Article first published as 49 Years Ago This Week, The Beatles Release Their Second 7” Single: Please Please Me on Blogcritics.
Released during one of the bitterest
winters in British history, ‘Please
Please Me’ helped to initiate a post-war socio-cultural thaw among British
youth. The release had a similar effect on its UK audience that ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand’ would have
upon a US audience almost twelve months later.
Released on January 11th 1963, the
records meteoric ascent up the charts brought the Beatles into virtually every
British home, against the backdrop of the freezing winter and the unfolding political
sex scandal of the Profumo affair.
Written in John Lennon’s childhood bedroom
as a deliberate bluesy attempt at emulating Roy Orbison, ‘Please Please Me’ became the Beatles’ first number one (NME and Melody Maker polls) hit single in the UK, catapulting the group out
of Liverpool and installing them as overnight national stars in one swoop.
In 1980 its author reflected:
‘Please Please Me’ is my song
completely. It was my attempt at writing a Roy Orbison song, would you believe
it? I wrote it in the bedroom in my house at Menlove Avenue , which was my auntie’s
place. I heard Roy Orbison doing ‘Only The Lonely’ or something. That’s where
that came from. And also I was always intrigued by the words of ‘Please Lend
Your Ears To My Pleas,’ a Bing Crosby song. I was always intrigued by the
double use of the word ‘please.’ So it was a combination of Bing Crosby and Roy
Orbison."...John Lennon
Lennon must have composed the song sometime
between June and September 1962 as it was not presented at the first EMI
session on June 6th or at the earlier Decca audition in January of
that year.
‘Please
Please Me’ first appeared in
the studio on September 4th 1962 during the recording session for ‘Love Me Do’ and ‘How Do You Do It’. It was rehearsed during a run-through presided
over by EMI producer, Ron Richards, from 2:30 to 5:00 pm, with new Beatle, Ringo
Starr, behind the drum kit.
The song
was certainly in its infancy on September 4th, with a number of
differences from the eventual official release. Probably slower in tempo, this earlier
version featured Harrison playing the scaled guitar riff throughout the verses
rather than at only the beginning of each. This repetition eventually grated on
Richards’ ears, prompting him to lose his patience, declaring, “For Christ’s sake, George, just play it in
the gaps!”
One week later, during the September 11th
session, the Beatles recorded ‘P.S. I
Love You’ and ‘Love Me Do’ with session
musician Andy White on drums. Starr was also in attendance, and participated by
playing maracas and tambourine. Perhaps cautious of Starr’s abilities, George
Martin had arranged for a session drummer to attend on the day.
With the session winding to a close, the
group attempted a taping of ‘Please
Please Me’. However, according to Beatles historian Mark Lewisohn, George Martin
was unhappy with the results and advised them to add harmonies and speed it up:
“At that stage ‘Please Please Me’ was a very dreary song. It was like a
Roy Orbison number, very slow, bluesy vocals. It was obvious to me that it
badly needed pepping up. I told them to bring it in next time and we’d have
another go at it.”...George Martin, (Lewisohn: The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions, p.20)
There is evident confusion about which
session Martin was at when he dispensed this advice. The rediscovered version
of ‘Please Please Me’ from September
11th, once thought lost and later included on ‘Anthology 1’, presents the song in almost identical form to the
final version, recorded on November 26th.
The structure is identical to the completed
version, as are the melody and harmonies. Most convincingly, the song’s signature
hooks are clearly in place. These include the stops and starts, Harrison’s
scaled guitar intro on each verse, his verse-chorus splitting riff, the call
and response “C’mon, C’mon” of the
chorus, and the busy drum fills which permeate the track. There is also little
difference in the tempo of these two versions, which conflicts significantly
with Martin’s claim that at this stage (September 11th) the song was
“very slow”.
So is it possible Martin actually made the
comments based on the version rehearsed the previous week (September 4th)
with Ron Richards at the helm? If so, then the problem is that Martin was reportedly
not present at this pre-session rehearsal.
Confusing? Yes. However, it serves as a
reminder that when analysing Beatles’ recordings, individual and collective accounts
often conflict and can never be totally trusted without corroborative evidence.
There is also confusion about which drummer
can be heard on the rediscovered September 11th recording. Ron
Richards stated that Starr did not play drums at all that day. However Geoff
Emerick, then a young apprentice tape-op, recalled how session drummer Andy White
was dismissed after his input on ‘Love Me
Do’/’P.S. I Love You’. Emerick remembers Beatles roadie, Mal Evans, setting
up Starr’s kit as White was leaving. To further confuse matters, Emerick also
recalls this version of ‘Please Please Me’
being slow in tempo, a claim that the resurfaced recording seems to contradict.
We can never state categorically who sat on
the drum stool during this early demo of ‘Please,
Please Me’. However it seems probable, based on the similar styles evident
on the September 11th and November 26th versions, and
with Geoff Emerick’s recollections of the session, that with ‘Love Me Do’/’PS I Love You’ in the bag
on September 11th and his job complete, Andy White may have handed
over the drum stool to Starr.
The style of drumming, the snare and
tom-tom fills, the stops and starts, indeed the pace and overall feeling on
both tracks (Sept 11th/Nov 26th) are too similar, one
might argue, to be the creative input of two different drummers, two months
apart.
