This Valentine’s Day, Let the Beatles Remind Us: “All You Need Is Love”

It can be easy to get caught up in the stresses of everyday life, being distracted from what really matters. Valentine’s Day, which happens to be today, Feb. 14, is a day some deride for the commerciality and materialistic nature that is associated with it.

That definitely makes sense, given the pomp and circumstance that sometimes goes along with it — but as the Beatles famously told the world in 1967, “All You Need Is Love.”

A bit more about this classic Beatles composition, from our Top 11 Songs For A Better World:

In June 1967 Our World, a TV show watched by 400 million people in 26 countries, hoped to send a message of peace around the world; the Beatles were asked to contribute a new song. “We were big enough to command an audience of that size, and it was for love. It was for love and bloody peace,” said Ringo Starr in Anthology. “It was a fabulous time. I even get excited now when I realize that’s what it was for: peace and love, people putting flowers in guns.”

Largely written by John Lennon, All You Need Is Love was recorded with the band surrounded by friends. “I remember the recording, because we decided to get some people in who looked like the ‘love generation,’” said George Harrison. “If you look closely at the floor, I know that Mick Jagger is there. But there’s also an Eric Clapton, I believe, in full psychedelic regalia and permed hair, sitting right there. We rehearsed for a while, and then it was: ‘You’re on at twelve o’clock, lads.’ The man upstairs pointed his finger and that was that. We did it – one take.” Though it seems uncomplicated, the song deserves a closer listen. “The chorus, ‘All you need is love,’ is simple, but the verse is quite complex; in fact I never really understood it, the message is rather complex,” said Paul McCartney in Many Years From Now. “It was a good song that we had handy that had an anthemic chorus.”

Let that be a reminder for us all this Valentine’s Day — and every other day, too.