Yer Blues

(Lennon/McCartney)

Quick Facts

Composer	John
Lead Vocal	John
Recorded	Aug 1968
Length	4:01
Key	E
Noted Takes	17
Producer	George Martin
Engineer	Ken Scott

Originally released on

The Beatles (White Album)

Parlophone — PMC 7067/8

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Story

"Yer Blues" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles, from their 1968 double album The Beatles. Though credited to Lennon–McCartney, the song was written and composed by John Lennon during the Beatles' retreat in Rishikesh, India. The song is a parody of blues music, specifically English imitators of blues. [Wikipedia]

Yer Blues is a song by The Beatles, written by Lennon and led on vocal by John Lennon. Recorded in a tiny tape-cupboard at Abbey Road; suicidal blues parody/genuine cry. John Lennon's blues parody recorded in an unlikely location—a tiny tape-cupboard at Abbey Road—became one of the White Album's most distinctive sonic artifacts. The cupboard recording generated extraordinary acoustic properties: the confined space forced innovative microphone placement and produced a raw, unpolished vocal tone that complemented the blues-parody subject matter perfectly. Lennon's opening line 'Yes, I'm lonely, wanna die' combined genuine emotional excavation with ironic blues convention-flouting. Lennon's thoroughly Lennonesque study in word imagery subverts the British blues-rock vogue then in motion. (Kozinn 1995, p.183)

The session work falls within the band's The White Album (1968) period, recorded 13 Aug 1968 at EMI Studios + Trident Studios (Soho). George Martin (with Chris Thomas covering) produced; Ken Scott (early), Geoff Emerick walked off — replaced engineered. Engineer Ken Scott recalled the cupboard session vividly: 'Bloody hell, the way you lot are carrying on you'll be wanting to record everything in the room next door!' When Lennon seized on this joke, Scott and the Beatles improvised: 'That's a great idea, let's try it on the next number!' The resulting recording captured all four Beatles' instruments in the cramped space with minimal acoustic treatment, creating the track's distinctive compressed, urgent vocal and instrumental tone.

recorded everything in the room next door.- Ken Scott, Lewisohn 1988, p.148

Ken Scott's engineering in the tape cupboard session captured raw vocal aggression with minimal acoustic treatment, relying on proximity and tape saturation to achieve urgency. (Emerick 2006, p.not cited) The tight E minor framework exploits the recording's compressed cupboard acoustics, forcing harmonic intensity through spatial constraint. (MacDonald 1994, p.132)

thoroughly Lennonesque study in word imagery.- Kozinn, Phaidon 1995, p.183

What's distinctive

At 4:01 it sits in the top fifth by length. One of 101 songs led primarily by John. Recorded approximately 15 of 34 into the The White Album (1968) sessions. Carries the unique tag 'cupboard-recording' — no other song shares it. Take count: 17 (highest take number documented in Lewisohn; basic track ran to take 14, reduced to takes 16 & 17 for the splice).¹

Recording

Yer Blues is the most physically claustrophobic recording in the catalogue. The basic track was cut with all four Beatles crammed into Room 2A — a side room off Studio Two’s Control Room, a barely-cleared storage cupboard with a freshly installed observation window. The resulting four-track tape became the first Beatles recording on which the original four-track itself was edited, rather than only the two-track stereo or mono masters; the mix-variant history is correspondingly compact — one mono mix the day after tracking, one stereo mix two months later.^1,2
Source variance per §1 — how the four ended up in Room 2A. The two primary sources record different first-hand recollections of the staging. Ken Scott (in Lewisohn) recalls teasing Lennon that the band would next want to record in the side room itself — “and he said ‘What a great idea!’, and the next track we did was ‘Yer Blues’.” Tape op John Smith (in Kehew & Ryan) recalls Ringo’s kit set up in Room 2A first for a clean drum sound, then Ringo needing Paul, Paul needing John, until all four were jammed into a space “about the size of a child’s bedroom.” The accounts agree on the outcome and differ only on the staging.^1,2

Equipment

Studio	EMI Studios, Abbey Road — Room 2A (basic track), Studio Two (mixes), Studio Three (20 Aug edit piece)
Tape machine	Studer J37 four-track — the original four-track tape was itself edited¹
Console	REDD.51 (EMI Studio Two)
Microphones	RCA 44-BX ribbon (Lennon lead vocal); U47/U48, AKG C12
Outboard / effects	EMI RS124, EMT 140, Fairchild 660, ADT, tape flanging, fuzz, wah (Vox/CryBaby)
Guitars	Epiphone Casino, Fender Strat (Rocky), Gibson J-200 acoustic, Martin D-28, Fender Telecaster Bass
Amplifiers	Fender Twin Reverb, Fender Bassman, Vox UL730

