Lennon&McCartney

Paul Hides Himself Away

2008-12-15T20:21:00.000-08:00

Guys I feel like the worst webmaster ever, so I'm asking for help. I'm looking for one co-mod for the site. All you need to know is how to update on a blogspot blog and love John Lennon and Paul McCartney and be willing to spend time of your life here :D if you're interested send us a mail to chesterlandsite@gmail.com

Anyway, here's an interview of Paul with the ABC News.

Paul McCartney's love house

2008-10-21T17:14:00.000-07:00

Sir Paul McCartney's girlfriend Nancy Shevell has moved in with him.

The Beatles legend asked the US millionairess - who he has been dating for almost a year - to move into Peasmarsh, his East Sussex estate, after she began spending almost every weekend there.

A family friend said: 'Paul and Nancy are as solid a couple as you can get after just a short time together. She always seems to be at Peasmarsh anyway so it made sense to him just to ask her to move in.

'She'll still travel between the UK and her base in the US but is setting up home with Paul.'

The 66-year-old musician asked Beatrice, his four-year-old daughter with ex-wife Heather Mills, for her approval before asking Nancy to live with him.

Paul's fashion designer daughter Stella - who had a well-publicised feud with Heather - has also given the move her blessing, although she is said to be urging her father not to rush into marriage.

The source added to Britain's The Sun newspaper: 'Paul asked Beatrice if she liked Nancy and got a resounding 'Yes', which meant the world to him.'

Paul bought the secluded Peasmarsh estate as a wedding gift for his first wife Linda in 1969.

Source: MSN Entertainment.

Happy Birthday, John

2008-10-10T13:13:00.000-07:00

Oh no, I didn't forget I was just busy. Happy 68th Birthday, John. Thank you for everything.

Give truth a chance: the real John Lennon

2008-10-01T19:21:00.000-07:00

Round glasses, beaky nose, an air of faintly amused cynicism: the man on the cover of Philip Norman's latest book is instantly recognisable. John Lennon's iconic face is as perfect for T-shirts as Che Guevara's. And, like Guevara, he's deified as a man of the people, a musical genius, a 20th-century romantic figure to admire and emulate. At least, that's the sell.

'He's a secular saint,' claims Norman, whose book John Lennon: The Life is his second foray into the late superstar's life. The first, 1981's Shout!, took in all of The Beatles, though it had an obvious Lennon bias. 'His image is painted like a holy icon. He himself would have been appalled by that. Lennon tried to demythologise himself while he was alive. He hated the unreality of his life with The Beatles and tried to reinstate normality the whole time.'

When it comes to Lennon's more unpleasant qualities, Norman's latest venture doesn't beat around the bush, but it's unlikely to debunk the musician's godlike status. Weighing in at a hefty 817 pages, the affectionate biography paints a more detailed picture than any Lennon book before it, and includes interviews with Yoko Ono and Paul McCartney.

'With a story like this, if you find any new information, you can't bear to leave it out,' shrugs the author. 'There are events that were the same as in Shout! but I had to revise a lot of my conclusions. That was a portrait of four people; this is like a full-length portrait of John in oils.'

A lot of new information about Lennon is revealed, from the mystery woman who inspired Norwegian Wood to his romance with pop-star Alma Cogan. However, the revelations that Lennon had sexual thoughts about his mother and Paul McCartney have grabbed most of the media attention.

Norman, however, insists Lennon didn't have an OediPaul complex. 'It tends to be put in an idiotic way,' he sighs, 'but he didn't really have a gay lust for Paul at all. He wanted to be a real artist, like Matisse or Van Gogh, and he thought artists had to try everything, so he wondered if he should try a gay relationship. Paul was around. He'd also have done anything to get The Beatles famous. And, according to Yoko, there was a side of him that quite liked campness.'

'His mother was this extraordinary figure that was in his life but was not his [to own],' Norman continues, 'because she had another man and the two sons from that relationship. But he saw her all the time and she was like a flirtatious big sister. And he had a big imagination.'

Norman likes Lennon and makes no bones about it, despite the warts-and-all account. 'For me, the biggest surprises were about John's character,' he says. 'The hidden John; insecure and vulnerable and very romantic. The world remembers a cynical, tough character but there's an incredible romantic side. And the insecure side where he never felt happy with what he did.'

Source: Metro.co.uk

Sean Lennon Opens Up About John Lennon's Temper

2008-09-21T20:45:00.000-07:00

In a jaw-dropping postscript in Philip Norman's new biography, "John Lennon: The Life," out next month, Sean Lennon tells how his father flew off the handle and screamed into his ear as a young boy.

"[He was] teaching me how to cut and eat steak, which was a mystery to me at age 4; how to stick the fork in and cut behind it, and that was how you got a piece in your mouth," writes Sean, 32, whose mom is Yoko Ono. "I think it was that night when he got very upset with me, I think because of something I did very cheekily with the steak. He did wind up yelling at me very, very loudly to the point where he damaged my ear, and I had to go to the hospital."

He says John, mortified by his cruelty, was immediately apologetic: "I remember when I was lying on the floor and hurting, and him holding me and saying, 'I'm so sorry.' He did have a temper."

Sean recalls his dad's soft side, too. "I remember one time he accidentally let one of the heavy wooden doors at The Dakota slam on my finger," Sean tells Norman. "And he was very upset about that. My fingernail eventually fell off." Another time, "Alice, our black cat, had jumped out the window after a pigeon and died, and I remember that was the only time, I think, I ever saw my dad cry." [MORE]

The Word Magazine

2008-09-20T08:35:00.000-07:00

I added 6 scans of John in The Word Magazine. An article about the book John Lennon: The Life by Philip Norman. Credits goes to Gloigloi at LJ.

Macca denies John gay claim

2008-09-20T01:56:00.000-07:00

Renowned biographer PHILIP NORMAN has accused the late Beatle of having gay fantasies in his controversial new book John Lennon: The Life.

However in an interview, which you can listen to by clicking here, Paul says John never made a move on him - despite them sharing a bed many times while on tour.

Paul says: "I don't think (the gay claims) are true. John never ever tried anything, I slept with him a million times.

"I've seen him on tour roaring drunk, out of his mind in the early days before he sobered up and went to rehab. Roaring drunk and it was always with a female, never once.

"If you've got a little gay tendancy and your roaring drunk I'd have caught him once." [MORE]

YOU CAN DISCUSS IT HERE

The National Magazine Company's 30 Days Of Fashion And Beauty

2008-09-16T12:44:00.000-07:00

I added some pictures of Paul and a picture of Stella at the The National Magazine Company's 30 Days Of Fashion And Beauty.

48 Hours: Paul McCartney

2008-09-04T19:47:00.000-07:00

scarlett_bat posted this at johnheartpaul and thought was interesting to post here:

So, going through my parents' VHS tapes in search of more Beatles stuff, as I often do, I found this 1989 interview with Paul from 48 hours. It was pretty good, although I only got to see part of it, but there was this gem from the interviewer (my reaction to it won me some strange looks from my dad):

Out of the loop interviewer: “Let me ask you about one of your new songs. This One. About a marriage?”
Paul: “A relationship, yeah.”

And he goes on to start discussing it in terms of a marriage... but then segues into explaining how really it's a song about John. I just love how he responds with a "yes," rather than "no, actually, just a friendship." It's worth a laugh, especially at the end, when he tells the interviewer that he loves him. :D Starting at 8:30 in part 7 and continuing amusingly at the beginning of part 8, ending at 1:33

PART 7

PART 8

If you know of more videos like this, LET US KNOW.

Affiliates

2008-09-01T19:47:00.000-07:00

I added one new affiliate to the site. Remember, if you want to be part of our affiliates just fill this simple form. But first, go and check this site out.

Kate to play Lennon's mother?

2008-09-01T19:38:00.000-07:00

Kate Winslet is apparently in the pipeline to play John Lennon's mother.

The Titanic star is on a list of actresses director Sam Taylor-Wood is looking to approach for the part, according to The Daily Mail.

The film, called Nowhere Boy, will tell the story of the Beatle's childhood, growing up with his mother and his aunt. The screenplay has been written by Matt Greenhalgh - who won a Bafta for Control, his biopic about Joy Division's Ian Curtis - and is based on the book Imagine This: Growing Up With My Brother John Lennon by John's sister Julia Baird. [MORE]

Palestinians to McCartney: Stay home

2008-09-01T19:37:00.001-07:00

Not everyone is ready to let it be over Paul McCartney's upcoming show in Tel Aviv.

The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) has called on the former Beatle to cancel the show, saying that "Palestinian dispossession and Israeli apartheid are no cause for celebration."

In a press release, the PACBI added that "since the creation of this state 60 years ago, [Israel] dispossessed and uprooted hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes and lands, condemning them to a life of exile and destitution."

"Performing in Israel at this time is morally equivalent to performing in South Africa at the height of the apartheid era... We strongly urge you to uphold the values of freedom, equality and just peace for all by joining this growing boycott against Israeli apartheid. Nothing less would do justice to the legendary legacy of the Beatles." [MORE]

Loved-up Macca invites girlfriend Nancy to join him on world tour

2008-08-21T01:07:00.000-07:00

When Sir Paul McCartney hits the road on his world tour later this year, there'll be one very special guest joining him for the ride. The former Beatle has apparently invited his millionairess love Nancy Shevell to join him after the fun they had on their Route 66 road trip through the US earlier this month.

