John – lead
vocals, rhythm guitar
Paul – harmony and backing vocals, bass
George – harmony and backing vocals, lead guitar
Ringo – drums
On 16 August 1960, John, Paul and George, together with Stuart Sutcliffe and Pete Best, set sail from Harwich for 16 weeks in Hamburg. As the newly christened “Beatles”, they would play up to six hour-long sets every night at the Indra Club and the Kaiserkeller.
Towards the end of their stint they became friends with an English performer at the Top Ten Club on the nearby Reeperbahn, Tony Sheridan. Sheridan was a seasoned performer and would play more bluesy material that appealed to the budding songsters. During their half-hour breaks, the Beatles would join Sheridan and his band on-stage at the Top Ten – a move that prompted the owner of the Indra and Kaiserkeller, Bruno Koschmider, to cancel their contract.
During their second spell in Hamburg – 92 nights at the Top Ten Club – the following spring, the Beatles made their professional recording debut. Produced by the German bandleader Bert Kaempfert (still hot from spending three weeks at the top of the Billboard charts in January with ‘Wonderland By Night’), John, Paul, George and Pete backed Sheridan on rocky versions of ‘My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean’ and ‘When The Saints Go Marching In’. As Paul explained the following year, it “got to number five in the German hit parade but … didn’t do a thing over here.” Not, that is, until re-released in 1963 when it entered the lower reaches of the chart while ‘From Me To You’ was at the top. “It wasn’t a very good record, but the Germans must have liked it a bit,” he added.
At that first recording session, the group also recorded ‘Ain’t She Sweet’ with John singing lead, and the Harrison-Lennon instrumental ‘Cry For A Shadow’. ‘Ain’t She Sweet’, when released in June 1964, spent three weeks at number 29 in the UK charts. ‘Cry For A Shadow’, the first original Beatles composition to be recorded in a studio (with George taking top billing!) was also the first Beatles composition to be released. It appeared, along with ‘When The Saints’, ‘My Bonnie’ and ‘Why’, on a French Polydor EP, Mister Twist, credited to Tony Sheridan. The Beatles also recorded three more songs with Sheridan, ‘Nobody’s Child’, ‘If You Love Me Baby’ (also known as ‘Take Out Some Insurance On Me, Baby’) and, to give it its full title, ‘Why (Can’t You Love Me Again)’. John and Paul seem to have drawn inspiration from this last track, composed by Sheridan and Bill Crompton, for their own ‘Ask Me Why’ (though Paul concedes ‘Ask Me Why’ is mostly John’s). Both songs have a strong I–iii–ii (E–G#m–F#m) hook and make use of prominent blocked harmony backing vocals. Both songs also switch from ballad to an R&B-style section reminiscent of ‘Chains’.
More obviously, the song owes a debt to the Miracles. ‘What’s So Good About Good Bye’, for example, has a similar melodic and harmonic feel, and the guitar arrangements and falsetto leaps in the two songs are very similar. (The Smokey Robinson composition also mentions ‘misery’ and ‘tell me why’ …)
‘Ask Me Why’ was first recorded on 6 June 1962, during the first session for EMI, along with ‘Love Me Do’ and ‘P.S. I Love You’. Having impressed George Martin, and cut their first single, they went back into the studio on 26 November to record the follow-up. ‘Please Please Me’ was to be the A-side, but ‘Ask Me Why’ was not picked for the B-side until a third song recorded during that November session, Paul’s ‘Tip Of My Tongue’, was rejected. George Martin said he was unhappy with the arrangement of this song, but the problem was not really with the arrangement. It was given to the bête noire of the Epstein stable, Tommy Quickly. His version, released in July 1963, sank without trace. (John later gave the song short shrift: “That’s another piece of Paul’s garbage, not my garbage”, and even Mark Lewisohn is uncharacteristically scathing: “They weren’t doing Quickly much of a favour: the song was terrible.”)
‘Ask Me Why’ is undoubtedly a better song, though far from perfect. Lyrically it is somewhat unfocussed and is uncomfortably padded – the first verse could be expressed equally well at half its length, and the ‘dear’ in the second verse is misplaced to say the least. Nevertheless it has humour and word-play, and is nicely ambiguous, even in its title. The unconventional structure is also interesting, with its sections of uneven length, giving it a stream-of-consciousness feeling. The delicate G# minor seventh chord that caps the song, extended over the fade, adds a welcome, jazzy touch to the ending.
The two mono mixes of the song are virtually indistinguishable – it’s unclear why George Martin made a second version when it came to mixing the tracks for the LP. The original mix was used for the Parlophone single, and the Vee Jay single in the US. The later mono mix was used for the Please Please Me and the Vee Jay Introducing… The Beatles LPs, and, presumably, for all CD releases of the song. (The song was not on the original issue of the Vee Jay LP, which had included ‘Love Me Do’ and ‘P.S. I Love You’. But the rights to these two songs were owned by Capitol, and so Vee Jay were compelled to replace them with ‘Please Please Me’ and ‘Ask Me Why’.) When Capitol finally acquired the rights to all Vee Jay’s Beatles songs, including ‘Ask Me Why’, and released the 1965 The Early Beatles LP, they simply folded together the stereo mixes of all the tracks to create the mono version of the album.
The group performed ‘Ask Me Why’ during their second appearance on BBC radio, the first Lennon-McCartney original to be played on the BBC. The show, the Light Programme’s Here We Go, was broadcast on 15 June 1962, and marked the last BBC performance by Pete Best as the group’s drummer. Their final performance of the track for the BBC, for Pop Go The Beatles on 24 September 1963, appears on Live At The BBC Volume 2.
Here We Go was the first BBC programme to include a performance by the Beatles, in an edition broadcast on 8 March 1962. By the time their gave their last BBC performance on 7 June 1965, the group had racked up 53 shows, with 275 performances of 88 different songs. On 16 July 1963, they taped 18 songs – as well as the usual banter with presenter Rodney Burke – for three editions of Pop Go The Beatles in under eight hours. After slotting in to existing programmes such as Saturday Club and Parade Of The Pops, the Beatles were soon hosting their own shows, starting with Pop Go The Beatles in June 1963, presented by Rodney Burke. Just four Pop Go The Beatles programmes were initially scheduled, although the BBC eventually made 15 of them before the series ended on 24 September. The group also hosted four holiday specials between Boxing Day 1963 and August bank holiday 1964, under the title From Us To You.
It’s easy to underestimate the impact of the BBC on pop music at the time. As there was no local radio and no commercial radio, the occasional popular music show on the BBC’s Light Programme, fitting in between shows such as The Archers, Housewives’ Choice and The Navy Lark, attracted huge audiences. For example, between 10 am and noon every Saturday, some ten million tuned in to listen to Brian Matthew present Saturday Club. Little wonder Brian Epstein had approached the BBC seeking an audition for the Beatles back on 10 January 1962 – two weeks before he had officially become their manager.