Five Beatles Songwriting Tricks

by Matt Blick
The Beatles are known as the most successful music group in music history,
selling over a billion records worldwide. The songwriting partnership
between Lennon and McCartney is legendary. The Beatles collectively were
also songwriting Ninjas, but they employed many tricks that anyone can
add to their songwriting tool box. Here are 5 less obvious examples:
1. Mutate Your Chorus
As well as starting songs with the chorus, some of The Beatles greatest hits
open with a chorus hybrid that previews the title and hooks.
The intro to Help has the same chord progression as the chorus but moves
twice as fast and features the title 4 times (to the choruss 3).
Use this trick and by the time you reach your chorus the listener will be
hooked by the reassuring feeling that theyve heard your song somewhere
before.
Also used on: She Loves You, Cant Buy Me Love.
2. Bluesify Your Melody
We expect to hear blue notes like the b3, b5 and b7th in rockers like Back
In The USSR but the Beatles often added these notes into more melodic
material too.
In Blackbird the final phrase uses the b7 on inTO the LIGHT and the b3
on dark BLACK night.
Tricky to pull off if youre not a confident singer you might want to insert
the blue note into your chord until youve learnt to pitch it correctly. Using it
will add a soulful edge to your melodies.
Also used on: Ticket To Ride, From Me To You.
3. Delay The Root Chord
Starting a song on the tonic chord is a rut the Beatles managed to avoid a
surprising number of times.
Eleanor Rigby starts on C major (the bVI of Em) before heading to the
home chord. Its one of the many things that gives the track such an

immediate sense of tension. Using this trick will give your progressions
more forward momentum.
Also used on: All My Loving, Hello Goodbye.
4. Utilise The Outside Chord
Many of us employ out of key chords (whether we realise it or not!). But
out of 186 Beatles compositions only 22 remain in key!
In Strawberry Fields Forever, Lennon pulls the rug from under the Bb
major tonality by replacing the F major chord with an F minor .
Bb Let me take you down cos Im going Fm to
Its like the stomach drop you experience on the crest of a rollercoaster.
Later he creates a disorientating momentary high by replacing the Gm with
a G major.
Eb Nothing to get G hung about
Outside chords will surprise your listeners and freshen your melodies.
Also used on: I Am The Walrus, Fool On The Hill.
5. Restate Your Lyrics
The Beatles didnt make their lyrics memorable just by repeating sections
wholesale. They also repeated and adapted words, phrases and sentence
structures.
Take A Day In The Life. 4 verses, a middle 8 and only one repeated line.
And yet its memorable (in part) because of lyrical links like these I read the news/saw a film today, oh boy
and though the news was rather sad/holes were rather small
found my way downstairs/coat/way upstairs
I just had to laugh/look
Using this subtle trick will make your lyrics sticky and give a sense of unity
to a track.