With the exception of "I'm the Greatest", a Ringo Starr album track written for him by John Lennon in 1973, all songs were recorded and released as singles during the active Beatles years in the 1960s.

A similar but less comprehensive compilation, The Stars Sing Lennon & McCartney, had been released on EMI's mid-price Music for Pleasure label in 1971.

[2][3][4][5][6] There were broadly three categories of Lennon–McCartney songs that were not released by the Beatles: In the earliest days of their songwriting partnership, Lennon and McCartney expressed a desire to emulate the success of composing duos such as Goffin & King and Leiber & Stoller in having their compositions recorded by other artists, so this was an aspect of the songwriting craft that they were interested in pursuing.

Once the Beatles' initial success in early-mid 1963 mushroomed into a phenomenon, there was great interest in songs written by the Beatles "in-house" writing duo.

Notes: McCartney's profile in the artwork for the front cover reused a portion of the illustration from the Beatles' album Revolver, and Lennon's profile is a drawing that duplicated the back-cover photograph from his album Imagine.