The Beatles: I Feel Fine

Recorded on 18 October 1964 and released on 27 November 1964. Backed with "She's a Woman"

George Martin, producer. Norman Smith, engineer.

The Beatles: John Lennon (voice & rhythm guitar), Paul McCartney (voice & bass guitar), George Harrison (lead guitar), and Ringo Starr (drums).

The Beatles. 1988.The Beatles: Past Masters - Volume One [14]. London: EMI Records Ltd. [Parlophone CDP & 90043 2].

Lennon: I suppose it has a bit of a country-and-western feel about it, but then so have a lot of our songs. The middle eight is the most tuneful part, to me, because it's a typical Beatles bit.

McCartney: "I'm in love with her, and I feel fine" will be the catch phrase and the selling point.
[Ray Coleman. 7 November 1964. John and Paul Feel Fine about their New Single. Melody Maker: 3.]

McCartney: John had a semi-acoustic Gibson guitar. It had a pick-up on it so it could be amplified. John and George both had them; we used to call them Everly Brothers because they were very similar to the ones the Everly Brothers had used and we liked the Everlys a lot. It was mainly an acoustic guitar. They only used a tiny bit of electric, just for colour. If you turned it up too much you don't get string noise, so the engineers and George Martin used to strike a balance between the colour of the electric thing and the natural acoustic. It's a coloured acoustic.

We were just about to walk away to listen to a take when John leaned his guitar against an amp. I can still see him doing it. He really should have turned the electric off. It was only on a tiny bit, and John just leaned against the amp when it went "Nnnnnnwahhhhh!" And we went, "What's that? Voodoo!" "No, it's feedback." "Wow, it's a great sound!" George Martin was there so we said, "Can we have that on the record?" "Well, I suppose we could, we could edit it on the front." It was a found object, an accident caused by leaning the guitar against the amp.

The song itself was more John's than mine. We sat down and co-wrote it with John's original idea. John sang it, I'm on harmonies and the drumming is basically what we used to think of as "What'd I Say" drumming. There was a style of drumming on "What'd I Say" which is sort of Latin R&B that Ray Charles's drummer Milt Turner played on the original record and we used to love it. One of the big clinching factors about Ringo as the drummer in the band was that he could really play that so well." (Miles 1997: 172)

	Section	Time	Meas.	Description	Text
	intro	0:00	8	guitar riff	—
A	verse	0:	6	solo vocal over ensemble	a
	refrain	:	4	vocal harmony with soloist on hook	b
A	verse	:	6	as in verse above	c
	refrain	:	4	as in refrain above	b
B	chorus	:	8	vocal harmony with soloist followed by vocal support	d
A	verse	:	6	as in verse above	e
	refrain	:	4	as in refrain above	f
(A)	verse	:	6	guitar solo	—
	intro	:	8	guitar riff	—
A	verse	:	6	as in verse above	c
	refrain		4	as in refrain above	b
B	chorus		8	vocal harmony with soloist followed by vocal support	d
A	verse		6	as in verse above	e
	refrain		4	as in refrain above	f
	coda		3+	as in refrain above; repeat and fade	f

Text
Baby's good to me you know she's happy as can be, You know she said so.	a
I'm in love with her and I feel fine.	b
Baby says she's mine you know she tells me all the time, you know she said so.	c
I'm so glad that she's my little girl, She's so glad, she's tellin' all the world.	d
That her baby buys her things you know he buys her diamond rings, You know she said so.	e
She's in love with me and I feel fine.	f

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Lennon & McCartney	Outline	Bit of Work
	04-Sep-2009