GLASS ONION AND ITS INCREDIBLE RECORDING PROCESS.

John didn't have much of the song written by May 28th, 1968, when The Beatles met at George Harrison's 'Kinfauns' home in Esher, Surrey to record demos of the songs they've recently written. This fact, though, didn't stop John from putting down on tape what he had so far. The recording consists of John double-tracking himself on acoustic guitar and vocal with a hint of tambourine played by someone else in the third verse. All three verses, however, consist of the first verse repeated three times with slightly different lyrics from what became the finished version. John here sings “I told you about Strawberry Fields, well here's a place you know just as real...where everything glows.” In the second verse, John flubs the line “to see how the other half lives” which results in him mumbling gibberish, him doing the same thing when this point arrives during double-tracking. John then continues this nonsensical habit in many other places in this recording, right down to the song's last moments. Another difference is the dramatically slowed tempo in the third verse during the line “here's another place you can go, where everything glows,” during which time you hear other Beatle voices in the background, one even saying “Help!” at one point. This recording can be heard in its entirety on the compilation album “Anthology 3.”

September 11th, 1968, marked the first day “Glass Onion” was brought into EMI Studio Two and officially recorded. John got together with Paul to finish off the lyrics at some point prior to this day, so a completely written song was ready to go. They all arrived sometime after 7 pm with Chris Thomas at the helm since George Martin lulled on vacation at the time.

The Beatles ran through 34 takes of the rhythm track on this day, the instrumentation being John on his Gibson acoustic guitar, George on his Fender Stratocaster, Paul on a newly acquired Fender Jazz Bass and Ringo playing, as Mal Evans mentions in the November 1968 edition of "The Beatles Monthly Book," "two drum kits instead of one."  Ringo had just acquired a new drum set, a Ludwig Hollywood kit.  "I knew we weren't going to play live anymore," Ringo states in Andy Bakiuk's book "Beatles Gear," "and the others were getting different things to use in the studio, so I thought I would get a proper kit, real drums with real skin heads."  With this new drum set arriving in EMI Studios on this day, they decided to set both this new kit up along with his current black oyster pearl kit, creating a hybrid double-bass drum set for use on this song.  "So we set them all up," Ringo remembers, "and when I was to play the fill, the break came and I just froze, looking at all these drums!"  When The Beatles started rehearsals in Twickenham Film Studios for what became the "Let It Be" album, the new Ludwig Hollywood drum set alone was used from that point onward. 

The song may have reached completion, but with only three verses and no solo of any kind, it ran only one minute and fifty seconds long, almost each of these 34 takes being of that length. Take 15 was stretched out to around six minutes as the song turned into a longer jam session. Take 33 deemed as the best take of the day, although it includes an edited version of two other takes, the obvious edit detected in the drum/cymbal sounds heard in the final verse during the line “fixing a hole in the ocean.” This edit probably was performed at the end of this session by Chris Thomas and engineers Ken Scott and John Smith, after which the session ended at 3:30 am.

They returned to the song on the following day (aka later that evening), September 12th, 1968, for more overdubs. They arrived in Studio Two at around 8:30 pm that finalized  John recording his lead vocal plus double-tracking it, and Ringo adding a tambourine part. By 1:30 am, they left for the evening.

The following day, September 13th, 1968, they met again at EMI Studio Two, this time around 8 pm, for further work on “Glass Onion.” Ringo actually double-tracked his drums for the song on this day, which is especially noticeable on the snare beats throughout the song. Paul also overdubbed a piano part on this day, which plays a vital rhythmic role in the recording. By 1:45 am, this session was then over.

On September 16th, 1968, John, Paul, and Ringo returned to EMI Studio Two primarily to work on a new Paul McCartney song entitled “I Will.” After extensive work settled on this new track, they returned to “Glass Onion” for another overdub before the evening’s end. Someone, either John or Paul, came up with the idea to add a recorder to the song after the reference to “The Fool On The Hill,” since the recorder was in such prominent use in that song. At approximately 2 am, Paul added a simple melody line on recorder after the lyric “he living there still,” he then double-tracking the line afterward. By 3 am, this recording session closed.

John Lennon felt that the recording of “Glass Onion” still needed something, so he compiled sound effects of four different elements at home and brought them into the control room of EMI Studio Two on September 26th, 1968, for overdubbing onto the song. The purpose of this session, actually, was for creating mono mixes of recently recorded songs, but at John's insistence, his idea took precedence.

A four-track tape was created for this overdub: Track one contained a telephone ringing, Track Two contained a single note of an organ, Track Three contained BBC television soccer commentator Kenneth Wolstenholme shouting “It's A Goal!” over and over with a cheering crowd in the background, and Track Four contained the sound of a window smashed. All four tracks had these elements repeated over and over, the entire tape lasting 2:35, which is just a little bit longer than the finished song so far. After this four-track tape spliced together, two attempts at a mono mix of the song rendered by Chris Thomas and engineers Ken Scott and Mike Sheady, no doubt with input from John, interjecting these effects at different times in the mix. This session, the last one with Chris Thomas as producer, erected complete by 1:30 am the next morning.

Upon George Martin's return from vacation, he examined mixes of the Beatles songs that were recorded in his absence, “Glass Onion” included. He was unimpressed by John's sound effects and convinced him to let him score a part for strings to complement the song nicely. John relented, and the tape box containing “Glass Onion” with the strange sound effects was marked “do not use” which, of course, was readily noticed when compiling the “Anthology 3” album decades later.

With the allotted time for finishing the album coming to a close, the needed session to record the string arrangement for “Glass Onion” happened on October 10th, 1968, in EMI Studio Two, starting at 7 pm. Eight musicians were brought in for the overdub on the song as well as on George Harrison's “Piggies.” An eerie orchestral score was recorded as an edit piece for the conclusion of “Glass Onion” which slowed in tempo as it progressed. With this complete, both the stereo and mono mixes used on the finished album were created by George Martin and engineers Ken Scott and John Smith, them adding a manual ADT "wobble" effect to both mixes. Two attempts loomed at each of these mixes, undoubtedly the second of both being the ones used, both having the eerie string section faded down at the conclusion of the song. One noticeable difference between the two mixes is an additional “ooh yeah” from Paul after the break in the mono mix.

A mash-up mix of the song was created by George Martin and his son Giles Martin sometime between 2004 and 2006 in Abbey Road (formerly EMI) Studios for inclusion on the album “Love.” This “Glass Onion” track combined vocal elements of “Hello Goodbye,” horns from “Magical Mystery Tour” and “Penny Lane,” and guitar work from “Things We Said Today.”

The structure for “Glass Onion” couldn't be much simpler, this being 'verse/ verse/ bridge/ verse/ conclusion' (or aabac). The “conclusion” consists of the menacing string arrangement that George Martin added to the end of the song which actually works as a link between album tracks. The idea was to come up with different types of segues between the songs on this album, these taking on many different forms. The first two songs, “Back In The U.S.S.R.” and “Dear Prudence,” had a crossfade between them. The next two songs, “Glass Onion” and “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” had this George Martin orchestral score. Even though this conclusion was not in John's Lennon initial vision of the song, it remains  universally accepted as an integral element of “Glass Onion.”

The song begins with two double-tracked snare drum flams from Ringo which startle the listener after the mellow fade of John's guitar ending for “Dear Prudence.” The first fifteen-measure verse begins immediately thereafter, ushering in Ringo's steady rock solid 4/4 drum beat, Paul's treble-heavy bass work, John's acoustic rhythm guitar and lead vocals, and George's electric guitar chops and accents. The strings first appear in measures six through nine with swooping ups and downs while the tambourine appears in this verse only in measures seven through nine.

The downbeat of measures ten through fourteen are anticipated and accented by a cymbal crash from Ringo. The tenth measure also ushers in Paul's piano for the first time, him playing descending and then ascending chords until the fourteenth measure where he pounds away on chords until the 'Beatles break' on the downbeat of the fifteenth measure. The cellos chop out dramatic eighth notes in the fourteenth measure to highlight the lyrical focal point “looking through a glass onion” before they disappear with the rest of the elements on the downbeat of the fifteenth measure. The only thing heard in the silence of this fifteenth measure is two more double-tracked snare flams from Ringo to usher in the next verse.

The second verse is nearly identical in arrangement from the first verse, the only noticeable difference being an excited “woo” in the silence of the fifteenth measure during another set of double-tracked snare flams.

