Lunchtime Poll: Which Beatles song could you never forget?
Tuesday, September 24, 2019 at 12:00PM 
This week's new titles on DVD or Blu-Ray are the remake of Child's Play (reviewed), the critically lambasted three generations of Shaft, Luc Besson's latest action flick Anna, and one of the year's true sleeper hits, Danny Boyle's Yesterday. In a freak occurence a failed songwriter (Himesh Patel) wakes up to discover that The Beatles have never existed. He's the only one who remembers their music so he starts passing off their songs as his own and skyrockets to fame. Did you see it? Did you love it, loathe it, or fall somewhere inbetween (*raises own hand*)? Either way there's surely a Beatles song you couldn't ever live without, even if you had to make do with a cover version.
Today's Lunchtime Poll: Which Beatles song is most burned into your memory and which is your favourite?
Reader Comments (36)
She Loves You. They manage to say absolutely everything that needs to be said about the joy of rock 'n' roll in three words, or more accurately one word repeated thrice "Yeah Yeah Yeah"
Runners Up: Help, Revolution, Eleanor Rigby, and George's Something
Most burned into memory: She Loves You, Hey Jude. (Honorable Mention to Ob-La-Di just because of the way my toddler tried to sing it.)
Best: A Day in the Life, Hey Jude, Something, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Something, Eleanor Rigby, And I Love Her.
Hard to choose. I love the Beatles.
The Yellow Submarine movie had an outsized influence on me growing up, so believe it or not: Nowhere Man.
Runners up: Yesterday, Eeanor Rigby, Twist and Shout, Norwegian Wood.
Burned into my memory: Here Comes the Sun.
Favorite: Here Comes the Sun would be up there (as would some others) but it's probably either Day in the Life or Tomorrow Never Knows.
Burned into Memory: Fool on the Hill, Something, Got to Get You Into my Life, If I Fell
Fave/Best: Norwegian Wood, She's Leaving Home, I Wanna Hold Your Hand, Eleanor Rigby
Underrated: I'm Happy Just to Dance With You, I've Just Seen a Face, And Your Bird Can Sing
I love all of these:
I Saw Her Standing There
From Me to You
Hello Goodbye
Here Comes the Sun
The Long and Winding Road
Are we done with the Emmys? The fashions and the speeches were really good.
Hello Goodbye!
I grew up thinking the Beatles were really overrated until I watched The World According to Garp in high school and heard “When I’m 64” for the first time. I loved it instantly and when I looked through the credits and saw who was performing it, my assumptions were totally upended, which sparked a deep dive into their catalog. So “64” is the one I could never forget, favorite is either “Ticket to Ride” or “Cry Baby Cry”...or “Every Little Thing”...or “Another Girl.”
Burned into memory: Wait
Ah, first love. When I was 15, my first love took a cross-country school trip that I couldn't go on. I got Wait stuck in my head, thinking of her, waiting desperately for our reunion. I sang it to myself all summer, and when she returned, she wanted nothing to do with me. I was destroyed.
Favorite is probably Here, There, and Everywhere, but I adore the Beatles, even their truly lesser work.
Lived through - and loved - Beatlemania as a kid in the 60's. Decades later saw McCartney in concert, was awed by the breadth and depth of the combined Beatles/McCartney solo catalogue. A memorable evening as one iconic classic after another.washed over an adoring crowd.
Burned into Memory: She Loves You, I Want to Hold Your Hand, Hey Jude
Favorites: I'll Follow the Sun, I'll Be Back, Eleanor Rigby, Here Comes the Sun, so many more
Probably Hey Jude.
For me, it will forever be "In My Life" if for no other reason than for being able to capture the sound of nostalgia, the actual, honest-to-goodness sound of nostalgia, in just six simple chords.
That, right there, is the power of artistry at its most immaculately simple and honest.
Yesterday the movie - I LOVED IT
Yesterday the song - #1, My mom (RIP) used to sing it to me and today is her birthday. Plus, I heard it live from Paul at an early concert of Paul McCartney and Wings
Eleanor Rigby the movie - Disliked it, Both versions.
Eleanor Rigby the song - #2, makes me cry every time
Other favs: Back in the USSR, Long and Winding Road,
Eleanor Rigby, and it's not close
Shit, there's too many of their songs burned in my memory as my dad was a big fan of them though I'm sure he would've hated Yesterday for how the music is presented.
