I suppose it marked a change to the really dumb questions, but in 1966 the idea that the Beatles song ‘Ticket To Ride’ was about prostitutes was put forward and immediately ridiculed. It has been ridiculed ever since. But is the idea so ridiculous? In a modified form, I don’t think so. In fact, I think it reveals otherwise hidden meanings in the lyric.
First, the song is obviously not about prostitutes. The woman in the song is obviously not a prostitute. “She said that living with me…” — prostitutes do not live with their clients. Nevertheless, the ‘it is about prostitutes’ idea was sparked off by the apparently well-established fact that a ‘ticket to ride’ was a term all the Liverpool groups used for the certificate granted to a prostitute who worked in the Reeperbahn and had passed a health-check. This check was a serious deal, for the district was a ring-fenced and officially okayed area for the sex industry. It wanted to be known as a ‘safe area’ for sex tourists. A woman who worked there was in big trouble if it was found she had a venereal disease. That would be bad for the ‘Bahn’s image.
So it seems a ticket to ride was a serious piece of jargon in Hamburg and it is difficult to believe that Lennon (or the other Beatles) could possibly hear the phrase without thinking of Hamburg and prostitutes. If we consider this a done deal, I think we can better understand the fairly sophisticated psychological depths of the lyric.
First, note the words are unusually layered, for here although the protagonist is the man, he is speaking from the woman’s viewpoint :-
She said that living with me
Was bringing her down
And she won't never be free
When I was around
The song is — it’s a Lennon song — about obsessive jealousy, but here the protagonist acknowledges the woman is a free spirit and respects (or perhaps better, accepts) her freedom.
Ah! she's got a ticket to ride
She's got a ticket to ri-hi-hide
She's got a ticket to ride
And she don't care!
The Hamburg etymology comes in right at this point: the woman is a free spirit and the song is about sex not love. The ticket to ride is a license for the woman to have sex with whom she wants. It is the symbol of her freedom.
Note too how the lyric subverts the protagonist. He is “gonna be sad” (he thinks) and she is driving him mad and yet she’s “going away”. But we feel more sympathy for her than him. She is freeing herself from his possessiveness and she’s given herself a ticket to ride (that is, a license to have sex).
So, a lyric with a a lot of things going on in it, particularly for midyear 1965. The words are a worthy component of one of The Beatles’ great songs.
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