The simple bridge heard next is ten measures long and vocally consists of three emotive “oh yeah”s (Paul getting vocally over excited in the background during the third one) until John finishes this section as if it's a verse with “looking through a glass onion” once again, ushering in yet another 'Beatles break.' The piano thumps away throughout this bridge and even throws in a thumb roll at the end of the eighth measure. The strings hold out long notes throughout the first eight measures which rise along with the chords to add a tense feel to the bridge. The final piano chord rings out into the silence of the tenth measure as Ringo adds only single-tracked flams this time to bring in the final verse.

While the arrangement of this third verse is very similar to the other two, there are some differences worth noting. The fourth and fifth measures include a double-tracked recorder played by Paul to accompany the mention of “The Fool On The Hill.” The orchestral swoops in the sixth through ninth measures are boosted, which stand out much more in the song than before. The tambourine is absent in the seventh through ninth measures this time, but appear in the tenth measure and then continue to finish out the song. The rough edit in the rhythm track, as heard here in the tenth measure, appears to happen because Ringo forgot to put in his anticipated cymbal crashes at this point of the song, another 'take' edited in to attempt to rectify this matter.

Before the silence of the fifteenth measure gets revealed, however, George Martin's eight-measure orchestral score unexpectedly pops in. Upon careful listening, it appears that this score is entirely in 4/4 time, but the downbeat of the first measure is missing, this orchestral recording reappears edited onto the master tape on the second beat of the measure. This results in the first measure of this section being in 3/4 on the released recording while the rest of it is in 4/4. As these eight measures progress, however, the tempo slows, and the volume decreases as a slow fade, but it doesn't fade away into silence. On the last beat of the eighth measure, the strings all slide their notes menacingly downward as if they've all just nodded off to sleep at that precise time in the studio that day.

There may have been some strange endings to Beatles songs up to this point, but with headphones on, this one surely lifted up the hairs on the back of listeners necks. Once again, the view that the “White Album” didn't see cooperation by all four Beatles playing as a band falls on deaf ears with this track. Everyone played a vital role, everyone shined on top of their game as well. John's vocals make you sure he's imparting you with some hidden wisdom (even though there wasn't any) along with well performed acoustic guitar playing. Paul's rough sounding bass works well here, as does his piano and recorder performances. George puts in a proficient job on electric guitar as does Ringo on drums and tambourine. And good thing George Martin came back from vacation in time to recognize where another tantalizing orchestral score was needed.

Stop by my blog next week and discover the intricate details showcased upon Ob-La-Di, Ob-La- Da.

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DEAR PRUDENCE AND ITS INCREDIBLE RECORDING PROCESS.

"Dear Prudence” was first committed to tape on May 29th, 1968 as a demo recording at 'Kinfauns,' George Harrison's bungalow home in Esher, Surrey. The Beatles met there on the 28th and 29th of the month to record demos of the songs they had individually written during their stay in India. The purpose introduced the songs to the rest of the group and gave themselves a better idea of how to officially record them for the new album. George Harrison had an Ampex four-track machine which he utilized for these demo recordings. 

This recording of “Dear Prudence” appears to be a solo performance by John Lennon on acoustic guitar and vocals, him double-tracking his guitar as well as his vocals. This demo shows that John had the bulk of the lyrics and musical arrangement already figured out, there hardly being much different from the finished version as we know it. Some minor differences include the lyric “sleeping child” in the third verse instead of “little child” as in the finished version, a repeat of the “look around, round” bridge after the third verse, a faster tempo on the final verse, and a continuation of the verse guitar passage at the song's conclusion instead of a repeat of the guitar introduction as we've come to be acquainted with in the released version. Interestingly, during John's vocal double-tracking during the final verse, he starts singing “let me see you smile” instead of “come out to play,” this resulting in him exclaiming “whoops!” Also, during the final moments of this version, while the double-tracked guitars are still playing, John briefly explains the inspiration for the song as follows: “No one was to know that sooner or later she was to go completely berserk under the care of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. All the people around her were very worried about the girl because she was going insane. So we sang to her.”

The Beatles didn't officially record “Dear Prudence” until three months later, on August 28th, 1968. Having recently recorded “Hey Jude” on eight-track recording equipment at Trident Studios (EMI Studios not yet instituting eight-track capabilities at their facility), the group returned to Trident on this day to record John's ballad in a similar fashion, taking advantage of this new technology and procedure. As noted above, Ringo was still away at this time, so the three Beatles arrived around 5 pm on this day to start work on this new song.

Documentation shows that only a single take (“take 1”) occurred on this day, but Mark Lewisohn's book “The Beatles Recording Sessions” explains that there was much more to the recording process on this day than one would think. “The eight-track facility meant that it could be recorded track by track, each one perfected over a number of times while simultaneously wiping previous attempts. This method of working makes the 'take one' statistic look distinctly silly for although it was just one 'take' it was innumerable recordings.” What was first recorded on this day was a basic track of John on his electric Epiphone Casino guitar, playing the distinctive finger-picking rhythm work heard throughout the song, George playing a lead guitar part on his Gibson SG Standard, and Paul on drums. After this, John then double-tracked his finger-picking guitar work on his Epiphone Casino during a good portion of the song, and George added another lead guitar part, double-tracking his lead work in the final verse by playing an octave higher than his first performance.

Since the session didn't end until 7 am the following morning, it appears that each of these elements took quite a few attempts until perfected to their satisfaction. This Trident session ended up costing EMI a total of 431 pounds for studio time, engineer's overtime and blank tape, a cost that would have been just an in-house accounting procedure had they just recorded at EMI on this day as usual.

The next day (or should we say, later that day), August 29th, 1968, they returned to Trident Studios at 7 pm to perform more overdubs on the song. Paul recorded his bass guitar part and John recorded is lead vocals, manually double-tracking them afterward. Then, the group recruited others present on this day, namely Mal Evans, Paul's visiting cousin John McCartney, and newly signed Apple artist Jackie Lomax, to help out in recording backing vocals along with Paul, John, and George. They also joined in providing handclaps at one point, John and Mal Evans even providing some tambourine shaking in the process which made it into the finished product. All those participating in these background vocals and handclaps then broke out in applause in the final moments of the song, although removed out of the released version during the mixing stage. By 6 am the following morning, the session was finally complete, although the song wasn't quite finished.

The following evening (or later that evening), August 30th, 1968, which happened to be the same day of the British release of their single “Hey Jude,” the three Beatles once again returned to Trident Studios to put the finishing touches on “Dear Prudence.” Paul overdubbed a well-performed piano track and, probably because the instrument happened to be lying around in the studio, a brief snippet of flugelhorn during the bridge of the song, this also played by Paul. The session was complete by 11 pm, and so was the recording of “Dear Prudence.”

The first mono mix of the song was done at Trident Studios on October 5th, 1968, by George Martin and engineer Barry Sheffield, along with the songs “Honey Pie” and “Martha My Dear,” which the band also recorded at Trident around that time. This mix was made, undoubtedly, because the master tape still belonged to Trident Studios. However, this mix was never released, instead, further improved upon once the master tape ownership transferred over to EMI Studios.

The song was touched on once again briefly on October 7th, 1968, in EMI Studio Two during a 16 1/2-hour session used primarily for recording George's composition "Long Long Long."  As outlined in Mark Lewisohn's book "The Beatles Recording Sessions," George was "in a happy mood throughout, laughing, joking and bursting into busked versions of other songs, including 'Dear Prudence.'"  This was never released but is evidence that the recording of the "White Album" wasn't all tension and arguments like most believe.

The master tape arrived October 13th, 1968, and immediately both the released stereo and mono mixes of “Dear Prudence” were created by George Martin and engineers Ken Scott and John Smith in the control room of EMI Studio Two. They only needed one try to get the stereo mix, which they completed first, but then had a slightly harder time perfecting the mono mix with five attempts (presumably the fifth attempt being the 'keeper'). The stereo mix has slightly more treble than the mono mix, and also fades to a lower volume during the song's conclusion.

Interestingly, The Beatles did run through a rough version of “Dear Prudence" on January 10th, 1969, during their filmed rehearsals at Twickenham Film Studios for what became their movie “Let It Be.” Needless to say, this version was never officially released in any way, shape or form.