The 66-year-old singer originally planned a boys only tour to celebrate his single status, reports the Daily Express. Since cementing his ten-month-old romance with New York-based Nancy, though, it's all change.

"Paul is excited about going on tour," reveals a pal. "Initially, he wanted to go it alone with just his band and road crew… but now he wants Nancy to be with him all the way.

"He says he had the time of his life on the road trip… I think it really sealed things for him."

Source: HelloMagazine.com

Paul McCartney Denies Wedding Rumours

2008-08-21T01:05:00.000-07:00

Sir Paul McCartney has denied rumours he is set to wed American heiress Nancy Shevell.

The couple sparked reports they were set to walk down the aisle in April after McCartney, 66, was spotted shopping at top London jewellers S.J. Phillips.

And the pair was subsequently reported to have sought the blessing of their families after their return from a road trip across the U.S. earlier this month.

But a representative for the former Beatle has denied the star is to wed, saying, "It is nonsense to say they are getting married."

McCartney ended his marriage to former glamour model Heather Mills, 40, earlier this year, while Shevell, 47, is still battling to finalize her divorce from U.S. lawyer Bruce Blakeman.

New Quotes + Lyrics Discussions

2008-08-18T15:44:00.000-07:00

I added new quotes on "What other people have said about John & Paul" and "John/Paul Quotes" all these sent by Brenna [thanks, luv]

If you have any interesting information about Lennon & McCartney you can send it to us. We really appreciate your help.

Lyrics Discussions [FORUM]
Numbernine started a new thread in our forums. It's called "That Means A Lot/Free As A Bird" with her thoughts about those songs. You can discuss it in our forum... join us now!.

John & Paul Quotes

2008-08-16T01:20:00.000-07:00

I just added 5 new John & Paul quotes sent by Brenna. If you have more quotes, articles, or any interesting information about these two you can always send it to us, we really appreciate and credit your help.

Also, any new idea to improve the site is highly appreciated.

Shoulda Been There

2008-08-14T14:12:00.001-07:00

Shoulda Been There
by Jude Southerland Kessler

Published 1994
by OnTheRock Books
Hardcover, 795 pages
ISBN: 978-0-9799448-0-2

Shoulda been there, the first researched historical novel on the life of John Lennon, is truly extraordinary. The book, the first in a promised trilogy of Lennon novels, written by Jude Southerland Kessler, covers John's life from 1940 to 1961, and traces the events that motivated his desire to become a famous rock star and the day-by-day activities of the early Beatles.

No less an authority than Bill Harry, founder of Mersey Beat, the '60s magazine that documented the Liverpool scene of the time, says in the book's foreward that Kessler got it right.

In what Mr. Harry referred to as a "factional" approach, Kessler blends twenty years of research on Lennon with her ability to create authentic Scouse or Liverpudlian dialogue and with an incredible familiarity with the ins and outs of northern England. Jude describes events in Lennon's adolescence as if she were there, as if, as Bill Harry notes, she had been a fly on the wall during these landmark events.

In the pages of this remarkable book, you will experience the Quarry Men's first performance at The Roseberry Street Festival and The Beatles days in Hamburg, you'll walk with John into Liverpool College of Art as a freshman in 1957, and you'll stand beside John at his mother's funeral in 1958. Each moment in John's youth and teen years becomes a moment in the reader's own experience. For 795 pages, the reader is John's shadow. Each reader is John's comrade.

As vivid as these are recounted, the accounts are not fiction. Jude documented these events in over twenty years of research including 7 trips to Liverpool and an incredible number of interviews of the people who were actually there and around at the time. The book is footnoted, and Jude's end notes debate the veracity of past non-fiction research, pointing out contradictions where they exist. Beatle myths are exposed, and new truths are suggested. The book, Shoulda Been There, works to present John Lennon as he really was, not as we've imagined him to be over the last 40 years. [MORE]

New Banner

2008-08-14T14:03:00.000-07:00

A long time ago Allison made a cool banner for the site, if you want to use it please link it back to lennon-mccartney.co.nr. If you link us on your site, let me know so I can add you back.

John Lennon's killer denied parole for fifth time

2008-08-14T13:54:00.000-07:00

The man who killed John Lennon in New York City nearly 28 years ago has been denied parole for a fifth time. The New York State Division of Parole said in a statement that the 53-year-old's request for parole was denied "due to concern for the public safety and welfare." [more...]

Beatles John Gallery is finally open

2008-08-14T13:46:00.000-07:00

I know it took me so long, and I still have a bunch of John pictures to upload, but at least I have some ready for the gallery. My computer is finally fixed and I'll be working on the site from now on. I'm sorry for the lack of updates, I really am.

Beatles John (875 pictures)

Announcement

2008-06-30T15:22:00.000-07:00

Hey guys, I'm really sorry I haven't updated the site in a long while. But my computer isn't working well. But as soon as I fix it I will work on the new look and sections for the site. Keep in tune for this update :D

Paul McCartney Planning 'Last Big Tour'

2008-06-10T20:43:00.000-07:00

Music legend Sir Paul McCartney is planning a massive farewell tour, it was claimed today.

According to Britain's Sunday Mirror newspaper, the former Beatle, 65, is set to announce a hundred-date stretch over two years. He will then retire from large-scale international touring to spend more time with his 4-year-old daughter with ex-wife Heather Mills, Beatrice.

A source reveals, "Paul explained that this tour will be the last big one. He wants to settle down and enjoy Beatrice's childhood.

"The tour will be the last time he performs in many parts of the world. Beatrice and his family life are going to come first. He does not want to be away for months at a time."

Source: Shobizspy.com

The Revolutionary Artist: John Lennon's Radical Years

2008-05-27T12:25:00.000-07:00

REVIEW:

What new materials could possibly be out there be when it comes to a subject like John Lennon? The answer is apparently quite a lot when it comes to The Revolutionary Artist, a new book that takes a look at the period where John actively promoted peace and wrote some of his best music. Here are some of the highlights:

Yoko's thoughts on John, and the other Beatles, recorded on a tape made during the recording sessions for "Revolution." Interestingly, she is much more fearful here of her tenuous relationship with John than is typically portrayed in Beatles books. She also is quite positive in her feelings about Paul McCartney: "He’s treating me with respect," she says.
Tells how George Harrison left the group in January 1969. John's only response to him was: "We aim to please." Also has a conversation between John and Paul soon afterwards recorded secretly by Let It Be director Michael Lindsay-Hogg where they discuss George and problems internal to the group.
Several interviews with John during the Montreal bed-in for peace event, including a wide-ranging discussion on various topics such as war, student radicals, systems of government, nationalism, the generation gap, parent-child relationships, educational systems, marriage, meditation, religion, money, censorship, and music records.
Testimony from John at a government commission on the use of drugs: "The problem still remains that all of us needs a drug," he says, "whether it is sleeping pills, barbiturates, alcohol or what have you."
John's last interview promoting a Beatles LP -- discussing Abbey Road in 1969.
John talking about his association with the family of James Hanratty and Michael X (there's one tense moment where a TV host refuses to shake Michael's hand and John interjects: "“Racialism! I saw it.”).
Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau giving his thoughts on meeting with John and Yoko.
A great discussion on the songs of the Plastic Ono Band LP vis-a-vis Dr. Arthur Janov's ideas on Primal Therapy and how they influenced the material. There is also a lengthy section on some private discussion recorded by John and Yoko at the Primal Therapy Institute where they carry out exercises prescribed by Janov and run through their histories of relationships.
Lennon talking to Phil Spector on Paul's (and Wings') Wild Life ("It’s really bad," Spector says).
John discussing the tracks of Imagine and Some Time in New York City ("If it’s a choice between the IRA or the British army, I’m with the IRA," John says at one point).
Frank Zappa talking about how John ripped him off in releasing the live cuts on the Some Time in New York City album.

Probably the most fascinating section is the final chapter (#9), where in 1972 John discusses all the Beatles tracks he wrote with Paul, giving his thoughts on each and pointing out who wrote what (it also includes a few of George's tracks that he contributed to). It goes all the way from "Love Me Do" to the Beatles' last single, "The Long and Winding Road" (it also includes the so-called "songs the Beatles gave away," like "Hello Little Girl," "Bad to Me," etc.). The thoughts are then augmented with occasional affirmations or rebuttals from Paul, who offers his own insights on the tracks (it's interesting to note that in 1972, they only disagreed on one song as to who wrote which part).

All in all, worth picking up if you're interested in some of the above-mentioned topics, especially John's music from the Beatles era to circa 1972. Those were the days, my friend...

Source: The Beatles Archive
Thanks to Peter for sending us this.

Message Board

2008-05-16T14:28:00.000-07:00

So I'm finally having a little time to work on the site and I finally made the Message Board. There you can talk about anything related to John and Paul or not. To join just click HERE. Don't forget to read the rules and introduce yourself.

More updates soon.

Paul McCartney's £20 autograph

2008-05-16T10:13:00.000-07:00

Paul McCartney signed a £20 note for a fan after she confused him with her mother’s neighbour.

