Written by: Lennon-McCartney
Recorded: 15 February 1965
Producer: George Martin
Engineer: Norman Smith
Released: 9 April 1965 (UK), 19 April 1965 (US)
John Lennon: double-tracked lead vocals, rhythm guitar
Paul McCartney: harmony vocals, bass, lead guitar
George Harrison: rhythm guitar
Ringo Starr: drums, tambourine, handclaps
Available on:
Help!
1
Anthology 2
Live At The BBC
Ticket To Ride was the first song to be released from Help!, The Beatles' fifth album. The group's performance of the song, filmed on the ski slopes in Austria, was one of the highlights of the Help! film.
The song was written by Lennon and McCartney, although the precise nature of their contributions has been disputed. In one of his final interviews, Lennon claimed it as mainly his work.
That was one of the earliest heavy-metal records made. Paul's contribution was the way Ringo played the drums.
All We Are Saying, David Sheff
In his authorised biography, published in 1994, McCartney claimed the song to have been more of a collaborative effort.
We wrote the melody together; you can hear on the record, John's taking the melody and I'm singing harmony with it. We'd often work those out as we wrote them. Because John sang it, you might have to give him 60 per cent of it. It was pretty much a work job that turned out quite well...John just didn't take the time to explain that we sat down together and worked on that song for a full three-hour songwriting session, and at the end of it all we had all the words, we had the harmonies, and we had all the little bits.
Many Years From Now, Barry Miles
McCartney also explained how he was particularly proud of Ticket To Ride's double-time coda:
I think the interesting thing was a crazy ending: instead of ending like the previous verse, we changed the tempo. We picked up one of the lines, 'My baby don't care', but completely altered the melody. We almost invented the idea of a new bit of a song on the fade-out with this song; it was something specially written for the fade-out, which was very effective but it was quite cheeky and we did a fast ending. It was quite radical at the time.
Many Years From Now, Barry Miles
The first Beatles single to be longer than three minutes, Ticket To Ride was heralded by the music press upon its release as a departure from the group's familiar territory. Certainly its unusual drum patterns and downbeat lyrics were a departure from The Beatles' usual upbeat optimism.
Ticket To Ride was slightly a new sound at the time. It was pretty fucking heavy for then, if you go and look in the charts for what other music people were making. You hear it now and it doesn't sound too bad; but it'd make me cringe. If you give me the A track and I remix it, I'll show you what it is really, but you can hear it there. It's a heavy record and the drums are heavy too. That's why I like it.
Anthology
The song's meaning has been subject to a number of interpretations over the years. While ostensibly about a liberated girl choosing her own path in life, a pair of incidents in The Beatles' past may have inspired the song in part.
McCartney's cousin Bett and her husband Mike Robbins owned a pub on Union Street in Ryde, on the north coast of the Isle of Wight. In the early 1960s Lennon and McCartney hitch-hiked to stay with them, and several years later the journey inspired a pun on the phrase 'ticket to Ryde' in the song.
I remember talking about Ryde but it was John's thing.
Many Years From Now, Barry Miles
Another suggestion is that the title refers to sexually-transmitted diseases, and was inspired by the prostitutes encountered by The Beatles during their time performing in Germany.
The girls who worked the streets in Hamburg had to have a clean bill of health and so the medical authorities would give them a card saying that they didn't have a dose of anything.I was with The Beatles when they went back to Hamburg in June 1966 and it was then that John told me that he had coined the phrase 'a ticket to ride' to describe these cards. He could have been joking – you always had to be careful with John like that – but I certainly remember him telling me that.
A Hard Day's Write, Steve Turner
Ticket To Ride was the soundtrack to a key scene in the Help! film. Filmed on the ski slopes of Obertauern, Austria on 20 March 1965, it was a forerunner of the music videos which would later become widespread.
It also became part of The Beatles' live repertoire in 1965, particularly on their summer tour of America. They played it during their final appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, and at their Shea Stadium and Hollywood Bowl concerts.
A version of Ticket To Ride, recorded for the British television show Blackpool Night Out, was included on Anthology 2. Another recording, taped for the radio show The Beatles Invite You To Take A Ticket To Ride, was included on the Live At The BBC collection.
