July 30th, 1963, opens the second recording session The Beatles had for their next British album “With The Beatles.” The first session for the album on July 18th consisted entirely of cover songs, and they continued this trend in resurrecting a chestnut from their 1962 stage shows, “Please Mister Postman” (changing from “Mr.” on the original version). This was the first of six songs The Beatles recorded on this day.
The morning session on this day ran from 10 am to 1:30 pm at EMI Studio Two, after which they left for Playhouse Theatre in London to rehearse and record a performance for the BBC radio show “Saturday Club.” Based on the evidence that they were very familiar with “Please Mister Postman,” it was a pretty straightforward recording with all four musicians singing and playing live for seven straight takes. Early takes of the song show them not breaking during the climactic vocal lines toward the end of the song (during “check it and see…” and “deliver the letta…”), so a decision must have seen the light (probably by George Martin) to accentuate these phrases by the time they recorded the seventh.
Since take seven deemed the keeper, overdubs followed to double-track John Lennon’s lead vocals, which took the takes to nine, then marked as ‘best.’ They recorded the song approximately from 10 to 11 am, thereby finishing the morning session with the much more difficult (and less familiar) original composition “It Won’t Be Long.”
The mono mix of the song was performed by George Martin and engineers Norman Smith and Geoff Emerick on August 21st, 1963 along with the rest of the tracks recorded thus far for the album. The same studio team (along with the mysterious B.T.) waited until October 29th, 1963 to create the stereo mix of the song which was also done with the rest of the album (except for “Money (That’s What I Want),” which engineers created the next day). These are the mono and stereo mixes that appeared in the US as well, albeit with some extra reverb added by the Capitol team.
Song Structure and Style
The structure for “Please Mister Postman” consists of a 'refrain/ verse/ verse/ refrain/ verse/ refrain' pattern (or abbaba) which is somewhat unique for The Beatles repertoire. Preceding this pattern is a short introduction, and then an alternate refrain repeats three times after the pattern. No solo or instrumental section felt required in this song.
What is quite common about this song in regards to pop music of the ’50s and early ’60s is the repeating four-chord pattern, which encompasses every section of the song (except the introduction). Common as it may have been in pop music of that time, this pattern stood virtually ignored by the Lennon/McCartney songwriting team throughout their career.
The song begins with a hi-hat beat just before the one beat of the four-measure introduction, which signals Paul and George’s “Wait,” ushering in John’s lead vocals. Only drums and a hint of bass are heard instrumentally in this introduction, which basically features John’s double-tracked vocals and Paul and George’s background vocals.
A short bass run introduces full instrumentation of the band in this first eight measure refrain, which actually features the background vocalists (Paul and George) singing the melody line while the lead vocalist (John) sings accentuating vocal lines, such as “oh yeah” and “please, please.” The first two actual eight measure verses then follow, which allow the lead vocalist to tell his story as the background vocalists “ooh” in hushed tones to allow John center stage.
After the tune reaches an identical refrain, a third verse appears, which once again allows the lead singer to add to the story. Another refrain then is heard, but this time the lead vocalist mostly sings with the background vocalists, accentuating his having to wait “such a long time” to hear from his girl.
This moves directly into three eight-measure alternate refrains which feature the key phrase “wait a minute” repeated by the lead and background vocalists. The seventh and eighth measures of the first two alternate refrains present a rest for all guitars as the lead vocalist portrays the urgency of his request for a “letta” from the postman. An interesting note is Lennon’s choosing to chop off the last syllable of the cute lyric “deliver the letta, the sooner the bet…” to allow for him to lead off the “wait a minute” melody line for a third alternate refrain.
This third alternate refrain simply repeats the “wait a minute” vocals in mostly three-part harmony, which then segues into what would be a fourth alternate refrain, except that the song immediately fades out before it can get very far.
In contrast to the playfulness of the original version, The Beatles steamroller the song from beginning to end. From Ringo’s open hi-hat rhythm section, the clanging rhythm guitars from both John and George, to all three vocalists singing at the top of their range, push the transformed song into a rock and roll powerhouse. The double-tracked urgency and desperation displayed by Lennon’s vocals, in many people’s minds, outdoes the original for sheer excitement.
