4 Beatles Songs That the Fab Four Famously Hated

When you’re part of the biggest rock band of the 20th century, it’s pretty easy to get sick of at least a few of your biggest songs. For most of the members of The Beatles, quite a few songs in their discography were worthy of being hated from the get-go. Let’s take a look at just a few songs that The Beatles produced and famously hated!

1. “Birthday”

Paul McCartney was inspired to pen this classic rock track after watching the 1956 film The Girl Can’t Help It. “Birthday” ended up making it to the third side of The Beatles’ White Album. McCartney, interestingly enough, spoke fondly of the song in later years. John Lennon, however, was not a fan of the song at all.

“‘Birthday’ was written in the studio,” said Lennon. “[…] I think Paul wanted to write a song like ‘Happy Birthday Baby’, the old ’50s hit. But it was sort of made up in the studio. It was a piece of garbage.”

2. “Little Child”

The Beatles hated mostly their throwaway songs, but this one was more neglected and unrespected than hated. And sadly for Ringo Starr, quite a few songs that McCartney and Lennon didn’t want to use themselves went straight to their drummer. Not everyone can be a multi-level threat, after all. Starr was a great drummer, but his singing ability was limited. “Little Child” ended up featuring the vocals of Lennon and McCartney, but it was originally given to Starr for the album With The Beatles.

“‘Little Child’ was a work job,” said McCartney of the track. “Certain songs were inspirational and you just followed that. Certain other songs were, ‘Right come on, two hours, song for Ringo for the album.’”

3. “It’s Only Love”

Both McCartney and Lennon hated this song from Help!, and we kind of understand why. It’s a little bit of a bummer.

“I always thought it was a lousy song_,” said Lennon of “It’s Only Love”. “The lyrics were abysmal. I always hated that song. That’s the one song I really hate of mine.”

“Sometimes we didn’t fight it if the lyric came out rather bland on some of those filler songs like ‘It’s Only Love’,” said McCartney. “If a lyric was really bad we’d edit it, but we weren’t that fussy about it, because it’s only a rock ‘n’ roll song.”

4. “Mean Mr. Mustard”

The majority of The Beatles’ famed White Album was written while studying Transcendental Meditation in India back in 1968. It was a spiritual and special time for The Beatles, but it did yield at least a couple of songs that the band hated. One noteworthy track would be Lennon’s “Mean Mr. Mustard”, which eventually made it to their later album Abbey Road.

“That’s me, writing a piece of garbage,” said Lennon of the song. 

Photo by Bettman/Getty Images

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