It sounds like there is an organ playing in the song, most audible in the intro, “under” the guitar. Or maybe it’s just guitar.
PS (for all songs):
When you write guitar it would be great if you wrote what kind of guitar. Especially if it is acoustic or electric. Same for bass guitar.
I think that George plays 12-string lead guitar in this.
No. Paul plays the lead guitar in this one.
Paul may have played the high riff in the middle of the song, but its sure sounds like George’s 360/12 Rickenbacker during the intro and throughout the song.
Paul plays the bluesy leads on the Casino. The intro is definitely George & maybe John on 12 string Ricks.
The guitar sample on the beginning of ticket to ride and the middle of Girl Don’t Tell me sounds alike
?
The intro is on a Ricky 12, so Macca could not have played it as there wasn’t a leftie Rick 360/12 in the world, George had number 2.
There is NO 12 string on Tix to Ride . Why do people and “ critics “ always claim to know what they don’t understand. Listen to the song. The intro actually sounds like Lennon’s 6 string Rick, you can hear the attack on the strings, the natural open S string stands out , there is nothing even close to octaves on intro or any other part of the song. Rolling Stone and the “ Beatles Bible “ also claim it’s a 12 string. Maybe someone should listen to the song.
Yes it’s George on 12 string, not only is that in George Martin’s track sheet notes for the song, but if you still can’t hear it, put it into a DAW and slow it WAY down so you can hear the octaves in the open.
He does, and so does George. Paul’s is a Rickenbacker 325, but I don’t know what George plays.
Left handed Rick 325?
Not even close. The solo after the bridge is a 6 string. Everyone insists there is a 12 string in the song, listen to it, it’s all 6 strings, intro ,solo and outro.
How about also digging out the information for what type of guitar, whether 1964 Rickenbacker 325 Jetglo or 1964 Rickenbacker 325-12 Jet-glo (for examples).
To wit, http://www.thecanteen.com/fabguitars.html, amazing collection of data. But Beatlesbible.com also rocks.
That’s a very nice site – thanks for mentioning it.
I’ve thought about giving information on instrumentation where available, but normally it’s a question of whether I have enough time to research it all, and whether the majority of people are likely to care. A feature on the group’s equipment is on the cards at some point. When that’s done I might think about going through each song’s equipment, though I’ve got a ton of other stuff to do first!
I would definitely love something like that, but only whenever you get the time. I’ve loved The Beatles since I was a little kid, but it wasn’t until recently (helped by the whole 09.09.09 marketing) that I really got into how their recording sessions were like and what instruments they used for which albums. The extra knowledge really adds another level of appreciation and wonder for all of their accomplishments.
John Lennon sings lead (double-tracked), Paul is doing harmony and George does not sing.
This isn’t the first Beatles song longer than 3 minutes; She’s a Woman, the B-side to I Feel Fine, was released in November 1964 and is slightly longer than 3 minutes.
Thanks Michael – I’ve amended it now.
Yep, She’s A Woman is 3:01
Neither She’s a Woman nor Ticket to Ride were the first over three minutes.
You Really Got a Hold on Me was the first, at 3’02. And I think TTR is actually 3’10, not 3’13
So it was. Thanks for that.
The length of TTR depends on which mix you’re listening to – stereo or mono, UK or US. Either way it’s well over three minutes, though for the sake of clarity I’ll take out the mention of 3’13.
Well, in the article it says “single,” not “song.”
You Really Got a Hold On Me was Smokey Robinson, and even though the Beatles covered it, it shouldn’t count.
I must’ve listened to this song for twenty years before I realized that the drum pattern changes after the first verse/chorus. Ringo starts out in a syncopated pattern that mirrors the lead riff but subsequent verse/chorus are a more straight forward beat.
Me too. Just realized that. Really nice.