Sometime between 2004 and 2006, George Martin and his son Giles Martin returned to the master tapes of “Dear Prudence” to capture elements of the recording for creating a track entitled “Come Together/Dear Prudence/Cry Baby Cry (Transition),” and appears on the highly successful album “Love.” During the conclusion of the song “Come Together,” they superimposed the lead vocal-less final verse of “Dear Prudence” which appears to fit perfectly given its similar tempo and key.  They also incorporated a bit of Paul's high piano tinkling from "Dear Prudence" on the track "The Fool On The Hill," which was only made available as a bonus track on the iTunes version of the "Love" album.

One can hardly expect a simpler structure for a Beatles song; this one follows a 'verse/ verse/ bridge/ verse/ verse' format (or aabaa) with both an introduction and conclusion thrown in which sound nearly identical.  What gives "Dear Prudence" its complexity is its hypnotically meandering finger-picking rhythm guitar, which lazily propels the song while allowing the listener to enjoy the picturesque landscape of a spring day comfortably.

After the senses get bombarded by the heart-thumping rock and roll of “Back In The U.S.S.R.,” the deafening screeching of a landing plane fades to reveal John's descending fingerpicking guitar work, helping us to relax for a nice leisurely ride. As the guitar slowly fades up in volume, it goes from single-tracked to double-tracked as it approaches the key instrumental phrase then repeats throughout most of the verse. This descending guitar introduction is six measures long, although the screeching plane obscures the first measure somewhat, and segues without us even noticing into the first verse, which is fourteen measures long.

This first verse contains John's hypnotic double-tracked guitar passages plus his double-tracked lead vocals. Paul adds simple one-note bass plucks on the three beat of each of the first eight measures, the tambourine also chiming in with an accompanying beat in the first and fifth measures as if to highlight whenever the word “Prudence” is sung. When John begins to double-up his vocal melody line in the ninth measure, Paul's drums appear for the first time with heavy emphasis on his riding hi-hats along with a rising and falling bass guitar part. The tambourine plays a beat in the gaps left in John's lyrics for the ninth and tenth measure (“the sun is up” beat “the sky is blue” beat...etc.), then putting in a seemingly random beat in the eleventh measure, which also is just after he sings the word “Prudence.” Then, in the thirteenth measure, all elements suddenly disappear to reveal only John's double-tracked finger-picking as heard before.

The second verse is also fourteen measures long and is melodically identical to the first, but with a variety of different elements added. A simple 4/4 drum beat without a ride cymbal for the first through eighth measures along with the same rising and falling bass pattern heard in the first verse. A tambourine beat is heard on the three beat of measures one and five as in the first verse, once again highlighting the word “Prudence.” The same hi-hat heavy drum beat is played once again in measures nine through twelve while the rising and falling bass continues as well. The tambourine plays syncopated quarter-note beats during measures nine and ten, once again adding a single beat after the word “Prudence” in the eleventh measure. Another additional element here is falsetto harmonies that stretch from the seventh measure (just after the lyric “sunny sky-ha-hi-hyyyy”) to the eleventh measure where they finally fade away. These falsetto harmonies reappear in the twelfth measure as a backdrop to the lyric “open up your eyes,” afterward fading away in the thirteenth measure along with the bass guitar and drums. The twelfth and thirteenth measures also premier Paul's piano overdub, playing three drawn-out chords to accent the chord changes. George appears for the first time in the final two measures of this verse with a see-saw-like lower note guitar pattern as a backdrop to John's changing finger-picking rhythm work.

This moves nicely into the eight-measure bridge, which features a continuation of John's finger-picking, George's lower note guitar pattern, which is mimicked by Paul on bass, George's overdubbed lead guitar passages in the first four measures, a simple cymbal-less drum beat from Paul, simple one-note toots on a flugelhorn by Paul, and a rhythmic tambourine overdub. Two sets of harmonies are present here, one set featuring a low monotone group of voices repeating “round, round, round...” (undoubtedly including the voices of Mal Evans, John McCartney and Jackie Lomax) and a set that specifically harmonizes with John's “round, round” in the first measure and “round, round, round” in the third measure. Then the harmonies extend the word “round” in a rising and falling melody in the fifth through seventh measure. Of note here is the sixth measure which is the only measure of the entire song that is in 2/4 instead of 4/4. The seventh and eighth measure is then identical to the final two measures of the first verse, namely, just John's double-tracked finger picking is heard. The third verse that follows is very similar to the second verse but with the addition of lead guitar work by George that worms its way around John's vocal melody line, filling in the open gaps as he goes. Also noticeable here, is the addition of handclaps that are heard periodically throughout the verse.  In the twelfth measure, we hear in the deep background what appears to be arpeggio-like chords from Paul on piano during the lyrics "won't you let me see you smile."  The final two measures, however, change things up dramatically as John temporarily abandons his finger-picking and strums the chords more energetically without raising the tempo (as he did in the demo).  Paul starts playing a careless but interesting random pattern on the drums for these final measures as well.

The fourth verse is lyrically a repeat of the first verse but extremely different musically and is actually fifteen measures long this time. Paul plays what results in an eight-measure drum solo while George double-tracks himself on an intricately worked-out rising lead guitar part, one guitar playing an octave above the other, this lead work stretching through the fourteenth measure. The tambourine and handclaps are going strong throughout the first fourteen measures as well, a high tinkling piano emerging in the third measure and lasting through to the eighth measure where Paul performs a climactic thumb slide down to the ninth measure.

The ninth through twelfth measures feature John spacing out his lyrics into halftime “the sun is up.......the sky is blue......” while the drums resort to a simple drum pattern accenting the snare on every quarter-note and the piano plays away rhythmically along with them. The fourteenth measure dramatically displays the exit of the majority of the elements of the song, revealing only John's finger-picking guitar and lead vocals along with George's highest lead guitar harmony notes ringing out. One can also faintly hear an electric rhythm guitar part played by George from the original rhythm track finishing its final notes while one of his lead guitars fade away with him manually playing with the tone switch of the guitar.

As everything falls away, a reprise of the descending finger-picking introduction lulls as the song's conclusion, performed single-tracked by John, which fades in volume as it descends the scale. After the dramatic climax of the final verse, we have a soft and satisfying landing. We are left off in the same way as we arrived as if floating away on the same cloud.

John must have known that he had something of great potential with “Dear Prudence,” insisting on recording it at Trident Studios with their eight-track capabilities in order to inspire them to a perfect arrangement and performance. All three Beatles involved were at their best, John's excellently performed and newly perfected guitar chops assembled to good use. His vocal work was also convincingly done, his concern for his subject coming through nicely along with his spot-on depictions of the beauty of nature. Paul, as usual, was up to the challenge of adding as many elements as possible to give the track the attention it deserved. George didn't shy away from working hard at perfecting his craft, undoubtedly recognizing the songs' potential and giving it his all.

Stop by my blog next week and discover the intricate details showcased upon Glass Onion.

Please feel free to leave any comments or corrections and share these articles plus the blog's website with your friends, especially Beatles’ fans. You and they might also enjoy knowing more about my Love Songs CD and my novel, BEATLEMANIAC. Just click on the “My Shop” tab near the top of this page for full details.

BACK IN THE U.S.S.R.’s INCREDIBLE RECORDING PROCESS.

The first time “Back In The U.S.S.R.” wound up on tape happened either May 28th or 29th, 1968, by demo form on an Ampex four-track machine at George Harrison's 'Kinfauns' house in Esher, Surrey. The Beatles used both days to introduce the songs they had written in India to each other, then, into EMI Studios the following day (May 30th) to start their next album, affectionately known as “The White Album.”

The demo consists mostly of Paul on acoustic guitar and double-tracked lead vocals, at least one other acoustic guitar as well as backing vocals, handclaps, and a tambourine. While no one can say for sure who contributed these other elements, Paul played the biggest role, undoubtedly layering most (if not all) of these himself. In place of where the guitar solo eventually would appear, Paul repeats the first verse, described the flight “awful” instead of “dreadful” as in the finished version. Also, the third verse as we've come to know it (“Show me around your snow-peaked mountains...”) did not appear on this demo, this verse probably not in existence as of yet. In place of this, Paul repeats the second verse and then follows that up with another verse, mouthing what a guitar solo would be as the song fades away. This demo is in a lower key and is substantially slower, thereby lacking the excitement of the finished product, yet it did express the flavor of what Paul intended.