The ECHO revealed last week how Sir Paul made a shopping trip to Lewis’s to pick up a couple of £11.99 ties ahead of his classical concert in the city.

Today it was revealed the former Beatle left his mark on a note more normally associated with the Queen.

Teaching assistant student Lyndsay Jordan told the ECHO of her joy at getting Macca’s signature, and said he held her young son and shared his chocolate buttons.

But the mother-of-three, of Prescot, did not recognise Sir Paul at first.

She said: “The shop floor in Lewis’s where we were wasn’t that busy and there was only us and this guy at the till.

“As we walked past he said hello to the baby and smiled at me. I thought at first he was a bloke who lived behind my mum’s house.

“But I kept thinking ‘what’s his name?’ Then as I walked away I realised it was Paul McCartney.

“I walked back over to him and asked if it was OK to get his autograph.”

It was then that Lyndsay, who was shopping with nephew Stephen Davies, 18, and 20-month-old son Vinnie, realised she had no notepaper.

“So I got a £20 note out and asked him to sign that. He laughed and told me I probably had more money than he did!”

She said: “He was really, really lovely and friendly. He picked Vinnie up and Vinnie even shared his white chocolate buttons with him.”

Lyndsay, who is also mother to six-year-old Abigail and four year-old JJ, added: “He stood there for ages just talking to us. He was great.”

Source: Liverpool Echo

McCartney and Mills granted divorce

2008-05-13T19:39:00.000-07:00

The ill-fated marriage of former Beatle Paul McCartney and his estranged wife Heather Mills came to a formal end during a 30-second hearing at London's High Court on Monday.

Justice Hugh Bennett said the petition for divorce by Mills was granted on the grounds that the couple had lived apart for two years.

Neither McCartney nor Mills were in court for the decree nisi.

Bennett said: "On the petition for divorce presented by Miss Heather Mills, I pronounce the decree nisi of divorce on the grounds of two years' separation.

"Sir Paul McCartney has consented to the decree being granted on these grounds."

The brief hearing contrasted with the protracted and bitter fight over the divorce settlement earlier this year.

In March, the judge blasted Mills, branding her evidence as "inconsistent and inaccurate."

He ended up awarding Mills 24.3 million pounds -- a fifth of the sum she had been seeking. That still gave her the equivalent of about $34,000 for each day of the four-year marriage.

McCartney married the former model and charity campaigner in 2002, four years after his first wife Linda died of breast cancer. They have a daughter, Beatrice.

Source: Reuters.com

JOHN LENNON PLANNED TO REUNITE THE BEATLES

2008-05-03T18:53:00.000-07:00

Former John Lennon paramour May Pang revealed that Lennon---the man who instigated The Beatles' break-up---actively planned to reunite them in 1974, but that "logistics" got in the way, The Rip Post has learned.
This is the first report ever that Lennon not only wanted to make new Beatles music, but planned to do it.
Pang’s revelation came during a lengthy interview with Casey Piotrowski, host of the nationally syndicated weekly radio program, “The Beatles Show,” in which she said that the ex-Beatle wanted to record one new song with the group as a prelude to a possible formal reunion.
"If one (song) comes around and it works, maybe we'll do another,” Lennon said, according to Pang. "It was to be behind the scenes. A quick one-off, and let’s see from there." [More]

Beatles Paul Gallery is finally open

2008-05-03T15:53:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to let you know that I finally uploaded some pictures to Paul's Beatles gallery. I'll be adding more with time. I will also work on the other galleries, but I'm glad we finally have one almost finished.

- Beatles Paul (1024 pictures)

John Lennon, a Darwen artist and The Catcher in the Rye

2008-05-02T09:36:00.001-07:00

"We now know that Margaret Chapman kept an owl as a pet and she was friends with John Lennon for a time in Liverpool, when she attended the Art College there."

She said Mrs Chapman, whose maiden name was Duxbury, was known as Duckie at college.

Ms Ellis said she has even heard anecdotal evidence that Mrs Chapman introduced Lennon to The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger, a novel that the musician later said was one of his favourites.

Ms Ellis added: "Her work is becoming more and more popular in the last eight years since her death. [More]

Security guard from Lennon's Montreal 'bed-in' shares memories

2008-05-02T09:31:00.000-07:00

George Urquhart remembers it "like it was yesterday."

The retired security guard says he was the one on duty when John Lennon and Yoko Ono staged their "bed-in for peace" at Montreal's Queen Elizabeth Hotel from May 26 to June 1, 1969.

Urquhart says he was asked to sit outside suite 1742, where the "bed-in" and the recording of Lennon's hit "Give Peace a Chance" took place, because he was the only fluently bilingual security guard at the hotel.

"I figured, 'My God, 12 hours, what a boring day that's going to be, for a full week,' but it was anything but, anything but," he recalled in a telephone interview from Calgary, where he now lives.

Urquhart grew nostalgic for the occasion after hearing earlier this week that a Montreal-raised TV writer is putting up Lennon's handwritten lyrics for "Give Peace a Chance" on the auction block in July.

Gail Renard obtained the piece of cardboard with the lyrics when she and a friend, CJAD Montreal radio talk show host Tommy Schnurmacher, crashed the "bed-in" as teens.

The two had to sneak into the hotel through back entrances and a fire escape. Once on the floor of the suite, they waited until Urquhart went to the bathroom before knocking on the door of the suite - but the security guard came back.

"I remember it clearly," recalled Urquhart, 73.

"(Schnurmacher) walked by and I grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and asked him where he thought he was going. It was a funny deal, I'll tell ya." [More]

Sir Paul McCartney: I owe Liverpool so much

2008-05-02T09:28:00.000-07:00

SIR Paul McCartney acknowledged the standing ovation for the Liverpool Cathedral concert of his classical music with a quip:

“This is the moment I have to pinch myself,” he told the 1,500-strong capacity audience. “That’s because I used to arrive here on the 86 bus from Speke.”

The ex-Beatle then repeated the joke made in his exclusive ECHO interview on Wednesday: “I auditioned for the choir. They turned me down . . . but I am not bitter.

“This is my revenge.”

Sir Paul, sitting with members of his family, attended last night’s northern premiere of his choral work, Ecce Cor Meum (Behold My Heart) dedicated to his first wife, Linda. [More]

Paul's Exclusive interview with Liverpool Echo

2008-04-30T09:49:00.000-07:00

SIR Paul McCartney is returning to Liverpool for what he calls his revenge gig.

He was referring to a concert of his classical music being staged at Liverpool cathedral, where he was rejected as a chorister more than 50 years ago.

Sir Paul gave an exclusive interview to the ECHO about his two Capital of Culture concerts in his home city.

For one he will be in the audience, and for the second on stage.

The former Beatle promised the Anfield stadium concert would be “my tribute to Liverpool”.

But tomorrow he joins a capacity audience in the cathedral for the northern premiere of his choral work Ecce Cor Meum (Behold My Heart), dedicated to first wife Linda.

He said: “There is no better place for me to hold this concert than in Liverpool where I’ll also get to invite my family.

“I have a lot of connections with the cathedral, having gone there as a kid and applied to join the choir.

“I got turned down, so this is my revenge trip.”

The performance will feature the cathedral choristers, the singing group he hoped to join in 1953 at the age of 11, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and choir.

Sir Paul said: “It is a privilege to be able to work with a great orchestra or a great choir.

“One of the things I particularly like about the Liverpool choir is that they are very committed.

“You get people from all walks of life, so I love the humanity of it.

“You get a plumber standing next to a surgeon, so it’s a great mix.

“And that’s something I’m interested in and have always liked.

“As on a train you find yourself next to someone who could be anyone. And it’s like that in a choir. I love this coming together of various types of people.”

He said Ecce Cor Meum, premiered in 2001 and commissioned for the world-renowned Magdalene College Oxford choir, was special.

“It was a great compliment to be asked to write something for them. They are showing you that they trust you,” he added.

Sir Paul said he hoped the work would sound particularly good in the cathedral with its big acoustics.

He said it was particularly interesting to work with a text partly in Latin.

Recalling his schooldays at Liverpool Institute (now the Lipa arts college of which he is lead patron) Sir Paul said: “I was not very good at Latin. But I liked it.

“I always used to encourage my own kids to learn a bit of Latin because it’s the root of the English language and all the romantic languages. Sometimes, when you are trying to work out what a word means, you can go back to the Latin root and I like that aspect.”

Tomorrow marks the third time Sir Paul has heard a live performance of Ecce Cor Meum which won the best album award at the Classical Brits last year. He said: “I heard it in London and New York.

“But one of the great things is that these mark a bit of a night off for me.

“Everything I’ve ever done with music has involved me performing so it is one of the luxuries that I can be in the audience.

“I couldn’t play it anyway. And I couldn’t conduct it.

“It’s out of my range.”

He said he would never revise an orchestral work: “I’d rather write something new. You write something and you are supposed to be happy with it so I wouldn't go back.

“I wouldn't tinker with it.”

Macca also revealed he is now writing a film score but added: “I can't really give anything away on that one at the moment.”

Paul McCartney’s first classical work the Liverpool Oratorio was premiered in Liverpool cathedral in 1991 to mark the Liverpool Phil’s 150th anniversary.

