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“Their songwriting was crap”: The Beatles songs George Martin thought were nothing special

Fri 11 October 2024 15:30, UK

Most bands have a long way to go before they become legendary recording artists. Very rarely does someone come into the studio fully formed, and despite some bands being rough around the edges in the studio, it’s only a stepping stone for them to grow on each release and get better and better. Although George Martin was able to foster The Beatles’ creativity in the studio, he felt that singles like ‘Love Me Do’ were far from the greatest things he had ever heard when they first came in.

But when the Fab Four were first introduced to Martin, he didn’t exactly sign them because he thought they would become the most advanced musicians in the world or anything. What he saw was a bunch of kids with oodles of charm and a whole lot of potential, and if they just redirected that energy in one direction, then they might have a shot at being on the same level as Elvis Presley.

On their first album, though, it’s not like they were meant to be the greatest musicians in the world. An album that whistled through in a single day is not really going to benefit from having a ton of overdubs, and even on tracks like ‘Do You Want To Know A Secret’, it’s clear that the group is incredibly out of tune, whether that’s due to them not having adequate tuners or their guitars giving out due to the sheer amount of work they had put in.

Before they did that one marathon session, though, ‘Love Me Do’ backed with ‘PS I Love You’ was the first major single they tackled. Even though Paul McCartney envisioned the tune to be a little bit bluesy with John Lennon’s harmonica playing, it does feel a little bit juvenile compared to Presley’s best tunes, and when measured on the same standard as their later material, it wouldn’t even be good enough for amateur hour on Abbey Road.

If this is what they were working with, Martin thought that he would need to drastically change their repertoire for them to have a massive hit, saying, “To begin with, their songwriting was crap. The first songs I heard from them, I thought, ‘Oh God, where am I going to get a good song for them?’ The first record we issued was ‘Love Me Do’ and ‘PS I Love You’, which are not exactly Cold Porter, are they?”

Then again, that might be a little bit harsh on both of the songs. Even though ‘Love Me Do’ is simplistic, it is at least charming for what it is, and ‘PS I Love You’ is actually fairly strong for what it is, complete with that weird change in the chorus where they throw in a Bb chord that’s completely outside of the key of the song.

But Martin had to think like a businessman, which meant getting them a song like ‘How Do You Do It’ by Mitch Murray, which he figured could be the makings of a hit record. While the lads did record a version of it, it was clear that they had some other magic left in the tank when they presented Martin with ‘Please Please Me’.

And from there, the classics never seemed to stop, whether that was them making pop juggernauts like ‘A Hard Day’s Night’ or dismantling everything that a traditional single was supposed to be on ‘I Am the Walrus’. There were bits and pieces of that magic on those early songs, but even if Martin couldn’t see it then, it didn’t take long for them to get even better as the years went by.