Release and Legacy
On 23 August 1963, the "She Loves You" single was released in the United Kingdom with "I'll Get You" as the B-side. The single set several British sales records, starting with becoming the biggest-selling single. It entered the charts on 31 August and remained in the charts for thirty-one consecutive weeks, eighteen of those weeks in the top three. During that period, it claimed the ranking of number one on 14 September, stayed number one for four weeks, dropped back to the top three, then regained the top spot for two weeks starting on 30 November. It made its way back into the charts for two weeks on 11 April 1964, peaking at forty-two.
It was the best-selling single of 1963, and remains the best-selling Beatles single in Britain today. It was the best-selling single in the United Kingdom for fourteen years until it was surpassed by "Mull of Kintyre" by Wings (written by McCartney and Denny Laine). As of November 2012, it is the eighth best-selling single of all time in the UK with sales of 1.9 million copies.
The song's gigantic success posed an ever-bigger puzzlement for The Beatles' producer, George Martin, and manager, Brian Epstein: why were The Beatles running up hit after hit in Britain, but utterly flopping on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean? Martin, who was angered by Capitol Records' stubbornness in turning down The Beatles, and a chance to become their record label in America, later recalled: "I said, for God's sake, do something about this. These boys are breaking it, and they're going to be fantastic throughout the world. So for heaven's sake latch onto them." This did not take long for Capitol of Canada, for "She Loves You" was a chart-topping hit there.
Before Capitol came along, The Beatles had been with Vee-Jay Records, until Vee-Jay failed to pay the royalties on time. Transglobal Music, an affiliate of EMI, held the licenses to The Beatles' output in America, and promptly ordered Vee-Jay to halt their manufacturing and distribution of Beatles records. Epstein, who needed a record label to release "She Loves You" in the United States, asked Transglobal to find another record label for him, and Transglobal came up with Swan Records. To avoid potential disagreements and lawsuits, the contract signed with Swan licensed to them only "She Loves You" and "I'll Get You", enough only for the A- and B-sides of a single — and only for two years. Even four songs would be enough to abuse the contract — in 1964, Vee-Jay released an album in America entitled Jolly What! England's Greatest Recording Stars: The Beatles & Frank Ifield on Stage, which in reality consisted of the only four Beatles songs that had been licensed to them, the rest of the album made up of performances by Frank Ifield.
When "She Loves You" came out as a single in America on 16 September 1963, it was mostly ignored. Three months later, The Beatles released "I Want to Hold Your Hand", which climbed all the way to number one, launching the British invasion of the American music scene, paving the way for more Beatles records, and releases by other British artists. Swan re-released the "She Loves You" single, which began a fifteen-week run on the American charts on 25 January 1964, two of those weeks at number one. On 21 March, Beatlemania had landed in America, spurred by The Beatles' appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show in February, where they performed, among other songs, "She Loves You". During its fifteen-week run in the American charts, "She Loves You" was joined by four other Beatles songs at the top five in the American charts.
New York City deejay Murray the K later recounted: "In late '63 they brought a record to me and mentioned the possibility that The Beatles might be coming to America, so I said, 'Okay,' and I put it on air. I had a record review contest on WINS at the time, where I'd play five new records each day. The audience would then vote on which records they liked best, and the winners of each week would be played next Saturday. And when I ran The Beatles in a contest with their record 'She Loves You', it came third out of five. But I still continued to play it for two or three weeks. But nothing happened. I mean, really no reaction. Absolutely nothing! Two months later I received an urgent call from my station manager in New York telling me 'The Beatles are coming!' 'Fine,' I said, 'Get an exterminator.'"
When Beatlemania reached the US, the record labels holding rights to Beatle songs rereleased them in various combinations. Swan claimed to own the rights to "Sie liebt dich", the German version of "She Loves You", although they did not. After buying and playing a copy of the German single, on 21 May 1964, "Sie liebt dich" was released by Swan in America, featuring "I'll Get You" on the B-side, just like the English-sung single. American consumers bought the single as well, leading to a one-week run in the charts at 97th on 27 June.
"She Loves You" was included on the US album, The Beatles' Second Album, which overtook Meet the Beatles! on 2 May 1964, reaching the top spot in the album charts. It was the first time an artist had taken over from themselves in the American album charts, and provided a hint of the successes The Beatles would continue to achieve.
"She Loves You" would also be featured in the albums A Collection of Beatles Oldies, 1962–1966, 20 Greatest Hits, 1 and in the 2004 CD release The Capitol Albums, Volume 1. It was also included on the American promotional version of the Rarities album, issued as the bonus disc in the limited edition boxed set The Beatles Collection, from November 1978.
Although no other act made "She Loves You" into a hit, a number attempted their own versions. American singer Neil Sedaka recorded it, as did comedians Peter Sellers and Ted Chippington. At a number of concerts, U2s Bono has snippeted "She Loves You" into the end of "Vertigo" — a song that has a 'Yeah yeah yeah' outro. In 1987, Cher features the "She loves you/yeah, yeah, yeah" chorus and chord progression in the bridge of the track "Working Girl", from her self-titled album. Avantgarde band The Residents worked a sample of the "yeah yeah yeah" outro to their Beatles collage "Beyond the Valley of a Day in the Life". Paul McCartney sang "We love you, yeah, yeah, yeah" at the end of his duet with Stevie Wonder titled "What's That You're Doing?" from Tug of War. The Beatles sang the chorus of "She Loves You" in the long fade-out of "All You Need Is Love". A carnival-styled organ version of the song is featured in the 1967 television film Magical Mystery Tour.
"She Loves You" (as "Sie liebt dich") was one of the two songs rerecorded by The Beatles in German, the other being "I Want to Hold Your Hand" (as "Komm gib mir deine Hand"). "Sie liebt dich" was released in Germany and in the US b/w "I'll Get You" by "Die Beatles" on 21 May 1964, (Swan 4182). Both songs were translated by Luxembourger musician Camillo Felgen, under the pseudonym of "Jean Nicolas".
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