Phony Beatlemania: "And Your Bird Can Sing"

Follow along in the book HERE. Today's song is at #22 and is featured on pages 154-157.

 

 

"And Your Bird Can Sing"

from Revolver

1966

I can empathize—it's tough pounding out 100 write-ups. Especially when it's about music. There's a lot to discuss about music generally, but when you're going through 100 items on a list, maybe there are some songs that really don't have a bigger point. Maybe that song is just a good song. A skilled writer (blogger, whatever) will spin the wheels for the minimum work count, and move on to the next one, hoping that there's something more interesting to say there.

I get the sense that "And Your Bird Can Sing" is the first such roadblock for our esteemed authors, Stephen J. Spignesi and Michael Lewis. It's clear why it's sitting at #22—it's a great fucking song, and it might be the first one we've come across that you could reasonably call a "deep cut," at least in the context of the full discography—but with that ranking comes the obligation to explain something with more panache than "hey, this is good." That's boring, to just say "yeah, it's good," and might lead to questions of "why are you even doing this?" And that's not good. You want to be interesting because writing is the act of constantly trying to justify your own existence.

I'm fortunate that, even though I feel the same way, that "And Your Bird Can Sing" is a really good song but slightly shallow, I at least have an extra layer to work with. I can tell you that it's a great song and probably justifies its seed, but I can also tell you about the book where two strangers are writing about it, and how maybe they dropped the ball a little bit at #22.

Here's something I really need to talk about when it comes to 100 Best Beatles Songs: A Passionate Fan's Guide. I've joked about it before but today I really need to seriously discuss it. I need answers about this. Because, yet again, John Lennon's interview from Playboy is mentioned. We've reached a breaking point. I need to know—was this an extensive enough interview that a "passionate fan's guide" can literally quote it 100 times for 100 songs, or are these two jabronis just secret perverts? Doing extremely cursory research, it seems like it's probably a case of the former—apparently Lennon spoke so much to Playboy that there's literally a book-length transcript. Wow. I still think it's weird that the tome of Beatles knowledge was spliced in between full-page nudes of 1980s models and actresses, but I'll concede that answers are answers, no matter where you get 'em.

From this oft-quoted Playboy interview, Spignesi and Lewis hung their write-up for the 22nd-best Beatles song on the hook of "John Lennon didn't even like this song." Credit where it's due—it is interesting when the audience seems to find something positive in a piece of art that not even its artist can find. Lennon used the word "throwaway." I guess technically it is, depending on how you define the term. "And Your Bird Can Sing" stands tall against the rest of the legendary tracklist of Revolver, and occasionally gets buried among other standouts. It wasn't released as a single or anything, which might speak to Lennon's feelings about it best. (In fact, it was left off of the original U.S. release of Revolver altogether, which is absolutely fucked up, but more on this some other day.)

Pretty weak premise for your write-up for the 22nd-best song, but what can ya do. Sometimes good songs are just good songs. That's why it's really weird that Spignesi tries to use "And Your Bird Can Sing" as proof that the Beatles were "greater than the sum of their parts." In my mind, this song proves the opposite. This is definitionally a sum of parts. The parts: dual jangly guitars, sweet harmonizing, a classic Beatles lyrical hook ("I'll be 'round / I'll be 'round"). The sum: legitimately one of the best Beatles songs, and possibly one the most underrated.

But it's not more than that. And the weak-ass write-up in the book (along with the weak-ass blog post accompanying it here) prove it.

BEATLES TRIVIA: The "Did You Know?" section for each song in this book usually includes a list of other artists who have covered this song in the past. Some lists are longer than others. Today's was unique because it was the first time I have literally never heard of any of the artists mentioned. They are: the Flamin' Groovies; Guadalcanal Diary; the Jam. They sound made up. But there you go, there's your trivia.

BETTER BEATLE: Some truth dropped in the intro paragraph of the write-up for this song—the fact that Revolver is known as one of the best rock albums ever, and that "And Your Bird Can Sing" is a big part of that. True, but maybe not in the way that that the authors intended. I believe that "And Your Bird Can Sing" is maybe the seventh- or eighth-best song on Revolver, and the fact that the seventh- or eighth-best song on the album is this fucking good says a lot about the album in toto. But, to answer the prompt, I'll give the obvious answer of "Tomorrow Never Knows," which is the best song on Revolver, and which really makes me question the integrity of Spignesi and Lewis in their decision to place it all the way down at #39. Insanity. But we'll get there eventually.

NEXT TIME: "Paperback Writer" at #23