This Mystery And Credit Of "Norwegian Wood" Unraveled

By | November 27, 2021

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The boys of "Norwegian Wood."

“Norwegian Wood,” The Beatles’ 1965 hit off their Rubber Soul album exemplifies the iconic group in many ways. First and naturally foremost, it features a battle for writing credit between the ever quarreling John Lennon and Paul McCartney. On the song also known as “This Bird Has Flown”, George Harrison played a strange instrument, the sitar, introducing it to the world at large. And all the while Ringo Starr quietly played the finger cymbals, hoping someone would notice.

“Norwegian Wood” only reached the #1 spot in Australia but Rolling Stone did rank the adulterous song as #83 on their 2004 list of the 500 greatest songs ever. So what is “Norwegian Wood,” and who came up with it? Read on to find out.

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The battle for credit ultimately unraveled The Beatles and "Norwegian Wood" stood as a prime example of that. metv

Writing Credit

Like many Beatles songs, parsing out who wrote it, turns into a job suited for Inspector Clouseau. According to Lennon, the song stemmed from his predilection to commit adultery.

“‘Norwegian Wood’ is my song completely. I was trying to write about an affair without letting my wife know I was having one. I was sort of writing from my experiences - girl's flats, things like that. I was very careful and paranoid because I didn't want my wife, Cyn, to know that there really was something going on outside of the household. I'd always had some kind of affairs going on, so I was trying to be sophisticated in writing about an affair, but in such a smoke-screen way that you couldn't tell. But I can't remember any specific woman it had to do with."

Perhaps if you’re looking to hide infidelity from your wife, writing a hit song about it might not be the most effective way of going about it. But hey, they say you should write what you know!