Not a Second Time

This song reaches for motifs of anger, relationship and self reflection. Worth noting, the title carries a number ('second') and also carries a no or a not, and no Beatles record before this one was the same. The writing draws on R&B. Intentional or not, the line "No no no" turns up in 4 Beatles songs, among them 'She Said She Said', 'I'm So Tired' and 'Devil in Her Heart'.

'Not a Second Time' moves at about 93 BPM in G major, a pop and ballad song with classical music influences (William Mann's 'Aeolian cadence' notice in The Times). It has a keyboard solo, and curiously, the harmony moves G → Em → G → Em → D, which 'Happiness Is a Warm Gun' does as well.

Cut in nine takes at EMI Studio 2 with no Harrison. George Martin played the piano including the solo. Lennon played the Gibson J-160E on it, his acoustic. The kit in the room included the Ludwig Downbeat, which turns up on 17 of that year's records. The Beatles used double tracked vocal on it, and it is on more of their 1964 records than any other year's. Five songs were started the day this one was, the 27th to the 31st of their career.

Lennon wrote this one and sang it. George Martin played piano, as he also did on 'All You Need Is Love' and 'Slow Down'.

The record reached the public on November 22, 1963, with With The Beatles, and was never a single. In America it arrived eight weeks later, on Meet The Beatles!, a Capitol record. This is their 31st record, and the 29th of the 32 they released in that year.