4 Beatles Songs John Lennon Deemed ‘Throwaways’
John Lennon was often cynical about his own work, especially once The Beatles ended. There are several songs he loved, had mixed feelings about, or flat-out hated. A few he was indifferent toward, calling them “throwaways,” meaning he didn’t hate them, but he found them forgettable. Here are 4 Beatles songs John Lennon deemed “throwaways.”
‘I Wanna Be Your Man’
“I Wanna Be Your Man” is an interesting track because it’s mainly associated with The Rolling Stones. Paul McCartney and John Lennon went to see the Stones perform and were asked by the band if they could write a song for them. McCartney and Lennon finished the track on the spot, and it became The Rolling Stones’ first hit in the U.K.
The Beatles recorded their own version, but it didn’t perform as well. The song being a hit for the Stones might have surprised Lennon, who thought the track wasn’t good enough for The Beatles.
“It was a throwaway,” Lennon said in a 1980 Playboy interview. “Ringo sang it for us, and the Stones did their version. It shows how much importance we put on them. We weren’t going to give them anything great, right? That was the Stones’ first record.”
‘Glass Onion’
“Glass Onion” is the most meta Beatles song they ever made. It’s a self-referential track that mocks fans who overanalyze every lyric to find hidden messages and themes. For example, Lennon sings “The Walrus is Paul,” referring to the song “I Am the Walrus”, but many fans used this line to further the “Paul is Dead” conspiracy theory.
“That’s me, just doing a throwaway song, à la ‘Walrus,’ à la everything I’ve ever written,” Lennon shared. “I threw the line in — ‘The Walrus was Paul’ — just to confuse everybody a bit more. And I thought ‘Walrus’ has now become me, meaning ‘I am the one.’ Only it didn’t mean that in this song.”
‘Run for Your Life’
“Run for Your Life” is a Beatles song that John Lennon wasn’t particularly fond of. It has questionable lyrics, especially with Lennon’s history of being an abusive partner. He also stole a lyric from Elvis Presley’s “Baby Let’s Play House”. Lennon wasn’t a massive fan of this song, but it was a favorite of George Harrison’s.
“Just a sort of throwaway song of mine that I never thought much of, but it was always a favorite of George’s,” Lennon told David Sheff. “It has a line from an old Presley song: ‘I’d rather see you dead, little girl than to be with another man’ is a line from an old blues song that Presley did once.”
‘And Your Bird Can Sing’
“And Your Bird Can Sing” is from 1966’s Revolver and is unique as it had Harrison and Paul McCartney performing as twin guitar leads. The track features intentionally ambiguous lyrics that John Lennon never explained, but it led to several theories from Beatles fans. Some fans thought it addressed Frank Sinatra, but others thought it addressed Mick Jagger, regarding Marianne Faithful. No matter the theory, Lennon still finds the song forgettable.
“That’s another of my throwaways,” Lennon said. “Fancy paper around an empty box.”
While Lennon wrote some of the most classic rock songs ever, he found some of his work forgettable, while others might consider it genius.
