Please Please Me was the Beatles second single and their first UK number one (the flipside was discussed in yesterday’s post 148: Ask Me Why). It is also the title track of their first album.
The recording and release of Please Please Me marked a transitional moment for the Beatles and has become a famous part of their mythology, like Arthur pulling Excalibur from the stone. Almost everything that can be written about it has been written many times over. Of course at any time, some people are encountering the Beatles for the first time.
The Beatles BibleThe follow-up to The Beatles’ début single ‘Love Me Do’, ‘Please Please Me’ was originally written as a slow, bluesy song in the style of Roy Orbison. Producer George Martin persuaded The Beatles to rearrange the song, which duly became their first n…
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WikipediaAfter spending many months and thousands of hours playing together in Hamburg, the Beatles had returned to Liverpool and to regular bookings at the Cavern Club, where they developed a very strong local following. They had been spotted by Brian Epstein who had learned of their burgeoning reputation via the record shop he ran in the city. Epstein offered to manage the band, and set about getting them a recording contract. The Beatles had been turned down by several record companies, and had finally been picked up by Parlophone, a small subsidiary label of EMI. George Martin was Parlophone’s producer, he had responsibility for signing artists, selecting material (so-called A&R – “artistes and repetoire) and supervising recording. Martin had been initially sceptical about the Beatles, but had been pressured into listening to them by EMI’s music publishing company Ardmore and Beechwood, who had been impressed by the potential of Lennon and McCartney’s songs.
On their initial audition/recording session Martin had not been hugely impressed. He’d taken a schoolmasterly attitude and spent some time criticising the Beatles and their equipment, but they had overcome his misgivings with self-confidence and charm. However he did not rate their drummer, Pete Best, privately advising Epstein that he’d have to be replaced for future recordings. This chimed with the Beatles’ own growing dissatisfaction, so before the next session they had replaced Best with Ringo Starr.
At the next session, to record their first single, Love Me Do and another candidate How Do You Do It, the Beatles brought along new songs including Please Please Me, which Lennon had written initially emulating Roy Orbison’s style. At that stage the song had a much slower, bluesy feel. Martin described it as “rather dreary”, and told them if they doubled the speed it might be interesting. Martin had also been unhappy with Ringo’s initial efforts on Love Me Do. A new session was arranged, and a session drummer was hired. The band recorded a satisfactory version of Love Me Do with the stand-in drummer, and experimented with a new much faster arrangement of Please Please Me which was much more promising, but Martin felt there was still room for improvement.
The stage was set for Excalibur to be drawn from the stone, having been forged in the clubs of the Reeperbahn and Mathew Street, and then plunged into the cold critical water of EMI’s Abbey Road studio.
Lennon and McCartney had worked hard on the arrangement and the final recording has many of the hallmarks that became characteristic of Beatles singles; strong harmonies, climactic call and response vocal lines, and unstoppable energy.
The verses pack an undeniable punch. The vocal is in two part harmony from the first line, with McCartney holding the same note while Lennon takes the descending melody while the pounding bass plays eighth notes all giving a sense of urgency. But when the chorus arrives the song somehow finds another gear with the call and response “come on”s leading into a crescendo just as the title arrives.
And if you think about it the words are quite saucy! At least he remembers to say “please”.
As Mark Lewisohn puts it:
Nothing remotely like this had ever been made before, not in Britain or America. The influences were checked – Orbison, Everlys, Isleys, Smokey’s Miracles, Goffin and King – but the Beatles had taken them and created something else, something vital, joyful, earthy, throaty, catchy and genuinely uplifting.
And so we are ready for the legendary moment that seems to appear in every Beatles biography and biopic:
Upstairs, George Martin reached across Norman Smith, pressed the talkback key and let his voice boom into the studio below: ‘Gentlemen, you’ve just made your first number 1 record.’
Mark Lewisohn. All These Years: Volume One: Tune In