How Otis Redding inspired a classic song by The Beatles

Credit: Volt Records

Revisit Otis Redding’s cover of The Beatles song ‘Hard Day’s Night’

Fri 9 September 2022 6:00, UK

Otis Redding and The Beatles came from entirely different scenes on opposite sides of the Atlantic, but there was strong mutual respect between the pair, with Redding paying his respects to the Fab Four with a rousing cover of ‘Hard Day’s Night’.

The details surrounding Redding’s cover of The Beatles’ classic are sparse, and it didn’t see the light of day until years after his passing. Redding’s story is entrenched in tragedy because he died in a plane crash on December 10th, 1967. He was travelling on a routine commute to a performance on Redding’s Beechcraft H18 aeroplane after an appearance on the Upbeat television show in Cleveland when he lost his life just as his career was on the brink of superstardom.

His signature song, ‘Sittin’ On The Dock Of The Bay’, was released just two days before Redding’s tragic demise. The singer was only 26 years old when he left the world, and if it wasn’t for the accident, Redding was on his way to becoming the voice of his generation, which is sadly now a question of what could have been.

Redding had finally established himself as a leading light in the music industry after years of being a backing singer before sharing his first solo album in 1964. His popularity multiplied with every release, and Redding had the privilege of calling The Beatles his fans.

The Beatles classic that Paul McCartney describes as “an anti-John song”

Their track, ‘Drive My Car’, was inspired by Redding’s ‘Respect’, later popularised by Aretha Franklin in 1967. The Beatles were in a writing session at John Lennon’s Weybridge abode that Paul McCartney later admitted was one of their “stickiest”, but a shot of inspiration from Redding helped them get over the bump in the road.

In the 2020 book, George Harrison on George Harrison: Interviews and Encounters, The Beatles guitarist discussed the track. “We laid the track because what Paul would do, if he’d written a song, he’d learn all the parts for Paul and then come to the studio and say (sometimes he was very difficult): ‘Do this’. He’d never give you the opportunity to come out with something. But on ‘Drive My Car’ I just played the line, which is really like a lick off ‘Respect,’ you know, the Otis Redding version — duum-da-da-da-dada-da-dum”.

“And I played that line on the guitar, and Paul laid that with me on bass,” Harrison explained. “We laid the track down like that. We played the lead part later on top of it.”

It’s unclear whether The Beatles and Redding ever had the opportunity to discuss their mutual appreciation of each other’s art, but they both let their feelings known. The late soul sensation’s stirring cover of ‘Hard Day’s Night’ does the original justice while bringing it into a new realm and deserves to be heard.