“Two of Us”, from 1969, is one of the few songs I like from the Beatles’ “Let it Be” album (the title song is another), but it’s a good one. And it’s clearly McCartney all the way. It ranks #54 on Rolling Stone‘s list of the 100 greatest Beatles songs, which adds that it’s about McCartney’s romance with Linda Eastman (note that the sheepdog Martha, described below, was the inspiration for the White Album song “Martha My Dear”):
This sweet, mostly acoustic number seems to be McCartney’s tribute to his long-standing friendship with Lennon — especially when you look at the rehearsal clip of the song that appears in the Let It Be movie, showing Lennon and McCartney reprising their old habit of singing into the same microphone. In fact, it’s about McCartney and Linda Eastman, who were married six weeks after the song was recorded. “We used to send a lot of postcards to each other,” she said. The two of them liked to go for long drives together, with McCartney’s sheepdog, Martha, in the back seat, heading off for nowhere in particular.
The session that yielded the album version of “Two of Us” (as well as the basic tracks for “Let It Be” and “The Long and Winding Road”) was held the day after the Beatles’ rooftop concert and wrapped up the Get Back experiment — a messy month of filming and recording. The “bass” part of “Two of Us” is actually played by Harrison on the low strings of an electric guitar, and the whistling at the end is provided by Lennon.
Here’s the recorded version; the album was produced not only by George Martin, but also by Phil Spector, which peeved McCartney when Spector made some of the songs (e.g., “The Long and Winding Road”) overly lush.
Here’s a live version from God knows where (it may be overdubbed with the recorded version). Lennon is sitting in front, huddled with Yoko.
Wikipedia adds this:
The song was originally titled “On Our Way Home”. McCartney claimed it was dedicated to his wife-to-be Linda Eastman, though the lyrics (e.g.: “you and I have memories/longer than the road that stretches out ahead” or “you and me chasing paper/getting nowhere”) sounded to author Ian MacDonald like they were actually addressing Lennon.
An early performance of the song, in a guitar-driven rock style, can be seen in the Let It Be film. Unsatisfied with this style, which McCartney described as “chunky”, the band reworked the song around acoustic guitars. The Beatles performed a finished version of the song live at Apple Studios on 31 January 1969; this performance was included in both the Let It Be film and album.
Perhaps a reader who has a copy of McCartney’s biography, Many Years from Now, can settle what the song was really about, since the book apparently gives Paul’s take on how a lot of Beatles songs originated.
Glad to see this one on the list. “Two of Us” has always been one of my favorite songs.
Great effin’ tune.
Now that IS (maybe) my favourite Fabs song. I was in a band that did it – the chord sequence is bizarre.
To me, that sounds more like an Elvis imitation 30 seconds in.
In Many Years from Now (p. 534 in my copy), Barry Miles describes the song as indeed about Linda, but notes that John and Paul were sharing the same microphone “and behaving in every way as if the lyrics were about the two of them. They appear to be having a good time together, particularly when John ad-libs, ‘Two of us wearing make-up.'”
*Including the classic Elvis sneer.
My favourite Beatles song
Thanks for this one. Brought tears to my eyes. (Must be getting old.)
Boy, that takes me back. (huge trips across Alaska in the early 70s, 8-track tapes included the Anthology 2-part album, and “Hey Jude”, as I remember).
Paul says it’s about Linda: from Barry Miles’s (heh) “Many Years From Now”, direect quotes from Paul blockquoted (hey, a new verb!):
The song “Two of Us” on the Let It Be album was written on one of these drives after Linda came to live in London. They bundled Martha into the back seat and drove the Aston Martin out beyond Esher and Weybridge to the country near Cobham where the M25 motorway now rings London, picking up sandwiches on the way. They found a side road and drove down it, found another side road and tried to get as remote and away from it all as possible. They found a
secluded spot to park near a wood and Linda got out to take some photographs. One of her
pictures shows the song actually being composed: Paul with a day’s growth of stubble, wearing a white open-necked shirt and his $10 thrift-shop herringbone coat, sitting half in the driver’s seat, strumming his acoustic guitar.
The rest of the section devoted to that song involves Paul and Linda’s attraction to nature, their mutual distaste of big, rich empty houses and the well-to-do socializing — ending on a bit centering on how she let Paul be a person.
Both the performance videos are from the Let it Be film. At the end, they do filmed performances (possibly lip-synced) of several tunes followed by the concert on the roof.
I just listened to the whole album again, and I have to say that I liked most of the songs a lot. The title track and the Two of Us are two of the best, but IMHO The Long and Winding Road and Across the Universe are also first rate. These guys just didn’t do much that I don’t enjoy hearing.
I’d be inclined to take with large doses of salt anything either John or Paul had to say about who wrote what about what at the time of the break-up
This thread provides the perfect opportunity to recount that on Saturday I was playing piano in Paul McCartney’s childhood home – which is odd because I can’t even play the piano! (I picked out “Strangers In The Night” with two fingers).
The National Trust tour of both McCartney’s and Lennon’s early homes is a tourist experience I would recommend to any Beatles fan who plans to visit Liverpool. The National Trust has done a magnificent job in restoring the houses to their original condition, even to the extent of the mismatched wallpaper in 20 Forthlin Road. Humble beginnings indeed.
Not much in the way of hi-hat or ride cymbal, as far as I can tell. A crash cymbal in a few spots, but that’s it.