The word in question is love–but John is not actually singing a love song. There is no boy or girl, no relationship, no sadness and heartbreak, it’s all abstract, about the importance of the word love. An unusual topic for a pop song–to write it about a word.
It’s heavily religious, in a gospel happy-clappy way, drawing perhaps on John and Paul’s Sunday school days and church services about the Good Book, what happened in the beginning, have you heard, the word is love, have you seen the light.
What made them suddenly turn to these religious metaphors? It could well have been marijuana, smoking all those joints, or LSD, which we are told can lead to religious and spiritual visions. Peace and love, man, that’s what it’s all about.
The hippie generation had not yet been defined, the word hippie was not yet in widespread use, and the Summer of Love had yet to start, but in this song in 1965 John and Paul were foretelling what was to come, what a whole generation would be associated with–Love and Peace, plus drugs. It was the Beatles’ first message song, though at the time it sort of seeped out, eased out, rather than hit you over the head.
‘It’s the marijuana period,’ so John admitted later. ‘It’s love and peace. The word is love, right?’
The music itself seems at first to be mainly on one note–which is what Paul had been talking about in that London Life interview. It begins like a dirge, reminiscent of an India raga, and perhaps reflected George’s new interest, but then settles down into a more conventional pop song, accessible to all.
It is mainly John’s, but he and Paul completed it together at Kenwood–and having finished it, they rolled a joint to celebrate.
Instead of writing the words out quickly on any old sheet of paper so they wouldn’t forget them, they found some crayons–so Paul remembered in 1997 when talking to Barry Miles–and produced an illuminated manuscript, the first time they had ever done so.* The words are in Paul’s handwriting, highly decorated in a sort of psychedelic purple-red, with trees and abstract shapes. The lettering is very neat, considering they were getting high, though in the fourth line Paul wrote ‘love is love’ instead of ‘word is love’ and had to correct it. D.H. Hoek, Head of the Music Library at Northwestern, who has examined the manuscript very carefully, says that the decorations are in fact in watercolour with some felt-pen marks–not crayons as Paul had remembered.
Say the word and you’ll be free
Say the word and be like me
Say the word I’m thinking of
Have you heard the word is love?
It’s so fine, It’s sunshine
It’s the word, love
In the beginning I misunderstood
But now I’ve got it, the word is good
Spread the word and you’ll be free
Spread the word and be like me
Spread the word I’m thinking of
Have you heard the word is love?
It’s so fine, It’s sunshine
It’s the word, love
Everywhere I go I hear it said
In the good and the bad books that I have read.
Now that I know what I feel must be right
I’m here to show everybody the light
Give the word a chance to say
That the word is just the way
It’s the word I’m thinking of
And the only word is love
It’s so fine, It’s sunshine
It’s the word, love