But John is itching to move on. He sees the strictures of touring as the artistic death of the Beatles. “That’s why we never improved as musicians; we killed ourselves then to make it. And that was the end of it.”

John has a point, but still, the band does put out good songs—crowd-pleasing pop songs, yes, but isn’t it their job to give the fans what they want? Songs like “I Want to Hold Your Hand” and “Please Please Me” made them international superstars. “Eight Days a Week” is full of energy. Makes you feel good.

Is it mainstream? Sure. But Paul likes mainstream, enjoys being a commercial songwriter. He’s so open to inspiration that when a song comes to him in a dream, he wakes himself up. “I got out of bed, sat at the piano, found G, found F sharp minor 7th—and that leads you through then to B and E minor, and finally back to E. It all leads forward logically.” Paul finds his musical epiphany “the most magic thing.”

In the morning, the tune still fresh in his mind, Paul gives it the offbeat title of “Scrambled Eggs.”

On set, Paul works at the song constantly, much to director Richard Lester’s annoyance. The budget is much bigger this time around, thanks to the massive success of A Hard Day’s Night, and the film will be released in color, but they’ve only got four weeks to shoot it. Lester tells Paul to finish the bloody song or he’ll have the piano on the set removed.

“Blimey, he’s always talking about [that song],” George remarks. “You’d think he was Beethoven or somebody!”

On vacation in Portugal in June of 1965, Paul and his girlfriend, Jane Asher, take a long drive. As Jane naps, Paul sings to himself, “Da-da-da…yes-ter-day…sud-den-ly…fun-ni-ly…mer-ri-ly…” until he has the lyrics.

“The song was around for months and months,” John remembers, but Paul couldn’t settle on a title. “Every time we got together to write songs or for a recording session, this would come up,” he says. “Then, one morning, Paul woke up, and the song and the title were both there. Completed! I know it sounds like a fairy tale, but it is the plain truth. I was sorry, in a way, because we had so many laughs about it.”

The recording session is on for later that month, right before Paul’s twenty-third birthday. When George Martin hears the completed song, he doesn’t think it has the Beatles sound. He preps Paul to sing it solo, replacing the band with a classical string quartet.

When they break for lunch, Paul approaches cellist Francisco Gabarro. “We have a winner with that ‘Yesterday,’” he predicts.

Not immediately. Though “Yesterday” makes the Help! sound track, it’s not played in the film, nor is it released as a single in the UK, though it hits number 1 in the United States.