This Beatles song is the biggest streaming flop on Spotify

When John Lennon and Paul McCartney began writing songs for the album With the Beatles in 1963, they were on a roll, releasing classics like “All My Loving,” “It Won’t Be Long” and “All I’ve Got.” to Do”, all of which have been played more than 30 million times.

But even the greatest songwriting partnership in rock history sometimes produces a dud. This is the case with “Little Child,” which is about a lonely man who asks a young woman to dance. It hasn’t appeared on a single compilation album since, which probably explains why it ranks so low on Spotify. (Their version of Carl Perkins’ “Honey Don’t” by Beatles for Sale was played a little less often, but we’re not counting cover versions here).

Does “Little Child” deserve to be barely heard?

Yes. Spotify’s swarm intelligence is just right in this case. The early Beatles records were recorded extremely quickly between tours and other promotional commitments. Half-baked tracks like “Little Child” would never have made it onto the album after they slowed down in 1966, stopped touring and focused on ensuring there were no weak moments on their albums.

McCartney himself has admitted that “Little Child” is just “album filler.” Most groups would sell their soul to write “filler” like “Little Child,” but by Beatles standards this is a very forgettable piece.

“Little Child” had 6,119,345 streams at the time of this writing (a translation of an article from rollingstone.com). That’s significantly more than the Rolling Stones’ least streamed song, but more on that soon.