Something (Beatles song)

"Something"
1989 UK reissue picture sleeve
Single by the Beatles
from the album Abbey Road
A-side"Come Together" (double A-side)
Released6 October 1969 (1969-10-06)
Recorded2 May, 5 May, 16 July, 15 August 1969
StudioEMI and Olympic, London
Genre
Length2:59
LabelApple
Songwriter(s)George Harrison
Producer(s)George Martin
The Beatles singles chronology
"The Ballad of John and Yoko"
(1969)
"Something" / "Come Together"
(1969)
"Let It Be"
(1970)
Song sample
Promotional film
"Something" on YouTube

"Something" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their eleventh studio album Abbey Road (1969). It was written by George Harrison, the band's lead guitarist. Together with his second contribution to Abbey Road, "Here Comes the Sun", it is widely viewed by music historians as having marked Harrison's ascendancy as a composer to the level of the Beatles' principal songwriters, John Lennon and Paul McCartney.[3][4] Two weeks after the album's release, the song was issued on a double A-side single, coupled with "Come Together", making it the first Harrison composition to become a Beatles A-side. The pairing was also the first time in the United Kingdom that the Beatles issued a single containing tracks already available on an album. While the single's commercial performance was lessened by this, it topped the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States as well as charts in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and West Germany, and peaked at number 4 in the UK.

The track is generally considered a love song to Pattie Boyd, Harrison's first wife, although Harrison offered alternative sources of inspiration in later interviews. Owing to the difficulty he faced in getting more than two of his compositions onto each Beatles album, Harrison first offered the song to Joe Cocker. As recorded by the Beatles, the track features a guitar solo that several music critics identify among Harrison's finest playing. The song also drew praise from the other Beatles and their producer, George Martin, with Lennon stating that it was the best song on Abbey Road. The promotional film for the single combined footage of each of the Beatles with his respective wife, reflecting the estrangement in the band during the months preceding their break-up in April 1970. Harrison subsequently performed the song at his Concert for Bangladesh shows in 1971 and throughout the two tours he made as a solo artist.

"Something" received the Ivor Novello Award for the "Best Song Musically and Lyrically" of 1969. By the late 1970s, it had been covered by over 150 artists, making it the second-most covered Beatles composition after "Yesterday". Shirley Bassey had a top-five UK hit with her 1970 recording, and Frank Sinatra regularly performed the song, calling it "the greatest love song of the past 50 years." Other artists who have covered it include Elvis Presley, Ray Charles, Booker T. & the M.G.'s, James Brown, Smokey Robinson and Johnny Rodriguez. In 1999, Broadcast Music Incorporated named "Something" as the 17th-most performed song of the twentieth century, with 5 million performances. In 2000, Mojo ranked "Something" at number 14 in the magazine's list of "The 100 Greatest Songs of All Time"; it was ranked 110th on Rolling Stone's 2021 list of the "500 Greatest Songs of All Time". In 2002, a year after Harrison's death, McCartney and Eric Clapton performed it at the Concert for George tribute at London's Royal Albert Hall.

  1. ^ Ursula Dawn Goldsmith, Melissa (2019). Listen to Classic Rock! Exploring a Musical Genre. ABC-CLIO. p. 32. ISBN 9781440865794. Retrieved 21 October 2022.
  2. ^ Unterberger, Richie. "The Beatles 'Something'". AllMusic. Archived from the original on 21 February 2012. Retrieved 18 February 2015.
  3. ^ Perone 2012, p. 211: "[Abbey Road marked] the full emergence of George Harrison as a songwriter of equal stature as Paul McCartney and John Lennon"; Lavezzoli 2006, p. 185: "[Harrison] would finally achieve equal songwriting status alongside Lennon and McCartney with his two classic contributions to the final Beatles LP, Abbey Road"; Weber 2016, p. 82: "[By 1968] Harrison began to produce songs that many considered equal to some of Lennon and McCartney's best compositions. This became even more evident on ... Abbey Road, which contained two masterpieces by Harrison: 'Here Comes the Sun' and 'Something'."
  4. ^ Unterberger, Richie. "The Beatles 'Here Comes the Sun'. AllMusic. Retrieved 22 May 2021: "After years of residing in the heavy shadow of the awesome Lennon–McCartney writing partnership, George Harrison obtained equal recognition for his songwriting on the Beatles' final album, Abbey Road, with both 'Something' and 'Here Comes the Sun'."