By the time I grew into a mushy teenager, John, Paul, George & Ringo had been ex-Beatles for over eight years. However, they were still on the radio in Delhi, literally all the time – especially on Forces Request. Songs from ‘The Beatles 1962-1966′ (the red border one if you remember – it was followed by ‘The Beatles 1967-1970’ , which was the blue border album) – “Love Me Do”, “Please Please Me”, “From Me To You”, “Can’t Buy Me Love”, “Eight Days A Week”, “Yellow Submarine” would come through the airwaves regularly…….I have vivid memories of these amazing songs coming through the radio and me, singing along, gloriously tuneless 😂

However, somehow, The Beatles never really grabbed me, like say, Dire Straits or Pink Floyd or Carpenters or Kraftwerk . Maybe, because these songs felt very simplistic, compared to the complex lyrics and layered music of all these bands. Until………a dear friend presented me the double-album LP of  “The Beatles – Love Songs”. Frankly, it just blew me away !😁 These songs were sheer poetry – not just raucous rock-and-roll numbers to shake your booty to, but songs that ran through the entire gamut of emotion that every teenager goes through. The insecurities, the crushes, the giddiness of new loves, the little things that bring you enormous joy and the despair of breakups….I must confess, I absolutely fell in love with The Beatles. They were Poets. Balladeers. Complex. Magical. Just the kind of musicians that I needed in the middle of my mushy teenage period! (I do appreciate that I am probably the 3 Billionth person in the world to have come to this conclusion, but hey, I do get there in the end 😁)

‘Yesterday’. Possibly the most beautiful pop melody ever composed? Simple, beautiful words that effortlessly convey the deepest and most complex of emotions – loss and deep regret – at completely screwing up a relationship. No wonder it is supposedly the most covered pop song of all time! Apparently, Paul came up with the melody in his sleep one night, and for weeks, played it to various people checking that he hadn’t subconsciously stolen it from another song. The words though……..that took some work! The working title of the song was “Scrambled Eggs” (try singing Scrambled Eggs/I love your legs…. to this tune😁). It was finally over a long drive in Portugal that Paul came up with the lyrics. When he presented the finished song to his fellow Beatles – they couldn’t figure out how to put drums or another guitar or even another voice on it. It was complete and perfect just with Paul and his guitar. So they asked him to record it by himself – so although it was released as a Beatles song, credited to Lennon/McCartney, this really is the first solo Beatles song! 

 ‘Something’. It’s been called “the greatest love song of the past 50 years” ( Mr. F.Sinatra😎) and “..probably one of the best love songs ever, ever, ever written…” (Mr. E.John☺️). It is the second most covered Beatles song, after ‘Yesterday’. And, IMHO, possibly even more beautiful than ‘Yesterday’. Released on the Abbey Road album, this song marked the chrysalis of George as a songwriter to rival Paul & John. The lyrics are beautiful – the otherworldly wonder at having found someone amazing to love, and, a little insecurity about where it would all go in the future. The story goes that George wrote this for his first wife Patti Boyd. (The gorgeous model has got to be one of the most amazing / luckiest women of all time, having two of the most wonderful love songs of all time written about her – after George she married Eric Clapton, who wrote “Wonderful Tonight” about her! 😱😍). ‘Something’ was written right at the end of the Beatles-era – if you notice the video, it features the various Beatles with their wives, but not a single shot of the four Beatles together. Sad!

‘And I Love Her’. Possibly written by Paul about Jane Asher, his girlfriend, who’s attic he lived in London. “I give her all my love/That’s all I do/ And if you saw my love/ You’d love her too”. Pure, simple love…I think that really was the genius of The Beatles. Being able to communicate the most complex of emotions in the simplest of lyrics, all in just 2 minutes 30 seconds. Having said that, it’s George Harrison’s riff at the start that makes the song instantly recognisable for me – come to think about it, it’s really quite amazing how many Beatles songs are really made brilliant because of George Harrison’s guitar work

Ok one more story – ‘Michelle’. Pure emotion. And with French lyrics too! Apparently, while John and Paul were students, Paul went to party at John’s college where a French guy was playing a guitar, surrounded by girls. To mock him. Paul composed a faux French song as a throw-away joke for his friends ….but the tune stuck in John’s head. Years later, he suggested Paul actually write a song to go with the tune. Paul liked the name ‘Michelle’ and started there. The wife of a friend taught French, and he asked her for French words to rhyme with ‘Michelle’. She suggested ‘Ma Belle’…and we were off to the races! Paul said “these are words that go together well” and asked her for the French for that phrase – and that’s how the lyrics ‘Sont les mots qui vont très bien ensemble’ found their way into the song ! Charming little ditty – but oh, so good, that it won the Grammy for “Song of the Year” in 1965! 

The Beatles. This album is a must listen. If you’re in love. If you’re searching for love. Even, if you’re out of love. Must. Listen