While it is well known that Paul McCartney and John Lennon helped out other artists on songs during the Beatle years, the one and only time that they ever helped out on song together was in 1967 on The Rolling Stones hit “We Love You”. The song is for the most part unknown in the U.S., but it reached # 8 on the British pop charts. In the U.S., it only reached # 50 on the Billboard Hot 100 and therefore was off the radar screen because it fell short of the coveted Top 40.

“We Love You” is definitely “interesting”. Its Moroccan influence is obvious. One critic at the time described it as a “psychedelic collage of jail sounds.”

The song was written in response to the drug arrests of Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Brian Jones on 12 February 1967 at Richards’ country home in Sussex. The band made an accompanying video that was a re-enactment of the 1895 trial of Oscar Wilde for indecency. Needless, to say the BBC immediately banned the video, or “promotional film” as was the term back then.

“We Love You” was a brazen and public “thank you” to The Beatles, The Who and the editorial page of the London Times for taking the bold initiative to voice public support for the three members of The Rolling Stones after their drug arrests. Since the song was written in part for The Beatles, Paul McCartney and John Lennon were asked to help out with backing vocals, marking the first and only time that these two Beatles would help out on a song together.

Interestingly, Stones lead guitarist Brian Jones played the Mellotron on the track.

The backing vocals provided by John Lennon and Paul McCartney went uncredited.

A 24 October 2010 article in the Daily Mail entitled “How the Acid King confessed he DID set up Rolling Stones drug bust for MI5 and FBI” shed light on the infamous 1967 drug bust. Also, the drug raid was the subject of a 2012 book, Butterfly on a Wheel: The Great Rolling Stones Drug Bust by Simon Wells.

Check out the song that never made the Top 40 in the U.S., and the promotional film the Stones made for it:

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