You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)
Non-album b-side: “Let It Be”
Written by: John and Paul
“You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)” was the reverse of the Beatles final UK single, “Let It Be”, meaning it was most likely the final original Beatles song many fans ever heard. What a strange way to go out.
It’s a straight up comedy record that moves along in distinct sections, beginning as a nice sounding would-be pop tune that absolutely must have been sampled by a hip hop artist by now and then moving along into stranger and stranger territory, degrading in sanity the whole way through. There’s sexy lounge jazz and zany music hall and the harrumphing voices of old British men who seem to belong on Sesame Street.
The song is really weird and in my honest opinion it isn’t quite knee-slappingly funny, but it does capture a side of the Beatles that most of their records do not. These four irreverent Liverpudlians did not become the biggest sensations the world has ever known simply on the merit of their amazing music. They were personable and charismatic, clever and witty, cheeky and charming. They were just plain fun. This is all made evident in their interviews and in their feature films, but only a few songs really show it and none quite so much as “You Know My Name…” does.
To really understand the power of the Beatles, the grand scope of their magnificence, you need to understand them as more than musicians. You need to know them as humans. Strange, very British humans with goofy senses of humor and the cunning to know that everything belongs in music, even comedy.
