Written by: Lennon-McCartney
Recorded: 6 May; 1, 15, 30, 31 July; 5 August 1969
Producer: George Martin
Engineers: Glyn Johns, Phil McDonald, Geoff Emerick
Released: 26 September 1969 (UK), 1 October 1969 (US)
Paul McCartney: vocals, backing vocals, bass, piano, guitar, chimes, tape loops
John Lennon: backing vocals, guitar
George Harrison: backing vocals, guitar
Ringo Starr: drums, tambourine
Available on:
Abbey Road
A lament about The Beatles' business wranglings of early 1969, You Never Give Me Your Money was written by Paul McCartney and was the genesis of the 'long medley' that dominated the second half of the Abbey Road album.
This was me directly lambasting Allen Klein's attitude to us: no money, just funny paper, all promises and it never works out. It's basically a song about no faith in the person, that found its way into the medley on Abbey Road. John saw the humour in it.
Many Years From Now, Barry Miles
The song is made up of a number of disparate parts, joined together in the manner of Lennon's Happiness Is A Warm Gun. The first part begins with a thinly-veiled protest at the influence of Allen Klein, whom McCartney profoundly distrusted.
'Funny paper' - that's what we get. We get bits of paper saying how much is earned and what this is and that is, but we never actually get it in pounds, shilling and pence. We've all got a big house and a car and an office, but to actually get the money we've earned seems impossible.
Anthology
The second part is a fondly nostalgic look back to The Beatles' earliest days, with a boogie-woogie backing led by McCartney on piano. Wistfully recalling the days when the group yearned to be "toppermost of the poppermost", having left college with no money and few job prospects, it describes "that magic feeling: nowhere to go."
The Beatles' future may be gone, but McCartney is determined to salvage their spirit, and that of the Sixties, for his future. You Never Give Me Your Money marks the psychological opening of his solo career.
A lengthy guitar solo acts as a bridge to the penultimate part of the song ("One sweet dream, pick up the bags and get in the limousine"). This section was written while McCartney was in New York with his wife Linda, and referred to their fondness for getting purposefully lost in the countryside.
The climax of You Never Give Me Your Money is the repeated chant: "One two three four five six seven, all good children go to heaven". It is backed by a motif of guitar notes that would later return as the bridge between Carry That Weight and The End.
The song plays out with a selection of tape loops, with which the song segues into Sun King.
In the studio
The Beatles began recording You Never Give Me Your Money on 6 May 1969. They laid down 36 takes of the song, which at this point ended abruptly immediately before the "One two three four five six seven" refrain.
On this day the line-up was McCartney on piano and guide vocals, Lennon on distorted guitar, Harrison on another guitar, fed through a revolving Leslie speaker, and Starr played drums.
McCartney alone returned to it on 1 July, overdubbing his lead vocals onto take 30. Two weeks later, on 15 July, more vocals were added, as were chimes - heard towards the end of the song.
On 30 July, when The Beatles prepared a rough mix of the long medley, they tried various ways to merge You Never Give Me Your Money into Sun King. At this point they settled upon a long organ note. More vocals were also recorded.
These vocals were scrapped the next day, and McCartney completed the song with the addition of bass and piano. The crossfade into Sun King, meanwhile, was finally settled on 5 August, when he assembled a collection of tape loops containing the sounds of bells, birds, bubbles and insects.
Related articles:
- Recording: You Never Give Me Your Money, Because, The End
- Recording, mixing: You Never Give Me Your Money
- Mixing, editing: The End, You Never Give Me Your Money, Sun King, Mean Mr Mustard
- Recording, mixing: You Never Give Me Your Money, Come Together, Polythene Pam, She Came In Through The Bathroom Window, Golden Slumbers, Carry That Weight, Sun King, Mean Mr Mustard, Her Majesty, The End
- Recording: You Never Give Me Your Money, Golden Slumbers, Carry That Weight
I like the Beatles, but I can`t believe that the song "you never give me your money was sung by Paul McCartney, I thought that was John, really I`m amazed.
Anyway I love the Beatles. Iam Paul McCartney`s fan.
This site open my eyes(my son help me)
Thanks.
