| "Paperback Writer" | ||||
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US single sleeve |
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| Single by The Beatles | ||||
| B-side | "Rain" | |||
| Released | 30 May 1966 (US) 10 June 1966 (UK) |
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| Format | 7" | |||
| Recorded | 13 April 1966 EMI Studios, London |
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| Genre | Hard rock,[1] power pop[2] | |||
| Length | 2:18 (stereo version) 2:26 (mono single version) |
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| Label | Parlophone R5452 (UK) Capitol 5651 (US) |
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| Writer(s) | Lennon–McCartney | |||
| Producer | George Martin | |||
| Certification | Gold (RIAA)[3] | |||
| The Beatles singles chronology | ||||
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"Paperback Writer" is a 1966 song recorded and released by The Beatles. Written by Paul McCartney[4] and credited to Lennon–McCartney, the song was released as the A-side of their eleventh single. The single went to the number one spot in the United States, United Kingdom, West Germany, Australia, New Zealand and Norway.
It was the first UK Beatles single that was not a love song (though "Nowhere Man", which was a single in the US, was their first album song released with that distinction). On the US Billboard Hot 100, the song was at number one for two non-consecutive weeks, being interrupted by Frank Sinatra's "Strangers in the Night".
"Paperback Writer" was the last new song by the Beatles to be featured on their final tour in 1966, and was the group's only U.S. number one released that year.
Contents |
The track was recorded between 13 April and 14 April 1966.
"Paperback Writer" is marked by the boosted bass guitar sound throughout, partly in response to John Lennon demanding to know why the bass on a certain Wilson Pickett record far exceeded the bass on any Beatles records.[5] This changed with the "Paperback Writer" single.
"'Paperback Writer' was the first time the bass sound had been heard in all its excitement," said Beatles' engineer Geoff Emerick in Mark Lewisohn's book The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions. "To get the loud bass sound, Paul played a different bass, a Rickenbacker. Then we boosted it further by using a loudspeaker as a microphone. We positioned it directly in front of the bass speaker and the moving diaphragm of the second speaker made the electric current."[5]
The background vocal harmonies at the beginning of the second chorus are provided by Lennon and George Harrison who sing the title of the French nursery rhyme "Frère Jacques" in several incantations. These harmonies occur at a little over one minute into the track.[6]
Emerick stated that the "Paperback Writer" / "Rain" single was cut louder than any other Beatles record up to that time, due to a new piece of equipment used in the mastering process, referred to as "Automatic Transient Overload Control", which was devised by the EMI maintenance department.[7]
According to disc jockey Jimmy Savile, McCartney wrote the song in response to a request from an aunt who asked if he could "write a single that wasn't about love."[8][9] Savile said, "With that thought obviously still in his mind, he walked around the room and noticed that Ringo was reading a book. He took one look and announced that he would write a song about a book."[8] In a 2007 interview, McCartney recalled that he wrote the song after reading in the Daily Mail about an aspiring author, possibly Martin Amis.[10] The Daily Mail was Lennon's regular newspaper and copies were in Lennon's Weybridge home when Lennon and McCartney were writing songs.[8]
The song's lyrics are in the form of a letter from an aspiring author addressed to a publisher. The author badly needs a job and has written a paperback version of a book by a "man named Lear." This is a reference to the Victorian painter Edward Lear, who wrote nonsense poems and songs of which Lennon was very fond (though Lear never wrote novels).
Aside from deviating from the subject of love, McCartney had it in mind to write a song with a melody backed by a single, static chord. "John and I would like to do songs with just one note like 'Long Tall Sally.' We got near it in 'The Word.'"[11] McCartney claimed to have barely failed to achieve this goal with "Paperback Writer," as the verse remains on G until the end, at which point it pauses on C. The backing vocals during this section are from the French children's song "Frère Jacques".[12]
In Britain, the single was promoted with a photograph depicting the Beatles with raw meat and decapitated baby dolls tossed about (the same photograph was later used as an album cover in the US and became infamous as the Butcher cover).[13]
For the American release of the single, the cover depicted the Beatles playing live, but with Lennon and Harrison's images reflected so that it appears that they are playing left-handed. (See the image at the top of the page).
The promotional film for the song, one of the first of its type, shot amongst ornate garden statuary, was directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg, who went on to direct the Beatles' final film, the documentary Let It Be.[14]
There is some dispute over who played what on "Paperback Writer". In the November 2005 issue of Guitar Player magazine, Paul McCartney claims to have played the song's famous opening riff on his Epiphone Casino guitar,[15] and photos from the song's session seem to verify this claim. McCartney is also widely credited for the song's iconic bass line, but photos from the session show George Harrison playing a Burns Nu-Sonic bass, not an electric guitar. Whether or not Harrison recorded a bass line for "Paperback Writer" that was later removed and retracked by McCartney remains unclear.
| Country | Title[17] |
|---|---|
| US | "Paperback Writer" b/w "Rain" |
| UK | "Paperback Writer" b/w "Rain"
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| UK | A Collection of Beatles Oldies... but Goldies
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| US | Hey Jude
|
"Paperback Writer" appears on subsequent re-releases including 1962–1966 (1973), a re-released single (1976), Past Masters, Volume Two (1988), and 1 (2000). The single was later released part of a Record Store Day reissue in 2010.[18]
Michael Lindsay-Hogg directed four promotional films for the song shot on 19 and 20 May 1966. On the first day they recorded a colour performance at Abbey Road, for The Ed Sullivan Show, which was shown on 5 June, and two black and white performance clips for British television. These were shown on Ready Steady Go! and Thank Your Lucky Stars on 3 June and 25 June, respectively.
On 20 May, another colour film was made at Chiswick House in west London. The Beatles mimed to the song, and they were shown in and around the conservatory in the grounds of the house. The clip was first broadcast in black and white on BBC-TV's Top of the Pops on 2 June.[19] The Beatles made their only live appearance on Top of the Pops to mime to "Paperback Writer" and "Rain". They were introduced by DJ Pete Murray. This session is famous for being wiped by the BBC when they were cleaning tapes for re-use. The session showed how difficult it was for the Beatles to even mime to their later material - they had difficulty in taking their performance seriously.
| Preceded by "Strangers in the Night" by Frank Sinatra |
UK number-one single 23–30 June 1966 |
Succeeded by "Sunny Afternoon" by The Kinks |
| Preceded by "Paint It, Black" by The Rolling Stones |
Billboard Hot 100 number-one single 25 June 1966 9 July 1966 |
Succeeded by "Strangers in the Night" by Frank Sinatra |