"You're Going to Lose That Girl" is a song by the English rock band

the Beatles The Beatles were an English Rock music, rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960. The core lineup of the band comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are widely regarded as the Cultural impact of the Beatle ...

from their 1965 album and

film A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, sinc ...

Help! ''Help!'' is the fifth studio album by the English Rock music, rock band the Beatles and the soundtrack to their Help! (film), film of the same name. It was released on 6 August 1965 by Parlophone. Seven of the fourteen songs, including the sin ...

'' Credited to the

Lennon–McCartney Lennon–McCartney is the songwriting partnership between the English musicians John Lennon (1940–1980) and Paul McCartney (born 1942) of the Beatles. It is widely considered one of the greatest, best known and most successful musical collabo ...

songwriting partnership, the song was mostly written by

John Lennon John Winston Ono Lennon (born John Winston Lennon; 9 October 19408 December 1980) was an English singer-songwriter, musician and activist. He gained global fame as the founder, co-lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of the Beatles. Lennon's ...

with contributions from

Paul McCartney Sir James Paul McCartney (born 18 June 1942) is an English singer, songwriter and musician who gained global fame with the Beatles, for whom he played bass guitar and the piano, and shared primary songwriting and lead vocal duties with John ...

Composition and recording

Credited to the

partnership, Walter Everett and

Ian MacDonald Ian MacCormick (known by the pseudonym Ian MacDonald; 3 October 1948 – 20 August 2003) was an English music critic, journalist and author, best known for both '' Revolution in the Head'', his critical history of the Beatles which borrowed te ...

both refer to the song as Lennon's. In his official biography '' Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now'',

estimates the writing as 60–40 to

. The song was likely written in January or February 1965. In a 16 January 1965 interview with Ray Coleman for ''

Melody Maker ''Melody Maker'' was a British weekly music magazine, one of the world's earliest music weeklies; according to its publisher, IPC Media, the earliest. In January 2001, it was merged into "long-standing rival" (and IPC Media sister publicatio ...

'' magazine, Lennon explained he had only written "half a song" for the Beatles' next film. From 25 January to 7 February, Lennon and his wife

Cynthia Cynthia is a feminine given name of Greek language, Greek origin: , , "from Mount Cynthus" on the island of Delos. The name has been in use in the Anglosphere since the 17th century. There are various spellings for this name, and it can be abbrev ...

vacationed in the

Austrian Alps The Central Eastern Alps (), also referred to as Austrian Central Alps () or just Central Alps, comprise the Main chain of the Alps, main chain of the Eastern Alps in Austria and the adjacent regions of Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Italy and Slov ...

with Beatles producer

George Martin Sir George Henry Martin (3 January 1926 – 8 March 2016) was an English record producer, arranger, composer, conductor, and musician. He was commonly referred to as the "fifth Beatle" because of his extensive involvement in each of the Beatle ...

and Martin's future wife, Judy Lockhart-Smith. The time off from touring provided Lennon, McCartney and

George Harrison George Harrison (25 February 1943 – 29 November 2001) was an English musician, singer and songwriter who achieved international fame as the lead guitarist of the Beatles. Sometimes called "the quiet Beatle", Harrison embraced Culture ...

time to write new songs, eventually recording 11 new tracks between 15 and 20 February. The Beatles recorded two takes and

overdubs Overdubbing (also known as layering) is a technique used in audio recording in which audio tracks that have been pre-recorded are then played back and monitored, while simultaneously recording new, doubled, or augmented tracks onto one or more a ...

of "You're Going to Lose That Girl" during an afternoon session at

EMI EMI Group Limited (formerly EMI Group plc until 2007; originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records or simply EMI) was a British transnational conglomerate founded in March 1931 in London. At t ...

on 19 February 1965. The next day Martin, assisted by

engineers Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while consider ...

Norman Smith and

Ken Scott Ken Scott (born 20 April 1947) is an English record producer and engineer known for being one of the five main engineers for the Beatles, as well as engineering Elton John, Pink Floyd, Procol Harum, the Mahavishnu Orchestra, Billy Cobham, Davi ...

, mixed the song for

mono Mono may refer to: Biology * Infectious mononucleosis, "the kissing disease" * Monocyte, a type of leukocyte (white blood cell) * Monodactylidae, members of which are referred to as monos Technology and computing * Mono (audio), single-c ...

. On 23 February while the Beatles filmed scenes for ''

'' in

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, engineers Smith and Malcolm Davies mixed the song for

stereo Stereophonic sound, commonly shortened to stereo, is a method of sound reproduction that recreates a multi-directional, 3-dimensional audible perspective. This is usually achieved by using two independent audio channels through a configurat ...

twice, preferring the second mix over the first. On 30 March the Beatles recorded more overdubs onto the song. An

electric piano An electric piano is a musical instrument that has a piano-style musical keyboard, where sound is produced by means of mechanical hammers striking metal strings or reeds or wire tines, which leads to vibrations which are then converted into ele ...

and Harrison's original guitar solo were erased from the original tape. Everett describes the original guitar solo as "tortured" due to the heavy

string gauge In music, strings are long flexible structures on string instruments that produce sound through vibration. Strings are held under tension so that they can vibrate freely. The pitch (frequency) at which a string will vibrate is primarily rela ...

on Harrison's brand new

Fender Stratocaster The Fender Stratocaster, colloquially known as the Strat, is a model of double- cutaway electric guitar designed between 1952 and 1954 by Leo Fender, Bill Carson, George Fullerton, and Freddie Tavares. The Fender Musical Instruments Corpora ...

