#263 The Beatles, 'A Hard Day's Night' (1964)

Previously #307

‘A Hard Day’s Night,’ the third album by The Beatles, came just fifteen months after their debut record. In that short space of time, Lennon/McCartney’s songwriting has developed so exponentially, that they were able to release an album solely consisting of original material and is The Beatles only album written 100% by Lennon/McCartney. They had shift from a Rock ‘n Roll sound to a more Pop sound, still with a Rock ‘n Roll edge, of course. The album opens with arguably the most discussed chord in music. Its structure has been debated for years and the band revelled in it. The album, just like ‘Help!,’ was the soundtrack to a film and its title was inspired by Ringo, whose malapropisms came to be known as Ringoisms. Starr said "We went to do a job, and we'd worked all day and we happened to work all night. I came up still thinking it was day I suppose, and I said, 'It's been a hard day …' and I looked around and saw it was dark so I said, '… night!' So we came to 'A Hard Day's Night.'"

The album also features ‘Can’t Buy Me Love,’ the first single released from the album, which soundtracked the iconic scene in the film (look it up on YouTube, you’ll know it). The title track and that single both achieved #1 in both the UK and the USA. Other highlight include the sickly sweet ‘And I Love Her,’ ‘I Should Have Known Better,’ ‘If I Fell’ and ‘I’m Hapy Just To Dance With You,’ sung by George Harrison. This album is one of three that doesn’t feature vocals by Ringo. The album ends with ‘I’ll Be Back.’ Before hearing it on this album, I first heard it as a teenager on ‘Anthology 1,’ which includes Lennon messing up the vocal before ending the song with “It’s too hard to sing!” Ironically, every time I hear this version (and I’ve heard it a lot) it still sounds wrong to me. My brain keeps on telling me that that screwed up demo on ‘Anthology 1’ is the definitive version of the song.

#rs500albums