The Beatles songs Ringo Starr could never get over: “The worst session ever”
Despite being a pivotal part of The Beatles, Ringo Starr was one of the band members who had the least amount of creative input.
He was always a supportive band member, though, as he would encourage his fellow Beatles when they were writing, and he was always excited about hearing what the band had to offer. That being said, despite his enthusiasm, there were some songs Starr despised.
One of the first tracks he hated was the first track he recorded with The Beatles, ‘Love Me Do’. Starr was always annoyed by the song because he was cut from it before he even had the chance to play on it. George Martin had hired a session drummer and opted to use him instead, despite Starr being there and ready to play.
“I don’t think Ringo ever got over that,” said McCartney. “He had to go back up to Liverpool and everyone asked, ‘How did it go in the Smoke?’ He’d say, ‘B side’s good’, but Ringo couldn’t admit to liking the A side, not being on it.”
That early slight arguably set the tone for Starr’s relationship with certain Beatles songs. Even as he settled into the group and became an essential part of their sound, there were always moments where he felt slightly on the outside of the creative process.
It wasn’t necessarily resentment, but it did mean he developed a sharper instinct for what he connected with and what he didn’t. When a track didn’t feel right, Starr was far more likely to disengage than try to force himself into it, which explains why his enthusiasm could vary so dramatically from song to song.
‘Little Child’ was a song from the band’s debut written specifically for Ringo Starr. It was always intended to be a filler song, but regardless, Starr refused to sing on it. There were other songs on the album which Starr preferred, and he insisted he sing on one of these; he ended up performing on ‘I Wanna Be Your Man’, which became one of his biggest hits.
While The Beatles were often quite uniform with the songs they wrote, there were some tracks so polarising that almost every member of the band ended up hating them. ‘Maxwell’s Silver Hammer’ was a track that nearly every band member besides Paul McCartney detested.
McCartney was adamant about getting the song right as it used various pieces of technology in order to put the song together. It meant the band were stuck in the studio for days while McCartney tried to perfect the song. The relentless recording process took its toll on Starr, who described putting the song together as “The worst session ever,” adding, “It went on for fucking weeks.”
In complete contrast, one of the Beatles’ most loved tracks was also despised by Starr. The recording process for ‘Here Comes The Sun’ was much less harmonious than the track’s sonic nature suggests. Starr struggled to hang on to the timing of the track. While his tom fills make up the rhythm section of the song, many of them were improvised, and Starr could never remember what he had played prior.
The timing of the song constantly flew Starr off. “George had been to India again, and he said, ‘I’ve got this song. It’s in 7 ½ time’. I mean, he may as well have talked to me in Arabic,” said Starr, “I can’t think of counting to seven for the beat. That’s just not my brain.”
‘If You’ve Got Trouble’ was another song that Ringo Starr was given to perform, but he didn’t quite pull it off. The lyrics and melody put together by Lennon and McCartney are arguably some of their worst, and Starr wasn’t happy about having to sing the song.