In fact, apart from a slight change in the
snare/tom-tom fills leading into the bridge, the main drum pattern and the
fills for each dynamic verse-chorus-bridge intro/outro are nearly identical.
The brisk, energetic flurries of each of these fills, and in particular the
identical ‘machine-gun’ phrased ending on the snare on both versions sound very
much like Starr’s signature style.
Despite confusion over earlier sessions, on
November 26th 1962 the Beatles did regroup at Abbey Road studios
with a reworking of the composition which was tight and explosive. Taping began
in earnest around 8:00 pm and was completed in 18 takes. Starr’s performance on
the drums that evening was so incandescent, that he permanently banished any
notions that he was another ‘Pete Best’.
‘Please
Please Me’ begins with a
hammer ‘baddum-dum’ pluck of the A string in E major, probably played on
Harrison’s Gretsch (or Lennon’s Gibson J160E). This introduces us to the main
hook of the song; Harrison ’s scaled intro on
guitar coupled with Lennon’s harmonica (overdubbed later in the session). The
clever use of harmonica provides a familiar continuity with the group’s debut
single, helping to establish a signature sound.
Just as the previous release, ‘Love Me Do’, may have been influenced
by ‘Bye Bye Love’, the harmonies on ‘Please Please Me’ are most likely
borrowed from another Everly Brothers single. Lennon’s lower melody, accompanied
by McCartney’s high ‘E’, is particularly reminiscent of the style employed on
the Everly’s 1960 hit ‘Cathy’s Clown’.
The vocals are utterly resolute,
introducing the listener to the plight of the protagonist (thought to be
attempting to coax his partner into engaging in oral sex). The animated, rushed
climb of the chords, from G through A to B, matched by Starr’s energetic fills
after the first line, serves to underline a climactic, sexually frustrated
desperation. A sudden stop on ‘E’, preceded by some brisk strumming on guitar,
again matched by Starr, introduces Harrison’s fat rockabilly riff on ‘E’.
Lennon’s four desperate “C’mon” calls
are delivered with a gruff sincerity. Each is answered by Harrison and
McCartney, providing the representation of peer pressure.
A cleverly truncated scaled riff drops the
listener into the bridge, courtesy of some expressive snare/tom-tom fills from
Starr, who then deploys a Latin tinged rhythm, complete with a ‘cha-cha-cha’
response on the snare. During the bridge, Lennon explains why he’s expecting to
be pleased, while McCartney and Harrison provide harmonies that would make Buddy Holly’s Crickets proud. In fact, the line referring
to “rain in my heart” is borrowed
from Holly’s ‘Raining In My Heart’
(1959). However what really broke ground here in contemporary pop music was the
audacious ending.
The coda concludes with an aptly climactic
triplet of repetitive pleading, with the last “you” held and then bent in falsetto. Meanwhile the guitars rise
and fall through a climactic chord sequence, interspersed by a fill of four,
even sixteenth notes on the snare. The result was one of the most revolutionary
two minutes of pop committed to tape at the time.
George Martin certainly thought so. At the
end of the final take he switched on the talk-back mic from the control room
where he was sitting and remarked...
“You’ve
just made your first Number One”...George Martin
...his prediction was not wrong.
Interestingly, an unsolved issue with the
original master tape from the November 26th session forced George
Martin to create the stereo mix of ‘Please
Please Me’ from three separate takes (16, 17, and 18). One of these takes
featured a lyrical fluff by Lennon, who mixes up his lines with McCartney’s.
This error remains on the stereo mix at 1:27 as does the chuckle from Lennon
during the first “C’mon” at 1:33, in
acknowledgment of the error.
Upon its UK release, the single reached
number one on both the NME and Melody Maker polls.
In the US the single was offered to, and
rejected by Capitol Records. This blend of R&B was traditionally associated
with black musicians and Capitol were thought to have believed that the sound
was too raucous for a white group and, that the sexual reference within the
song was too risqué for a US
release. It seems unlikely however that the Beatles’ ethnic background would
pose a problem for a society which had experienced white musicians such as
Elvis Presley and Buddy Holly playing R&B seven years previously. The most
likely explanation is that Capitol executives were simply deaf to a new sound
when they heard it, and skeptical of a new musical phenomenon from England, an
unlikely source of a rock ‘n’ roll revolution.
After the release of ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand’ in the US, and the subsequent explosion
of Beatlemania, ‘Please Please Me’
was re-released and peaked at number 3 in the Billboard Hot 100. The two songs
at numbers 1 and 2 were; ‘I Want To Hold
Your Hand’ and ‘She Loves You’
respectively.
The release of ‘Love Me Do’/’P.S. I Love You’ had guaranteed the group’s debut
release was comprised exclusively of McCartney compositions. Now, ‘Please Please Me’/’Ask Me Why’ ensured
their second release was a totally Lennon affair. Over the next year, while busy
conquering the world, most of their single releases would be joint ventures.
This article is an excerpt from the
App/eBook; Please Please Me – The AlbumGuide. Created by Dinosaur Album Guides, this guide is available on iPad
and Kindle, and on multiple devices (PC/Mac/Android/iPhone/Blackberry) using
Amazon’s free Kindle reader application.