The Beatles song Ringo Starr “copied” for ‘Back Off Boogaloo’
People often joke about Ringo Starr having been the weakest link in The Beatles. Whether you believe it to be deserved or not, he’s often seen as the fall guy and the butt of the joke, with many considering his efforts to have paled in comparison to those of John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison, and despite his best efforts to be taken seriously, many will still poke fun at him, as is often the case with drummers.
However, in reality he was incredibly proficient at his instrument, and his contributions to the songs of the other three members of the band were always stellar, holding together tracks with a steady backbeat. Starr was never flashy, but some of his drum fills took a simple idea and made them stand out with great effect. Joke about Ringo all you want, but as a drummer, you can’t actually fault him.
Perhaps where Starr’s talents came more unstuck was when it came to him writing his own material for the band, and often when he contributed an original song, they left a little bit to be desired when compared to the brilliance of his bandmates’ efforts. Quite often, he’d have to rely on getting a little bit of assistance from the others in the band to finish songs as he lacked the musicality to complete them to a passable standard. After all, where do you think ‘With a Little Help From My Friends’ come from?
When Ringo embarked on a solo career after the collapse of the Beatles, there were a number of question marks as to whether he’d be able to survive out in the wild by himself and write songs without his support network around him. His bandmates were away pursuing their own solo careers, and when left to his own devices, Starr surely lacked the skill to be able to write his own original material that would compete with the solo efforts of Lennon, McCartney and Harrison.
As it happens, he didn’t really need it for some of his own work, as he would end up resorting to stealing elements of Beatles classics not written by him, as evidenced by his 1972 track ‘Back Off Boogaloo’ having elements that were directly lifted from the McCartney-penned ‘Get Back’. Ringo was always a fan of ‘Get Back’, labelling it as having been a “kick-ass track” that goes “back to basics”, but going to the extent of plagiarising it may have been a stretch too far.
However, Starr attests that the work wasn’t stolen, and that the elements he took from ‘Get Back’, despite it having been written by McCartney, were his own contributions to the song. “I’d done a hook to the track in ‘Get Back’ which sounded good and it’s been copied since,” he explained. “By myself, in fact, in ‘Back Off Boogaloo’. That’s perfectly allowed by me!”
Starr may not have ‘stolen’ from McCartney’s work, but the track also didn’t come about without the executive assistance of his old pal George Harrison, who he invited into the studio to assist him with providing some of the finishing touches. Speaking to the Daily Mail, Starr revealed: “I didn’t have the talent to end a song. With ‘Back Off Boogaloo,’ I went to George and he helped me finish it.” At least he’s completely honest about where his ideas came from.
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