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TL;DR:

  • John Lennon never made any money off The Beatles’ “Something.”
  • He didn’t care how the track performed on the charts.
  • One of his songs was released as a double A-side with “Something.”
The Beatles' John Lennon with a guitar
John Lennon | Max Scheler – K & K/Redferns

John Lennon said he didn’t make any money off The Beatles‘ “Something” or some other Fab Four songs. Subsequently, he explained why this was the case. Notably, fans in the United States and the United Kingdom reacted differently to “Something.”

John Lennon made no money off The Beatles’ ‘Something,’ ‘Taxman,’ or Ringo Starr’s songs

The book All We Are Saying: The Last Major Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono features an interview from 1980. In it, he discussed his feelings about George and Ringo Starr.

“Now, I don’t get a piece of George’s songs,” John said. “I don’t get a piece of anything he wrote, like ‘Something,’ or any of Ringo’s songs. Not even … anything. OK?

“Or the contributions I made to George’s early songs like ‘Taxman,'” he added. “Never asked for anything or any recognition or anything from it.” For context, George is the sole credited writer of “Something” and “Taxman.”

John Lennon was more concerned with the popularity of 1 of The Beatles’ other songs

According to the 1997 book Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now, NME asked John if The Beatles would record another album in a 1970 interview. “It just depends how much we all want to record together,” he replied. “I don’t know if I want to record together again. I go off and on it.

“In the old days, when we needed an album, Paul and I got together and produced enough songs for it,” he continued. “Nowadays, there’s three of us writing prolifically and trying to fit it all into one album.

“We’ve always said we had fights, it’s no news that we argue,” John added. “For instance, I don’t give a damn about how ‘Something’ is doing in the charts. I watch ‘Come Together‘ [the flip side] because that’s my song.”

How ‘Something’ and ‘Come Together’ performed on the pop charts in the United States and the United Kingdom

“Something” became a massive hit for The Beatles. “Come Together” and “Something” were released as a double A-side single. The songs reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for a single week, staying on the chart for 16 weeks. Both tunes appeared on the album Abbey Road. The album topped the Billboard 200 for 11 of its 487 weeks on the chart.

According to The Official Charts Company, “Something” and “Come Together” hit No. 4 and stayed on the chart for 12 weeks. Later, the tunes recharted at No. 84 for one week. On the other hand, Abbey Road peaked at No. 1 for 17 of its 97 weeks on the chart.

Subsequently, “Something” inspired covers by Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles, and numerous others. The tune soundtracked a memorable sequence in the jukebox musical Across the Universe.

“Something” became a huge hit and John said he didn’t make a dime from it.

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