“The cathedral was always looming over our classroom,” he recalled.

“It was mostly finished by then. But they were still fixing on bits and pieces.”

My thank you

SIR Paul said his Capital of Culture Anfield concert would be a personal thank-you to his home city.

“I’m doing a decent length of songs,” he said, denying earlier rumours that he was singing only four numbers.

“I know we’ve also got a few guests. But I’m not sure of exactly who. It’s still a bit up in the air so I wouldn’t get anybody’s hopes up.”

“It’s going to be interesting.

“But it is basically my tribute to Liverpool.”

I turned down Paul McCartney

THE man who turned Paul McCartney down for the Liverpool cathedral choir said the former Beatle owed him.

Ronald Woan, 88, said: “If I had taken him on, he would probably have ended up teaching music in a comprehensive school.

“Under the circumstances he went on to do other things.

“I think he owes me an awful lot of money.”

Mr Woan, cathedral director of music until his retirement in 1982, said Paul was one of 90 boys auditioned that year.

He added: “He would have been required to sing a verse of Once In Royal David’s City, but he wouldn’t, at that stage, have been required to read music.

“Not reading music was not the reason he failed his audition as is often supposed.”

"Give Peace a Chance" lyrics up for sale

2008-04-29T18:46:00.000-07:00

John Lennon's handwritten lyrics for the hit song "Give Peace a Chance" will go under the hammer at auction in July and are expected to fetch 200-300,000 pounds ($400-600,000), Christie's said on Tuesday.

The lyrics are being sold by comedy writer and presenter Gail Renard, who was 16 when Lennon and Yoko Ono staged their famous "Bed-In" at a hotel in Montreal in 1969.

Renard and a friend sneaked into the Queen Elizabeth Hotel where the recently married Lennon and Ono were holding a protest for peace and became friendly with the couple.

According to Christie's, Lennon gave Renard some mementos, including the lyrics, telling her: "One day they will be worth something."

Lennon also helped launch Renard's early career as a writer by calling the editor of "The Beatles Monthly" magazine in London and instructing him to publish her piece about the bed-in.

During the "Bed-In" for peace in Montreal, which followed a similar stunt in Amsterdam, Lennon and Ono opened their doors to the world's media. [More]

Mike McGear to unveil is photo exhibition in Liverpool

2008-04-29T18:43:00.000-07:00

Mike McCartney’s Liverpool Life, which opens to the public on June 26th, features incredible black-and-white photographs documenting the origins of the British Invasion.

McCartney will be making a personal appearance at the Museum on Wednesday, June 25th to share some of the inspiration behind his imaginative photographs.

"It’s the story behind the story of that magical era," said Mike McCartney.

A self-taught photographer, McCartney perfected his art through years of practice and experimentation, using books from the local library for inspiration. His pictures include playful self-portraits of the artist experimenting with his first camera and intimate, informal scenes of family life in McCartney’s modest childhood home at 20 Forthlin Road.

The exhibition is accompanied by quotes from the photographer, who reveals stories behind these images, from his father’s great fondness for playing piano at family parties, to numerous pictures of his first car, a Ford Classic. [More]

Fan Art & Wallpapers

2008-04-28T17:28:00.000-07:00

I added two new fan arts and two wallpapers sent by Unelma.

John/Paul Fan Arts

... More

Wallpapers

.... More

You can send us your own fan arts here.

Pictures of Summer of 1963

2008-04-26T13:13:00.000-07:00

I added four pictures of the boys in the summer of 1963 posted by the DailyMail.

Remember the Gallery is still under construction.

Paul at Linda's photographs exhibition

2008-04-26T13:02:00.000-07:00

I added some pictures of Paul at Linda's exhibition.

Yoko Ono in legal feud over rare Lennon footage

2008-04-26T12:59:00.000-07:00

Footage of John Lennon smoking pot, writing songs and discussing putting the hallucinogenic drug LSD in President Richard Nixon's tea is the focus of a court case starting in Boston next week over whether the video should be made public.

The case pits Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono, against Lawrence, Massachusetts-based World Wide Video, which claims ownership of nine hours of raw footage of the former Beatle and Ono that was filmed just weeks before the "Fab Four" broke up in 1970 [MORE]

Sir Paul proudly unveils exhibition of Linda's photographs

2008-04-26T12:54:00.000-07:00

Linda McCartney could see beauty in "changing a baby's nappy, driving to Scotland, being on the farm with the sheep or horses".

That was Sir Paul McCartney's tribute to his late wife, a "great artist", as he unveiled an exhibition of her photographs yesterday.

The ex-Beatle has curated the display of prints at the James Hyman Gallery with his daughter Mary, also a photographer.

Sir Paul, 65, described how he had watched Linda's work "unfold".

He said: "Since Linda passed away, we worried that her work was not going to be shown, so it was wonderful when James Hyman said that he'd like to exhibit her photographs. [MORE]

Is Paul McCartney Getting Married Again?

2008-04-26T12:49:00.000-07:00

Sir Paul McCartney has sparked engagement rumours after he was spotted shopping at a top London jewellers, just weeks after finalising a divorce settlement from estranged wife Heather Mills.

The former Beatle was snapped by photographers shopping at exclusive New Bond Street store S.J. Phillips yesterday, fuelling speculation he is to propose to American heiress Nancy Shevell.

The 65-year-old recently returned from a romantic Caribbean holiday with Shevell after settling his $48.6 million (£24.3 million) divorce from former ‘prostitute’ Mills last month. [MORE]

Officially open

2008-04-26T12:47:00.000-07:00

Ok so... Lennon & McCartney is officially open. I still have some things to work with like the gallery and most of the multimedia section, but I think the site is ready to go public. After that said... enjoy!.

Hidden Messages

2008-04-26T12:29:00.000-07:00

Over at johnheartpaul a lot of people posts the lyrics of the songs and explains why they think they have hidden messages, like Two Of Us, or Oh Darling or Don't Let Me Down, also their solo work like Jealous Guy. If you have your own theory about any song and want to share it with us, you can do it here. Send us your explanation and your lyric and I will publish it here.

The Clues

2008-04-26T12:27:00.000-07:00

There are many reasons why people think John and Paul had a relationship deeper than just a friendship and this section is dedicated to the fans. Here is your chance to list your reasons why you think John and Paul were more than just friends. Send us your thoughts and I'll publish them here.

Slash

2008-04-26T12:21:00.000-07:00

This section will be dedicated to all the J/Pers out there that truly believes that John and Paul had a deeper relationship than just a friendship.

- The Clues
The reasons why the fans think John and Paul were more than just friends.

- Hidden messages
Do you think any of their songs had a hidden message? Here you can explain us why.

- Fan Art
The art dedicated to this "couple".

More sections soon.

Help

2008-04-26T12:11:00.000-07:00

This is a brand new site and we still lack of information and interesting material, so I wanted to ask you the huge favor of sending us anything you think the site should have. I appreciate your help and suggestions.

Also, you can send us pictures, fan art, icons, wallpapers, fan fictions, poems, news, articles, or anything related to John and Paul.

Thanks for your help!.

Pictures Gallery

2008-04-26T12:03:00.000-07:00

Some things you should know about the site. Well, I don't claim property over this pictures, I don't own them in any way, why I use tags? well..... promotion.

Albums
John's and Paul's albums are separated in before The Beatles, during The Beatles and after The Beatles because I can't really tell when did Paul start Wings, I know it might be obvious but I rather have it this way than to burn my brain trying to figure out if its a Wings picture or a solo picture. Anyway, Paul's "Recent" album means pictures of Paul from 10 or 15 years from now. So the albums aren't that elaborated but having more than 10,000 makes it hard to separate everything with dates or events. The Gallery is also in slow progress... I have too many pictures to have it ready in four days, so I'll be working on it with time.

Help
I'm quite sure I've made mistakes with the albums and the organization, so if you find any mistake can you please let me know?. Also, if you want to send us pictures that aren't already in the gallery you can do it here.

And now that everything is clear....

THE PICTURES GALLERY

Fan Videos

2008-04-25T14:38:00.000-07:00

This section is dedicated to all the tribute videos the fans have done about John, or Paul or both. All you have to do is send us the link of your video on youtube and it will be published here. (Remember to not delete your video from your youtube account)

By Chester:

Beautiful Boy

Fan Art

2008-04-25T14:13:00.000-07:00

To have your art published here all you have to do is fill a form HERE.

Fan Art Categories

John Fan Art
Paul Fan Art
John/Paul Fan Art
Beatles Fan Art

To submit your fan art you have to uplodad your graphic or drawing to photobucket, tinypic, or imageshack and send us your link. Don't forget to put the category in our "Category" space in the form.

FAN ART GALLERY

Paul's speach at John's induction into the Rock Hall of Fame

2008-04-25T14:10:00.000-07:00

Dear John,

I remember when we first met, at Woolton, at the village fete. It was a beautiful summer day and I walked in there and saw you on stage. And you were singing "Come Go With Me," by the Dell Vikings, But you didn't know the words so you made them up. "Come go with me to the penitentiary." It's not in the lyrics.

I remember writing our first songs together. We used to go to my house, my Dad's home, and we used to smoke Ty-Phoo tea with the pipe my dad kept in a drawer. It didn't do much for us but it got us on the road.

