The Ballad Of John And Yoko

Recorded on 14 April 1969 at Studio Three, EMI Studios, Abbey Road, with John Lennon and Paul McCartney performing without George Harrison or Ringo Starr. George Martin produced the session and Geoff Emerick engineered and mixed the track the same day. Released as a standalone single on 30 May 1969, it turned Lennon’s marriage-and-bed-in chronicle into a direct piece of contemporary reportage. It reached No. 1 in the UK and became the Beatles’ 17th UK chart-topper. The song remains one of the clearest examples of Lennon and McCartney working as a duo in the Beatles’ final year. Its promo film and tightly observed lyric have kept it in the band’s core late-period canon.