A significant factor in The Beatles’ success was John Lennon. In addition to singing lead, he also served as the main songwriter for several of their best-known tunes. The Beatles’ distinctive sound was shaped by Lennon’s avant-garde and experimental approach to music, which was essential to their commercial success. He was renowned for his engaging demeanor and talent for relating to followers. In addition, Lennon played a significant role in the 1960s counterculture movement. His political and social activities contributed to the rise of The Beatles as a cultural phenomenon rather than just a band.
Although John Lennon was already an accomplished author, it wasn’t until The Beatles’ chance meeting with Bob Dylan that Lennon began to properly appreciate the glories of songwriting with sincere intentions. The band has changed from its earlier days of commercial music to become one of history’s most productive bands.
Lennon was more like a poet or writer of fiction. As his songs are written first and foremost around the words, many of them are quite personal. That makes it difficult to choose from his greatest work. Even though John Lennon has transcended the realm of music, he was always a rocker first. These are a few of his finest songs in the Beatles.
10. ‘Come Together’ – Abbey Road (1969)
Written originally as a campaign song for Timothy Leary as the pro-drugs activist ran for office in California, Lennon saw the song’s potential and made sure to incorporate it into their repertoire as soon as Leary’s run was ended. By the time Abbey Road arrived, this song had already started to serve as a significant premonition of what was to come.
The song, which was the final one the four Beatles recorded together, also has one of the group’s most slinky rhythms—a snaky hiss that is both amusing and frightening. In an out-of-court settlement, Lennon paid the rock star for the song, which had a Chuck Berry-like quality.
9. ‘Happiness Is a Warm Gun’ – The Beatles (1968)
John recognized a hook when he heard one, and when he saw the NRA advertisement with the slogan “Happiness is a warm gun” in a magazine, he felt he had something.
This song from the “White Album” is actually three Lennon skits combined into one. It is one of the Beatles’ most complicated songs and a forerunner to John Lennon’s occasionally difficult solo releases due to its hard time signatures. Lennon juggles electric blues, freak-out psych-rock, and a doo-wop conclusion with one of his most exciting voices in less than three minutes. It is, according to McCartney, his favorite track from “The White Album.”
8. ‘Please Please Me’ – Please Please Me (1963)
The follow-up to The Beatles’ debut record, “Love Me Do,” earned their first number-one single with “Please Please Me.” It was originally intended to be a blues-infused parody of a Roy Orbison song, but with George Martin’s assistance, it developed to represent The Beatles’ early style.
The Beatles’ debut hit reached number one, yet they never would have gotten that far without the compositional prowess of John Lennon.
Lennon previously outlined how “Please Please Me” impacted the band. He said, “We’d had a top 30 entry with ‘Love Me Do’ and we really thought we were on top of the world, Then came ‘Please Please Me’ – and wham! We tried to make it as simple as possible. Some of the stuff we’ve written in the past has been a bit way-out, but we aimed this one straight at the hit parade.”
7. ‘Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds’ – Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)
‘Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds’, unquestionably one of Lennon’s most well-known and instantly recognizable songs, was largely seen as a not-so-subtle allusion to LSD. Lennon revealed that the song was in fact inspired by a sketch that his son Julian brought home from elementary school.
He clarified, “I had no idea it spelt LSD. This is the truth: my son came home with a drawing and showed me this strange-looking woman flying around. I said, ‘What is it?’ and he said, ‘It’s Lucy in the sky with diamonds,’ and I thought, ‘That’s beautiful.’ I immediately wrote a song about it.”
6. ‘Norewgian Wood’ – Rubber Soul (1965)
Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown), which was performed by Harrison, is renowned for being the first rock song to include the sitar and for including introspective lyrics by John Lennon. It represents a significant development for the Beatles.
The song’s sole murky aspect was that Lennon had composed it as a result of all the affairs he had been having secretly from Cynthia Lennon.
Although the song from Rubber Soul is frequently regarded as Lennon’s first authentic acid-rock song, this is not entirely accurate. Instead, he introduces that sound into his own musical language for the first time on this song. Naturally, he required assistance with the song’s sitar section; fortunately, he had Harrison on hand.
5. ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ – Revolver (1966)
It seems inevitable that the song that John Lennon referred to as “my first psychedelic song” will be towards the top of this experimental album. Although Lennon may not have included the tens of thousands of chanting monks he had initially planned for the song, “Tomorrow Never Knows” has a tendency to trip people out.
The Beatles took their time with “Revolver,” arguably the most significant milestone in a career full of them, after churning out six albums in only three short years. The first song created during the sessions’ fertile creative production was “Tomorrow Never Knows.” And there is a lot of astonishment in this place. In less than three minutes, there are loops, reverse cassettes, Indian instruments, double-tracked voices, distortion, and delay used. A voyage to a sonic playground on psychedelics.
4. ‘I Am The Walrus’ – Magical Mystery Tour (1967)
Lennon created this surrealist masterpiece for Magical Mystery Tour, possibly The Beatles’ most eccentric album. The Beatles’ next single following “All You Need Is Love” was supposed to be “I Am The Walrus,” but Paul McCartney and George Martin insisted on selecting the much more popular “Hello, Goodbye.” The choice started the bitterness that finally resulted in the band’s breakup.
In “I Am the Walrus,” several different things are going on, including a communal chant, an orchestral arrangement, and an unexpected musical ending. In this list of the Top 10 John Lennon Beatles songs, maybe the most daring song.
3. ‘Across The Universe’ – No One’s Gonna Change Our World (1969)
Lennon’s song sprang out of nowhere following a disagreement with his first wife Cynthia. He told, “I kept hearing these words over and over, flowing like an endless stream. I went downstairs, and it turned into sort of a cosmic song rather than an irritated song… it drove me out of bed. I didn’t want to write it, but I was slightly irritable, and I went downstairs, and I couldn’t get to sleep until I’d put it on paper.”
Despite its first looking brittle origins, the song has evolved and is now regarded as a dazzling moment on the album, a moment where it’s simple to let the music flow through you.
2. ‘Help!’ – Help! (1965)
John was worn out from living as a member of the biggest band in the world. Hence, when he typed “Help!” he was sincere in his request. He was developing into a terrific poet in his own right at this stage.
Fans have interpreted John Lennon’s No. 1 song from the height of Beatlemania in a variety of ways. Is it a request for some normality following two years of mayhem? Is Lennon, who is prone to emotional fragility, dealing with something more personal right now? Lennon said that it was a combination of the two, but nonetheless, the song’s bouncy pace belies the song’s heavy lyrics, which sound like a depressing plea for assistance.
It was a time when Lennon’s previous character and manner of living were starting to be eclipsed by the pop sensation the band had made.
He thus made every effort to drive those monsters from his life and to capture them through music. It marked the birth of John Lennon, an icon.
1. ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ – Magical Mystery Tour (1967)
Lennon used his experiences growing up in Liverpool to give this otherwise surreal song a touch of nostalgia for the band’s 1967 album Magical Mystery Tour. The song’s success was aided by the fact that it had a significant impact on the emerging psychedelic sound of the time. The song was written by Lennon to depict his safe refuge.
The childhood-themed portion of Lennon’s double A-side was the ideal complement to McCartney’s “Penny Lane.” Strawberry Fields Forever was recorded during the beginning of the “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” sessions, just like “Penny Lane.” That in some ways sums up and depicts all of John Lennon’s facets as a Beatle.
