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The single "We Can Work It Out" reached number one in Britain (where it won the Ivor Novello Award for the top-selling A-side of 1965), the United States, Australia, Canada, and Ireland. In the UK, it was the seventh highest selling single of the 1960s, and the Christmas number one of 1965. McCartney wrote the words and music to the verses and the chorus, and then presented the song to Lennon, who contributed the bridge: "I took it to John to finish it off, and we wrote the middle together. Which is nice: 'Life is very short. There's no time for fussing and fighting, my friend.'' Then it was George Harrison's idea to put the middle into 3/4
time, like a German waltz. The waltz-like passage suggested by Harrison that leads back to the verse is possibly meant to suggest tiresome struggle. Rather than a formal change to 3/4 time, the waltz effect is created by the use of quarter note triplets within the regular 4/4 rhythm.