The group didn't get around to officially record the song until nearly three months later, August 22nd, 1968, in EMI Studio Two. The session was scheduled to begin at 7 pm but, as was usual during the sessions for this album, they probably arrived much later than that. One of The Beatles, however, was more punctual than the rest. Engineer Ron Richards explains: “Ringo was always sitting in the reception area waiting, just sitting there or reading a newspaper. He used to sit there for hours waiting for the others to turn up.” Engineer Peter Vince relates how other tensions were apparent during these days as well: “Things were getting very strained on Beatles sessions by this time. The engineers would be asked to leave. They'd say, 'Go off for a meal' or 'Go off for a drink' and you'd know they were having heavy discussions and didn't want anyone around.”

Some heavy discussions ensued during their rehearsal for “Back In The U.S.S.R.” on this day. Paul, in a 1986 interview, gives us a good idea of how things went down with an already uptight Ringo on this day. “I'm sure it pissed Ringo off when he couldn't quite get the drums to 'Back In The U.S.S.R.,' and I sat in. It's very weird to know that you can do a thing someone else is having trouble with. If you go down and do it, just bluff right through it, you think, 'What the hell, at least I'm helping.' Then the paranoia comes in – 'But I'm going to show him up!' I was very sensitive to that.”

It appears that Paul had a particular drum pattern in mind and was attempting to explain it to Ringo (as he had done at various times during their career – see “Ticket To Ride” for example). Barry Miles, in Paul's biography "Many Years From Now," explains it as Paul ticking off Ringo "over a fluffed tom-tom fill."  Possibly while Paul got behind the drum kit and was in the process of demonstrating to Ringo what he wanted, Ringo actually decided to quit the band. "Paul is the greatest bass guitarist in the world," Ringo explained in 1968, "but he is also very determined.  He goes on and on to see if he can get his own way."  Ken Scott, who was the engineer on this session, recalls: “I remember Ringo being uptight about something, I don't remember what, and the next thing I was told was that he'd quit the band.” “I felt two things,” Ringo explains in the Beatles Anthology special, “I felt I wasn't playing great, and the other three were really happy, and I was an outsider. And so, you know, I came to this decision, ''F*ck it, I'm leaving.'”

With the Beatles now drummer-less (Ringo being coerced back into the group two weeks later), they still took advantage of the studio time on this day to record the basic backing track to “Back In The U.S.S.R.” Since Paul knew what he wanted the drums to sound like, he played them himself with George playing a chopping pattern on electric guitar to accentuate the drums snare beats. “I played the six-string bass on that,” John recalled in 1980, also done during this rhythm track. Five attempts shaped this rhythm track, 'take five' deemed the best. They left the song in this state for the night to “leave it till tomorrow” for overdubs. After a tape copy of “Baby You're A Rich Man” was made for George Martin, the session was complete at 4:45 am the following morning.

Later that same day, August 23rd, 1968, the three Beatles returned to EMI Studio Two at 7 pm (or so) to complete the song. “Ringo's absence spurred the Beatles into making one of their tightest and best-recorded rock songs ever,” Mark Lewisohn relates in his book “The Beatles Recording Sessions.” Onto 'take five' of the previous day, the three of them recorded multiple overdubs. Engineer Ken Scott relates: “They did 'Back In The U.S.S.R.' with what I seem to recall was a composite drum track of bits and pieces, possibly with all of the other three playing drums.” This has to be the case since the two drum parts played were performed simultaneously to Paul playing other instruments. Mark Lewisohn also explains: “The song was also a composite recording in other ways, with three bass guitar parts, played by John, Paul and George respectively, and both Paul and George playing lead guitar.” Since John already performed his bass guitar part on the rhythm track the previous day, both Paul and George's bass parts commenced as overdubs on this day. Other overdubs included Paul on piano, Paul's lead vocals (double-tracked at times), John, Paul and George's Beach Boys-like harmonies during the bridges, and handclaps.

During these overdubs, the four-track tape reached capacity, so a reduction mix occurred to clear up more space for the remaining overdubs. This reduction mix was marked 'take 6.' After all the overdubs were complete; the first and only mono mix arose made by producer George Martin and engineers Ken Scott and John Smith. During this mix, however, one final touch was added; the sound of an airplane taking off and landing, eight seconds of which appear at the beginning of the song, the sound then reappearing here and there throughout and then repeated at the conclusion. Stuart Eltham, curator of the sound effects library at EMI, explains: “Someone managed to get that tape for me at London Airport. There's one of it revving up and taking off and one of it landing. It's a Viscount airplane filed in the library as 'Volume 17: Jet and Piston Engine Aeroplane.'”

A tape copy of the completed mono mix was made at the end of the session, along with four other recently completed songs, and given to roadie Mal Evans. This highly productive session was complete by 3 am the following morning.

Even as late as 1968, mono appears to have been the most important medium for popular music. The released stereo mix of “Back In The U.S.S.R.” took place on October 13th, 1968 in the control room of EMI Studio Two sometime in the later hours of this 7 pm to 6 am session. After the entire recording of the last “White Album” track, “Julia,” stereo and mono mixes of various album tracks lined up on this day by the same engineering team of Martin, Scott, and Smith. Only one attempt was needed to get the proper stereo mix, there being a few differences from the mono mix. The piano appears somewhat quieter in the stereo mix, the plane sounds differ slightly between the two mixes, the sharp guitar sounds at the very beginning of the song are louder in the mono mix, drum beats heard during the closing plane sounds in the mono mix are missing in the stereo, and extra guitar chords play at the beginning of the guitar solo in the stereo mix, as well as additional shouts and piano during the solo.

Another element John and Paul wanted in the new album was crossfades between some of the songs. During what became the first and only 24-hour-session the Beatles ever had, John and Paul worked to construct the complete running order of the two-disc “White Album” on October 16th/17th, 1968 in Rooms 41 and 42 of Abbey Road as well as the control rooms of EMI Studios One, Two and Three. This session lasted from 5 pm on October 16th to 5 pm on October 17th. The final airplane sound was planned to crossfade with the guitar introduction of “Dear Prudence.” Both a mono and a stereo crossfade developed during this marathon session, the stereo version takes a few seconds longer to crossfade between the two songs than the mono. These were created by the same engineering team of Martin, Scott, and Smith, under the supervision of John and Paul.

On January 3rd, 1969, during their rehearsal sessions at Twickenham Film Studios for what became the "Let It Be" movie, the Beatles briefly ran through a rough version of "Back In The U.S.S.R." which was committed to tape.  This version, of course, has never seen any official release.

A newer, more vibrant stereo mix was made of “Back In The U.S.S.R.” sometime between 2004 and 2006 by George Martin and his son Giles Martin for the album “Love.” Its clarity is superior throughout, the vocal track being raised up to hear much more of the extraneous vocalizing throughout the song, most noticeable in the introduction and conclusion of the song. Additional guitar work is heard at the beginning of the song as well. The released compact disc contains a truncated version of this song which omits the solo and second bridge, while the DVD and iTunes version includes the entire piece.

The first live released recording of “Back In The U.S.S.R.” by Paul McCartney came on March 5th, 1990 in Tokyo, Japan, released on both “Tripping The Live Fantastic” and “Tripping The Live Fantastic: Highlights!” Sometime between April 1st and May 18th, 2002, another live recording of the song was released on both “Back In The U.S.” in the states and “Back In The World” worldwide. Between July 17th and 21st, 2009, another live version of the song recorded at Citi Field for release on the album “Good Evening New York City.” Paul's performance of the song at Amoeba Music in Hollywood, California was also recorded and released on the album “Paul McCartney Live In Los Angeles,” which was made available only in Britain and Ireland exclusively for 'The Mail On Sunday' newspaper.

Since the song is patterned after classic rock 'n roll gems like "Back In The U.S.A." and "California Girls," the structure for "Back In The U.S.S.R." is quite standard, consisting of a 'verse/ verse/ bridge/ verse (instrumental)/ bridge/ verse' pattern (or aababa) with a predictable introduction and conclusion thrown in for good measure.  That is not to say there isn't a trick or two hidden within, as we'll see.

We start off with a few seconds of a plane taking off which is faded in and then continues in the mix during the actual band introduction. The first instrument heard is a rather startling lead guitar flub which appears to have been caught on an open track of the tape by accident. (This guitar flub disappeared from the newer mix created for the “Love” album, the producers opting instead to artificially insert some highly distorted guitar noise from the previous track “Revolution.”) The proper introduction then begins, which is four measures in length and builds musically in layers, not unlike the trademark “aah” harmonies in “Twist And Shout.” Multiple guitars, basses, and drums thump out this standard rock 'n roll introduction which ends in an overdubbed tom-tom fill from either John or George and an anticipated “ohhhhh” from Paul. The 'plane taking off' effect fades during the fourth and final measure of this introduction.

