Talk:Yesterday (song)

Composition and structure
The chords given for the 'second section' are all wrong. But heck, the chords for the first section are wrong too. The progression is mostly the same for both the verse and the middle eight. You got G and F#m7 and B7 and C and D and there's an Em7 at the end followed by an A7 and then a C before resolving to the tonic G. This makes for a great two-tone phrase D-C#-C on top of a lower E.

Not impressed at all by Pollack - quite the contrary, and it might help if he played guitar like Macca. And got more fresh air from time to time. Who wrote that section? Played any gigs recently?

String Quartet
A full string quartet was used in the making of "Yesterday" but it seems the Viola comes very strong and adds the emotion and expression to this song in the final verse. More so than the Violin, Cello or Bass. This applies only to the strings section and not the guitar.Amaddrums (talk) 14:49, 12 April 2015 (UTC)
 * And?

Yesterday in films?, cont'd
Hi there,

I see in the archive that someone asked if it could be interesting to list the movies in which the song is played, but got no reply. I was once told of a (1970's?) film where the character is obsessed with the song and keeps playing it over and over, but i never heard of any other mention of such a film. Anyone ? --Jerome Potts (talk) 03:18, 20 June 2015 (UTC) Well, there is now an entire movie ("Yesterday"). --Daveler16 (talk) 20:33, 10 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Maybe Anna (Go to Him) Al Bundy, Married With Children, 1991? MBG02 (talk) 03:00, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

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Scrambled eggs
Isn't the "scrambled eggs" paragraph repetitive and redundant? It explains that McCartney asked around about the melody, became confident it was his, and wrote the nonsense lyrics. Then it goes on to say that McCartney asked around about the melody, became confident it was his, ands wrote the nonsense lyrics. Mind if I shorten it?--Daveler16 (talk) 20:30, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

No objection, apparently, so I made the change, keeping the citation.--Daveler16 (talk) 16:44, 14 July 2019 (UTC)

Film
Although an uncited reference to it has recently been removed, the film named after the song probably warrants a mention. Thoughts? Dave.Dunford (talk) 23:51, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Erasing McCartney
Seems it's the standard on Wikipedia to put "written by John Lennon" at every given opportunity, because if a source claims McCartney had nothing to do with it, that's the one to use. McCartney himself claims he contributed to almost every song and in the Beatles anthology, while admitting John wrote most of "all you need us love", he still wrote part of it. Backed up by George Harrison, Ringo Starr and George Martin, in the same documentary, with all three refering to both of them as the writers of it. But, if Lennon fans can get away with giving John sole ownership, they'll have it. Meanwhile, when it's a McCartney song, the words "primarily" written by Paul McCartney proves to be the prefferd phrasee, hintig that "he didn't do it on his own." Such a shame this bias is allowed to run rampant through Wikipedia. 77.98.216.8 (talk) 04:29, 5 February 2022 (UTC)
 * We follow the sources, not personal opinions or hearsay. Beatles-related articles are very well sourced because there is a huge amount of information available. One thing to remember: Lennon and McCartney had an agreement from the very beginning of their partnership that both would be credited for all songs they wrote (while in the Beatles). Song articles always indicate "credited to Lennon-McCartney". We can't do otherwise because those are the official credits for all Lennon and McCartney songs when they were in the Beatles. But please note that song articles also make a point of stating (almost always in the lead) what the sources say about the actual writer(s). This article is an example: "written by Paul McCartney and credited to Lennon–McCartney". No one is "erasing McCartney", and there is no conspiracy here by "Lennon fans". All Beatles articles have a lot of eyes on them. If such a conspiracy was even attempted, it would be immediately reverted. Everything on Wikipedia must be reliably sourced. And there is no debate that all of their songs are "credited to Lennon-McCartney". You won't find a source any more reliable than those already used that states otherwise. Sundayclose (talk) 04:48, 5 February 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 14 May 2023

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Move per agreement over WP:PRIMARY TOPIC (non-admin closure) >>> Extorc . talk  12:04, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Close also endorsed by, see below.