We wanted to be famous.

I remember the visits to your mum's house. Julia was a very handsome woman, very beautiful woman. She had long, red hair and she played a ukulele. I'd never seen a woman that could do that. And I remember to having to tell you the guitar chords because you used to play the ukulele chords.

And then on your 21st birthday you got 100 pounds off one of your rich relatives up in Edinburgh, so we decided we'd go to Spain. So we hitch-hiked out of Liverpool, got as far as Paris, and decided to stop there, for a week. And eventually got our haircut, by a fellow named Jurgen, and that ended up being the "Beatle haircut."

I remember introducing you to my mate George, my schoolmate, and getting him into the band by playing "Raunchy" on the top deck of a bus. You were impressed. And we met Ringo who'd been working the whole season at Butlin's camp - he was a seasoned professional - but the beard had to go, and it did.

Later on we got a gig at the Cavern Club in Liverpool which was officially a blues club. We didn't really know any blues numbers. We loved the blues but we didn't know any blues numbers, so we had announcements like "Ladies and gentlemen, this is a great Big Bill Broonzy number called "Wake Up Little Suzie." And they kept passing up little notes - "This is not the blues, this is not the blues. This is pop." But we kept going.

And then we ended up touring. It was a bloke called Larry Parnes who gave us our first tour. I remember we all changed names for that tour. I changed mine to Paul Ramon, George became Carl Harrison and, although people think you didn't really change your name, I seem to remember you were Long John Silver for the duration of that tour. (Bang goes another myth.)

We'd been on a van touring later and we'd have the kind of night where the windsceen would break. We would be on the motorway going back up to Liverpool. It was freezing so we had to lie on top of each other in the back of the van creating a Beatle sandwich. We got to know each other. These were the ways we got to know each other.

We got to Hamburg and met the likes of Little Richard, Gene Vincent...I remember Little Richard inviting us back to his hotel. He was looking at Ringo's ring and said, "I love that ring." He said, "I've got a ring like that. I could give you a ring like that." So we all went back to the hotel with him. (We never got a ring.)

We went back with Gene Vincent to his hotel room once. It was all going fine until he reached in his bedside drawer and pulled out a gun. We' said "Er, we've got to go, Gene, we've got to go..." We got out quick!

And then came the USA -- New York City -- where we met up with Phil Spector, the Ronettes, Supremes, our heroes, our heroines. And then later in L.A., we met up with Elvis Presley for one great evening. We saw the boy on his home territory. He was the first person I ever saw with a remote control on a TV. Boy! He was a hero, man.

And then later, Ed Sullivan. We'd wanted to be famous, now we were getting really famous. I mean imagine meeting Mitzi Gaynor in Miami!

Later, after that, recording at Abbey Road. I still remember doing "Love Me Do." You officially had the vocal "love me do" but because you played the harmonica, George Martin suddenly said in the middle is the session, "Will Paul sing the line "love me do?", the crucial line. I can still hear it to this day - you would go "Whaaa whaa," and I'd go "loove me doo-oo." Nerves, man.

I remember doing the vocal to "Kansas City" -- well I couldn't quite get it, because it's hard to do that stuff. You know, screaming out the top of your head. You came down from the control room and took me to one side and said "You can do it, you've just got to scream, you can do it." So, thank you. Thank you for that. I did it.

I remember writing "A Day in the Life" with you, and the little look we gave each other when we wrote the line "I'd love to turn you on." We kinda knew what we were doing, you know. A sneaky little look.

After that there was this girl called Yoko. Yoko Ono. She showed up at my house one day. It was John Cage's birthday and she said she wanted to get hold of manuscripts of various composers to give to him, and she wanted one from me and you. So I said," Well it's ok by me. but you'll have to go to John."

And she did...

After that I set up a couple of Brennell recording machines we used to have and you stayed up all night and recorded "Two Virgins." But you took the cover yourselves -- nothing to do with me.

And then, after that there were the phone calls to you. The joy for me after all the business shit that we'd gone through was that we were actually getting back together and communicating once again. And the joy as you told me about how you were baking bread now. And how you were playing with your little baby, Sean. That was great for me because it gave me something to hold on to.

So now, years on, here we are. All these people. Here we are, assembled, to thank you for everything that you mean to all of us.

This letter comes with love, from your friend Paul.

John Lennon, you've made it. Tonight you are in the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame.

God bless you.

Paul

Artificial Intelligence Project

2008-04-24T22:11:00.000-07:00

John Lennon Artificial Intelligence Project (JLAIP™) is recreating the personality of the late Beatle, John Lennon, by programming an Artificial Intelligence (AI) engine with Lennon's own words and thoughts. Triumph PC's breakthroughs take the field of AI to an entirely new level, thus making Persona-Bots™ (robots inhabited with unique and authentic human personalities) possible and further blurring the precarious line between man and machine.

To "chat with John" click HERE and then go to "Chat with John"

John Facts

2008-04-24T13:07:00.001-07:00

Father, with Yoko Ono, of Sean Lennon.

Father, with Cynthia Lennon, of Julian Lennon.

An actor named Mark Lindsay Chapman was supposed to play the part of John Lennon in John and Yoko: A Love Story (1985) (TV), but lost the part because he had the same name (Mark Chapman) as Lennon's killer. He later portrayed Lennon in Chapter 27 (2007).

When "Rolling Stone" magazine was launched in November 1967, Lennon made the first cover, in a photo from How I Won the War (1967).

The first instrument he learned to play was the harmonica.

He used a number of pseudonyms in his musical work. These include Dr. Winston O'Boogie, Booker Table, Dwarf McDougal, Rev. Fred Ghurkin, Mel Torment, Dr. Dream, The Honorable John St. John Johnson, John O'Cean, Joel Nohnn, Kaptain Kundalini, Dad and Winston Leg-Thigh.

Inducted posthumously into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Beatles January 20, 1988.

Added "Ono" to his name in honour of wife Yoko Ono (aka Yoko Ono Lennon); he wished to drop his middle name Winston, but couldn't under British law. While he never used "Winston" again, his U.S. Resident Alien card (aka "green card") was issued to "John Winston Ono Lennon."

He was given his U.S. Resident Alien registration (his "green card") on the bicentennial of the American revolution: July 4, 1976. He was also informed that he would be eligible to apply for U.S. citizenship in 1981.

He wrote the song "Beautiful Boy" for his son Sean, who was born on his 35th birthday.

His murder was first announced to the world by U.S. sportscaster Howard Cosell during "NFL Monday Night Football (1970)". According to Frank Gifford, Lennon met Ronald Reagan when both were guests on "Monday Night Football" in the mid-1970s. After appearing on the show, he gave Gifford and Howard Cosell each a complete collection of Beatles albums, which he autographed.

Assassinated as he returned from the recording studio Monday, December 8, 1980, outside the Dakota, his apartment building, by Mark David Chapman, a crazed fan.

In 1974, he and singer Harry Nilsson were ejected from the Troubadour Club in Hollywood by the bouncers, after they both heckled the Smothers Brothers onstage. Lennon and Nilsson both sent flowers and an apology to the Smothers Brothers the next day, and Lennon replied to a columnist's speculation that he might have been using drugs, with the confirmation that they'd simply had too many Brandy Alexanders.

In 2001 the Liverpool Airport was renamed the John Lennon Airport after him.

Widow Yoko Ono's photograph of John's spectacles, bloodstained from day he was fatally shot outside their apartment building in December 1980, sold at auction in London, April 2002 for about $13,000. At second Christie's auction later in April, 2 tape recordings of Lennon improvising songs and telling stories to his stepdaughter sold for $195,000. One tape, from summer of 1969, records Lennon making up tunes and telling 6-year-old Kyoko about a dwarf who lived in their garden. It sold for $110,000. Other tape, a 25-minute recording of Lennon working on melody and lyrics for "She Said She Said", contains lyrics never heard in the song's final "Revolver" version. It sold for $85,200.

Posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (as a solo artist) in 1994.

His "In my Life" was played at the funeral of Kurt Cobain.

In 1989, the Republic of Abkhazia (in the former Soviet Georgia) proclaimed independence. To show the world they were rejecting their Communist past, they issued two postage stamps of Groucho Marx and Lennon (as opposed to Karl Marx and V.I. Lenin).

He is one of several famous and tragic figures from history to be featured on the front and back sleeves of rock band Marillion's "Clutching at Straws" album (released 1987).

His assassination is referred to in the lyrics of the Marillion song "Warm Wet Circles" (from their 1987 album "Clutching at Straws") and is the subject of the Chameleons' song "Here Today" (from their 1983 album "Script of the Bridge").

His voice was sampled for the Marillion song "Gazpacho" (from their 1995 album "Afraid of Sunlight").

In 2002 Paul McCartney changed the credits to many of the songs he wrote with Lennon to "McCartney & Lennon" (from "Lennon & McCartney") to a large public uproar. However, this was not the first time McCartney's name appeared first; many of their early songs were so credited, and the same had been done with songs on the 1976 live album "Wings Over America". In the credits to Give My Regards to Broad Street (1984), McCartney's name appeared prominently - and alone - as composer of the songs performed, which included Beatles tunes "Yesterday" and "Here, There and Everywhere".

