“Help!” is one of the biggest hits John Lennon wrote for The Beatles. However, the lyrics have more meaning than many may have realized. The track expressed many of Lennon’s insecurities, and he even admitted to being “insecure” while writing the track.
John Lennon wrote The Beatles ‘Help!’ as an actual cry for help
In 1965, Beatlemania was at its peak. The band was benefitting from unprecedented success. However, Lennon wasn’t overjoyed as the success overwhelmed him and caused him to experience intense pressure and stress. In an interview with Playboy in 1980. Lennon said the insecurity he felt over The Beatles’ success manifested itself in “Help!”, which he wrote in his “fat, Elvis period.”
“When ‘Help!’ came out, I was actually crying out for help,” Lennon shared. “Most people think it’s just a fast rock ‘n’ roll song. I didn’t realize it at the time; I just wrote the song because I was commissioned to write it for the movie. But later, I knew I really was crying out for help. So it was my fat Elvis period.”
A comment from a journalist made him insecure about his talent
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“Help!” was primarily written by John Lennon, but he did receive some assistance from the Beatles’ songwriting partner Paul McCartney. The pair showed the track to John’s first wife, Cynthia Lennon, and his journalist friend, Maureen Cleave.
“I turned up at John’s house for a writing session and saw the opportunity to add a descant [melody in the second verse],” McCartney explained to Billboard. “We finished it quite quickly; we went downstairs and sang it to John’s wife at the time, Cynthia, and a journalist he was friendly with called Maureen Cleave. We were very pleased with ourselves.”
According to Lennon, Cleave had asked him why he couldn’t write songs with more than one syllable. Lennon specifically put words with two or three syllables in “Help!” to please the journalist, but she still wasn’t satisfied, causing Lennon to become even more insecure about his talent.
“So in ‘Help!’ there are two- or three-syllable words, and I very proudly showed them to her, and she still didn’t like them,” Lennon told David Sheff of Playboy. “I was insecure then, and things like that happened more than once. I never considered it before. So after that, I put a few words with three syllables in, but she didn’t think much of them when I played it for her, anyway.”
While Lennon had his doubts, ‘Help!’ turned out to be a huge hit
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“Help!” was released as a single by The Beatles in 1965 and is the title track of the 1965 film and its soundtrack. The track peaked at No. 1 on the charts in the U.K. and the U.S. and remained at the top of the charts for three weeks. While Cleave appeared to have an issue with it, that wasn’t the case with audiences, as it was a tremendous success.
Additionally, the movie Help! and its soundtrack also proved to be a hit for The Beatles, even if filming the movie was a pain for many of the band members. Still, it was a box office success, and the soundtrack reached No. 1 in multiple countries.
