Behka’s Breakfast with The Beatles Recap: Week of March 24

Here's a look at all the songs that started the morning show at 6:00 a.m. with Breakfast with Behka and The Beatles. On Monday, I played "I Should've Known Better".

The song is performed in the train compartment scene of A Hard Day's Night. It was in fact filmed in a van, with crew members rocking the vehicle to fake the action of a train in motion. Paul McCartney is seen singing along both in the train scene and in the live performance at the end of the film, despite not singing in the recording. In fact, the track features a common technique used at the time called "double tracking" where the main singer of the song's voice is layered two or three more times to make it sound fuller.

On Tuesday, I played "The Ballad of John and Yoko".

The song, chronicling the events surrounding Lennon’s marriage to Yoko Ono, was the Beatles’ 17th and final UK number one single. The song was recorded without George Harrison (who was on holiday) and Ringo Starr (who was filming The Magic Christian). In his biography, McCartney recalls that Lennon had a sudden inspiration for the song and had suggested that the two of them should record it immediately, without waiting for the other Beatles to return.

On Wednesday, I played "P.S. I Love You".

"P.S. I Love You" is a song composed principally by Paul McCartney, with McCartney on lead vocal. It was released on 5 October 1962 as the B-side of their debut single "Love Me Do" and is also included on their 1963 album Please Please Me. Written in 1961, while Paul McCartney was in Hamburg, this song is sometimes considered to be a dedication to his then-girlfriend Dot Rhone.

On Thursday, I played "You Can't Do That".

One of Lennon's semi-autobiographical songs, "You Can't Do That," contradicted the genial tone with its tense threats, sexual paranoia and nagging, dragging groove. The song's jealousy theme was re-visited in other Lennon compositions, such as "Run for Your Life" and "Jealous Guy". Lennon played the guitar solo. With filming due to begin on A Hard Day's Night, film director Dick Lester needed the Beatles to provide him with original material ahead of production and "You Can't Do That" was selected as part of the Scala Theatre "live performance" scene in the film, but was dropped for the final cut along with "I'll Cry Instead" and "I Call Your Name."

On Friday, I played "A Day In The Life".

"A Day in the Life" is the final song on the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album. The song comprises distinct sections written independently by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, with orchestral additions. While Lennon's lyrics were inspired by contemporary newspaper articles, McCartney's were reminiscent of his youth. This goes hand in hand with the themes the group was working with earlier in the recording process - they had planned to do a theme album about their childhoods, which was scrapped after "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" were released as singles. According to Lennon, the inspiration for the first two verses was the death of Tara Browne, the 21-year-old heir to the Guinness fortune who had crashed his Lotus Elan on 18 December 1966 in Redcliffe Gardens, Earls Court. Browne had been a friend of Lennon and McCartney.

Let me know if there's something you wanted to hear next week!

Beat-ily yours,
Behka