His death is referred to in the lyrics of the Badly Drawn Boy song "You Were Right".

Was photographed for the cover of "Rolling Stone" magazine by Annie Leibovitz on the day he was murdered. Had also just recorded an extensive interview for RKO Radio, and for the BBC the week before.

He was preoccupied with the number nine: An avant-garde composition on the Beatles' "White Album" was "Revolution 9", while a solo recording of his was "#9 Dream", a term he gave to a state of enlightenment. He died at 11 p.m. on December 8, 1980 in New York, but in his native England (five hours ahead), it was already December 9.

His neighbors at the Dakota included singer Roberta Flack, and actors Peter Boyle, Gloria Swanson, and Lauren Bacall.

His mother Julia was killed by a drunk driver when John was seventeen; his stepfather broke down at the news, and John had to go with the police to identify her body. (He later named his first son Julian for her, and remembered his mother in the song "Julia", ten years after her death.) His best friend and former band mate Stuart Sutcliffe died from a brain hemorrhage in 1962, when they were both 21; John asked Stuart's mother for the old scarf he'd worn to Art school, and kept it as a memento.

In the days leading up to Lennon's murder, Chapman 'lived the life' of J.D. Salinger's "Catcher in the Rye" narrator Holden Caulfield, and was calmly flipping through the book when he was arrested.

Married first wife Cynthia at the Mount Pleasant Registry Office in Liverpool; married second wife Yoko on the Rock of Gibraltar.

Cremated privately the day after his death. Yoko Ono has never revealed the whereabouts of the ashes, or what happened to them. In lieu of a funeral for John, Yoko asked the public for ten minutes of silence and prayer at 2pm ET on the following Sunday, December 14th, and to contribute to charities in his memory.

Besides re-releases of his music, his presence has remained in the marketplace and media through selections from his writings and drawings, including a line of children's products based on creations made for son Sean.

He didn't spend every day of his five years' retirement at the Dakota. Yoko or one of their consultants would occasionally send him (or the family) to different spots around the globe, for vacations or good-luck trips, beginning with a flight around the world from west to east to "clear their karma". Lennon had to visit Hong Kong alone, book his own room, and see to his own meals, which he'd never done in his life; after a nervous first day (spent mostly in the bath), he finally tried going out for a walk - and was surprised to find that nobody took him for more than a tourist, let alone one of the world-famous Beatles. Not getting the celebrity treatment for the first time since his early twenties, he felt like he'd rediscovered himself.

Although his music with and after the Beatles usually featured the latest technical and sound innovations, he was all-thumbs when it came to most audio/visual equipment, and usually depended on a knowing technician or assistant to give him the sound or look he wanted. He also spent little time on remixing with his solo records; latter-day remasters of his solo albums have been carefully remixed, bringing out many subtleties in the music buried or lost in the original mixes.

Former bandmate George Harrison remembered Lennon in 1981 with his song "All Those Years Ago" (featuring Ringo Starr on drums, and Paul McCartney and Linda McCartney on background vocals). Queen also recorded a tribute to Lennon (the song "Life Is Real", appearing on their "Hot Space" album), as did Paul McCartney with "Here Today", and later Elton John with "Empty Garden (Hey Hey Johnny)". Phil Collins recorded the Beatles' song "Tomorrow Never Knows" on his debut solo album "Face Value", which was released in early 1981.

His first girlfriend (at age fifteen) was named Barbara Baker; his girlfriend at Art school (before dating Cynthia Powell, later Cynthia Lennon) was named Thelma Pickles.

The Cranberries' song "I Just Shot John Lennon" explored the day of his murder at the hands of Mark Chapman.

Yoko Ono signed over the royalties of his song "Imagine", in perpetuity, to Amnesty International, a world-wide organization devoted to political prisoners.

Shortly before his death, he declared The B-52's self-titled debut album to be his favourite album of all-time.

He was voted as a solo artist as the 38th Greatest Rock 'n' Roll Artist by "Rolling Stone". The Beatles were voted the Greatest Rock 'n' Roll Artists of all time on the same list in the magazine.

Was a bright child, but not much of a student from secondary school (akin to middle and high school) on; he found little to engage him, and failed his last round of final exams by just a few points. Was able to enter Art school on a headmaster's recommendation, but found it no more engaging, and slacked off, giving most of his energies to the Beatles, friends and girlfriends.

Danish rock band Dizzy Mizz Lizzy is not only named after a famous Beatles song (written by Larry Williams), but included on their second album "Rotator" was the song "11.07pm" honoring the memory of lead singer Tim Christensen's greatest songwriting inspiration.

After his conviction for hashish possession in the fall of 1968 (he pled guilty on his lawyer's advice, to "get it behind him" and to keep Yoko from being prosecuted, and possibly deported from the U.K.), Lennon was denied entry into the United States during 1969 and 1970, at the height of his and Yoko's "peace campaign". Psychiatrist and Primal therapist Dr. Arthur Janov was able to arrange a medical visa for Lennon late in 1970, on the grounds that he and Yoko had come to Janov for treatment, and they were also allowed to return the next year for a series of custody hearings over Yoko's daughter Kyoko Ono Cox. Their decision to stay in America at the end of 1971 led to a four-year court battle, with the hashish conviction at its heart. (The conviction was eventually overturned by a U.S. court, clearing the way for him to apply for permanent resident status.)

Kept his old bow-tie from Quarry Bank School, and wore it for special occasions as an adult. Also had a favorite necktie that he wore every day to court in the mid-1970s, during his immigration hearings, and later during a lawsuit brought against him by publisher Morris Levy.

His "Mind Games" album came about because in 1973, the former Beatles were behind quota in their renegotiated contract with EMI. Neither George Harrison nor Ringo Starr had released albums in 1971 or 1972 (Harrison's The Concert for Bangladesh (1972) soundtrack didn't count under the contract, as a charity all-star album, co-distributed by EMI and Columbia Records), while Lee Eastman had brokered a separate deal for son-in-law Paul McCartney. Lennon was in no hurry to return to recording after the failure of 1972's "Some Time In New York City", but with legal action pending against the former band, he locked himself away in a bedroom for 48 hours, writing and polishing off an album's worth of songs, which he recorded quickly a couple weeks later. The album was only a modest hit, but it satisfied EMI's expectations.

The Beatles experimented with names throughout 1959. At one point they were called "Johnny and the Moondogs." Another time they turned up to a show in different coloured shirts, and called themselves "The Rainbows".

The cover of Rolling Stone magazine featuring a nude John Lennon hugging and kissing a fully clothed Yoko Ono taken by photographer Annie Liebovitz was voted the top magazine cover of the last 40 years by a panel of magazine editors, artists and designers chosen by the American Society of Magazine Editors. The photo was the cover of Rolling Stone's tribute to Lennon after his death. Ironically, the picture was taken on the last day of Lennon's life.

Shares a birthday with fellow Rock and Roll Hall of Fame members John Entwistle of the Who and singer-songwriter Jackson Browne.

Moving to New York City in the early 1970s, John and Yoko first sublet a luxury apartment in the Dakota from actor Robert Ryan, then purchased it from Ryan's estate following his death. They later purchased several other apartments in the same building. One became their office, another storage for their video collection, another storage for clothing. One with Lennon's instruments and jukebox briefly became the "Club Dakota", for a New Year's party with publicist Elliot Mintz.

The band O.A.R. (of a revolution) wrote "Dakota" off of their album "Stories of a Stranger" in memory of Lennon.

His song "Jealous Guy" became a British number one single for Roxy Music in 1981. The band's lead singer, Bryan Ferry, later performed it at the Live Aid concert at Wembley Stadium in 1985.

His song "Imagine" was performed by Peter Gabriel at the opening ceremony to the 2006 Olympic Winter Games in Turin, Italy.

According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industries in 2006, the Beatles are the biggest popular music act of all time, with 400 million albums sold (50 million more albums than their runner-up, Michael Jackson).

In 1969 he recorded the song "Give Peace A Chance" in room 1742, Queen Elizabeth Hotel, Montréal, Canada. Norman Mailer, Tom Smothers, and Timothy Leary can be heard as part of the chorus.

Was the only Beatle to eat meat regularly. Starr was a vegetarian for life, due to health problems. Harrison converted in 1968, and McCartney became one in 1975. Lennon mostly followed a macrobiotic diet (with brown rice as a staple), but not strictly.

It was after hearing Paul McCartney's new single "Coming Up" that Lennon decided to return to music in early 1980. His reported response was "Oh shit, I've got to get back." Lennon loved the song.

Isolated himself from the other former Beatles after 1974. He had slammed Paul McCartney in the press (to which McCartney vehemently responded), he and George Harrison had stopped talking after an argument over The Concert For Bangladesh (Lennon wanted Yoko Ono to be an integral part of the show, and Harrison didn't want her to even perform). Lennon was also deeply hurt that Harrison did not mention him by name in his autobiography "I, Me, Mine". They never spoke again after the release of the book. He stayed away from Ringo Starr because he wanted to stay sober (and Starr was always drinking). He and McCartney were together for the last time on April 24th, 1976 (The night of the SNL offer of $3000 for the Beatles to re-unite). Harrison agreed in later years that their disagreement was petty and that there was no real animosity between them.

