We Can Work It Out

"We Can Work It Out"
US picture sleeve
Single by the Beatles
A-side"Day Tripper" (double A-side)
Released3 December 1965 (1965-12-03)
Recorded20 and 29 October 1965
StudioEMI, London
GenreFolk rock[1]
Length2:15
LabelParlophone (UK), Capitol (US)
Songwriter(s)Lennon–McCartney
Producer(s)George Martin
The Beatles UK singles chronology
"Help!"
(1965)
"We Can Work It Out" / "Day Tripper"
(1965)
"Paperback Writer"
(1966)
The Beatles US singles chronology
"Yesterday"
(1965)
"We Can Work It Out" / "Day Tripper"
(1965)
"Nowhere Man"
(1966)
Promotional film
"We Can Work It Out" on YouTube

"We Can Work It Out" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles, written by Paul McCartney and John Lennon. It was first issued as a double A-side single with "Day Tripper" in December 1965. The song was recorded during the sessions for the band's Rubber Soul album. The single reached number one in Britain (where it won the Ivor Novello Award for the top-selling A-side of 1965),[2] the United States, Australia, Canada, and Ireland. In the UK, it was the seventh highest selling single of the 1960s.[3]

"We Can Work It Out" is a comparatively rare example of a Lennon–McCartney collaboration from this period in the Beatles' career,[4] in that the two songwriters worked together as they had when writing the group's early hit singles of 1963. "A Day in the Life", "Baby, You're a Rich Man", and "I've Got a Feeling", are among the other notable exceptions to this trend from the group's later career.[5]

  1. ^ Unterberger, Richie. "The Beatles 'We Can Work It Out'". AllMusic. Archived from the original on 11 May 2012. Retrieved 9 June 2017.
  2. ^ "The 1966 Ivor Novello Awards". theivors.com. Archived from the original on 15 August 2018. Retrieved 18 October 2018.
  3. ^ "Ken Dodd 'third best-selling artist of 1960s'". BBC News. 1 June 2010. Retrieved 7 September 2020.
  4. ^ Hertsgaard 1995, p. 150.
  5. ^ MacDonald 2005, pp. 171–172.