One After 909

From Wikipedia:

“One After 909” (sometimes titled “The One After 909” in early recordings) is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their 1970 album Let It Be. It was written by John Lennon, with input from Paul McCartney, and was credited to their joint partnership. The album version is the live performance from the rooftop concert which took place on 30 January 1969. This performance is also included in the Let It Be film. The song was written no later than spring 1960 and perhaps as early as 1957, and is one of the first Lennon–McCartney compositions. “One After 909” is perhaps more reminiscent of early American rock ‘n’ roll than any of the other songs from the rooftop show, and as a joke for the rooftop chatter, Lennon sings a variant on the opening line of “Danny Boy” after the song is finished.

Origin

In his 1980 Playboy interview Lennon explained, “That was something I wrote when I was about seventeen. I lived at 9 Newcastle Road. I was born on the ninth of October, the ninth month [sic]. It’s just a number that follows me around, but, numerologically, apparently I’m a number six or a three or something, but it’s all part of nine.”

McCartney said, “It’s not a great song but it’s a great favourite of mine because it has great memories for me of John and I trying to write a bluesy freight-train song. There were a lot of those songs at the time, like ‘Midnight Special’, ‘Freight Train‘, ‘Rock Island Line‘, so this was the ‘One After 909’; she didn’t get the 909, she got the one after it.”

Different versions

On 5 March 1963, the Beatles recorded a version of the song in five takes during the same session that produced their third single, “From Me to You“, and its B-side “Thank You Girl“. They were unhappy with the result and that version was not released at the time. Various takes from the 5 March session, and an edit of them, were released in 1995 on the Anthology 1 compilation. The song was shelved for six years, until the Beatles re-recorded it for their Get Back project, and eventually saw the release in Let It Be.

“One After 909” is included on 2003’s Let It Be… Naked, in a remixed and remastered version of the 1969 rooftop concert take. The original third take of the song was released as part of the 2021 re-release of Let It Be. […]

Paul McCartney in "Many Years From Now", by Barry Miles:

It was a number we didn’t used to do much but it was one that we always liked doing, and we rediscovered it. There were a couple of tunes that we wondered why we never put out; either George Martin didn’t like them enough to or he favoured others. It’s not a great song but it’s a great favourite of mine because it has great memories for me of John and I trying to write a bluesy freight-train song. There were a lot of those songs at the time, like “Midnight Special”, “Freight Train”, “Rock Island Line”, so this was the “One After 909”; she didn’t get the 909, she got the one after it! It was a tribute to British Rail, actually. No, at the time we weren’t thinking British, it was much more the Super Chief from Omaha.

From The Usenet Guide to Beatles Recording Variations:

[a] stereo 23 Mar 1970.
UK: Apple PXS 1 and PCS 7096 Let It Be 1970.
US: Apple AR 34001 Let It Be 1970.
CD: EMI CDP 7 46447 2 Let It Be 1987.

The talk at the end and a bit of A Londonderry Air (also called Danny Boy) belongs, as seen in the film Let It Be.

From The Usenet Guide to Beatles Recording Variations (Anthology outtakes):

excerpts of takes 3, 4, 5[b] mono 1995. edited.
CD: Apple CDP 8 34445 2 Anthology 1 1995.

As edited and mixed for Anthology: Take 3 fades up, breaks down, and ends with the spoken words “want them” (as it also does on a bootleg of this day’s tapes). Take 4 fades up, breaks down, and ends with the words “wasn’t”, “it was”, and a guitar strum. Take 5 starts just after the “take 5” announcement (as heard on bootleg), with the words “it must be”, and strangely, the strum from the end of 4 is made to repeat over those words, merging the two to sound as if they ran continuously. Take 5 then fades out, ending the Anthology mix.

edit of takes 4 and 5[c] mono 1995. edited.
CD: Apple CDP 8 34445 2 Anthology 1 1995.

Take 4 to near the end of the solo, edited to take 5.

The first item listed above was compiled to show where the song broke down during two attempts at recording the whole song, and then shows the startup of a take that begins in mid-song and runs to the end. The second item fulfills the original plan by using that edit piece to make a complete version of the song.

This recording was listed for an album of unreleased tracks in 1981, appeared in the Abbey Road studios show in 1983, and was to be on Sessions in 1984. The Sessions edit made in 1984 cuts to take 5 at the start of the solo, while this edit uses take 4 for most of the solo. The song was first bootlegged in 1984 on File Under Beatles, where it appears in yet another edit. All these takes have been bootlegged in full in stereo.

The bit you won’t see in the [Get Back] film is our kid telling John that I was the one who remembered the “one after 909” from Forthlin Rd rehearsals! At least Pete Jackson has sent me the outtake!

Mike McCartney – from Twitter, December 31, 2021

That was something I wrote when I was about seventeen. I lived at 9 Newcastle Road. I was born on the ninth of October, the ninth month [sic]. It’s just a number that follows me around, but, numerologically, apparently I’m a number six or a three or something, but it’s all part of nine.

John Lennon – From interview with Playboy, 1980

Lyrics

Officially appears on

Bootlegs

Videos

Live performances

“One After 909” has been played in 19 concerts and 32 soundchecks.

Latest concerts where “One After 909” has been played

Going further

Chris Williams • 5 years ago

meaigs • 2 years ago

The PaulMcCartney Project • 2 years ago

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