Written by: Lennon-McCartney
Recorded: 2, 19, 25 October, 2 November 1967
Producer: George Martin
Engineers: Ken Scott, Geoff Emerick
Released: 24 November 1967 (UK), 27 November 1967 (US)
Paul McCartney: vocals, bass, piano, bongos, conga
John Lennon: backing vocals, lead guitar, organ
George Harrison: backing vocals, lead guitar
Ringo Starr: drums, maracas, tambourine
Kenneth Essex, Leo Birnbaum: violas
Available on:
Magical Mystery Tour
1 (One)
Anthology 2
Hello, Goodbye - The Beatles' final single of 1967, their annus mirabilis - was their first release after the death of Brian Epstein. It was backed with I Am The Walrus, to the displeasure of John Lennon, who considered his song to be the superior of the two.
Lennon later dismissed Hello, Goodbye as "three minutes of contradictions and meaningless juxtapositions". The song had its genesis at Paul McCartney's house in Cavendish Avenue, London.
According to Alistair Taylor - Epstein's former personal assistant and later the general manager of Apple Corps - McCartney first got the idea for Hello, Goodbye at his home in Cavendish Avenue, London, after Taylor asked him how he wrote songs.
Paul marched me into the dining room, where he had a marvellous old hand-carved harmonium. 'Come and site at the other end of the harmonium. You hit any note you like on the keyboard. Just hit it and I'll do the same. Now whenever I shout out a word, you shout the opposite and I'll make up a tune. You watch, it'll make music'...
'Black,' he started. 'White,' I replied. 'Yes.' 'No.' 'Good.' 'Bad.' Hello.' 'Goodbye.'
I wonder whether Paul really made up that song as he went along or whether it was running through his head already.
Yesterday
The song's simplicity, much like previous single All You Need Is Love, was tailored to be understood by an international audience. Its childlike lyrics chimed with the times, perhaps a side-effect of the regressive spirit of LSD.
Hello, Goodbye was one of my songs. There are Geminian influences here I think: the twins. It's such a deep theme in the universe, duality - man woman, black white, ebony ivory, high low, right wrong, up down, hello goodbye - that it was a very easy song to write. It's just a song of duality, with me advocating the more positive. You say goodbye, I say hello. You say stop, I say go. I was advocating the more positive side of the duality, and I still do to this day.
Many Years From Now, Barry Miles
In the studio
The Beatles began recording Hello, Goodbye on 2 October 1967, under the working title Hello Hello. They recorded 14 takes of the backing track - piano, organ, drums and other percussion instruments including bongos, congas, maracas and tambourine.
They returned to it a little over a fortnight later. On 19 October two guitar parts were added, as were McCartney's occasionally double tracked lead vocals, and Harrison and Lennon's backing vocals.
The following day two violas were added. George Martin scored the instruments, based on notes suggested by McCartney at the piano.
All of The Beatles were there. One of them was sitting on the floor in what looked like a pyjama suit, drawing with crayons on a piece of paper.
The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions, Mark Lewisohn
McCartney added his first bass part on 25 October, and added another on 2 November - at which point the song was complete.
From the recording aspect I remember the end bit where there's the pause and it goes 'Heba, heba hello'. We had those words and we had this whole thing recorded but it didn't sound quite right, and I remember asking Geoff Emerick if we could really whack up the echo on the tom-toms. And we put this echo full up on the tom-toms and it just came alive. We Phil Spector'd it. And I noticed that this morning and I said to Linda, 'Wait! Full echo on the toms, here we go!' And they came in quite deep, like a precursor to Adam and the Ants.
The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions, Mark Lewisohn
Chart success
Hello, Goodbye was released in the UK on 23 November 1967, with I Am The Walrus on the b-side. It entered the charts six days later at number three, and reached the top a week later. It remained at number one for seven weeks - The Beatles' longest chart topper since She Loves You.
The single was released in the US on 27 November. On 9 December it entered the top 40, and went on to spend three weeks at the top. It remained in the top 40 for 10 weeks. It was also included on the full-length Magical Mystery Tour LP, released on the same day as the single.
Paul didn't think this song through - he ran out of antonyms ending with the long "O"-sound and had to resort to the inconsistent "why/I don't know" couplet. If he'd given it ten minutes of thought, he might've come up with any of these perfectly satisfactory pairings:
"You say buck/I say doe"
"You say friend/I say foe"
"You say reap/I say sow"
"You say to/I say fro"
"You say shrink/I say grow"
and my favourite:
"You say suck/I say blow!"
(Still an enjoyable song, but the lyrics are surely the worst thing about it.)