The Beatles Bookstore

Run for Your Life by The Beatles

John’s turn today, although he said in a Rolling Stone interview that he didn’t like the song much:

I never liked ‘Run for Your Life,’ because it was a song I just knocked off. It was inspired from …“Baby, Let’s Play House.” There was a line on it…”I’d rather see you dead, little girl, than to be with another man” – so I wrote it around that but I didn’t think it was that important.

In fact, in the early ‘70s he said that it was his least favorite Beatles song, although he knew that George liked it a lot.

There is an interesting lineage for the song, however, that started with a country and western song written for Eddy Arnold in 1951, “I Want to Play House with You.”

Four years later, that song title had morphed into “Baby, Let’s Play House.”

This was a song written for Elvis Presley by a young songwriter named Arthur Gunter.  His song included the following lines:

Now listen to me baby
Try to understand
I’d rather see you dead, little girl
Than to be with another man

The Gunter song was an unambiguous “I want you” song. Ten years later (1965) Lennon, however, remembered a couple lines from it, and made them the centerpiece for a song about a “wicked guy” who was “born with a jealous mind.”  It’s an interesting case study in how derivative music can be, and I’ve talked here before about how the Beatles listened to everything they could get their hands on, then made it their own.  

For this derivative, “knocked off” song, John sang lead, Paul and George did the harmonies, and everyone played their regular instruments with the exception that John had both electric and acoustic tracks on the song to go along with George’s energetic lead and Paul’s bass.

Flash forward over 55 years to a time when the nation has been running for its collective life, and we all are working to adapt the best we can to the new reality.

From:

When We Find Ourselves in Times of Trouble: The Beatles

(All their songs with encouraging words for challenging times)

By Tim Hatfield

[Go to www.amazon.com, search “Tim Hatfield Beatles” and download the free app to read the ebook on your device]