A HARD DAY'S NIGHT

A Hard Day's Night is quite a milestone in the history of the Beatles. Firstly, it's the first album with only self-written compositions (and the only Beatles album with nothing but Lennon/McCartney songs on it), and that itself was quite remarkable in a time when most other bands performed songs written by other people. Secondly, it is a big step forward in terms of songwriting, containing songs that sound much more accomplished than most of their previous work. Several of the songs have a level of sophistication not heard in their 1962-63 output. Even if earlier songs like "Not a Second Time", "She Loves You", "I Want To Hold Your Hand" et al contains several "unorthodox" harmonic patterns (said classical music critics who judged the music in terms of the traditional functional harmony that is characteristic of European art music from approximately 1600 and onwards), they can not match the sophistication heard f.e. in "If I Fell", "Things We Said Today" or "I'll Be Back". Back to this later.

The background for the album was the film of the same name, directed by Richard Lester. It is a rather humorous, often ironic, picture of a day in the life of the Beatles during the height of Beatlemania. The title came about after a particularly hard day of film recording when Ringo sarcastically said: "It's been a hard day's night". After "A Hard Day's Night" was decided as the film title, John Lennon rushed to write the song before Paul McCartney did the same.

Of the 13 songs on the album, 7 were used in the film, and these are packed together on side 1 whereas side 2 contains other songs. This format was later repeated with the Help! album in 1965, as well as the American album version of Magical Mystery Tour. At this stage, Lennon wrote the majority of songs, and on this album he has written 10 out of 13 songs altogether. The three McCartney songs ("And I Love Her", "Can't Buy Me Love" and "Things We Said Today"), on the other hand, are all among the very best early Beatles songs.

The album starts off with a bang. Or to be precice, with the chiming guitar chord that preceeds the title song. According to the legend, the chord more or less came "by accident" in the studio during the recording, and it is so complex that even music analytics have different views as to how it should be analyzed (either as a G7add9sus4, a G7sus4 or a G11sus4). The chord is repeated in the fade-out as an arpeggio figure, and in a way it foreshadows the psychedelic period of Revolver and Sgt. Pepper. The actual song is all in all a fairly conventional Beatles song of that time, but it's quite an infectious one, probably with the shift from Paul's singing in the middle eight back to John in the verse as the highpoint in terms of musical energy. Of course it was another number 1 hit.

The rest of side 1 is generally solid, even if not all songs are equally interesting. "I Should Have Known Better" is rather anonymous, and the lyrics - by Lennon's own admission - mean nothing. "Tell Me Why" has a very infectuous and energetic drive, but in many ways it is a good example of how the Beatles could make a minor song sound better than it actually is - the melody is rather monotonous, repeating the same 2-3 notes over and over again. "I'm Happy Just To Dance With You" is actually quite interesting with its major/minor ambiguity, but George Harrison's rather anonymous singing drags it down somewhat.

The songs from side 1 that really stand out, apart from the title song, are "Can't Buy Me Love", "And I Love Her" and "If I Fell". The first is one of their simplest hits, based mainly on the standard 12 bar blues form and containing no backing vocals, but the title phrase resembles "She Loves You" in catchiness, and it starts the song in the very much same manner. It also has a stellar vocal performance by Paul. "And I Love Her" is the first real Beatles ballad, and it is a magnificent example of Paul McCartney as a melodist, containing a wonderfully dynamic melody that spands over an octave plus a fourth.

And then there is "If I Fell" whose intro has a rather unusual harmonic structure. Beginning with a chord (D sharp minor, or D#m) that is not the tonic, the harmonic base (C sharp major or C#) is not clear from the start, but if we had already assumed C# to be the main key, the most obvious thing would have been to go from D#m through G# to C#. Instead the second cord is a D major natural, allowing Lennon to keep some of the same melody notes, plus allowing a chromatic descending movement in the bass. The D#m to D pattern is repeated in the 5. and 6. bar, but this time the D major chord leads to an Em, and via A we go back to D, thus establishing D major as the main key in the rest of the song. In the contest of pop music, this is quite extraordinary.

The songs on side 2 tend to have a somewhat darker mood, but they are by no means less interesting, perhaps with the exception of "Any Time At All" and "When I Get Home". Both songs are still well written, and in general there is no bad song on the album. "Any Time At All" is one of many many Beatles songs to contain the minor subdominant (that is, a minor chord on the 4th step, which is usually in major if the main key is also major). "When I Get Home" repeats the "Whoo ooh-whoo-I" phrase from the second and third verses of "I Should Have Known Better", but the composition is pretty dynamic, among other things because the verse and chorus are in different keys.

But "I'll Cry Instead" is the Beatles' first attemt at incorporating country and western, something which would be more common in Beatles For Sale and Help!. At the same time the lyrics show signs of a more vulnerable side of Lennon (the title phrase, as wel as "I get shy when they start to stare"). "I'll Be Back" is especially successful for its elegant mix of major and minor. But whereas it is most common to switch between parallel keys (f.e. between C major and its minor parallel which is A minor), "I'll Be Back" switches between major and minor in the same key. It even underlines the lyrics: F.e. in the first line the narrator says that "If you break my heart I'll go", and here we are in minor, but as the words continue with "But I'll be back again", the music changes to major. It is beautifully underlined by the excellent vocal harmonies. The result is a song of very ambiguous emotional signals, and thus a clear sign that Lennon and McCartney were growing musically and taking more chances.

"You Can't Do That", originally released as the B-side of "Can't Buy Me Love", is based on the blues form like its A-side, but contains a more bitter tone. Like "I'll Cry Instead" it shows signs of a deeper emotional level ("I can't help my feelings, I go out of my mind"). Sadly, the song is also a clear product of a rather patriarchal thinking: "If I catch you talking to that boy again, I'm gonna let you down". The sexist undertones would sadly get even worse on Rubber Soul with a song like "Run For Your Life", but fortunately Lennon later dismissed the latter for the same reason; Yoko Ono probably taught him a lesson or two. Thankfully it's not the purpose of art to be moralizing, and "You Can't Do That" remains a great song and, in particular, a magnificent performance by The Beatles. Lennon sounds like he really means every word, and the raw, almost punky, guitar solo (probably played by Lennon himself) almost sounds desparate. George Harrison shoud also be praised for the riff that introduces the song and which also underlines its musical tension by emphasizing the major/minor ambiguity that lies in blues harmony.

And then, finally, there is "Things We Said Today", the B-side of the title track, and possibly the album's best song. Once again it is due to a sophisticated harmonic structure, and just like "I'll Be Back" it plays with major and minor (the verse/chorus is in minor whereas the middle eight is in major, in the same key). The first really interesting thing happens in the 5th and 6th bar of the verse. The main key is A minor, but in the 5th bar we go to its parallel chord C major. Instead of leading directly back to A minor, it leads further away through F major to B flat major (Bb), thus corresponding to text lines such as "Wishing you weren't so far away" and "Some day when we're dreaming". But then, from the Bb in "far away", we go directly back to A-minor (Am), that is, back home, back to reality. The (Bb to Am sequence adds a touch of the Phrygian mode. And then comes the chorus which begins in A major, so here we have the same minor/major interplay as in "I'll Be Back".

In conclusion, A Hard Day's Night is a really interesting LP, and one that is pointing adhead in many ways. The Beatles were still playing simple dance pop, but there are things happening under the surface that should also satisfy the average prog fan - even if A Hard Day's Night is by no means a prog album. Also, the album was the proof that the Beatles were not just the throwaway music of the moment. The songs have a lasting quality, and they prove that pop does not necessarily have to mean standardized.