You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away

Released in August 1965, the Beatles fifth album, Help! contains many of the songs that people commonly recognize, including Yesterday, Help, and Ticket to Ride. One of the other songs on the album is titled You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away, it, as with many Beatles songs, was written and sung by John Lennon. The song has a very clear influence from Bob Dylan; Lennon himself said “That’s me in my Dylan period again.” Due to the influence from Dylan, the song has more of a folk feel to it than other Beatles songs. The main aspect that differs from Dylan’s work is that a flute is used in the Lennon song rather than the harmonica that Dylan used in his works. 

The meaning of the song has been debated among Beatles enthusiasts. There are many sides to the debate but the main two are that Lennon wrote the song about Brian Epstein, the Beatles’ manager who was gay, and the other is that Lennon wrote it about having to keep the fact that he was married under wraps. Either way, the song tells of someone who must hide their love due to either societal pressure or simply fear.  

Due to its presence on such a famous album, You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away is often overlooked when people who aren’t Beatles fans listen to Help! As a song, it is underrated and needs to be brought into the spotlight alongside songs like Yesterday.