It's cool! I remember when I didn't know who was singing. The more you listen, the more you start recognizing the voices. Some still stump me though!
I know what you mean, it blew my mind when I realized John was singing 'Anna' (from Please Please Me) and not George. I blame Lennon's cold for my confusion.
It does sound quite a bit like George on Anna, especially in the verses. It fooled me at first too.
Great tune. When I first heard it, I was pretty certain that was Paul singing, though at times it sounds like he's trying to imitate John's style.
What I had trouble with was determining who's playing the guitar parts the follow the piano introduction.
To me, it sounds like someone playing guitar, but as if they were soloing on a bass (i.e. as if they practiced the lines on a bass, but recorded it with a guitar).
Paul is listed as playing the main piano part but there is some rather fast "boogie woogie" piano in the section that starts "Out of college...". I've always wondered whether this was played by someone else as it sounds a lot more difficult than most other Paul piano parts.
Michael - I'm pretty certain it was Paul. He was a pretty good pianist; listen to Lady Madonna or Martha My Dear, both of which have some pretty nifty playing.
Additionally, there's always the possibility it was taped an octave down at half-speed and sped up.
this sounds right if you listen to this video of the isolated piano:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sgsp0LPyiE
it sounds really sped up (only during the fast section, of course), especially toward the last few seconds.
Isolating the left side and playing at half-speed helps to uncover the actual speed that the track was recorded at and Paul's "boogie woogie" virtuosity. It also explains the chiming "tack" piano sound created by doubling the speed in normal playback (similar to Alvin & the Chipmunks). And even more interesting is that the right hand riffs were recorded on separate tracks (also at half speed) and later reduced to the one final track evident by the disparity of the levels and the intricacy of the parts. Hats off to Geoff Emerick in creating Meade Lux McCartney through creative editing and gave us a memorable piano performance.
Thanks Doug. That solves a long standing mystery for me!
I'm pretty near certain that it's George Martin. If you listen to outtakes of this song, Paul plays the piano in this part, but the piano part is totally different to the finished version. Listen to Mr Martin's honky tonk piano in Rocky Raccoon, then listen again to You Never...it's the same style. Paul is a good piano player, but not quite technical enough to play this part.
According to Mark Lewisohn (forgot how to spell his name) but in his book "The Complete Beatles Chronicle" says that the day they were recording this song that George was on Distortion and John was on a "bright guitar"...you might have it mixed up...
I didn't mix it up. From Lewisohn's book: "Certainly recorded with the medley in mind, the Beatles taped 36 basic track takes (the 30th being "best"): piano and guide vocal (Paul), drums (Ringo), distorted electric guitar (John) and chiming electric guitar (George)."
This song sounds like a musical quilt. It sounds like bits and pieces from all of the songs to come put together. Great song though.
I think of this song as being directly influenced by Happiness Is A Warm Gun. They always rose to the challenges set by the others, and Happiness... was Paul's favourite White Album track.
An update for all concerned: Allen Klein, the attorney about whom the song "You Never Give Me Your Money" was written and performed, passed into the legal hereafter yesterday, aged 77.
This is my favorite song, and it was my gateway to real rock and roll - I feel like the bridge is one of the hardest-rocking sounding pieces of Beatles work ever!
Hmm, never thought about it like that before, but I guess it could be viewed as the psychological beginning of Paul's solo career.
Which, in turn, would explain why I'm neither a big fan of this song nor Paul's solo stuff.
Yeah, I agree. This was the first of many suite-type songs that Paul was doing in the early '70s like "Uncle Albert," "Band On The Run," and "Live And Let Die."
I've always been fascinated by the melodic overtones while Paul sings "Oh, that magic feeling, nowhere to go." It first sounds like bells, but then resolves into a distinct electric guitar tonality, as if it is a guitar effect (which I don't believe existed commercially until years later).
those melodic overtones are the result of george's guitar being fed into a rotating leslie speaker... that and some creative miking and eq'ing helped to create those bell-like overtones.
that was george's party trick for a number of years (listen to the middle of "Badge" by Cream, a part that george helped write for them, as well as any other number of early solo pieces).
There's no wind chimes here. Otherwise, it's impossible to get that sound from wind chimes. The chimes sound were guitar effects.