>I realized that the drum pattern changes after the first verse/chorus
So, the middle section has the straighter kick pattern (Xo oo XX oo) and the verse has Xo oX Xo oo, but as the song goes along, he starts doing the 2nd one for the later verses – BUT – if you listen to the 1965 Wembley version live, he’s very strict about always playing the verse the first way throughout – and in the youtube where he’s demonstrating it for that clinic, he always plays it the first way. So I think the studio version was before he’d fully settled on the part.
Ticket to Ride… the drone maybe derived from Indian music, .the unique rhythm, where the verse seems to go forward, then hesitate, with every measure. The Beatles psychedelic roots might start here especially in it’s relation to “Tomorrow Never Knows” and “Rain.
I rank this as in the top ten Beatles songs ever. It’s interesting to speculate what, beyond the drumming, Paul contributed. John claims it as mainly his song, Paul cites the amount of time he spent working on it. How many of the words did John have done before Paul came in? Elsewhere in his biography, Paul mentions having had the first verse of a particular song before bringing it to John, and adds “which usually means you have the melody and the tempo.” So with Paul claiming that John wrote the melody and he the harmony, where does that leave his contribution? What else might he have contributed? Did he have a hand in the middle? Maybe suggesting John speed up on “She-oughta-think-twice…”? Maybe he suggested the fadeout? What “little bits” did he contribute??
“Elsewhere in his biography, Paul mentions having had the first verse of a particular song before bringing it to John, and adds “which usually means you have the melody and the tempo.” So with Paul claiming that John wrote the melody and he the harmony…”
That’s a bit of a leap, isn’t it?
George plays his Rick 12 for the intro guitar while Paul does the bridge and end fills on his Casino, which he used later the same evening to do the same sounding fills in “Another Girl.”
There are two other guitars in the song, both Fender Stratocasters (John on rhythm, George on via an overdub). The “Help” sessions were the first time Fender Strats showed up on Beatles records.
Is this not the coolest record ever?!
What I like most about it: Lennon’s dry, sardonic vocal delivery, McCartney chiming in with his beautiful high harmony
(“…she could never be free…”), Harrison’s tasty jangling guitar, Ringo’s tight drumming, especially the `machine-gun-like bit toward the end (after Lennon sings `she’s got a ticket to ri-iiide…’). So sweeet all the way around!
“Lennon played a 12-string Rickenbacker 325, and it is likely that George Harrison played a Rickenbacker 360 12-string.”
Lennon did not play a 12 string on this record, but instead played one of the two new Sonic blue Fender Stratocasters Mal had gone out and gotten at George and John’s request.
Paul’s lead guitar fills are a wee bit clumsy.
Total nonsense, they are pretty wonderful, and everyone raved about them when the record came out.
I don’t remember it that way, nobody raved about anything but the great singing and song itself.
Don’t know where you lived, or what bands you were in, or. whether you saw the record review saying “the new Beatles single features guitar breaks that are making session players swoon” etc.
It was an amazing guitar record, not just amazing song.
The drum rolls in ticket to ride sound like a old time ticket printing machine especially the one in the middle of the song @ around 1m 53s and really throughout the song the drums sound like the same ticket printing machine but as if the machine were slowed down. Or is it just me?
Paul says, ” We almost invented the idea of a new bit of a song on the fade-out with this song; it was something specially written for the fade-out, which was very effective but it was quite cheeky and we did a fast ending. It was quite radical at the time.”
One prior song comes to mind: “Leader of the Pack” Shangri-las.
Interesting comparison, and one I’d not considered before. Interestingly, the Shangri-las song gets slightly slower in the coda, whereas The Beatles played theirs in double time. As McCartney says: “We almost invented the idea”!
For those who are into “compare and contrast” exercises, listen to “Girl Don’t Tell Me” by the Beach Boys. This is one of the best Carl Wilson vocals, my favorite track on their 1966 Summer Days album… and I never could put my finger on “why?”…until the Beatles connection was pointed out to me recently. Check out the similar guitar motifs and drum figures, and also Carl’s “I’m the guy-eye-eye”…very much like “…ticket to ri-eye-eyed”,
Is it a rip off?…no, I think of it as Brian Wilson’s homage to kindred spirits.
