"Eleanor Rigby" #11 9/24/1966

When Paul first conceived this tune, the woman's name was Daisy Hawkins. Boy, that would've turned out differently, eh? There was a real-life Eleanor Rigby who may have subliminally influenced his songwriting; she's buried at the church where Paul and John first met at a fair in 1957. He originally called the minister Father McCartney, but Paul felt people would interpret it as being about his dad, so he lifted the surname McKenzie out of a phone book. There really hadn't been any rock songs to date using only an octet (eight piece string section - four violins, two violas and two cellos) and vocals. Once again, the Beatles didn't just break the rules - they wrote new ones for everyone else to follow. The video is from the animated "Yellow Submarine" movie.