(The Hit Hammer is where I'm reviewing each #1 song on the Billboard Hot 100. Starting from when the chart started in 1958 and eventually working my way to the present. To see my inspiration and more information about this blog, please CLICK HERE)
The Beatles - "All You Need Is Love"
Hit Number 1: August 19, 1967
Stay at Number 1: 1 Week
In 1967, there was the first live, and international satellite television program that was to be broadcast to 19 different nations. It's estimated to have had around 400 to 700 million people who watched it from around the globe. The program was called Our World, and though the broadcast is still recalled by many, a lot of the acts from it have been forgotten over time. One that has stood the test of time was the UK's contribution to the program. Their contribution was the Beatles performing their, at the time, never-before-heard song "All You Need Is Love". That was the conclusion of the Our World program, and once again, the Beatles scored themselves a #1 hit afterwards. Their performance on Our World was also aided by the release of the Beatles latest album, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, an album filled of nonsensical insanity that reflected everything the Flower Power Movement was all about. "All You Need Is Love" was a continuation of the insanity.
The performance on Our World of "All You Need Is Love" was a psychedelic whirlwind. The Beatles didn't perform the song entirely live, instead playing with a pre-recorded backing track behind them. Members of the Rolling Stones, the Who, and the Small Faces also appeared in the Beatles performance wearing psychedelic attire, and signs and streamers were littered all over the place. It was the door to the Beatles "weird era", and the recorded version of the song was included on the Beatles next album Magical Mystery Tour, which is an even stranger album than Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
Anyway, before the Beatles signed on to perform on Our World, they were asked to come up with a song that everyone could understand. Both John Lennon and Paul McCartney worked on their own respective songs, and Lennon's "All You Need Is Love" was picked over McCartney's "Your Mother Should Know". The Beatles manager at that time, Brian Epstein, said of "All You Need Is Love": "It was an inspired song and they really wanted to give the world a message. The nice thing about it is that it cannot be misinterpreted. It is a clear message saying that love is everything." That's a pretty accurate statement. "All You Need Is Love" is about as simple as it gets. It's a song conveying the message that love is all anyone ever needs; it's literally the title of the song. Lennon added that the simple nature of the song was inspired by his liking of slogans and advertising.
"All You Need Is Love" is SO simple, that it's hardly even a song. And it's a really strange song. There's a confusing state of flowery schmaltz that the song is soaked in. It's one that is forever tied to its moment of war protests and Flower Power stuff. I take back what I said about "Windy" being the Summer of Love anthem. When there is a song that the biggest humanitarian in the history of music (John Lennon) obsesses with the idea of love being all you need, DURING the Summer of Love, I think you have to give that song the title. You could look at that as being a good thing, or a bad thing. Because again, "All You Need Is Love" is a weird song, and it's lost in its moment. The other Beatles chant "Love, love, love" in a way that sounds straight out of a nursery rhyme of some kind, and the lyrics that Lennon sings aren't anything too impressive. They achieved the goal of making a simple song for every one to understand, but the end result is something that sounds like a 5-year old came up with it. The ending coda goes on for way too long, and the sudden burst of nostalgia for early-Beatles times appears when McCartney starts singing "She Loves You" while the song is fading out. It's a freaky drug trip crammed into a song.
I'll say that the song isn't terrible, and the chorus is a friendly sing-a-long for anyone to enjoy, but compared to other Beatles hits', "All You Need Is Love" is very weak. It's a limp shrug of a song, not the kind of thing that Lennon should be terribly proud of. I do applaud the effort of bringing people together, and these times were tough. Maybe the public just wanted something that had a great chance of bringing everyone together, and a friendly sing-song, elementary level tune by the top band at the time was something that resonated with them? I don't know, I wasn't alive in 1967. All I can tell you guys from my personal point-of-view is that "All You Need Is Love" doesn't come close to the other songs of the Beatles before hand. On the other hand, it's still a harmless, lighthearted song that claims love to be the only thing we need. It's message brings nothing but positive vibes.
GRADE: 5/10
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