Three classic Beatles songs inspired by Ringo Starr
It’s a well-known fact that Ringo Starr wasn’t the most active contributor to The Beatles‘ music. Most songs the Fab Four released during their ten-year existence were credited to John Lennon and Paul McCartney, with George Harrison contributing 25, three of which were a group effort. On the other hand, Starr wrote two songs – ‘Don’t Pass Me By’ and ‘Octupus’s Garden’.
However, the drummer was already an established performer in various skiffle bands in the late 1950s, such as Eddie Clayton and the Clayton Squares and the Raving Texans, who backed singer Rory Storm. Whilst playing with Storm in Hamburg, Starr met The Beatles, with whom he got along well. Soon enough, the band invited him to replace their existing drummer Pete Best, despite backlash from fans, who began rioting at The Cavern Club.
Starr needn’t have worried – it wasn’t long before fans accepted him with open arms. The musician was the star of the band’s films Help! and Yellow Submarine, clearly indicating his popularity.
Although the drummer wasn’t as involved in the band’s writing process as the others, he contributed some interesting drum fills and rhythms that were made unique because of Starr’s left-handed playing. His natural wit also inspired the names of some of the band’s hugely successful tracks…
In total, three songs were written with Starr’s malapropisms or quirky quips in mind. Firstly, ‘A Hard Day’s Night’, which was also the name of the band’s third album and 1964 comedy film. McCartney claimed that “There wouldn’t have been ‘A Hard Day’s Night’ without him. He had this kind of thing where he moved phrases around.”
He recalled that “Ringo would do these little malapropisms, he would say things slightly wrong, like people do, but his were always wonderful, very lyrical. They were sort of magic even though he was getting it wrong.” Similarly, Lennon described the phrase as “A Ringo-ism, where he said it not to be funny… just said it.”
Starr also inspired the title ‘Eight Days A Week’, a track that appeared on Beatles for Sale. McCartney shared that Starr “said it as though he were an overworked chauffeur” before trying on a thicker accent to imitate his bandmate, “‘Eight days a week.’ When we heard it, we said, ‘Really? Bing! Got it!'” The single was the band’s seventh number one on the Billboard Hot 100 when it was released in 1965.
Finally, ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’, a psychedelic classic inspired by Lennon’s experience of using LSD. The Beatles brought in instruments that were not commonly used in Western pop music, such as the sitar and tambura. It even featured backwards recordings of a guitar which marked the first use of a reserved sound in a pop song. Lennon wrote the lyrics for the song, which do not contain the title phrase. Instead, the phrase was lifted from Starr, who had said the phrase in a television interview in 1964.
McCartney said, “He used to say, “Well, tomorrow never knows.” And he’d say it for real. He meant it. But all that sounds a bit trivial there. That wasn’t all he did. That was just the tip of the iceberg.” He also stated that “On the surface, Ringo was just some drummer. But there was a hell of a lot more to him than that.”
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