You Know What to Do
| "You Know What to Do" | |
|---|---|
| Song by the Beatles | |
| from the album Anthology 1 | |
| Released | 20 November 1995 |
| Recorded | 3 June 1964, EMI Studios, London |
| Length | 1:59 |
| Label | Apple |
| Songwriter(s) | George Harrison |
| Producer(s) | George Martin |
"You Know What to Do" was one of the first songs written and recorded by George Harrison with the Beatles. It was recorded on 3 June 1964 but remained unreleased until its inclusion on the band's 1995 outtakes compilation Anthology 1.
During a photographic assignment on the morning of 3 June 1964, Ringo Starr was taken ill with tonsillitis and pharyngitis, 24 hours before the Beatles were due to leave for a six-country tour. The recording session booked for that day was originally intended to produce a fourteenth song for the band's A Hard Day's Night album, but this activity was cancelled so that a replacement drummer, Jimmie Nicol, could be brought in and rehearse with the group. After running through six songs in a one-hour rehearsal in EMI's Studio Two, everyone felt satisfied with Nicol's drumming, so he left to pack his suitcase.
That evening, in a four-hour session in Studio Two, each of the three present Beatles recorded a demo of a newly written song. Harrison recorded "You Know What to Do"; John Lennon did "No Reply", which eventually ended up as the opening track of their next album, Beatles for Sale; and Paul McCartney did "It's for You", a song which was written specifically for Cilla Black to sing. The tape of the session was subsequently misfiled, but was rediscovered in 1993.
After Anthology 1 was released, Harrison was asked about the song but he said he did not even remember its existence.
Harrison's first contribution to the Beatles' output was "Don't Bother Me", recorded in September 1963. His next contribution was not until "I Need You", recorded in February 1965. Asked about this gap in 1965, and referring obliquely to "You Know What to Do", George Martin explained that Harrison "got discouraged some time ago when none of us liked something that he had written".
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