The Top 20 Beatles Songs, #18: “She Loves You”

“She Loves You”

Album (U.S.) : The Beatles’ Second Album (1964)

Composers: Lennon/McCartney

Expertly crafted harmonies and a deceptively simple arrangement make “She Loves You” excruciatingly catchy. The “yeah, yeah yeahs,” “whoas,” and “oohs” make this a quintessential early Beatles hit.

The way the band dives right into the chorus at the beginning of this song is a lot like the way they exploded into international superstardom around the time of its release. The tune was an instant success in Britain, rocketing up the charts and eventually becoming the Beatles’ all-time bestselling single there. Though “She Loves You” was not initially as popular on this side of the pond, it soon became the first of a one-two punch when “I Want to Hold Your Hand” spurred on the British Invasion. “She Loves You” enjoyed some latent success as a result, and it soon became a track on the Beatles’ aptly-named sophomore album, The Beatles’ Second Album. For a song that was supposedly written in a hotel room in a matter of hours, the result is far from shabby.

McCartney has said of the song’s origins, “There was a Bobby Rydell song out at the time “Forget Him” and, as often happens, you think of one song when you write another. We were in a van up in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne. I’d planned an ‘answering song’ where a couple of us would sing ‘she loves you’ and the other ones would answer ‘yeah yeah’. We decided that was a crummy idea but at least we then had the idea of a song called ‘She Loves You’. So we sat in the hotel bedroom for a few hours and wrote it — John and I, sitting on twin beds with guitars.”