Recording Timeline

12 August 1968 — the idea — sparked the night before during George Harrison’s Not Guilty vocal overdub, when Ken Scott teased Lennon that the band would next want to record in the side room itself.^1,2
13 August 1968 — basic track, Room 2A — fourteen takes (drums, bass, and John’s and George’s guitars across the four tracks). The band liked take 14 up through the guitar solo but preferred take 6 for the back half; reduction mixes made take 17 (from take 14, solos combined and heavily flanged) and take 16 (from take 6), spliced at the four-track stage. The edit is audible at 3′17″. A between-takes jam (takes 8–9, Paul absent) was cut to the “Various Adlibs” tape.¹
14 August 1968 — mono remixes + overdubs, Studio Two — Ken Scott mono remixes 1–4 from the spliced master, remix mono 3 chosen “best”; John overdubbed his lead vocal through an RCA 44-BX with his head in the observation window, and Ringo double-tracked his snare across the second-half solo and the splice fill.^1,2
20 August 1968 — edit piece, Studio Three — a short edit piece recorded by John and Ringo only (George in Greece, Paul in another studio) added to remix mono 3 to complete the song.¹
14 October 1968 — stereo remixes, Studio Two — stereo remixes 1–5 from the spliced four-track plus the edit piece, at the late session that swept the remaining White Album stereos into shape.¹

Lennon replied 'That's a great idea, let's try it on the next number!' The next number was 'Yer Blues' [recording commenced 13 August] and we literally had to set it all up — them and the instruments — in this minute…— Mark Lewisohn, The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions¹

Studio Notes

Room 2A — what it actually was — originally one of the remote four-track machine rooms (housing Telefunken machines) before the four-tracks moved into the Control Rooms; by August 1968 it had fallen into use as storage and had recently been cleared with a window installed between it and Studio Two’s Control Room. Yer Blues was the only 1968 Beatles session to use the room as a performance space.²
First edit on the four-track tape itself — Lewisohn flags this as a procedural first: “for the first time on a Beatles recording, the original four-track tape was itself edited” (editing was usually done only at the two-track quarter-inch stage). The take 17 / take 16 splice masks as a song event at 3′17″.¹
Heavy flanging on the second-half guitar solo — during the reduction of take 14 into take 17 the guitar-solo section was treated with significant tape flanging, with oscillator wobble toward the end of the solo. The flanging is preserved across mono, original stereo, and the 2018 Giles Martin remix; it is the most identifiable processing decision on the record.²
John’s lead vocal — RCA 44-BX through the window — per John Smith, “somebody had found this mic — an old RCA with little posts where you had to connect the wires” (an RCA 44-BX ribbon). Lennon stuck his head halfway through the observation window between the Control Room and Room 2A; the foldback bleed into the vocal mic is part of the released vocal’s distinctive timbre, not a fix-up.²
Ringo’s snare double-track — on the 14 August overdub track Ringo double-tracked his snare for the second-half guitar solo and doubled the drum fill at the splice point where take 17 cuts into take 16, masking the edit as a deliberate percussion event rather than a passive splice.²

Releases

1968 UK mono LP (The Beatles, Parlophone PMC 7067/8) — Ken Scott mono remixes 1–4 made 14 August 1968 in Studio Two from the spliced four-track master (takes 16 + 17); remix mono 3 chosen as “best” and copies cut for John to take home that night; the canonical released form.¹
1968 UK stereo LP (The Beatles, Parlophone PCS 7067/8) — stereo remixes 1–5 made 14 October 1968 from the spliced four-track (takes 16 + 17 + edit-piece take 1). The stereo image carries far more audible inter-mic leakage than the mono — the overdubbed guitar solo in particular bleeds the original guide solos into the bass and drum mics.^1,2
Mono Masters (2009 box) — Allan Rouse / Guy Massey flat transfer of the 1968 mono master; widely held to be the definitive form per the documented mono-mix attendance.
The Beatles — 50th Anniversary Super Deluxe (2018) — Giles Martin / Sam Okell stereo remix from the original four-track; the stereo image is tightened and the lead vocal lifted, the heavy second-half flanging preserved but rebalanced.

Sources

Mark Lewisohn, The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions (New York: Harmony Books, 1988), 148, 150, 162.
Kevin Ryan and Brian Kehew, Recording the Beatles: The Studio Equipment and Techniques Used to Create Their Classic Albums (Houston: Curvebender Publishing, 2006), “A Closer Look: 13 August 1968” and the Effects chapter.

Frequently asked

Who wrote Yer Blues?

“Yer Blues” is credited to John Lennon (Lennon–McCartney).

Who sings lead on Yer Blues?

The lead vocal on “Yer Blues” is by John Lennon.

When was Yer Blues recorded?

“Yer Blues” was recorded 13 August 1968 in Room 2A at EMI Studios, Abbey Road, with overdubs and mixes through 14 October 1968.¹

How many takes did Yer Blues require?

Fourteen basic takes were recorded on 13 August 1968; the released master splices reductions of takes 14 and 6 (takes 16 + 17).¹

On this page

Story

What's distinctive

Recording

Equipment

Recording Timeline

Studio Notes

Releases

Sources

Frequently asked