Just wanted to say that The Beatles’ Love Me Do kicks ass - awesome harmonies and that harmonica…well, yeah. John knew a thing or two about music. And Paul too.
And shit.
The fascinating thing about “Love Me Do” – particularly since it was The Beatles’ first recorded original work on their own (if you discount the instrumental “Cry for a Shadow”) – is that it’s virtually impossible to characterize either John’s or Paul’s vocal part as the melody.
Both parts are completely integral to one another and to the song. Listen sometime to the Hollyridge Strings version of “Love Me Do,” which has the violins playing only Paul’s high part. It sounds completely wrong, almost like a different song.
Seriously? I think “Love Me Do” is one of the Beatles’ most inane and boring songs. And that’s saying something.
Historically it’s an important part of the Beatles discography, of course, but if I were to make a CD-length playlist of my favourite Beatles songs I don’t think it’d make the list. Maybe if it were a double-CD.
I do absolutely love the harmonica though.
And Ringo plays history’s shortest drum solo in the middle.
For a seemingly simple harp part, there’s a lot to discuss about it. . .much like everything the Beatles did, I guess. It isn’t a given for even knowledgeable harp players to know what instrument he was playing - takes some thinking and detective work. I put it down to people not expecting John to be playing a chromatic.
Is this the version? I’ve always heard the high part as the melody, so this sounds completely normal to me.
Anyhow, Love Me Do is, indeed, a very charming song from the early Beatles catalog, where you can hear the Beatles beginning to gently play around with the pop form (like with the quirky 13-bar verse format, the melody playing around between myxolydian mode and straight major between the verse and the bridge, etc.) Not their most sophisticated work, by far, but full of personality and already a subtle portent of things to come from these four.
Yeah, it’s definitely a chromatic. There was a thread on the harp part a couple weeks ago. It never occurred to me to think that it was played on a chromatic (I always played it on a diatonic), but it’s bloody obvious when you listen to it with that knowledge in mind. In fact, after reading that it was played on a chromatic, I had a :smack: moment. It should have been obvious from first listen, just unexpected.
Are you sure it’s Ringo? The single was, hmm, Alan White? A session drummer that George Martin was comfortable with and had decided upon simply because he didn’t trust this new kid recruited from from Rory Storm and the Hurricanes, given the Lads’ track record with plodding Pete Best…
ETA: my view on the song is basically the same as **multimediac17’s **- but also have to point out Lennon’s little bit of vocal urgency at the end - just a hint of cutting loose.
I agree with DChord568 about the vocal. I think that the same thing happens in If I Fell, where neither part seems to stand out as the melodic line.
I think Love Me Do was important as a first single because it showed right out of the gate that they were going to do something quite different with the Everly Brothers vocal model. They had the low and high parts mixed equally, like Phil and Don, but they clearly weren’t aiming for Everly sweetness.
From what I have read, both versions of Love Me Do were released. The Ringo version was used in early pressings of the single, while the White version was used for later pressings of the single and the on the album. I think that the way to tell which one you are hearing is that the White version has tambourine in it, played by Ringo, while the Ringo version has no tambourine.
I remember reading in a biography that Lennon shoplifted that harmonica, but can’t remember the book. . .A Twist of Lennon perhaps?
A session drummer was there, but he didn’t play. At most, he may have done one track (I don’t recall the song), but that version was never released.
…and WordMan and Crotalus make both my points bam-bam… 
I still think Ringo’s part’s just fine; I didn’t like that “we’re bringing in the session guy whether you like it or not” thing they did back then. Although now that I think about it, that’s what they did to Pete Best when they brought Ringo in in the first place. Oops.
The Everly Brothers thing’s really interesting since their voices we’re so different, yet this worked so well. It also set the concept of them being a real group, not focused on just one lead singer, something that seemed to have taken hold pretty solidly in the ensuing 48 years… 
The album version on Please Please, Me featured Alan White on the drums.
There is a demo version with Pete Best that was recorded in 1962 that was issued as part of Anthology 1.
The Ringo version (sans tambourine) is available as part of Beatles: Past Masters 1, which was also the early single version, which I believe was replaced by the album version in later pressings.
Early in the Beatles history they were on a tour with Bruce Channel, who had a hit with “Hey, Baby.” Great harp playing by Delbert McClinton. John learned some of those licks, and used them on “Love me, Do.”
Defining harp sound, eh!
Andy White. Alan White is the Plastic Ono Band/Yes drummer.
One thing I like about “Love Me Do” is the reverb in the silence after they sing “PLEEE-EE-EE-EEEASE”.
:smack:
echoing puly: :smack::smack:
For a first song, I think it was very good, and was somehow different than what was the norm in the British charts at the time.
I love the use of the harmonica in it; it’s interesting to see how Lennon’s proficiency at it expanded in Please Please Me and I Should Have Known Better.