I would describe this song as a combination of irritating and catchy: the guitar is irritating and the beat is catchy.
The Honeycombs were from north London. They were unusual for the time because they featured a female drummer, Honey Lantree.
"Have I The Right?" was produced by legendary and notorious producer Joe Meek, who recorded the song in his apartment in Islington, which he used as a recording studio. The beat in the song was enhanced by group members stomping on the wooden stairs to the studio, recorded with five microphones fixed to the banisters with bicycle clips. It reached #1 on the UK Singles Chart and #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 and sold a million copies.
The Honeycombs had some other British hits and two #1 singles in Sweden but did not chart again in North America. The band split apart in 1966 when three of its members left; all but one of the original members reunited briefly in 1999.
Meek was best-known for being the writer and producer of "Telstar", a global #1 hit for The Tornadoes. (Trigger warning ahead.) In 1967, he got into an argument with his landlady and shot her and then himself.
Created July 31, 2026.