The first verse then begins, which is fourteen measures in length. Paul's piano kicks in immediately at this point, as do his single-tracked lead vocals. The 'plane landing' effect lingers throughout the verse in the background at various volumes. In the eighth measure, Paul performs a perfunctory tom-tom fill while he sings the song title for the first time. Through the remainder of the verse, Paul sings double-tracked. An interesting building lead guitar passage appears in the ninth through eleventh measures while Paul misses the snare drum once in the ninth and tenth measures, redeeming himself in the eleventh measure with a quick snare drum fill to signal a 'Beatles break' where all instruments suddenly stop in the twelfth measure. This measure is filled with Paul repeating the song's title, followed by the full instrumentation coming back in on the thirteenth and fourteenth measure, the final measure including a simple transitional lead guitar passage and an eighth-note snare drum fill.

The second verse is pretty much identical to the first instrumentally except for it being sixteen measures long instead of fourteen. By the fourth measure of this verse, the 'plane landing' effect finally disappears; however, it reappears in the sixth measure and continues until the twelfth measure. A slight tom-tom fill rolls at the end of the fourth measure, and then a simple eighth-note snare fill arrives in the eighth measure, both of these presumably performed by Paul during the rhythm track. The twelfth and thirteenth measures are in 4/4 time while the fourteenth measure is in 2/4, these three measures encompassing an extended version of the 'Beatles break' heard in the first verse, allowing the tricky vocal repetition “Back in the U.S., back in the U.S., back in the U.S.S.R.” dramatically sung. Paul's double-tracked vocals unite with John on a lower harmony (the first time his voice resonances on the song) along with syncopated staccato guitar chords in the background. The final two measures, the fifteenth and sixteenth, show the full instrumentation coming back in along with the 'plane taking off' effect. These final two measures also feature an eighth-note snare drum fill and the first emergence of low Beach Boys-like background vocals.

The first bridge is heard next, which is ten measures long and features Paul on double-tracked lead vocals once again. The 'plane taking off' effect is heard throughout the entire bridge, lessening in volume in the middle measures and swelling in volume at the conclusion. Two sets of background vocals are heard throughout the entire bridge as well, one lower and one higher, similar in style to The Beach Boys' hit “Fun, Fun, Fun.” A descending chord pattern unleashes in the fifth and sixth measures, which adds an interesting change to the expected dynamic of the song. A slight tom-tom fill rolls in the fourth measure, and an eighth-note snare drum fill occupies the seventh and eighth measures accenting Paul's lyric “Georgia's always on my my my my my my my my my mind.” An eighth-note snare fill appears in the ninth measure while an eighth-note tom-tom fill takes up the tenth measure along with Paul's growling “Oh, come on” which ushers in the guitar solo next.

A partial instrumental verse takes over, which is fourteen measures in length as the first verse was, with a searing guitar solo playing a slight variation of the melody line taking up the first eight measures. Assorted vocalizations chime during these measures, highlighted by Paul's “oooh” and John's “yet” in the fifth measure. Two slightly uncomfortable drum fills pass through in the sixth and eighth measures while the 'plane taking off' effect starts out loudly in the opening measures and fades almost out of the picture (but not totally) as this verse progresses. The final six measures of the song are almost identical to the first verse, except for a guitar part which this time plays along with the lower Beach Boys harmonies that appear as a transition to the repeat of the bridge that follows.

After a virtual repeat of the bridge, which this time features an excited “awwwwwww” from Paul in the final two measures, the final verse, fourteen measures in length, appears next. The elements of this verse are also nearly identical to previous verses except for an alarm-like high pitched guitar note that whines throughout the chord changes of the first eight measures. Also prominent throughout the verse is the overdubbed handclaps from the three Beatles. Paul also gives way with a piano thumb ride during the 'Beatles Break' in the twelfth measure. And if you were missing it, both the 'plane taking off' and 'plane landing' effects are heard throughout this final verse as well, in that order. The last measure begins Paul's ad-lib yells that finish off the song, the first being “Awww, Let me tell you, honey!”

A seven-measure conclusion comes next which features the building lead guitar passage from the verses, although they stay on the same chord this time around. The high Beach Boys harmonies are also present as are the rollicking piano chords which are accentuated at the end of the second and fourth measures. Paul's ad lib vocalizing is heard saying “Hey, I'm back...I'm back in the U.S.S.R...Hey, It's so good to be home. Hey, hey, hey, hey, back in the U.S.S.R...Aha, ha!” John's bass from the rhythm track accidentally continues past the downbeat on the seventh measure, although this is obscured very well by the 'plane landing' effect which raises in volume at the end of the song. This then crossfades nicely into John's opening guitar work on the next track of the “White Album,” namely, “Dear Prudence” or, on other compilation albums, faded out quickly before one can detect the beginning of “Dear Prudence.”

As to their performance, author David Quantick in his book “Revolution: The Making Of The Beatles' White Album” explains: “It thunders along like the jet airliner it mimics, takes corners at incredible speed, and is stuffed full of musical puns. It is one of The Beatles' greatest songs, and widely regarded as the best rock song they ever wrote...they were always more at ease rocking out on their versions of Chuck Berry and Little Richard songs.” For an album that has been maligned by some as the disintegration of The Beatles as a band, they appeared to be in full cooperation with each other on this opening track, a “potboiler” as George Martin would always call his choice for an album's opening number. All instruments were played with the enthusiasm and cohesiveness as their earlier albums contained...except, unfortunately, Ringo wasn't there! Instead, it appears that Paul played drums on the rhythm track and both John and George took turns adding drum fills as overdubs where needed.

Stop by my blog next week and discover the intricate details showcased upon Dear Prudence.

Please feel free to leave any comments or corrections and share these articles plus the blog's website with your friends, especially Beatles’ fans. You and they might also enjoy knowing more about my Love Songs CD and my novel, BEATLEMANIAC. Just click on the “My Shop” tab near the top of this page for full details.

The Beatles' Marathon 'Please Please Me' Session, Hour by Hour.

In line with my daily FaceBook series, LET IT BE ONLY A NORTHERN SONG, found on many Beatles & 60’s FB Group Pages, the program currently features fun fact articles for the tracks from the Beatles debut PLEASE PLEASE ME LP. So, I thought it only fitting this week’s blog may well suit another opinionated angle. Enjoy!

The Beatles recorded the bulk of their debut album, 'Please Please Me,' in a single daylong studio session. Read an hour-by-hour account.

By Jordan Runtagh

The last notes of "Please Please Me" still hung in the stale air of EMI's Studio Two on November 26th, 1962, when George Martin's disembodied voice crackled over the talkback from the control room above. "Gentlemen," he addressed his young mop-topped charges, "I think you've made your first Number One." The veteran producer had a finely tuned ear for hits, but it would be several months before the Beatles rode their second single to the top of the charts. Released on January 11th, the song received an unexpected boost from Mother Nature the following week. The winter of 1963 was one of the most brutal in England's history, and the record-breaking cold forced many to spend their Saturday nights at home in front of the television, just in time to catch the band making one of its earliest national broadcast appearances on ITV's pop-music program Thank Your Lucky Stars. As the band lip-synched to its latest record, viewers were transfixed by the instantly hummable melody, cascading harmonies, relentless beat and – for early-Sixties Britain – ridiculously long hair. Almost overnight, the single launched skyward.

With a smash on his hands, Martin knew that the next logical step was getting a full-length LP into shops as rapidly as possible. He initially considered a live recording at the band's Liverpool home base. "I had been up to the Cavern, and I'd seen what they could do – I knew their repertoire, knew what they were able to perform," he recalled for the Beatles' 1995 Anthology documentary. Cheap and practically instantaneous to produce, the format had much to recommend itself. He'd achieved great success two years earlier capturing the wildly popular Beyond the Fringe satire revue (featuring a young Dudley Moore and Peter Cook) with a tape recorder directly under the stage of London's Fortune Theater. But the subterranean Cavern, with its concrete walls acting as a natural echo chamber, was ill-suited for such a venture. Instead, Martin would re-create the electricity of the Beatles' live shows inside the recording studio: "I said, 'Let's record every song you've got. Come down, and we'll whistle through them in a day.'"

