Hold Me Tight
| "Hold Me Tight" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Song by the Beatles from the album With The Beatles | ||||
| Released |
22 November 1963 (mono) 30 November 1963 (stereo) | |||
| Recorded | 12 September 1963 | |||
| Genre | Rock and roll | |||
| Length | 2:32 | |||
| Label | Parlophone | |||
| Writer | Lennon–McCartney | |||
| Producer | George Martin | |||
| With The Beatles track listing | ||||
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"Hold Me Tight" is a song by the Beatles from their 1963 album With the Beatles. It was first recorded during the Please Please Me album session, but not selected for inclusion[1] and re-recorded for their second album.
History
"Hold Me Tight" was composed principally by Paul McCartney in 1961, and was part of the Beatles' stage act until 1963.[2][3] They attempted to record it for their début Please Please Me but the thirteen takes recorded were deemed unsatisfactory, and the tape was destroyed. Seven months later, they recorded a further nine takes, and the final version is an edit of the sixth and ninth takes from the second attempt, varispeeded up a semitone to F major.
Both McCartney and John Lennon, at one time or another, shared their distaste for the song, and in a 1980s interview with Mark Lewisohn, McCartney says, "I can't remember much about that one. Certain songs were just 'work' songs, you haven't got much memory of them. That's one of them."[4] In Barry Miles' Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now, the songwriter calls it "a failed attempt at a single which then became an acceptable album filler."[5] Lennon in 1980 said "That was Paul's....It was a pretty poor song and I was never really interested in it."[6]
In their book The Beatles: An Illustrated Record, Roy Carr and Tony Tyler call it the album's poorest track, saying it "fails because McCartney's vision of the complete tune obviously sagged somewhat."[7] They also claim that McCartney's singing was "out of tune".
However, Ian MacDonald redeems it in his book Revolution in the Head, in which he writes: "Play it loud with the bass boosted, and you have an overwhelming motoric rocker strongly redolent of the band's live sound."[8]
McCartney wrote a different song called "Hold Me Tight" for a medley included on the 1973 Wings album Red Rose Speedway.
Personnel
- Paul McCartney — vocal, bass, handclaps
- John Lennon — harmony vocal, rhythm guitar, handclaps
- George Harrison — backing vocal, lead guitar, handclaps
- Ringo Starr — drums, handclaps
- George Martin — producer
- Norman Smith — engineer
- Personnel per MacDonald[3]
Cover versions
At least four cover versions of this song have been recorded. The Treasures, a Phil Spector-produced vocal group, recorded the song in 1964, as a single released on Spector's Philles Records.[9] British band Stackridge included a cover version on their 1976 album, Mr Mick. Another cover version was featured near the beginning of the 2007 Beatles-themed film, Across the Universe with vocals by Evan Rachel Wood; an American independent band, The Northern Crowns, recorded a version on their EP.
Notes
References
- Carr, Roy; Tyler, Tony (1975). The Beatles: An Illustrated Record. New York: Harmony Books. ISBN 0-517-52045-1.
- Harry, Bill (2000). The Beatles Encyclopedia: Revised and Updated. London: Virgin Publishing. ISBN 0-7535-0481-2.
- Lewisohn, Mark (1988). The Beatles Recording Sessions. New York: Harmony Books. ISBN 0-517-57066-1.
- MacDonald, Ian (2005). Revolution in the Head: The Beatles' Records and the Sixties (Second Revised ed.). London: Pimlico (Rand). ISBN 1-84413-828-3.
- Miles, Barry (1997). Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now. New York: Henry Holt and Company. ISBN 0-8050-5249-6.
- Rovang, Martin. "In and Out of the Shadows". Retrieved 2009-07-30.
- Sheff, David (2000). All We Are Saying. St Martin's Griffin. ISBN 0-312-25464-4.
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