. “The Loco-Motion” was a million-selling US number 1 and British number 2 for the singer Little Eva, a dance-floor smash that urged people to snake around ballrooms in a long train. The legacy of the Twist, which made the record business and much of the public dance-mad, was still holding sway. John and Paul sang its lead vocal in unison, as they did in “Some Other Guy,” and George stepped forward to join Paul at the second mike, head to head, for the girl-group backing vocal—but there’s no recording and no further information to say if they rearranged it.

  Other new numbers in the set were nabbed by George, maintaining their year-long format of stage equilibrium, one vocal from each of the front line in turn. He added two in September and, strangely—and in a timely fashion—the first was by Buddy Holly and the other was very Holly-like. The second of these was a song called “Sheila,” strongly reminiscent of “Peggy Sue” but written and sung by the Atlanta-born Tommy Roe; it made number 1 in America and 2 in Britain (where, like “The Loco-Motion,” it was kept off the top by the Tornados’ space-age instrumental “Telstar”). The Beatles didn’t rearrange it but stuck to the record and did it virtually as a two-hander: George sang and played guitar and Ringo hit the toms fast from start to finish. Ringo had yet to sing with the Beatles, but—piece by piece, song by song—the Beatles’ set was evolving into one that was exclusive to his drumming, numbers Pete hadn’t played.

  The new Buddy Holly song was “Reminiscing,” which happily combined for the Beatles two blasts
from the past: great Holly music, to remind them who they were and why they were, and also the sound of the Coasters. King Curtis—who played sax on “Yakety Yak,” “Besame Mucho,” “Three Cool Cats” and “Young Blood”—did so again here on Reminiscing, recorded in 1958, five months before Buddy Holly was killed at the age of 22, and unissued until now. George introduced it as “Reminiscing-ing-ing-ing,” which always got a laugh, and he replicated Curtis’ sax solo on his Gretsch, using the lower strings to produce a more rasping sound than the Beatles usually featured.62

  Through all this time, Brian was having difficulties with Granada TV. He wanted to build promotion around the broadcast of the Cavern film, but the company wouldn’t schedule a date and Brian felt his inquiries were being fobbed off. Granada’s problem, concealed for the moment, was that the essential contrasting element in this edition of Know the North—film of the Brighouse and Rastrick Brass Band—would be too expensive to screen. Only belatedly had Granada realized that showing it would necessitate paying Musicians’ Union fees to every one of the thirty bandsmen—a budget-busting proposition. Without this contrast, there was no other vehicle for showing the Beatles, and when Brian demanded to know what was going on, Leslie Woodhead was forced into confessing the problem. As he recalls, “I said in desperation, ‘I’ll try and get the boys in the studio to do something, as a kind of consolation prize,’ and this led to their first appearance on People and Places.”63

  While the Cavern film was shelved indefinitely, Woodhead urged his colleague David Baker—producer of Granada’s live evening magazine show—to see the Beatles. He drove from Manchester to the Cavern on October 3 and booked them on the spot to broadcast two weeks later, the 17th. It would be another vital breakthrough: the Beatles’ first TV appearance, plugging their new record at tea-time right across the north of England.