Yesterday (Beatles song) → Yesterday (song) – There have been several previous RMs here, but all focused on the two extreme options of simply Yesterday or the doubly-disambiguated Yesterday (Beatles song). Per WP:INCOMPDAB and WP:PDAB, a partly-disambiguated title may still have a primary topic; a rule of thumb I often see used is whether the article gets more pageviews than all other candidates combined. Well, let's see. |Yesterday_(Black_Eyed_Peas_song)|Yesterday_(Toni_Braxton_song)|Yesterday_(Shanice_song) For the previous year: That is a 33:1 pageview ratio in favor of the Beatles song over the three others combined. Similarly, WikiNav shows that the Beatles song got 35.91% of outbound clicks from the Yesterday DAB in April, the highest of any song and the second-highest overall (after the recent film); no other song cracks the top 6 (which bottoms out at 1.8%). In addition to that technical data, there is the fact that the Beatles song is one of the most influential, most covered, and most popular songs of all time. I think there is a strong case here for it to be the primary topic for "Yesterday (song)". -- Tamzin  [ cetacean needed ] (she&#124;they&#124;xe) 18:23, 14 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Yesterday (Beatles song): 241,137 pageviews in 2022
 * Yesterday (Toni Braxton song): 5,210
 * Yesterday (Shanice song): 1,061
 * Yesterday (Black Eyed Peas song): 1,022
 * Comment: In addition to the four songs listed above, there are about 25 other songs listed at Yesterday (disambiguation) with this title, and three of them (a total of seven) have articles devoted to them. That seems like a more diverse list of topics than the quintessential PDAB example, Thriller (album). —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 19:52, 14 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Some of those songs are "Yesterdays". The three I listed are the only ones with articles. There's 10 listed that point to albums and 3 that point to artists. As noted at WP:INCOMPDAB, there's been consensus to ignore non-article-worthy songs in INCOMPDAB situations. I don't think that any of these non-notable songs, none of which get a significant percentage of outbound clicks, shift the analysis much. --  Tamzin  [ cetacean needed ] (she&#124;they&#124;xe) 20:36, 14 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Ah, yes, the Ashley Roberts song article was blanked and redirected in 2021, and some of the others are "Yesterdays". One caveat I suggest though is not to consider "not having an article devoted specifically to the song" synonymous with necessarily being "a non-notable song". Disambiguation is about topics, not articles, and may consider topics discussed as a subtopic within an article that is primarily about something else (such as an album or artist). I don't know whether that distinction matters here or not – perhaps not. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 22:52, 14 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Oppose malformed and early close Other songs. See WP:DISAMBIGUATION. In ictu oculi (talk) 21:35, 14 May 2023 (UTC)
 * While you certainly can oppose the RM, it isn't malformed and there is no reason to early close. Please see WP:ETIQ. 162 etc. (talk) 21:59, 14 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Okay. Well, I'll strike "malformed and early close" - but this is a proposal contrary to WP:PT and WP:TITLE. Why would we deliberately ambiguate an article title in this case? In ictu oculi (talk) 12:46, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Oppose. No reason at all to move this to an incomplete disambiguation title. Gonnym (talk) 03:10, 15 May 2023 (UTC)
 * There were reasons given, those being a 33:1 pageview ratio between the Beatles song and other songs titled "Yesterday"; 35.91% of outbound clicks from the Yesterday DAB; and the fact that the Beatles song is one of the most influential, most covered, and most popular songs of all time. lol1 VNIO ( I made a mistake?  talk to me ) 09:39, 19 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Support, the Beatles song is primary and has long-term historical significance. Randy Kryn (talk) 12:17, 15 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Weak oppose I'd normally expect more like 1 in 100 or at least in in 50.  Crouch, Swale  ( talk ) 18:15, 15 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Support. Thresholds vary for when "incomplete disambiguation" is appropriate, but my own preferences are solidly met here.  The Beatles song is many many many times more notable than all the rest combined per page view stats.  It's more prominent than the non-song meanings, too.  SnowFire (talk) 20:23, 18 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Support. I would normally be against a specific song having the primary title whenever other songs with the same title have separate articles. That being said, I do think there is a strong case to be made for this being the primary topic. It has the page-views to support it, and there is just a strong long-term historical significance. If this change is made, I think a hat-note redirecting users to the disambiguation page and to the links for other songs with this title would be beneficial. Aoba47 (talk) 21:57, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Discussion after close
with respect and assuming good faith, I have reverted your non-admin close and placed a message on your Talk page. This is such a high visibility move contrary to en.wikipedia guidelines, it could have a knock on effect elswhere in the article corpus, and is highly controversial, so an admin closer would be preferable. At least a relist would be expected at this 7 day mark. But if you push through your close again I will not revert a second time. In ictu oculi (talk) 12:42, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
 * following a request by Extorc on my talk page, I'm reinstating Extorc's close here. Procedurally, it was not legitimate to simply reverse the close simply because it was a non-admin close - WP:RMNAC is clear that not being an admin is not sufficient ground on its own to reject a close. Also, having looked over the discussion I think it's a fair close, the policy explicitly allows for partial primary topics if a sufficient bar is met, which a majority here felt it did. I'm happy to also put my endorsement on this close as an admin, if that makes things clearer for you.. If you still wish to challenge the close after this, the course of actino would be to discuss it with Extorc, perhaps mention some aspects you think they failed to consider. Then, if you're still not happy after discussion with Extorc, you can file an entry at WP:MRV. Cheers and I hope you're both having a good weekend otherwise. &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 14:01, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. Although I personally think that 3 oppose and 3 support would have been better served by a relist, No I do not think any further action is needed at this point. We'll see how the change benefits readers over the next year(s). In ictu oculi (talk) 20:36, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Original 2,200 cover versions citation
Re, I did a little bit of digging in search of the original source. The citation just added for the "2,200 covers" claim is to cheatsheet.com, but this in turn cites a "book" by PediaPress, based on Wikipedia (quote: "BBC News named his song "Yesterday" the most covered song in history—by over 2,200 artists"). The citation ([625]) is not available in the Google Books version of the Pedia Press book. However, the citation for this claim in the Paul McCartney article, where the Pedia Press book presumably got it from, is to a BBC article from 1999. So that's the citation I've gone with. God knows where the BBC got their information from. Dave.Dunford (talk) 07:44, 26 June 2023 (UTC)