Getting Better

"Getting Better" is a song written by Paul McCartney, with help from John Lennon, based on an original idea by McCartney. It was recorded by The Beatles for the 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. The song's music suggests optimism but some of the song's lyrics have a sinister theme. In this sense, it exaggerates the contrasting personas of the two most active songwriters in the group. In response to McCartney's line, "It's getting better all the time," Lennon replies, "It can't get no worse!" Lennon also claimed the lyric that begins, "I used to be cruel to my woman..."

According to Hunter Davies, the initial idea for the song's title came from a phrase often spoken by Jimmy Nicol, the group's stand-in drummer for the Australian leg of a 1964 tour.