The Beatles: "I Feel Fine"

December 28, 1964 (1 week)

By now The Beatles were being graded on a curve. Their impeccable standards had resulted in a string on fantastic singles and three outstanding studio albums, each of which had been an upgrade on their predecessors, but there were fears that they were beginning to slip a bit. The weary looks on their faces on the cover of their fourth LP Beatles for Sale (along with John Lennon appearing to be rather plump) gave critics and listeners this idea that its contents sounded equally exhausted. This is true up to a certain point: they trudged their way through a series of dismal cover versions — aside from an absolutely blistering "Rock and Roll Music" — and there's a new found pessimism at the heart of originals such as "No Reply", "I'm a Loser" and "I Don't Want to Spoil the Party" but there's still plenty of joie de vivre as well; "Eight Days a Week" opens side 2 and it's one of The Beatles' breeziest, most carefree numbers.

More worrisome than their alleged gloominess was that they didn't appear to be improving anymore. A Hard Day's Night had been made up of all Lennon-McCartney compositions and tracks like "Things We Said Today" and "I'll Be Back" indicated that they were on the verge of a major artistic breakthrough. Hints of this would appear on Beatles for Sale but they would be overshadowed by some of the more average material. Their creative flowering would take place but it would end up being delayed as this mild wilderness period that would carry over into the middle of 1965.

Recorded during the Beatles for Sale sessions (which goes some way towards explaining why it doesn't sound out of place on its American counterpart release Beatles '65), "I Feel Fine" sounds in retrospect like the final gasp of Beatlemania as the Fab Four searched for a way forward. The distinctive feedback in its opening seconds and those aggressive, clipped guitars hint at what was to come while some of John Lennon's laziest lyrics ("that her baby buys her things you know, he buys her diamond rings you know..."; not to be outdone, Paul McCartney farted out some equally banal words on its B side "She's a Woman"; both sides of their latest single suggest that Lennon and McCartney were making strides musically while treading water lyrically) confirm that he was phoning it in for the first (though, sadly, not the last) time in his career.

But why exactly? As I mentioned above, he was becoming increasingly comfortable with expressing his inner turmoil while at the same time there may no longer have been a muse for his often overlooked happy-go-lucky pop side (while this is typically considered to be more McCartney's realm, Lennon wrote the bulk of such buoyant classics as "Please Please Me", "It Won't Be Long" and "Any Time at All" proving he could do pure pop just as well as his partner). Living outside of London with his wife and young child, his social life began to take a hit as he began feeling increasingly isolated. He was smoking a lot of pot, he had an ocean of alcohol at his disposal and there were individuals in The Beatles' orbit who had harder drugs for him to sample, either willingly or otherwise. This fueled what would prove to be a stellar run of compositions from the early part of 1965 through the next two years (I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that everything he wrote or co-wrote from "Ticket to Ride" to "I Am the Walrus" represents the greatest hot streak in pop history). Conversely, was he a contented person during this time? How joyful could the man who had just put out "I'm a Lose" — and who was soon to write both "Help!" and "Nowhere Man" — be?

In fact, there's a misery to "I Feel Fine" that few think to discuss. She's in love with him and he feels fine? Well, good for them, I suppose, but his choice of words could be more convincing. When people ask me how I'm doing, I respond with "fine" when I'm not feeling particularly lousy. When thing are okay. When I'm in a good mood I'll actually say so. So, Lennon's life is okay but it could be better all things considered. The guy was leader of the biggest band in the world and was making money hand over fist from both all those lucrative songwriting royalties as well as those increasingly burdensome tours they were embarking on. He had the world at his feet and all he could say about it was that he was "fine".

Not unlike "I Feel Fine" itself. While perhaps a slight let down next to their immaculate singles from 1963 and '64, it's nevertheless filled with energy and, not unlike "Eight Days a Week", it betrays this notion that The Beatles were as exhausted as they appeared to be on the cover of their most recent album. Yes, John Lennon began to look inward but he could still knock out a better-than-average pop hit without a whole lot of effort — even when he wasn't in especially joyful mood. It's just that he was capable of a whole lot more. Luckily, he would spend much of the following year proving it. 

Score: 7