![\"John](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/John-Lennon-1970s-Far-Out-Magazine-1140x855.jpg\")
<\/p>\n <\/p>\n
(Credits: John Lennon)<\/p>\n
Sat 17 May 2025 19:23, UK <\/p>\n
Finding just one decent singer can be quite the task when throwing together a rock group. Though the Beatles\u2019 success relied on much, much more, the band was inundated with vocal talent. Not only could band leaders Paul McCartney and John Lennon<\/a> whip their lungs around an arresting rock harmony, but lead guitarist George Harrison and drummer Ringo Starr were also fine singers with plenty of credits in the catalogue.\u00a0<\/p>\n Technical ability is, of course, a fundamental attribute when singing in most musical styles. However, as Bob Dylan has demonstrated, one doesn\u2019t need the range of Freddie Mercury to become a successful singer. In the realms of folk and rock \u2018n\u2019 roll, personality and timbre are much more important. As for The Beatles, their voices were both technically competent and brimming with character. <\/p>\n Beatlemaniacs have argued for decades over who was the better singer between Lennon and McCartney. If we take personal bias and songwriting nuances out of the equation, McCartney probably just about had the edge on Lennon, with a dynamic voice suited to soulful ballads like \u2018Let It Be\u2019 and screaming rockouts like \u2018Helter Skelter\u2019<\/a>. <\/p>\n Although most of The Beatles\u2019 catalogue is credited to the Lennon-McCartney partnership, most of the tracks were primarily written by one or the other. Thus, there was usually not too much in the way of argument when it came to deciding who would take the lead vocal in each song. The pair tapped up Starr for several songs in need of his unique voice, like \u2018What Goes On\u2019 and \u2018Yellow Submarine\u2019, but for the most part, the Beatles led the vocals on the material they wrote.\u00a0<\/p>\n Paul McCartney\u2019s vocals on \u2018Oh! Darling\u2019 nearly went to John Lennon\u2026<\/p>\n When it came to recording the larynx-ripping Abbey Road cut \u2018Oh! Darling\u2019 in 1969, the band didn\u2019t deviate from the unwritten rule. As a McCartney composition, McCartney decided that he would record the intense and challenging vocal track<\/a>. \u201cI mainly remember wanting to get the vocal right, wanting to get it good, and I ended up trying each morning as I came into the recording session,\u201d McCartney revealed in Many Years From Now. \u201cI tried it with a hand mike, and I tried it with a standing mike, I tried it every which way, and finally got the vocal I was reasonably happy with.\u201d<\/p>\n Alan Parsons, the recording engineer working on Abbey Road, remembered McCartney\u2019s struggle to perfect the vocal in The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions. \u201cHe only tried it once per day; I suppose he wanted to capture a certain rawness, which could only be done once before the voice changed. I remember him saying, \u2018Five years ago I could have done this in a flash,\u2019 referring, I suppose, to the days of \u2018Long Tall Sally\u2019 and \u2018Kansas City\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n Lennon, who was better versed in raspy yelling vocals, as demonstrated in classic songs like \u2018Yer Blues\u2019, \u2018Don\u2019t Let Me Down\u2019 and \u2018Twist and Shout\u2019, felt that \u2018Oh! Darling\u2019 would have suited his voice much better. \u201c\u2018Oh! Darling\u2019 was a great one of Paul\u2019s that he didn\u2019t sing too well. I always thought that I could\u2019ve done it better \u2013 it was more my style than his,\u201d he told David Sheff. \u201cHe wrote it, so what the hell, he\u2019s going to sing it. If he\u2019d had any sense, he should have let me sing it.\u201d<\/p>\n Still, that kind of push-and-pull was the fuel behind The Beatles\u2019 brilliance. Lennon and McCartney weren\u2019t just writing partners; they were rivals in the best sense. Each pushed the other to dig deeper, shout louder, or, in this case, belt until the vocal cords begged for mercy. It\u2019s easy to imagine Lennon turning in a throat-shredding take that leaned more into bluesy agony, but McCartney\u2019s delivery, honed over mornings of coffee and frustration, gives \u2018Oh! Darling\u2019 its wounded charm.<\/p>\n Besides, there\u2019s something oddly endearing about McCartney working himself hoarse trying to nail a part Lennon probably could\u2019ve knocked out half-drunk. That tension, the ego and effort bleeding into tape, is what made the band so dynamic. Even when they weren\u2019t quite on the same page, the result was often magic.<\/p>\n One can certainly imagine Lennon\u2019s version of the song carrying that nuance of dark intensity with which he\u2019s associated. However, McCartney\u2019s ultimate recording was to use his words \u201ca bit of a belter\u201d. If I were McCartney, I would be much more concerned about the criticisms regarding his \u201cfruity\u201d song<\/a> that preceded \u2018Oh! Darling\u2019 on the album. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n Related Topics<\/p>\n Subscribe To The Far Out Newsletter <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(Credits: John Lennon) Sat 17 May 2025 19:23, UK Finding just one decent singer can be quite the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20201,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3936],"tags":[77,8345,269,4162,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-110157","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-john-lennon","10":"tag-music","11":"tag-the-beatles","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114525587814152070","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110157"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110157\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}