Was the first Beatle ever to perform solo, appearing in The Rolling Stones's The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus (1996) (filmed in December 1968), and also at a concert in Toronto the next year. Was also the only Beatle never to do a solo tour, with Ringo doing his annual All-Starr Band festivals, George going around the US in 1974 and Japan in 1992, and Paul touring England from 1971-1975, the US in 1976, a small world tour in 1980, and full world tours in 1989, 1993, 2001 and 2005. Tours were planned for 1972 (cancelled because of his immigration problems) and 1981 (cancelled after his death).

It was said that the birth of his son and his new fatherhood in 1975 made him much more sweet and mellow, even watching Beatles films and cartoons and listening to their records with Sean. Although he gave a rather biting interview to Playboy magazine in 1980, he was said by most of his associates to be much easier to work with in that part of his life.

The only Beatle never to attend a Paul McCartney solo concert. Starr went to one in 1976 and Harrison went to one in 1993. (Both preferred not to go onstage.) Lennon was planning to visit McCartney in New Orleans during the "Venus and Mars" album sessions, but cancelled when Yoko Ono became pregnant with Sean.

Elton John is the godfather of his son Sean Lennon

Was best man at Peter Boyle's wedding to Loraine Alterman Boyle

Felt that both "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Across the Universe" were poorly recorded.

Posthumous winner of the British Phonographic Industry Award for Outstanding Contribution in 1982.

Is portrayed by Tim Piper in The Linda McCartney Story (2000) (TV).

The Beatles were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame for their outstanding contribution to British music and integral part of British music culture. [11 November 2004]

Richie Sambora's song "Made In America" references John's passing and talks about his legacy.

Amateur photographer Paul Goresh was the last person to photograph Lennon alive, autographing his "Double Fantasy" album for Mark David Chapman, just hours before Chapman fatally shot Lennon. A press photographer sneaked into the morgue, photographing Lennon's body in state before it was taken to be cremated.

He was a huge fan of Bing Crosby late in his life, reintroduced to Crosby's music by a restauranteur friend.

Is portrayed by Ian Hart in Backbeat (1994).

Inducted with Paul McCartney into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1987.

He claimed a disdain for Beatles memorabilia, but privately sent assistants to fan conventions (including the early Beatlefests) to buy interesting or special items. One such trip reunited him with German friend Jürgen Vollmer. Considered showing up at a convention unannounced, just to see the reaction, but never did.

Was taught banjo chords by his mother, Julia, and played his guitar at first in banjo style. Paul McCartney later taught him proper guitar chords.

Is portrayed by Mark Lindsay Chapman in Chapter 27 (2007).

Only performed two Beatles songs in concert after the group broke up, "Come Together" in Madison Square Garden in 1972, and "I Saw Her Standing There" with Elton John at Madison Square Garden, on Thanksgiving, 1975.

John Biography

2008-04-24T13:06:00.001-07:00

If John Lennon had only been one of the four members of the Beatles, his artistic immortality would already have been assured. The so-called "smart Beatle," he brought a penetrating intelligence and a stinging wit both to the band's music and its self-presentation. But in such songs as "Strawberry Fields Forever," "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)," "Rain" and "In My Life," he also marshaled gorgeous melodies to evoke a sophisticated, dreamlike world-weariness well beyond his years. Such work suggested not merely a profound musical and literary sensibility - a genius, in short -- but a vision of life that was simultaneously reflective, utopian and poignantly realistic.

While in the Beatles, Lennon displayed an outspokenness that immersed the band in controversy and helped redefine the rules of acceptable behavior for rock stars. He famously remarked in 1965 that the Beatles were "more popular than Jesus" - a statement that was more an observation than a boast, but that resulted in the band's records being burned and removed from radio station playlists in the U.S. He criticized America's involvement in Vietnam, and, as the Sixties progressed, he became an increasingly important symbol of the burgeoning counterculture.

But it was only after the breakup of the Beatles in 1970 that the figure the world now recognizes as "John Lennon" truly came into being. Whether he was engaging in social activism; giving long, passionate interviews that, once again, broadened the nature of public discourse for artists; defining a new life as a self-described "househusband;" or writing and recording songs, Lennon came to view his life as a work of art in which every act shimmered with potential meaning for the world at large. It was a Messianic attitude, to be sure, but one that was tempered by an innate inclusiveness and generosity. If he saw himself as larger than life, he also yearned for a world in which his ego managed at once to absorb everyone else and dissolve all differences among people, leaving a Zen-like tranquility and calm. "You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one," he sang in "Imagine," which has become his best-known song and an international anthem of peace. "I hope someday you'll join us, and the world will live as one."

Such imagery, coupled with the tragedy of his murder in 1980, has often led to Lennon's being sentimentalized as a gentle prince of peace gazing off into the distance at an Eden only he could see. In fact, he was a far more complex and difficult person, which, in part, accounts for the world's endless fascination with him. Plastic Ono Band (1970), the first solo album he made after leaving the Beatles, alternates songs that are so emotionally raw that to this day they are difficult to listen to with songs of extraordinary beauty and simplicity. Gripped by his immersion in primal-scream therapy, which encouraged its practitioners to re-experience their most profound psychic injuries, Lennon sought in such songs as "Mother" and "God" to confront and strip away the traumas that had afflicted his life since childhood.

And those traumas were considerable. Lennon's mother, Julia, drifted in and out of his life during his childhood in Liverpool - he was raised by Julia's sister Mimi and Mimi's husband, George - and then died in a car accident when Lennon was seventeen. His father was similarly absent, essentially walking out on the family when John was an infant. He disappeared for good when Lennon was five, only to return after his son had become famous as a member of the Beatles. Consequently, Lennon struggled with fears of abandonment his entire life. When he repeatedly cries, "Mama, don't go/Daddy come home," in "Mother," it's less a performance than a scarifying brand of therapeutic performance art. And in that regard, as well as many others, it revealed the influence of Yoko Ono, whom Lennon had married in 1969, leaving his first wife, Cynthia, and their son Julian in order to do so.

The minimalist sound of Plastic Ono Band was significant too. Lennon had come to associate the elaborate musical arrangements of much of the Beatles' later work with Paul McCartney and George Martin, and he consciously set out to purge those elements from his own work. Co-producing with Ono and the legendary Phil Spector, he built a sonic environment that could not have been more basic - guitar, bass, drums, the occasional piano -- whatever was essential and absolutely nothing more. Lyrically, he turned away from the psychedelic flights and Joycean wordplay of such songs as "I Am the Walrus" and "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" - as well as his books, In His Own Write and A Spaniard in the Works -- and toward a style in which unadorned, elemental speech gathered poetic force through its very directness.

On his next album, Imagine (1971), Lennon felt confident enough to reintroduce some melodic elements reminiscent of the Beatles into his songs. Working again with Ono and Spector, he retains the eloquent plainspokenness of Plastic Ono Band, but allows textural elements such as strings, to create more of a sense of beauty. The album's title track alone ensured its historical importance; it is a call to idealism that has provided solace and inspiration at every moment of social and humanitarian crisis since it was written.

From there Lennon turned to a style that was a sort of journalistic agit-prop. Sometime In New York City (1972) is as outward-looking and blunt as Imagine was, for the most part, soft-focused and otherworldly. As its title suggests, the album reflects Lennon's immersion in the drama and noise of the city to which he had moved with Yoko Ono. And as its cover art suggests, the album is something like a newspaper - a report from the radical frontlines on the political upheavals of the day. His activism would create enormous problems for Lennon, however. The Nixon administration, paranoid about the possibility that a former Beatle might become a potent leader and recruiting tool of the anti-war movement, attempted to have Lennon deported. Years of legal battles ensued before Lennon finally was awarded his green card in 1976.

Lennon's political struggles unfortunately found their match in his personal life. He and Ono split up in the fall of 1973, shortly before the release of his album, Mind Games. He moved to Los Angeles and later described the eighteen months he spent separated from Ono as his "lost weekend," a period of wild indulgence and artistic drift. Like Mind Games, the albums he made during this period, Walls and Bridges (1974) and Rock N Roll (1975), are the expressions of a major artist seeking, with mixed results, to recover his voice. None of them lack charm, and their high points include the lovely title track of Mind Games; Walls and Bridges' "Whatever Gets You Through the Night," a rollicking duet with Elton John that gave Lennon his first number-one single as a solo artist; and the sweet nostalgia of Rock N Roll, a covers album that was Lennon's tribute to the musical pioneers of his youth. But none of those albums rank among his greatest work.

In 1975, Lennon reunited with Ono, and their son Sean was born later that year. For the next five years, Lennon withdrew from public life, and his family became his focus. Then, in 1980, he and Ono returned to the studio to work on Double Fantasy, a hymn to their life together with Sean. The couple was plotting a full-fledged comeback - doing major interviews to support the album's release, recording new songs for a follow-up, planning a tour. Then, shockingly, Lennon was shot to death outside the apartment building where he and Ono lived on the night of December 8, 1980.