Glad you mentioned the Beach Boys’ “Girl Don’t Tell Me”. I’d never heard it before. Just listened to it on YouTube. Nice song. Yes, there are some similarities to “Ticket to Ride”. Seems to have been influenced by it. Like you say, not a rip-off. The Beatles themselves were influenced by others, like Dylan on “You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away”.
Did McCartney’s cousin Bett and her husband Mike Robbins sell their pub in Reading after the Nerk Twin’s performance and in the same period moved to Ryde?
Hello, The Beatles are a part of my life for the last forty years. All the John vs. Paul discussion is strange to me. The real awesome power of the Beatles is the Lennon-Mccartney combination. As many examples show such as We Can Work It Out, In My Life, She’s Leaving Home, And Your Bird Can Sing, Getting Better and on and on. Then in the studio was the added input of George Harrison to the arrangements and of course. George Martin.
A great Beatles single. I love the scene in the film Help! with The Beatles skiing and skylarking on the Austrian Alps. Whilst it is a collaboration , to me this is more of a Lennon song. He often mentioned it and his songs ,( with the notable exception of Paul’s Yesterday ),tended to deal with themes of loss more often than the more upbeat McCartney. Ticket To Ride has one of my favorite Beatles chorus and I love the guitar/ drums intro.And when I make the comment about theme differences I am talking particularly about the 1964-65 period.
Guitar is tuned down almost a quarter-step.
There is a very interesting piece on YouTube; https://youtu.be/3fbjHQxOZZU, 15 minutes into the programme this songs drumming pattern is discussed.
Lennon said, ” We were potty about Dylan at this point.” Couldn’t quite believe it. Never knew they were following anyone too closely, seemed to be leading. Second to none, the sound – track of a generation.
Another fantastic jangling-era stunner. Nothing sounded like this. They were at the top of their game, with so much more yet to come.
With regard to the who-wrote-what questions, I think it’s worth noting that John’s memory has been shown to be quite remarkably faulty. Examples abound – what John thought he contributed to “Eleanor Rigby” being flatly contradicted by Pete Shotton’s book, etc. etc.
Is McCartney´s “memory” better? 1971 McCartney said that “Lennon-McCartney” is only a myth, it´s all mine”, but later on he admited it was wrong. 1990 he said he wrote “Help”, but some years later he admited it´s Lennon´s song. That about Eleanor Rigby is uninteresting. Lennon only commented the lyrics not the melody.
I never believe a word of what McCartney is saying.
I look forward to your exact sources for Paul saying in 1990 that he wrote “Help!” and for saying in 1971 “It’s all mine.” I have no idea what the following means: “Lennon only commented the lyrics not the melody,” perhaps you can clarify.
Johann/John snipes at Paul constantly. For “Help” Johann contends that in some show/1990, Paul claims ownership for “Help” though in the song’s comments (written by Joe), Paul is quoted as saying the song is 70-30 John’s. When it comes to comments by Johann just consider the source as he is more than a little biased.
No. Johan never clarifys. Never cites sources, quotes, or factual data. Just his own twisted, biased flights of fancy. Take it with a gallon or two of salt.
Ringo’s off-kilter drumming really stands out on this track, so it’s fascinating to discover that John attributed that sound to Paul. Someone else mentioned Paul’s high harmonies on this, and I couldn’t agree more about how wonderful they are. Other lovely tidbits: the way John sings that self-indulgent and almost world-weary ‘ahhhh’ at about 2:31, leading into ‘she’s got a ticket…’, the way the middle eight speeds up – the headlong rush in the delivery of the vocals there is just delightful, the little guitar licks at 2:15ish… yeah. Pretty much all of it.
Does anyone else notice the little flourish mistake John Lennon made at the last verse? It’s supposed to go, “She said that” But he sings, “She lel” lmao always forgetting them lyrics lol
A technical-accuracy correction: the Epiphone Casino is not a “semi-acoustic” (or more properly, “semi-hollow”) guitar. It is a true hollow-body electric.
No other “heavy” records out there at the time, John? “All Day and All of the Night” makes TTR sound like The Kingston Trio in the “heavy” sweepstakes.