Birthday (The Beatles song)

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“Birthday”
“Birthday” cover
Song by The Beatles
Album The Beatles
Released 22 November 1968
Recorded 18 September 1968
Genre Rock, Hard rock, Rock and roll
Length 2:42
Label Apple Records
Writer Lennon-McCartney
Producer George Martin
The Beatles track listing

Side one

  1. "Back in the U.S.S.R."
  2. "Dear Prudence"
  3. "Glass Onion"
  4. "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da"
  5. "Wild Honey Pie"
  6. "The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill"
  7. "While My Guitar Gently Weeps"
  8. "Happiness Is a Warm Gun"

Side two

  1. "Martha My Dear"
  2. "I'm So Tired"
  3. "Blackbird"
  4. "Piggies"
  5. "Rocky Raccoon"
  6. "Don't Pass Me By"
  7. "Why Don't We Do It in the Road?"
  8. "I Will"
  9. "Julia"

Side three

  1. "Birthday"
  2. "Yer Blues"
  3. "Mother Nature's Son"
  4. "Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey"
  5. "Sexy Sadie"
  6. "Helter Skelter"
  7. "Long, Long, Long"

Side four

  1. "Revolution 1"
  2. "Honey Pie"
  3. "Savoy Truffle"
  4. "Cry Baby Cry"
  5. "Revolution 9"
  6. "Good Night"

"Birthday" is a song written mostly by Paul McCartney and performed by the The Beatles on their eponymous double album popularly referred to as The White Album. It is the opening track on the third side of the LP (or the second disc in CD versions of the record). This song is a prime example of the Beatles' return to more traditional rock and roll form, although their music had increased in complexity and it had developed more of its own characteristic style by this point.

"Birthday" begins with an intro drum fill, then moves directly into a blues progression in A (in the form of a guitar riff doubled by the bass) with McCartney singing at the top of his chest voice, "They say it's your birthday/ Well it's my birthday too, yeah!" with Lennon on a lower harmony. Afterwards, a drum break lasting eight measures brings the song into Lennon's section, which rests entirely on the dominant before returning to a third section, sung by McCartney and Lennon. It is among McCartney's most intense vocal performances given the range in which he sings during the blues run. This song is the only track on The Beatles in which Lennon and McCartney share lead vocal duties.

[edit] Personnel

Credits per Ian MacDonald[1]

[edit] Other uses

  • Underground Sunshine scored a Top 40 hit with this song in the US in 1969.
  • Philadelphia Phillies games play this song while showing the attendees celebrating their birthdays on the Jumbotron as well the New York Islanders.
  • Similarly, Detroit Lions games play the song while showing the attendees celebrating their birthdays on the scoreboard screen.
  • On an episode of Full House, the family goes into Jesse's (John Stamos) bedroom to wake him up for his birthday. The family sings Birthday, while Joey (Dave Coulier) imitates the guitar riff.
  • There are multiple instances in the "Hypno-Birthday to You" episode of Jimmy Neutron where you can hear "Birthday" in the background.
  • Used in Moonlighting (TV series) , on the second season episode "In God We Strongly Suspect", Bruce Willis (David) sings with the whole office crew to Cybill Sheperd (Maddie) as a surprise on her birthday.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ MacDonald, Ian (2005). Revolution in the Head: The Beatles' Records and the Sixties, Second Revised Edition, London: Pimlico (Rand), 316. ISBN 1-844-13828-3. 
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