My mistake. According to Lewisohn, there were chimes, indeed.
Yes, but I've also read that McCartney recorded a number of instruments that were left out of the final mix. I think chimes might have been among them. As there's some confusion I've left them in there for now.
Guitars, not chimes, during the "but, oh, that magic feeling" section, and you can hear a string bend (impossible on chimes) after the first "Nowhere to go...".
Chimes, not guitars, panned between centre and left during the outro.
That's the confusion. First, Lewishon states guitar with chime effects, and later he mention overdub of vocals, chimes, etc.
chimes = tubular bells
Yeah, tubular bells during the "Oh, that magic feeling..." bit, and tape-looped wind chimes (+ crickets and whatnot) during the fade.
I just noticed that the chord structure for "You Never Give Me Your Money", (which is really nice), is identical to the chord structure of the first part of "The Earle of Salisbury" pavan written by William Byrd in the 1600's. Specifically, Am, Dm7, G7, Cmaj7, Fmaj7, Bm7b5, E7, Am. Has anyone asked Mr. McCartney if this is where he got the inspiration or is this just a much more common progression than I thought?
Many famous songs have similar chord changes that range through a wide variety of musical genres. for example, the jazz standard "Autumn Leaves," which was written in the 1940's, also has changes very similar to this song(except that the "Fmaj7" would be an "F#minor" when played in the same key, and the "E7" would be minor as well) a later song with similar but not identical changes would be Gloria Estefan's "I will survive".
Further to the reply above, the chord sequence in question is based on the "circle of 4ths" ( or circle of fifths if you move in the opposite direction). As Rocky says, it's very common. "I say a little prayer" and "Caroline No" are other contemporary examples although both of these songs only use the sequence in part.
Sigh. Never mind. Go back to sleep.
"The Beatles began recording You Never Give Me Your Money on 6 May 1969. They laid down 36 takes of the song, which at this point ended abruptly immediately before the "One two three four five six seven" refrain."
Yeah but take 30 (the final version) lasts 6 minutes, with a jam at the end.
This isn't my favorite song (don't let the username fool you) but I enjoy it very much. My favorite part is when they're singing, "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, all good children go to Heaven." I love the chorus on that part, it just sounds so amazing. <3
I always thought that this line was strange but recently I've tried to find some sense in it because I really love that line and song. I don't know if it is 100% right what George said, I wanna hear Paul say the meaning.
What I thought of this line is that funny papers are money and all they get is funny papers, all they got was money from everyone but no one gives them real money, real love or real feelings, they used money as a metaphor.
"Step on the gas and wipe that tear away".... This song really seems to symbolize the end of the Beatles. Probably my favourite song on the whole album which is saying a lot.
You Never Give Me Your Money" with various sections, beautiful harmonies, varioius guitar sounds, prog like movement, ambient loops all in 21 chords in less than 4 minutes
A very creative song by Paul, with great piano and bass work by him. George is strong on the guitar, and I think John plays some of his best guitar as a Beatle (with lead-like parts) on this song. One of my favorites.
I think this is my favourite song on the album. Paul was still ambitious, and full of musical confidence. It was delicate; it rocked. Paul used three different voices; the clean arpeggio lines are almost textbook Beatles; the drumming is inventive...oh, I could go on.
George has some tasty licks on this track, assuming he's on the right channel.
Isolating the left side and playing at half-speed helps to uncover the actual speed that the track was recorded at and Paul's "boogie woogie" virtuosity. It also explains the chiming "tack" piano sound created by doubling the speed in normal playback (similar to Alvin & the Chipmunks). And even more interesting is that the right hand riffs were recorded on separate tracks (also at half speed) and later reduced to the one final track evident by the disparity of the levels and the intricacy of the parts. Hats off to Geoff Emerick in creating Meade Lux McCartney through creative editing and gave us a memorable piano performance.
Are the 3 guitar solos (two in the middle and the one in the outro) all played by George?
One of the best tracks on the album I'd say. All four Beatles' are at their finest instrumentally and vocally. Great guitar work by George and John, a nice piano part by Paul, incredible drumming by Ringo, and a sick vocal.