“Hello, Goodbye” was the first song released by the Beatles following the death of their manager, Brian Epstein. It was written by Paul McCartney and he is the lead singer. They were in the middle of production for Magical Mystery Tour at the time, but “Hello, Goodbye” did not initially become a part of that movie’s soundtrack. The single was released as a non-album single at first, but later was included on the soundtrack album. It’s also been included on various greatest hits albums and the famous “Red” and “Blue” albums of hits. “Hello, Goodbye” is on the “Blue” album.

The song originated when Paul sat down at the piano and started just playing around. He asked their assistant manager Allen Klein (now manager with the death of Epstein) to start making up some opposites, like “Yes, No” “Black, White” “Up, Down” and it went from there. One of them said “Hello, Goodbye” and they had a title for the song. It didn’t take long for Paul to finish the song.

When the song was recorded, they also recorded “I Am the Walrus” which was to go on the B-side of the record and was on the Magical Mystery Tour album. John didn’t like “Hello, Goodbye” very much and pushed to have “I Am the Walrus” as the A-side, but Paul and Klein overruled him and so “Hello, Goodbye” became the A-side.

They were proven right when “Hello, Goodbye” spent seven weeks at number one in England and three weeks here in the States. “I Am the Walrus” only peaked at number 57 in the United States, becoming the worse ranking B-side in Beatles history.

Even with it’s poor showing in America, “I Am the Walrus” is worthy of some mention here. It was inspired by the poem “The Walrus and the Carpenter,” from Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. According to John, the poem is about the capitalist and social system. The walrus is the bad guy and the carpenter is the good guy. From what I know about John Lennon, I can see why he would lean toward hat song.

Jeff Lynne, the leader of Electric Light Orchestra, said that “I Am the Walrus” was his favorite song and was the inspiration for ELO in the first place. Electric Light Orchestra was one of the first bands to include classical music blended with rock music.

In the recording of “Hello, Goodbye,” Paul plays the piano, bongos and conga drum. John plays the lead guitar and the organ. George is also on lead guitar and tambourine. Ringo, of course, plays drums and also the maracas.

“Hello, Goodbye” entered the charts in American at number 45 on December 2, 1967 and four weeks later became the Beatles fifteenth number one. It stayed at number one for three weeks, one of those in 1967 and the other two in 1968. It was the last number one of 1967 and the first number one of 1968.