Misery

From BeatlesWiki

Jump to: navigation, search

Misery is a song on The Beatles' first album Please Please Me.

Contents

Writing

The song is one of the few written by both Lennon and McCartney. It was written backstage in King's Hall, Stoke-On-Trent on January 26 when touring in January 1963 with Helen Shapiro. The rest of it was written at McCartney's home. Originally, the song was intended for Shapiro herself to record, but she turned it down. As Paul said "She turned it down. It may not have been that successful for her because it's a rather downbeat song. It was quite pessimistic." Shapiro remembers differently. According to her, her manager turned the song down on her behalf, apparently not even letting her hear it. She said, "They certainly offered it to me, but I didn’t know anything about it until I met them on the first day of the tour." Instead, The Beatles gave it to Kenny Lynch, becoming the first Beatles cover ever. When Lynch first played the song to Lennon, John said "Who’s that playing the telephone?," insulting the guitar playing. Lynch apologized, "I was going to do You Could Never Stop Me Loving You instead, but I gave it to Johnny Tillotson and recorded Misery. Tillotson had a hit with his – I didn’t." Paul later made up for this by having Lynch on the cover of his 1973 album, Band On The Run.

Recording

It was recorded in 11 takes on February 11, 1963, the day that most of the album was recorded. It was recorded at double speed to allow the piano to be overdubbed at a slower speed. The piano was recorded on February 20 by George Martin.

Participants

Musicians

The Beatles
Guest Musicians

Production

Recording Sessions


Available Versions

Available On

Trivia

  • Around the 1:22 mark in the song, Paul tries to hold back laughing.

Cover versions

  • The Flamin' Groovies
  • Kenny Lynch

Sources

Retrieved from "http://www.beatleswiki.org/wiki/Misery"
Personal tools