After giving it some thought, I have to add:
I Saw Her Standing There, I'll Cry Instead, A Hard Day's Night, Paperback Writer, I Am the Walrus, Lady Madonna, Don't Let Me Down, Birthday, Piggies, Happiness Is a Warm Gun, Oh Darling! and their covers of Long Tall Sally and Rock and Roll Music
She's Leaving Home.
Probably Hey Jude. So many to choose from.
Can't believe I forgot about "In My Life", a song whose beauty and resonance reader Manny has so eloquently expressed.
Hey Jude, Let It Be, or Eleanor Rigby.
I never got into them. When I think of The Beatles’ music, it’s a medley for a 1-800 commercial for a compilation CD that goes “I wanna hold your haaaaaand” / “she loves you yeah, yeah, yeah, she loves you yeah yeah yeah yeah”” / “Hey Jude, don’t make to bad...”
Burned into Memory: Strawberry Fields Forever and Twist and Shout.
Favourite: Here Comes the Sun.
Most burned into my memory: "Love me do". It was the first song that my dad ask me to translate the lyrics to learn english when i was 13 years old.
Favorite: "Come together", that bass is everything
Special mention: "Because". My favorite song from The Beatles used in a movie. Is the perfect epilogue to American Beauty
Helter Skelter or Sexy Sadie
Haven't seen the movie (yet) but I lived through Beatlemania, and my first album ever was "Help"
followed by Revolver.
Burned into memory: Help, And I love Her, Michelle....many others but you get the idea.
My favourite: Tie between " Let it Be" and "In My Life".
Fun topic, like trying to pick a favourite Gershwin/Cole Porter song. Beatle songs are like wallpaper and then you really listen and realize how poignant some of the lyrics are.
@Roger - you read my mind. That commercial was on TV all the time when I was growing up!
Burned in to memory: I Wanna Hold Your Hand, Yesterday, With a Little Help from my Friends
Favorites: The Long and Winding Road, A Day in the Life, In My Life, Yesterday, And I Love Her, Eleanor Rigby, Here Comes the Sun, I'll Follow the Sun, Blackbird
Overrated: Hey Jude. Great song, for the first 4 minutes, But then it goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and...
Thoroughly enjoyed the movie.
Burned into my head: You've got to hide your love away (sad... I know)
My favorites include Hey Jude, Dear Prudence (it builds upon itself so beautifully), Blackbird (simple and perfect), and Across the Universe.
Still haven't seen Yesterday, but looks like its worth a go. As a Danny Boyle fan, I'm puzzled by the fact that I keep forgetting he directed this.
The Long and Winding Road
Burned: Here Comes the Sun. A good song but so ubiquitous.
Favorite: Strawberry Fields Forever, the Anthology 2 version. This record came out when I was starting to process the psychological abuse of my childhood, just kind of realizing it wasn’t normal. Somehow this song helped a lot. John Lennon was such a genius.
Eleanor Rigby for sure! I don't think I could forget it if I tried, so watching Jack work himself into a tizzy over it was hilarious.
Other favorites are Imagine, Hey Jude, With a Little Help from My Friends, and Revolution 9.
What white nonsense is this...
If I Fell. I was a 16 year-old kid, playing Beatles music on the photograph in my and my brother's room. Something about this ballad made me so hopeful but also sad.
/3rtful -- this is the very first i've heard people complain that loving the Beatles was a skin color thing but whatevs. I'm not a big fan -- I just thought it was a fun question given the movie.
Roger & Thefilmjunkie -- totally! since i never got into them i knew the catchiest songs as they were inescapable. But now that I'm older I have more appreciation for their craft -- though I still think ABBA is the greatest band of all time ;)
Everyone -- my favoties are Ob-li-da and Across the Universe and i'll admit that yesterday gave me a new appreciation of The Long & Winding Road. .
Never a Beatles fan, but there's a Beatles song I've always loved until watching for the first time what would become one of my favorite movies, the musical The Music Man, and discover that "Til There Was You" is not LennonMacCartney! Meredith Willson, creator of the musical, one of the most successful of its time, said he made more money from the band's famous version of the song than with the play and movie (another hit) combined. That's one of the coolest things about them - everybody (or almost) sang / recorded Beatles (from Ella Fitzgerald and Frank Sinatra to Willie Nelson and Liberace) and then, people like me, who aren't fans of the sound they made, can enjoy what they did. I love Across The Universe soundtrack (more than the movie) - its version of Want to Hold Your Hand is jaw-dropping.