Today's song was kind of a big deal for the boys. It was a long time in the making, and it turned out to be a very important step on their road to success. "Love Me Do" was The Beatles' first single, and when it was released in the U.S. in 1964, it topped the charts. I'll share some quotes:
Ringo: "The first record, 'Love Me Do', for me that was more important than anything else. That first piece of plastic. You can't believe how great that was. It was so wonderful. We were on a record!"
Paul: "In Hamburg we clicked... At the Cavern we clicked... but if you want to know when we knew we'd arrived, it was getting in the charts with 'Love Me Do'. That was the one. It gave us somewhere to go."
John: "Paul wrote the main structure of this when he was sixteen, or even earlier. I think I had something to do with the middle." (This one makes me LOL.)
It's interesting to note that it's not Ringo playing drums on this one; Andy White (you guessed it, yet another fifth Beatle... that's three so far by my count) replaced Ringo for one version. Wikipedia tells us that "an easy way to distinguish between the two versions of the song is that if there is a tambourine, then it is White playing drums."
The history behind this one is actually pretty fascinating. Lennon played a stolen harmonica he'd lifted from a music shop in The Netherlands. The guys were really excited to record this song because it was their own original material (then, as today, it was more common for an artist to perform a song written by professional songwriters), and this song was later covered by both The Chipmonks and David Bowie (a rather dubious honor in the case of the former). For me, it was pretty alright. I liked the harmonica bits; the lyrics are simple and make this stand out as one of the only songs I've heard which rhymes on every line (creating an eminently catchy tune). I think my favorite part about this particular experience was learning that the harmonica was hot. :P
The history behind this one is actually pretty fascinating. Lennon played a stolen harmonica he'd lifted from a music shop in The Netherlands. The guys were really excited to record this song because it was their own original material (then, as today, it was more common for an artist to perform a song written by professional songwriters), and this song was later covered by both The Chipmonks and David Bowie (a rather dubious honor in the case of the former). For me, it was pretty alright. I liked the harmonica bits; the lyrics are simple and make this stand out as one of the only songs I've heard which rhymes on every line (creating an eminently catchy tune). I think my favorite part about this particular experience was learning that the harmonica was hot. :P
See you guys tomorrow!
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