The interplay between lead vocalist and background vocalists heard in this song is no doubt the inspiration to later Beatle arrangements such as “You’re Going To Lose That Girl,” “You Can’t Do That” and even “Help!”
Songwriter Georgia Dobbins has expressed that the lyrics are conveying the singers’ distraught appeal for the mailman to deliver a letter from her boyfriend who has been away at war. Since The Beatles required a gender change in the lyrics, we can assume here that Lennon just really misses his girlfriend.
Next Song--Roll Over Beethoven:
The second recording session for their British album “With The Beatles” occurred on July 30th, 1963. They were in for the long haul that day, assigned to a morning session as well as an evening session, the latter running from 5 to 11 pm. It was in the middle of this evening session that The Beatles began and finished “Roll Over Beethoven,” one of three vocal contributions from George Harrison on their second British album.
At approximately 7 pm, after doing more work on “Money (That’s What I Want)” and totally re-making “Till There Was You,” The Beatles started work on “Roll Over Beethoven.” It took five takes of the full group, vocals and all, to perfect the song, take five considered as best. They then made two attempts of overdubbing onto take five, which accomplished double-tracking George’s lead vocals and adding handclaps throughout the song. These overdubs took the song to take seven. To complete the song, one edit piece was performed of the final guitar riff, which engineers edited onto take seven at a later date. This edit piece was considered ‘take eight.’ By approximately 8 pm, The Beatles had finished recording the song.
August 21st was the date chosen to attach the guitar riff of ‘take eight’ to the completed ‘take seven.’ After this occurred by George Martin and engineers Norman Smith and Geoff Emerick in EMI’s studio three, they then created the mono mix for the song as well as the seven other songs that had been completed so far for the new album. This is the mono mix heard on the British album but not on the American release.
On October 29th, 1963, the same EMI staff (with the mysterious engineer known only by the initials B.T.) reconvened in EMI’s studio three to mix the entire new Beatles album for stereo. This is the stereo version of the song heard on the American “Beatles’ Second Album,” although Capitol engineers decided to add extra reverb onto the recording to create a more ‘punchy’ sound. Instead of using the mono mix made on August 21st, Capitol created their own mono mix by combining both channels of the stereo mix into one frequency, which was standard practice at that time. The superior quality of the mono mix heard on the British release was not heard in the US until February 26th, 1987 with the release of “With The Beatles” on CD.
The Beatles entered the recording studio once more with “Roll Over Beethoven” on April 19th, 1964. This was in order to record the soundtrack to the British television show “Around The Beatles,” which aired on May 6th and June 8th by British TV. The audio recording took place between 10 am and 8:30 pm at London’s IBC Studios on three-track tape with Jack Good as producer and Terry Johnson and future Beatles producer Glyn Johns engineering. The version of the song recorded this day was a highly abbreviated version of the song, eliminating the third verse as well as both verses after the solo. This allowed the band to fit more performances into the television program.
August 23rd, 1964, signals the first date The Beatles played at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. They included "Roll Over Beethoven" in the set list this night, which Martin recorded for future inclusion on the album "The Beatles At The Hollywood Bowl" in 1977.
Sometime between December 1 - 17, 1991, George Harrison and his band (including Eric Clapton) recorded the song live during their tour of Japan, the result later released on the album "Live In Japan" on July 14th, 1992.
Then on June 23rd, 1994, "Roll Over Beethoven" has been rumored to surface among a variety of songs that Paul, George, and Ringo had recorded and filmed at George's Friar Park home studio in Henley On Thames, England, for possible inclusion in the "Anthology" television special. This footage was not included in the program, and the audio still remains unreleased as of yet.
Song Structure and Style
Like most other Chuck Berry songs, “Roll Over Beethoven” consists of a standard twelve-bar blues pattern repeated nine times. The first and fifth verses both fully consist of a guitar solo, while all the other seven are full vocal verses. As to song pattern, The Beatles version is almost a carbon copy of the original Chuck Berry version, right down to the guitar solos. As to style, The Beatles change it dramatically by lowering the key to D major, slowing it down somewhat, and playing it in a boogie-woogie style similar to later Chuck Berry classics like “Johnny B. Goode” and “Carol.” Harrison’s vocal delivery varies from the original as well, singing it in a more ‘in the pocket’ fashion (like “Johnny B. Goode”) instead of the looser rhythm sung by Berry himself on the original.