. Harrison recorded a new guitar solo,

Ringo Starr Sir Richard Starkey (born 7 July 1940), known professionally as Ringo Starr, is an English musician, songwriter and actor who achieved international fame as the drummer for the Beatles. Starr occasionally sang lead vocals with the group, us ...

played

bongos Bongos (Spanish language, Spanish: ''bongó'') are an Afro-Cubans, Afro-Cuban percussion instrument consisting of a pair of small open bottomed hand drums of different sizes. The pair consists of the larger ''hembra'' () and the smaller ''macho'' ...

and McCartney played

piano A piano is a keyboard instrument that produces sound when its keys are depressed, activating an Action (music), action mechanism where hammers strike String (music), strings. Modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, tuned to a c ...

which ended up being unintentionally sharper than the electric guitars. On 2 April Martin, assisted by Smith, made another stereo mix of the song using the 30 March overdubs. This stereo mix was included on both the UK and US stereo releases of ''

In the film ''Help!''

In the film, the group appears singing this song in the recording studio. In addition to the group's familiar guitar-and-drum setup, there is also footage of Paul McCartney at a piano and Ringo Starr playing the bongos, both miming instruments they had overdubbed onto the recording. Towards the end, one of the thugs uses a chainsaw to saw a hole in the floor around the drum kit. The producer reports that they will have to re-record the song due to a buzzing noise, at which point The Beatles begin asking one another who was buzzing. As they look to Ringo, he and the drums fall through the floor.

Release

''Help!'' was released by EMI's

Parlophone Parlophone Records Limited (also known as Parlophone Records and Parlophone) is a record label founded in Germany in 1896 by the Carl Lindström Company as Parlophon. The British branch of the label was founded on 8 August 1923 as the Parloph ...

label on 6 August 1965, with "You're Going to Lose That Girl" sequenced as the sixth track between " Another Girl" and "

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". Capitol released the soundtrack album in North America with an altered track listing as ''

'' on 13 August. The track, instead titled "You're Gonna Lose That Girl", is eleventh and sequenced between two

orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * String instruments, such as the violin, viola, cello, ...

l pieces. The track is the first use of Harrison's Sonic Blue Fender Stratocaster, with ones gifted to him and Lennon during

the Beatles' 1965 US tour The Beatles staged their second concert tour of the United States (with one date in Canada) in the late summer of 1965. At the peak of American Beatlemania, they played a mixture of outdoor stadiums and indoor arenas, with historic concerts at S ...

. The guitar remained one of Harrison's favorites for the rest of his career and featured heavily on the Beatles next album, ''

Rubber Soul ''Rubber Soul'' is the sixth studio album by the English Rock music, rock band the Beatles. It was released on 3 December 1965 in the United Kingdom on EMI's Parlophone label, accompanied by the non-album double A-side single "We Can Work It Ou ...

''. Writer Jacqueline Warwick describes the track as an "advice" song, comparable to "

She Loves You "She Loves You" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles, written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney and released as a single in the United Kingdom on 23 August 1963. The single set and surpassed several sales records in the United Kingdom c ...

" and the Beatles' earlier covers of

girl group A girl group is a music act featuring two or more women in music, female singers who generally vocal harmony, harmonize together. The term "girl group" is also used in a narrower sense in the United States to denote the wave of American female p ...

s. Everett describes McCartney and Harrison's

responsorial A responsory or respond is a type of chant in western Christian liturgies. Definition The most general definition of a responsory is any psalm, canticle, or other sacred musical work sung responsorially, that is, with a cantor or small group sing ...

backing vocals as being heavily influenced by

Motown Motown is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. Founded by Berry Gordy, Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on January 12, 1959, it was incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau ...

music. Warwick imagines Motown based choreography for the song: "it's easy to picture Paul and George shimmying and wagging their fingers if only they hadn't instruments to contend with." In his

musicological Musicology is the academic, research-based study of music, as opposed to musical composition or performance. Musicology research combines and intersects with many fields, including psychology, sociology, acoustics, neurology, natural sciences, f ...

analysis of the song's chord progressions, Everett describes the changes as "jarringly original". MacDonald describes the track as one of the few recorded during the ''Help!'' sessions that stands up, singling out the vocals in particular. The music journalist Bill Wyman interprets

the Ramones The Ramones were an American punk rock band formed in the New York City neighborhood Forest Hills, Queens in 1974. Known for helping establish the punk movement in the United States and elsewhere, the Ramones are often recognized as one of t ...

' song "You're Gonna Kill That Girl" as a

parody A parody is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satire, satirical or irony, ironic imitation. Often its subject is an Originality, original work or some aspect of it (theme/content, author, style, e ...

of the song.

Personnel

According to

, except where noted: *

double-tracked lead vocal, rhythm guitar *

backing vocal, bass guitar, piano *

backing vocal, lead guitar *

drums,

Cover Versions

* 2025 - John Greene, ''Sunburn for the Soul''

Notes

References

Sources

* * * * * * * * *

External links

* {{Authority control The Beatles songs Song recordings produced by George Martin 1965 songs Songs written for films Songs written by Lennon–McCartney Songs published by Northern Songs 1969 singles Apple Records singles