Please Please Me | Fab Forum | The Beatles Bible

I would suggest there has to be some doubt whether a recording of the slow version was ever made, though it has long been suggested, with supporting quotes from George Martin and Ron Richards. However, the question of memory comes into play.

It is known that The Beatles first played it at Abbey Road on 4 September. It was one of six songs they rehearsed during the afternoon before recording Love Me Do  and How Do You Do It  in the evening. The afternoon rehearsal was not recorded, and it is certain that the performance then was the Roy Orbison-style one.

It is then suggested that they recorded the Roy Orbison-style version at the end of the second Love Me Do  session on 11 September. Because the session tapes no longer existed it was easy to take George Martin and Ron Richards’ comments on face value.

However, in 1994 an 11 September recording of Please Please Me  was discovered (and included on Anthology 1 ). It is nothing like Roy Orbison-style. In fact, it could be described as 85-90% on the way to the final version.

Now, the story goes that, after recording the Orbison version, GM suggested at the end of the session that they go away and work on the tempo of the song. Now, the tempo of the known 11 September recording suggests to me that they had been working on it.

It seems to me that it is most likely that GM’s comments were made following hearing it being rehearsed on the 4 September, and when they arrive on 11 September, they show him they have a new up-tempo arrangement at the end of the session. He still doesn’t think it’s quite there (no harmonica at this stage), and so it’s held over for another attempt at the next session.

It has never been argued that The Beatles changed the tempo and arrangement during the session, but always that GM sent them away to work on it. If that is true, it can only have been on 4 September, with us knowing that the only known 11 September recording is not the Roy Orbison-style version, but a new uptempo arrangement.

If one accepts that the changes were made as a result of GM’s telling them what he wanted them to work on before they were next in, and was not a result of developing the song in the studio, it must mean that they arrived at the 11 September session with the reworking they had been working on in the week since they had first played it for GM.

In which case, I would suggest, they would have no reason to spend time recording an arrangement that GM didn’t like and that they had already abandoned.

I do not believe the Orbison-style version was ever recorded, but rather them rehearsing it on the 4th, and recording it on the 11th, have become mixed up in some minds.