Oh! Darling

"Believe me when I tell you

I'll never do you no harm..."

Over the years I have met many boring people in pubs who have opined, after their third pint of Too Familiar, that Paul McCartney's songs are 'less emotional' than John Lennon's due to Paul's supposed love of musical pastiche and the occasional Vaudevillian curlicue.

I usually greet these claims with a massive yawn.

'Oh! Darling' is about as raw (roar?) as it gets for me. I don't think there are many singers who could divide just one word - 'died' at 1.37 - into two such distinct halves: the first a Little Richard-esque squall, the second a wounded, boyish plea.

Paul experimented with a lot of vocal takes for this track over a number of weeks. Apparently, he would try it only once a day, believing the final version should be a first take. The unused Take 26 didn't make it onto the anthologies, but has been knocking around for years and gives us access to a very different performance - all soft and tremulous (or shot, maybe) on the second chorus. Fucking phwooargh.

Anuses like me may have noticed a slight bass fluff or edit on the finished version at 0.52, which you can hear clearly by panning the balance on your amp hard right. This will also expose George Harrison's sneering chorus lead in all its glory. I love that riff - so dry, stark as fuck, satisfyingly nasty, almost like the Telecaster equivalent of Herrmann's 'Psycho' stabs.

One thing that will always grieve me; however, is that 'Oh! Darling' is followed by 'Octopus's Garden'. Surely the sequencing equivalent of a whoopee cushion at a funeral.

John Lennon said:

"'Oh! Darling' was a great one of Paul's that he didn't sing too well. I always thought I could have done it better—it was more my style than his. "

Wanker.