Recording a full album in such a short span didn't seem like an unreasonable request in 1963. Songs were recorded live on a two-track BTR machine, leaving few opportunities for overdubs or elaborate edits. Besides, "Please Please Me" and its B side, "Ask Me Why," were already in the can, as well as the Beatles' first single, "Love Me Do," backed by "P.S. I Love You." That left ten more songs to fill out the customary 14 tracks of a British LP. "It was a straightforward performance of their stage repertoire – a broadcast, more or less," Martin said, not unlike their regular sessions on the BBC radio. Their manager, Brian Epstein, got them excused from their touring commitments the day before so that they would arrive fresh at EMI Studios at 10:00 on the morning of February 11th, 1963.

That was the idea, at least. Instead, they showed up late, with John Lennon nursing a bad cold. "[His] voice was pretty shot," session engineer Norman Smith recalled in Mark Lewisohn's The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions. Tins of Zube's throat lozenges lay strewn across the lid of the baby grand piano in a corner. Nearby, the bandmates huddled on stools while they worked out the day's set list with Martin. "We were permanently on edge," said George Harrison in the Anthology. "We ran through all the songs before we recorded anything. We'd play a bit, and George Martin would say, ‘Well, what else have you got?'" Paul McCartney wanted to record the old Marlene Dietrich ballad "Falling in Love Again," but the number was vetoed by Martin, who deemed it "corny." The same went for "Besame Mucho," made famous by the Coasters, which had been a perennial Beatles favorite since 1960. Instead, Martin insisted on "A Taste of Honey," a relatively new addition to the set, which he believed would sound better on record.

They settled on four originals, rounded out by a selection of six covers that they could tear through in short order. "We knew the songs because that was the act we did all over the country," Ringo Starr said in the Anthology. "That was why we could easily go into the studio and record them. The mic situation wasn't complicated either: one in front of each amp, two overheads for the drums, one for the singer and one for the bass drum." Young tape operator Richard Langham was one of the battalions of technicians who helped set up the equipment. While mic'ing up their amps, the very same they used on the road, he found the speaker cabinets stuffed with bits of paper. "They were notes from the girls from the dance floor who threw them up on the stage," Langham said. "They said, 'Please play this, please play that, this is my phone number.' I guess they just read them and then threw them in the back of the amplifier."

Soon they were ready, armed with their weapons of choice: McCartney with his distinctive violin-shaped 1961 500/1 Hofner bass, Starr his Premier kit, Harrison his cherished 1957 Gretsch Duo-Jet and 1962 J-160E Gibson "Jumbo" acoustic-electric, Lennon with his matching Jumbo and 1958 Rickenbacker 325. "[It] was, 'Let's get this up and let's get on the road,' because by this time it was half past 10 [or] 11," Langham said in a 2013 BBC documentary. EMI in the early Sixties was more an institutional research facility than a creative space, and as such operated under rigid recording schedules. Sessions ran "strictly to time," beginning in the morning between 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. (with a 90-minute break for lunch), then an afternoon slot from 2:30 to 6 p.m. (with a 90-minute break for dinner), and finally an evening period from 7:30 until the studio closed at 10. With the clock already running, the Beatles got to work. "They just put their heads down and played," Epstein later said to a friend.

 Years of grueling late-night jam sessions and punishing tour itineraries prepared them well for this music marathon. Now they relied on muscle memory, transforming the fluorescent-lit Studio 2 into another seedy club or tweedy dance hall. As Lennon recalled a decade later with no small degree of pride, the band's debut album "was the nearest thing to what we might have sounded like to the audiences in Hamburg and Liverpool. Still, you don't get that live atmosphere of the crowd stomping on the beat with you, but it's the nearest you can get to knowing what we sounded like before we became the 'clever' Beatles." As Martin once noted, the "live" nature of the recording was born more out of necessity – and the band's naiveté – rather than from a conscious minimalist choice. "The Beatles didn't really have much say in recording operations," he said later. "It was only after the first year that they started getting really interested in studio techniques. But they always wanted to get the thing right, so it wasn't a one-take operation. They would listen to it, and then do two or three takes until they got it."

The sessions wrapped just after 10:45 p.m., and the following night the Beatles were back out on the road. The venture had cost the record label just £400 (about $11,000 in 2018). "There wasn't a lot of money at Parlophone," Martin admitted. "I was working to an annual budget of £55,000." It took the band just under 10 hours of studio time to record the bulk of the first album, released on March 22nd, 1963, as Please Please Me. As Harrison wryly observed decades later, "The second one took even longer."

What follows is an hour-by-hour record of what happened during this extraordinary day in the life of the Fab Four.

10:45–11:30 a.m.: "There's a Place"

The Beatles clearly had high hopes for this relatively new composition, giving it pride of place as the first song tackled that day. It had been written several months earlier in the living room of the McCartney family home, where a copy of the West Side Story soundtrack played a direct role in the song's creation. "There's a Place" borrowed its title from the opening line of "Somewhere," and expanded on the theatrical standout's youthful yearning for a peaceful space away from the prying eyes of adults. "In our case, the place was in the mind, rather than round the back of the stairs for a kiss and a cuddle," McCartney recalled in his authorized biography, Many Years From Now. "This was the difference with what we were writing. We were getting a bit more cerebral." Given that it was the first song intentionally recorded for the Beatles' debut, its maturity was a portent of good things to come.

Conceived, in Lennon's words, as "a sort of Motown black thing," the song showed strong promise as a potential highlight, or possibly even a single. The initial take was a complete run-through, nearly identical to the final version except for the absence of Lennon's harmonica on the intro. Instead, Harrison takes up the phrase on guitar, but the octave figure proves tricky to master, and he fumbles it on most of the first few versions. He can be heard practicing between takes, loosening up his fingers by playing the similar introduction to "Please Please Me." The vocals also prove to be a sticking point, with Lennon's voice already showing the effects of his sore throat even this early in the day. Just before the fifth take, he can be heard giving McCartney some advice on the elongated "There-e-e-e-ere" a cappella line: "It works better if you do it on the beat somehow – you know, think the beat in your head." McCartney, meanwhile, halted the song after just a few bars. "It was bad, that beginning," he proclaimed bluntly. They nearly had it by Take 9, but McCartney's voice began to waver on the high harmonies. Clearly frustrated, the bassist was heard to sarcastically mutter "Take 15 ..." before the actual take, number 10.

This attempt provided the basis for the version heard on the record. Lennon's harmonica would be added later in the day, but with noon fast approaching, the group decided to move on to another promising original.

11:30 ­a.m.–1:00 p.m.: "I Saw Her Standing There"

Even before recording engineer Norman Smith announced the song as "Seventeen" – as it was known during its time as an early Cavern-era staple – a disapproving Martin can be heard grumbling from the control room: "I think it ought to have a different title." It would be known forevermore as "I Saw Her Standing There," a masterful blend of formative band favorites, melded into something completely fresh.

Lyrically the song pays homage to the Coasters' "Young Blood" ("I saw her standing on the corner ..."), Chuck Berry's "Little Queenie" ("She's too cute to be a minute over 17") and even the golden oldie "When the Saints Go Marching In" ("I want to be in that number/When the saints go marching in" having the same meter as "How could I dance with another/Since I saw her standing there"), which the Beatles often performed as a rocked-up piss-take. In later years, McCartney revealed that he "nicked" the bass line from another Berry tune, 1961's "I'm Talking About You," which was part of the setlist around the same period. "I played exactly the same notes as he did and it fitted our number perfectly," he said in Many Years From Now.

The Beatles essentially captured the final version on the first take, playing and singing live, and preserving on record the first of their famous falsetto "oooohs," which would become an early trademark when coupled with a mop-topped head shake. Martin, however, pushed for another go around just to be safe. Take 2 would prove less successful, as McCartney and Lennon have difficulty remembering the order of "how could I dance," "she wouldn't dance," and "I'll never dance" in the chorus. Though the take had plenty of vigor, McCartney ended it with a despondent descending bass slide, and a dispirited Lennon muttered, "Dreadful." Martin tried to salvage the situation by having the band record edit pieces for the botched lines (Take 3), and more run-throughs of Harrison's solo on Takes 4 and 5. The tension began to show as Take 6 broke down midway through. "Too fast," copped McCartney. "No, you had a wrong word, didn't you?" a voice from the control room pointed out. "Yeah, but, I mean, it's too fast anyway," McCartney countered.

