Hans Hot 100 Beatles Songs: #99 : ‘No Reply’- One of four songs from Beatles For Sale to crack my Hot 100. The Lennon- McCartney song which was the opening track on the album- was written mainly by John Lennon. Lennon originally gave it to another artist managed by Brian Epstein, Tommy Quickly but he didn’t use it. What the hell was he thinking? You ever hear of Tommy Quickly? John began working on the song while on holiday in Tahiti in May 1964- and finished it up when he returned to London- with some assistance from Paul. Ringo doesn’t appear on this track he had been hospitalized on that day- Paul filled in on the drums.
slicethelife 
Tommy Quickly wasn’t too quick was he…
I love both the syncopated cadence and the harmonies on this one.
As a radio DJ, I hated cold opens (where it starts with a vocal). I loved using intros to talk over. With a cold open, when you want to keep the momentum going often times, you come out of one record (on the fade out) with the radio call letters and go right into the next song so there is always music under your voice. However, I also love a good cold open. The Beatles have a few cold opens that just grab you right from the get go. This one is a more mellow open (as opposed to All My Loving) but it still grabs you. Good pick!
While I certainly like the song a lot- it’s kind of an odd choice as an album opener I thought.
I would tend to agree