‘If I Fell’ from A Hard Day’s Night – the third album by The Beatles – is the song to show people if they were to ask what was so great about John Lennon and Paul McCartney as a pair of vocalists. Their voices and their melodies are what carry this track for its duration. That wasn’t meant to be a slight at George Harrison or Ringo Starr because they do their thing too. But with Lennon and McCartney’s vocals being the main attraction, there’s no reason for the other two to do anything too fancy.

Paul and John harmonise throughout the entire track bar some parts where they sing the exact same melody and John’s double tracked lead at the start. I usually sing John’s part if ever the song comes into my head. I’ve always seen it as Paul singing the higher harmony and John taking the lead rather than vice versa. It is John’s song after all. Although there is a demo recording of him trying to sing what would become Paul’s vocal, so it may be that that is the main melody. It’s no big deal to be honest.

It’s a love song, similar to a lot of other songs the two wrote during those years in the band, but sees Lennon practically begging this new love to treat him better than the one who came before. He would do this again only five years later in “Don’t Let Me Down“. But in 1964 he was a lot more sweeter about in his approach.