McCartney himself stopped Take 7 with a frantic cry of "Too fast!" before apologetically showing his perfectionist streak. "And again, I'm sorry, you know, but . . .," he said while demonstrating the song's appropriate tempo. The drummer had been going strong all morning, but it was Starr's turn for a mistake on Take 8. A missed high-hat hit caused the song to sputter to a stop, with McCartney moaning, "What happened?!" With his patience growing thin, he threw extra oomph into the count-in for Take 9, spitting out a raucous "one-two-three-FAW."

The effect was so invigorating that Martin later edited it onto the front of Take 1, creating one of rock's greatest intros since Elvis Presley crooned, "Well, it's one for the money, two for the show . . .," on his debut seven years earlier.

1:00–2:30 p.m.: Lunchtime

Typically, after morning sessions at the studio concluded, the next 90 minutes were reserved for artists and staff to take their lunch. But, distraught by their slow progress, the Beatles had other plans. "We told them we were having a break, but they said they would like to stay on and rehearse," Langham said in The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions. "So while George [Martin], Norman and I went round the corner to the Heroes of Alma for a pie and pint, they stayed, drinking milk. When we came back, they'd been playing right through. We couldn't believe it. We had never seen a group work right through their lunch break before."

2:30–3:15 p.m.: "A Taste of Honey"

Eager to make headway, the bandmates decided to focus on a more familiar number from the stage set. For their first cover of the day, they went with "A Taste of Honey," a pop standard that had been given an R&B remake by Lenny Welch the year before. Both Epstein and Martin saw the value of including a sophisticated adult-contemporary ballad alongside rock stompers to showcase the band's versatility. So did McCartney, who was vocal about his love for pre-war melodies. "I thought those were good tunes," he reflected. "The fact that we weren't ashamed of those leanings meant that the band could be a bit more varied."

Five takes of the song were recorded, two of them incomplete breakdowns, with the band playing and singing live. The fifth was temporarily labeled as the final.

3:15–3:45 p.m.: "Do You Want to Know a Secret"

"'Do You Want to Know a Secret' was 'my song' on the album," Harrison complained in the Anthology. "I didn't like my vocal on it. I didn't know how to sing. Nobody told me how to." Lennon wrote the bulk of the song, drawing on a childhood memory of his late mother. "She was a comedienne and a singer," he remembered in Playboy shortly before his death in 1980. "Not professional, but she used to get up in pubs and things like that. She had a good voice. . . . She used to do this little tune when I was just one or two years old. . . . The tune was from the Disney movie – 'Want to know a secret? Promise not to tell. You are standing by a wishing well. . . .'" (The song, called "I'm Wishing," was featured in Walt Disney's debut feature film, 1937's Snow White.) Lennon included a slow, minor-key introduction on his composition, perhaps as a nod to its vintage inspiration – or maybe he took his cue from tunesmiths like Carole King and Gerry Goffin, who had recently employed a similar technique on several of their hits.

Discounting two false starts, the Beatles performed four complete takes of the song, with Take 6 marked as the best. At Martin's insistence, the Beatles took two attempts at overdubbing Lennon and McCartney's "doo-dah-doo" backing harmonies on the verses, and Starr's stick taps during the bridge. Take 8 was the finished version.

3:45–4:15 p.m.: "A Taste of Honey" vocal overdubs

The overdubs on "Do You Want to Know a Secret" apparently triggered something with Martin and the boys because the next hour and a quarter was spent polishing off songs that were already in the can. McCartney's bandmates had a break while he was tasked with "double-tracking" his vocals at two points in "A Taste of Honey," resulting in a richer, fuller sound during the dramatic "I will return" verses. The Beatles would utilize this recording technique again and again throughout their career.

4:15–4:30 p.m.: "There's a Place" harmonica overdubs

Fearing that Harrison's guitar lacked impact, Martin suggested that Lennon perform the introductory riff of "There's a Place" on harmonica. The trick had been used to great effect on the band's first two singles, "Love Me Do" and "Please Please Me," and Lennon duly obliged. He required three passes over the previously recorded Take 10, effectively burying Harrison's guitar work on the final version, Take 13.

4:45–5:00 p.m.: "I Saw Her Standing There" hand-clap overdubs

In an effort to echo the excitement of a crowd stomping and banging along in unison, Martin requested that the Beatles add hand claps to what would become the album's opener. The band gathered around a microphone while tape ops cued up Take 1, the strongest version from earlier in the day, but the first attempt at a clapping overdub was marred by volume problems. This sends the boys into joyful hysterics, faux applause and other goofy humor (McCartney can be heard urging the others to "keep Britain tidy," a non sequitur joke that would crop up in A Hard Day's Night). They got the job done the next time around, completing the song with Take 12.

5:00–6:00 p.m.: "Misery."

Seeking to cement their reputation as songwriters for hire, Lennon and McCartney penned "Misery" with the aim of presenting it to the headliner of their package tour, a young singer named Helen Shapiro. Unfortunately, her manager, British record impresario Norrie Paramor, felt the rather dour subject matter was ill-suited for a teenage chanteuse. "She turned it down," recalled McCartney. "It may not have been that successful for her because it's a rather downbeat song. It was quite pessimistic." Eventually, the track went to another of their tourmates, Kenny Lynch, making him the first artist to cover a Lennon-McCartney number on record.

The Beatles' version came first, requiring 11 takes in all to complete. The first was in many ways the best, with a few extra drum flourishes from Starr (which were eventually dropped) and some extra spirited "ooohs" and "la-la-las" on the outro. Unfortunately, Harrison's guitar run was slightly out of time on the bridge, requiring another go. Take 2 was nearly as good, but Martin stopped the song after noticing that Harrison's guitar was coming through distorted. "Clean it up a bit, and a little less volume, George," he instructed. A handful of false starts followed, with Lennon having trouble keeping the words and the chords straight. "I won't see her no more," McCartney guided. Take 6 was perhaps the most interesting of all, with bold drum fills and some guitar embroidery from Harrison that didn't make the final cut. But it was a little too busy for Martin, who requested a more streamlined approach on Take 7.

The descending guitar line was proving too difficult to perfect, so the producer asked Harrison to lay out (he would overdub the phrase himself on piano nine days later, on February 20th, without the involvement of the band). Take 8 crashed to a stop soon after the count-in with McCartney merrily pointing the finger at Lennon: "Stop it, he said the wrong words!" Take 9 would be the final attempt that day before the clock read 6:00 and it was time for dinner. Martin would splice together the beginning of Take 7 and the end of Take 9 to create the version on record. (The edit can be heard on the first word of the third verse when Lennon sang what sounds like "shend.")

6:00–7:30 p.m.: Dinner break.

Having wrapped the afternoon session, the presumably famished Beatles likely took a quick meal in the decidedly unglamorous EMI canteen. If they were anxious, they had good reason. The bandmates were two-thirds through their allotted recording time, and they had produced only half of the required songs. They would need to bang out a further five tunes in two and a half hours in order to complete the album on time. Luckily the remaining songs, mostly covers, were mainstays in their repertoire. They could play these numbers backward, forward and sometimes – as could be the case during their long Hamburg club nights – in their sleep. With their eyes on the prize (as well as the clock), they trooped back into Studio 2 determined to let it rip.

7:30–8:15 p.m.: "Hold Me Tight."

Unfortunately, the beginning of their evening session proved to be a colossal waste of time, as the Beatles ran through 13 takes of an original tune that would not make the album at all. "Hold Me Tight" was an uptempo rocker written mostly by McCartney several years earlier. It had been integrated into their stage show, but they never counted it among their best work. Even its composer dismissed it in retrospect as "a failed attempt at a single which then became an acceptable album filler." Lennon was equally blunt in his assessment of the number toward the end of his life. "That was Paul's," he said in 1980. "It was a pretty poor song, and I was never really interested in it."

Perhaps it's for this reason that "Hold Me Tight" never got off the ground during the Please Please Me session. Tapes of the song from that day have since been destroyed, but the session notes paint a maddening portrait of false starts, breakdowns and edit pieces to patch up errors. Although the band eventually got a serviceable version (Take 9 spliced with an edit piece, Take 13), the song was abandoned for the day. A rerecorded incarnation would surface on the band's next album, With the Beatles, later that year.