The Beatles version starts off with Harrison’s interpretation of Chuck Berry’s introductory guitar spot. While Harrison struggles to copy it note-for-note, as well as flubbing the defined four measures of the song’s introduction, he still puts in a suitable performance which, with the added reverb in the US mix, is an excellent beginning to an exciting American Beatles album. The Beatles know the song so well that they could easily discern when George finished his intro in order to come in perfectly on the fifth measure to complete the first instrumental verse.
The first vocal verse then begins, showing that Harrison is capable of an enthusiastic rock and roll vocal delivery just as much as Lennon or McCartney was. With the hard-driving drums, rollicking boogie-woogie rhythm guitar of Harrison and the insistent hand-clapping, the song shows the hallmark of professionalism right from the beginning.
The second and third vocal verses are identical musically except different lyrics and occasional “ooh” accents from McCartney. The fourth vocal verse, which begins “if you’re feeling like it,” is different in structure because of a change in the melody line, as well as a change in delivery with Ringo not utilizing the ride cymbals and just focusing on the snare and toms. This changes the beat and feel of this verse, which adds a nice variation to an otherwise repetitious structure.
We then enter into a guitar solo which is performed barely without flaw, unlike the original which is sloppy and with stray notes. At this point in The Beatles version, most listeners likely realize that they have eclipsed the original version by leaps and bounds, both in confidence and energy.
After the solo, we enter into a fourth and fifth vocal verse which are virtually identical to the earlier verses, although our interest holds firm by the interesting lyrics and confident vocal delivery. The sixth vocal verse then occurs, which he delivered in a punchier style with a climactic feel. The main difference is the phrase “Roll Over Beethoven” repeated five times throughout the verse helps signal the grand conclusion to this magnificent performance. Instead of ending with a ‘big finish’ with the full band, The Beatles tastefully decide to end on a final ringing D major chord played by Harrison alone.
Also note how closely The Beatles mimic the original in the tenth bar of the final verse where they cut the measure in half as Berry (probably mistakenly) does the same thing. In their allegiance to “rock and roll,” they wanted to stay as close to the original as possible, just as they had done throughout their formative Cavern/Hamburg years. (An example of this would be they’re purposely flubbing the measure count in “That’s All Right Mama” on their "Live At The BBC" performance to keep with the mistake Elvis made on the original Sun recording, viewing this flub as ‘sacred ground.’)
The overall lyrical message of the song was that the popular rhythm and blues music of the day would cause Beethoven actually to roll over in his grave, then adding the request for Lugwig to “tell Tchaikovsky the news” that rhythm and blues music has now replaced classical forever.
Although “rocking and rolling” did appear in the lyrics to the song, the transition to rock and roll music had yet to define itself fully. Rhythm and blues ushered in the proposed replacement to classical music according to this song. Other song references appear in the lyrics, such as Carl Perkins’ “Blue Suede Shoes,” Louis Jordans’ “Early In The Morning” (later covered by Harry Nilsson) and the line “hey diddle, diddle” from the nursery rhyme “The Cat In The Fiddle.” Future songs were influenced by the lyrics as well, such as “Rockin’ Pneumonia” by Huey (Piano) Smith and “A Shot Of Rhythm And Blues” by Arthur Alexander.
Other interesting tidbits in the lyrics include writing “a little letter” to a disc jockey to request a song on the radio, which definitely predates the use of calling in a request by phone. He obviously won’t “hear it again today” since it’ll be a day or so before the DJ gets the letter. The phrase “rhythm review” doesn’t translate well to later generations, but it actually refers to old-style R&B shows featuring many artists performing in front of a big band. The phrase “a trifle further,” which translates into ‘a little bit more,’ was somewhat of a tongue-twister for Harrison as well as others who covered the song.
Another interesting fact about the lyrics is that they unfold a song about itself. This is evident within the first verse where the singer is requesting his “local DJ” to play a song on the radio, which in fact is the song currently sung on the station’s program.
Performance wise, Harrison shines the brightest with his most competent guitar and vocal delivery to date. Ringo would come next with his exuberant drilling drum work, complete with his characteristic off-beat drum fills. Both Lennon and McCartney play confidently at their respective instruments, taking a backseat to let the audience know that this was Harrison’s feature on the album (or show).
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