US single release: A Hard Day’s Night

The title track of The Beatles debut feature film and fourth US album was released as a single on this day in America.

‘A Hard Day’s Night’ was issued as Capitol 5222. Its b-side was ‘I Should Have Known Better’.

Its parent album had been released by United Artists, who owned the rights to the film. However, Capitol were able to issue the songs in other formats, hence the release of several songs from the soundtrack as singles.

The single entered the US charts five days after its release, and from 1 August spent two weeks at number one. On that day a record was set, as The Beatles held the number one positions in the single and album charts in both the UK and US.

A Hard Day’s Night sold more than a million copies in America in its first five weeks on sale.