Behka’s Breakfast with the Beatles Recap – Week of December 2

Here on the morning show, I decided to start a new segment.  I’m a huge fan of The Beatles, and I’ve found out that a lot of you guys are, too.  So I thought, why not start our day off right at the beginning of the show with a different Beatle song every day?  That’s exactly what I did! However, I know some of you out there aren’t exactly early birds – 6:00 a.m. is pretty dang early, after all.  And some of you might have caught the end of a song or just missed it, and so I thought I’d post some audio and videos of the songs I used each day, and I’ll tell you what I know about em here, too.Monday's tune was a song off the Yellow Submarine soundtrack, "Hey Bulldog."

This song was written and recorded around the same time as the single "Lady Madonna."  It was one of those that they had planned to use, but never ended up on an album.  Then, through a series of business decisions that they may or may not have been happy with, the cartoon for Yellow Submarine was being made and needed songs for an accompanying album.  For the most part, the group was not involved in the film (they didn't even do the voices - those are impersonators.  They only did one little live action filmed bit at the end).   They weren't sure if the movie was going to be any good, as the only thing they  knew about it was that the people involved had been involved with The Flinstones.  So they didn't want to put a huge amount of new material on the album, in case it was a failure.  So this was one of the songs put on the album, and it's not something you'd think would be a throwaway.  It's fun and upbeat, with some off the cuff barking and report from Lennon and McCartney at the end.

Tuesday's song was "You Won't See Me."

This is an album track off of the record Rubber Soul.  The style shows the influence of American music that had been reinforced upon them from their tours in the states the previous year.  The song itself was written by Paul McCartney about his relationship with the actress Jane Asher.  At this time he lived in the Asher family household (with Jane, her parents, and her brother Peter) when he was in London and was having arguments with her while the group was out on tour.

Wednesdays song was "Not A Second Time."

This song was on their second British album, With the Beatles.  It was notable for getting some attention from the press at the time.  The reason why was because the song was critiqued by a formidable music expert for The Times newspaper.  What was surprising  was that the critic liked it, and compared it to some classical music with a use of Aeolian Cadences.  John Lennon, who wrote the song, never did know what an Aeolian Cadence was.

Thursday's song was "The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill."

This song was written during and about the vacation of sorts that The Beatles took to India in 1968. They went on a retreat to Rishikesh and hung out in a kind of summer camp with the guru Maharishi and his group. The point of the retreat was to unplug and recharge and forget about the everyday life, while enjoying the scenery and nature. One person in the group, though, would go out every day and hunt wildlife - endangered stuff, illegal stuff, etc. John Lennon and the others couldn't believe this guy, and did a comical song about it. It features many, many people in the chorus of the song including friends and wives, most notably Yoko Ono.

Friday's song was "A Hard Day's Night."

This version is special because it's one of the half live versions they did for the radio.  It's not all live, in that you can hear them singing against the recorded track (the solo, for example, is not played on guitar and was not re-created live).  There's also some fun little banter included before and after that I thought you'd enjoy.

Happy Beatledom,

Behka