8:15 p.m.–8:45 p.m.: "Anna (Go to Him)"

The frustrating experience of "Hold Me Tight" was now behind them, leaving them free to plow through their beloved covers. "A Taste of Honey" aside, which was more of a request from Martin and Epstein, these were the songs that truly inspired them. It's telling that all the non-original songs on Please Please Me had been performed (or at least popularized) by black soul artists, bearing out McCartney's assertion that the Beatles saw themselves as "a little R&B combo."

The first Lennon-led cover of the night, "Anna (Go to Him)," paid tribute to one of his great heroes, Alabama country-soul pioneer Arthur Alexander. The arrangement had been honed through constant performance, so recording was a relatively simple matter of getting a good live take. Floyd Cramer's introductory piano figure was played on guitar by Harrison, who was also an enormous fan of Alexander. "I remember having several records by him, and John sang three or four of his songs," he said in the Anthology. "Arthur Alexander used a peculiar drum pattern, which we tried to copy, but we couldn't quite do it, so in the end, we invented something quite bizarre but equally original." By Take 3, the song was complete.

8:45–9:00 p.m.: "Boys."

The prevailing industry ethos of the time dictated that every pop group had to have a frontman, but Martin, to the foursome's everlasting gratitude, refused to make it First Name and the Beatles. In doing so, he cemented the idea of the band as a unified collective, and not merely hired backing. The group took this democratic notion even further by giving each member his own lead vocal spot on the album. For Starr's turn, they chose "Boys," a Shirelles B side he'd been performing since his pre-Beatles days in Rory Storm and the Hurricanes. According to McCartney, the number "was a fan favorite with the crowd. And it was great – though if you think about it, here's us doing a song and it was really a girls' song. 'I talk about boys now!' Or it was a gay song. But we never even listened. It's just a great song."

As he did onstage, Starr sang and played at the same time, which any drummer can attest isn't the easiest thing to do. But instinct took hold, and he got it on the first try, making it the only song of the day to be wrapped in a single take. "We didn't rehearse for our first album," the drummer recalled. "In my head, it was done ‘live.' We did the songs through first, so they could get some sort of sound on each one. Then we had to just run, run, run them down."

9:00– 9:30 p.m.: "Chains."

Originally recorded by the Cookies, an R&B girl group out of New York City, "Chains" showcased the Beatles' formidable ability to unearth deep-cut American pop gems, then a rarity in their British homeland. "With our manager, Brian Epstein, having a record shop, NEMS, we did have the opportunity to look around a bit more than the casual buyer," McCartney explained in the liner notes to On Air – Live at the BBC Volume 2. Harrison was particularly taken with "Chains," purchasing the record in December 1962 and claiming the lead vocal as his own. The band recorded two complete versions of the song, with the first deemed the best.

A look at the label on the Cookies' single, which the Beatles no doubt inspected closely, would have revealed that "Chains" was written by Gerry Goffin and Carole King, the husband-and-wife duo who were a huge inspiration to the Beatles' own songwriting partnership. Lennon famously expressed his desire to be "the Goffin-King of England" with McCartney – as long as his name came first. When the initial pressing of Please Please Me credited the originals to "McCartney-Lennon," the rhythm guitarist quickly pulled some strings. The move rankled his collaborator and became something of a sore spot in years to come. "I wanted it to be McCartney-Lennon, but John had the stronger personality, and I think he fixed things with Brian before I got there," McCartney related in Many Years From Now. "That was John's way. He was one and a half years older than me, and at that age, it meant a little more worldliness. I remember going to a meeting and being told, 'We think you should credit the songs to Lennon-McCartney.' I said, 'No, it can't be Lennon first, how about McCartney-Lennon?' They all said, 'Lennon-McCartney sounds better, it has a better ring. . . .' I had to say, 'All right, sod it.'"

9:30–10:00 p.m.: "Baby It's You"

The next number the band attempted was penned by Burt Bacharach and Mack David – elder brother of the composer's better-known lyricist, Hal. The second Shirelles song the Beatles' recorded that day, "Baby It's You" also featured contributions from Luther Dixon (credited as Barney Williams), the co-writer of "Boys." Three takes were recorded, one of which was a false start, with the final one labeled as the best. The track would be completed nine days later, on February 20th, when Martin tracked himself playing celeste over Harrison's guitar solo.

Lennon's voice, which had been deteriorating all day, was beginning to show major cracks, notably on the "Don't want nobody, nobody" section. Fortunately, he had only one song left to do, but it would take everything he had.

10:15–10:30 p.m.: "Twist and Shout."

It was now 10:00, the time when the studio officially closed for the night. For all of their superhuman stamina that day, the Beatles (discounting the aborted "Hold Me Tight") were still one song short. The following morning, they were due to make the long trek to the north of England for a booking in Oldham, Lancashire. They had to get it now. Martin, as he often would for the Beatles, decided to bend the rules slightly and sneak in one more session after hours. But what would they play?

"At about 10 p.m., we all retired to the studio canteen for coffee and biscuits, where we and George Martin began an earnest discussion about a suitable number for the last track," McCartney remembered. Also present was journalist Alan Smith, who was reporting on the sessions for NME. "We all crowded in there, and I think it was George who said, 'What are we gonna do for the last number?'" Smith said in a BBC documentary. "I said, 'I think I heard you do "La Bamba" on the radio a few weeks ago.' McCartney looked a bit blank, and then he said, 'You mean "Twist and Shout"!' I said, 'Yeah, "Twist and Shout."'" The idea was instantly accepted.

On visits to the Cavern, Martin had witnessed firsthand the song's power to bring down the house. "John absolutely screamed it," he recalled. "God alone knows what he did to his larynx each time he performed it because he made a sound rather like tearing flesh. That had to be right on the first take because I knew perfectly well that if we had to do it a second time, it would never be as good." Yet as they tuned up one final time that night in Studio 2, there was a very real question of whether he could manage it at all. "By this time all their throats were tired and sore," Norman Smith told Mark Lewisohn. "It was 12 hours since we had started working. John's, in particular, was almost completely gone, so we really had to get it right first time. John sucked a couple more Zubes, had a bit of a gargle with milk and away we went." Stripping off his shirt, he stepped up to the microphone.

The 22-year-old threw back his head and emitted a wail that, half a century later, still evokes winces of pain along with the involuntary head bob. "I couldn't sing the damn thing – I was just screaming," he admitted to Rolling Stone in 1970. "The last song nearly killed me," he said later. "My voice wasn't the same for a long time after. Every time I swallowed, it was like sandpaper. I was always bitterly ashamed of it because I could sing it better than that. But now it doesn't bother me. You can hear that I'm just a frantic guy doing his best." The utter passion and total commitment made up for the wavering pitch and occasional cracks, which add flawed beauty to the song. In solidarity, the other Beatles played with an intensity that was all the more impressive given the grueling day behind them. Starr attacked the drums with a primal fury, while McCartney and Harrison bolstered their flagging singer with airtight harmonies and encouraging war whoops. "He knew his voice had been going all day, and he could only give it one or two goes, and it would just rip it – which it did," said McCartney. "You can hear it on the record. But it was a pretty cool performance." The final seconds of the song, which eventually closed the Beatles' debut, capture a joyous "Hey!" – McCartney's spontaneous salute to his mate.

A second take was briefly attempted, but there wasn't much point. Lennon gave it all the first time around. "It was good enough for the record, and it needed that linen-ripping sound," said Martin. The Beatles' "Twist and Shout" was released with no edits, no overdubs, and no second chances.

10:30–10:45 p.m.: Playback

"At the end of the recording, George Martin looked down from the control room and said in amazement, 'I don't know how you do it. We've been here recording all day and the longer you go on, the better you get!'" McCartney recalled. With 14 songs in the can, there was nothing left to do but step back and admire their work. At half past 10, the Beatles climbed the stairs from the studio floor to the control room for the chance to listen to their debut album for the first time. "Waiting to hear that LP played back was one of our most worrying experiences," Lennon said in 1963. "We're perfectionists: If it had come out any old way, we'd have wanted to do it all over again. As it happens, we were very happy with the result."

McCartney concurred. "This album was one of the main ambitions in our lives," he said. "We felt that it would be a showcase for the group, and it was tremendously important for us that it sounded bang on the button. As it happened, we were pleased. If not, sore throats or not, we'd have done it all over again. That was the mood we were in. It was break or bust for us."

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