While working out the details for their second feature film, The Beatles had to decide what they were going to call it. A Hard Day’s Night had set a precedent for loopy malapropisms, and with a basic idea of bringing in a Hindu cult, the title Eight Arms To Hold You was tentatively put down. That title soon became irrelevant when The Beatles cut their latest single, ‘Eight Days a Week’, a paradigm of their in escapable catchiness.
“I think we wrote this when we were trying to write the title song for Help! because there was at one time the thought of calling the film Eight Arms To Hold You,” John Lennon confirmed to Hit Parader in 1972. However, for Lennon, both the film and the song were simply boxes to check off on The Beatles’ busy schedule where expansive art was proving too time-consuming to indulge in.
“Help! as a film was like ‘Eight Days A Week’ as a record for us. A lot of people liked the film, and a lot of people liked that record. But neither was what we wanted – we knew they weren’t really us,” Lennon was later quoted as saying in the Anthology book. “We weren’t ashamed of the film, but close friends knew that the picture and ‘Eight Days’ weren’t our best. They were both a bit manufactured.”
Lennon had a history of speaking critically about some of his Beatles material. Over the years, songs like ‘Good Morning, Good Morning’ and ‘Mean Mr. Mustard’ were dismissed by Lennon in various ways. While the more basic early days of the band were occasionally tinted with rose-coloured glasses, Lennon was more proud of what eventually became the actual title song to Help.
“‘Eight Days A Week’ was the running title for Help! before they came up with Help! It was Paul’s effort at getting a single for the movie,” Lennon told David Sheff in 1980. “That luckily turned to ‘Help!’ which I wrote – bam! bam! – like that and got the single. ‘Eight Days A Week’ was never a good song. We struggled to record it and struggled to make it into a song. It was his initial effort, but I think we both worked on it. I’m not sure. But it was lousy anyway.”
For his part, Paul McCartney always seemed to be fond of ‘Eight Days a Week’. Although the song was never performed live by The Beatles during their final years as a touring act, McCartney revived the song during the initial legs of his ‘Out There’ tour in 2013. The song came in a flash, inspired by a remark made by McCartney’s driver as he was going to visit Lennon.
“I remember writing that with John, at his place in Weybridge, from something said by the chauffeur who drove me out there,” McCartney recalled in Anthology. “John had moved out of London to the suburbs. I usually drove myself there, but the chauffeur drove me out that day, and I said, ‘How’ve you been?’ – ‘Oh, working hard,’ he said, ‘working eight days a week.’”
This instantly sparked inspiration for McCartney, who was always on the lookout for wordplay with a degree of commonality. “I had never heard anyone use that expression, so when I arrived at John’s house, I said, ‘Hey, this fella just said, ‘eight days a week’. John said, ‘Right – ‘Ooh, I need your love, babe…’ and we wrote it,” McCartney added. “We were always quick to write. We would write on the spot. I would show up, looking for some sort of inspiration; I’d either get it there with John, or I’d hear someone say something.”
However, given that the band were looking to expand into spiritualism and arrangements with greater scope to match, this formulaic way of writing what they knew was growing stilted. In this regard, the song represents a pivotal moment for the band: they had honed their skills to a fine craft, but they feared that things had gotten so seamless they were suddenly lacking depth. Thus, there is The Beatles before ‘Eight Days a Week’, and the band that followed thereafter.
