I haven’t written much about The Beatles lately, but there has been some talk over on E-V.com about the favorite songs of that group. I rather suspect that it would be easier to come up with a list of ten songs of theirs that I don’t care much for.

I also suspect that any list I come up with today will be different from the one I come up with tomorrow. But tomorrow never knows.

Here is today’s list, very roughly in the order in which they were released.

She Loves You—the very first song of theirs that grabbed me. I loved that sixth harmony on the final “yeah”. Already they knew how to vary their arrangements.

Ticket to Ride—one of many of their songs where I like a cover version as much as the original, in this case the Fifth Dimension’s version. 

Here’s a truncated version that the Fifth Dimension performed with Glen Campbell.

Got to Get You into My Life—absolutely joyful.

Here, There, and Everywhere—or Yesterday or Michelle or… 

She’s Leaving Home—Ned Rorem compared this to a Franz Schubert lied. Yep.

A Day in the Life—a genuine collaboration between John and Paul and the fifth Beatle George Martin.

Hey Jude—the song is great, the extra long fade out on the song’s coda is fun. 

Something—I wanted to include at least one George Harrison song.

Revolution—I like both versions.

The Ballad of John and Yoko—it was a Beatles song so the radio stations had to play it, even if they had to bleep out all the Christs. Only a few years earlier assholes in the South were burning their Beatles records because Lennon had said that The Beatles were more popular than Jesus, and The Beatles PR machine had gone into high gear damage control. Now John didn’t give a shit anymore.

“Christ, you know it ain’t easy / You know how hard it can be / The way things are go – ing / They’re gonna crucify me!”