Lennon's death broke hearts around the world. In the U.S., it recalled nothing so much as the assassination of John Kennedy in 1963, an event for which, ironically, the arrival of the Beatles a few months later had provided a welcome tonic. In the twenty-five years since, Lennon's influence and symbolic importance have only grown. His music, of course, will live forever. But he has survived primarily as a restless voice of change and independent thought. He is an enemy of the status quo, a bundle of contradictions who insisted on a world in which all the various elements of his personality could find free, untrammeled expression. Innumerable times since his death Lennon has been sorely missed. And just as many times and more he has been present - evoked by all of us who find ourselves and each other in the music he made and the vision that he articulated and tried to make real.

Paul Facts

2008-04-24T13:04:00.001-07:00

He is one of Britain's wealthiest men: according to Virgin news his estimated fortune in 2006 was 760 million pounds (about 1.5 billion US dollars). The August 1998 issue of the British rock magazine "Q", listed Paul McCartney as the richest rock star in the world with an estimated fortune of over £500m (one billion USD) in 1998.

Still plays his 1964 Epiphone acoustic guitar which he used to compose his greatest song, Yesterday.

Although all his songs for The Beatles are still credited as "Lennon - McCartney" he individually wrote almost half of all 200 songs for The Beatles, such as Yesterday, Let it Be, Can't Buy me Love, Helter Skelter, Eleanor Rigby, Yellow Submarine, Hey Jude and many more. Only songs in earlier albums are really joint efforts with John Lennon. The co-credit was because of a handshake deal the two had made in their teens (that was before their age was 21, so their oral agreement was technically not legal).

He appeared as himself in Tracey Ullman's "They Don't Know" music video.

His younger brother, Michael, is better known as Mike McGear of the satirical group "The Scaffold". Michael chose to take the name of McGear as his professional name so as not to capitalise on the fame of his brother.

During his engagement to Jane Asher, Paul (with John Lennon) wrote several songs for Jane's older brother, Peter Asher, of the singing duo Peter and Gordon, including their #1 hit "World Without Love". He also wrote the song "Woman" for them, under the pseudonym of Bernard Webb.

Cousin of Kate Robbins and Ted Robbins.

Born at 2:00pm-BDST

His four children with Linda McCartney are Heather McCartney (adopted from her previous marriage), photographer Mary McCartney, top fashion designer Stella McCartney and musician/sculptor James McCartney. Paul was married to rock photographer Linda Eastman on March 12, 1969 at the Marylebone Register Office.

Left-handed

Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of The Beatles January 20, 1988. Citing business differences, he did not attend the induction ceremony at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City with his former bandmates George Harrison and Ringo Starr.

Awarded the Polar Music Prize, the Royal Swedish Academy of Music Award, in 1992.

His later musical compositions have included classical works, such as the acclaimed 'Liverpool Oratorio' and 'Standing Stone'.

Is in The Guinnes Book of Records with 60 gold discs and sales of over 100 million singles.

Owns the double bass that once belonged to Elvis Presley's bassist Bill Black.

Played about 40 various instruments on two of his solo albums, 'McCartney' (1970) and 'McCartney II' (1980).

According to McCartney, the name of the rock group Wings was inspired by daughter Stella McCartney's birth, which was premature and traumatic; Stella and her mother both almost died. As his daughter was being born by emergency cesarean section, Paul sat outside the operating room and prayed that she be born "on the wings of an angel."

Had wanted The Beatles to do a club tour shortly before they broke up. John Lennon disagreed, thinking that if they did tour again, it should have been in stadium-sized venues.

Named one of E!'s "top 20 entertainers of 2001."

Animal-rights activist, vegetarian, and anti-landmine activist. Created Paul and Linda McCartney charity foundation and several other charities. Donated millions to humanitarian causes across the world, and has been involved in charity recordings and concert performances.

Owns the copyrights to Buddy Holly's song catalogue, and also numerous other compositions, including "Ramblin' Wreck From Georgia Tech".

His song "Yesterday" is one of the most popular songs of all time. Whilst he was looking for the right lyrics, he was temporarily using the line "Scrambled Eggs" until he came up with "Yesterday" in the final version of the song, as it is now known to the world. It became one of the most recorded songs of all time, with more than 3,000 known versions.

Claims his nights in a Japanese prison in 1980 were the only time he had been separated from then-wife, Linda McCartney.

Has written several songs about his former bandmate John Lennon, including "Dear Boy", "Too Many People", "Dear Friend", "Let Me Roll It" and "Here Today."

Has a record 29 #1 singles on the American charts with The Beatles, Paul McCartney & Wings, and as a solo artist (including one duet with Stevie Wonder).

Fined $200 in 1973 for growing marijuana on his Scotland farm. Arrested and jailed briefly in Japan in 1980 for carrying same substance.

Jokingly, on occasion, uses the pseudonym of 'Apollo C. Vermouth.'

Made an honorary detective by the New York City Police Department for the benefit concert he gave for 9/11 victims, April 2002.

Won last-minute court order preventing Christie's from auctioning his handwritten lyrics to the song "Hey Jude." Paper with lyrics scrawled on it had been expected to bring up to $116,000 at auction scheduled for April 30, but England's High Court, ruled for Sir Paul the day before, deciding that the valuable artifact from The Beatles will remain at auction house until ownership is finally determined by agreement or trial.

Won prize for drawing of a church at age 11. In 2002, from May-August, over 70 of his paintings from past 20 years on view at Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, England.

Was the only member of The Beatles who received classical education at a school of music.

Daughter, Stella McCartney, was born on September 13, 1971.

Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1999 (as a solo artist).

His first guitar was a Zenith archtop f-hole acoustic. He got it at the Rushworth and Drapers Music Store in Liverpool when he was 14, as a gift from his father (brother Mike McGear got a banjo at the same time, but broke his arm at Boy Scout camp a few weeks later).

His song, "When I'm 64" was written for his father Jim on his 64th birthday.

He wrote his first song, "I've Lost My Little Girl", when he was 14.

His father, Jim, was a musician, and had a band called Jim Mac's Jazz Band. Paul has fond memories of lying on his bedroom floor and listening to his father play piano.

Along with writing "Hey Jude" for Julian Lennon the summer his parents broke up, Paul also jokingly proposed to Cynthia Lennon, in the wake of his own breakup with Jane Asher. Cynthia appreciated the laugh they both shared-- and the single red rose that Paul had brought.

Was the only member of The Beatles to graduate from Britain's equivalent of high-school; he majored in Art.

Usually considered the most "conventional" of The Beatles, but Paul has had his share of far-out ideas, including the germ of the TV-movie Magical Mystery Tour (1967) (TV), and a "self-portrait" published as a 1960s magazine cover, a psychedelic painting a la Pablo Picasso.

Set up John Lennon's "home studio" for him at Kenwood, with its chain of tape decks; Lennon used this setup to make song demos for the Beatles, and later the infamous 'Two Virgins' album with Yoko Ono (which Paul gave its cover quote).

A lyric sheet to his song "Yesterday" is featured on the front cover of the Marillion album "Script for a Jester's Tear" (released 1983).

In 2002 he changed the writing credits to many of the songs he made with The Beatles to "McCartney & Lennon", to a large public outrage. It is a common misconception, however that this was the first time he had done this. He made the same credit change on his 1976 live album "Wings Over America" to little or no public scrutiny and to no public comment from John Lennon (who, of course, was still alive at the time).

Performed "Let It Be" at Live Aid in 1985. During this performance, Bob Geldof, David Bowie, Alison Moyet and Pete Townshend (of The Who) all came on stage towards the end to sing backup vocals.

Eleven years after the breakup of The Beatles, along with Ringo Starr he played on George Harrison's, "All Those Years Ago", about the death of his singing partner, John Lennon. The last Harrison song he and Starr played on was "When We Was Fab", which takes a look back at The Beatle years.

The three surviving members of The Beatles appeared on three separate episodes of "The Simpsons" (1989). Starr appeared in a 1991 episode of "Brush with Greatness," Harrison appeared in a 1993 episode of "Homer's Barbershop Quartet," and McCartney appeared in a 1995 episode of "Lisa The Vegetarian".

Contributes "Calico Skies" to the "Warchild Hope" album (released 21 April 2003).

Met his first wife Linda McCartney in a London nightclub called the Bag O'Nails.

He was respected by The Beatles producer, George Martin for his superior musicianship, musical inventiveness, and multi-instrumental abilities. Martin said that Paul McCartney was the one with enough attention span to sit at the piano, or in the studio as long as it takes to compose the best melody and harmony for their songs.

In 1998, his song "Blackbird" was covered by Marillion for their live album "Unplugged at the Walls".

Is half of the techno duo The Fireman.

In 1971, he produced (but did not perform on) "Thrillington", an instrumental version of the album "Ram" he recorded with his wife Linda. The songs were presented in orchestral versions, and Paul's work as producer and director was pseudonymously credited to "Percy 'Thrills' Thrillington". The album was not well received by the critics, but is now a much sought-after collectable.

First used the pseudonym "Apollo C. Vermouth" when producing an album for the novelty musical group, The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band (later known as The Bonzos). He used the pseudonym because record contract obligations prevented him from using his real name on a rival record label. The band repaid McCartney's efforts with a composition entitled "Mister Apollo", a song about an impossibly perfect body builder.

The only member of The Beatles to have been nominated for an Academy Award in his own right.

Favorite singers were Little Richard and Elvis Presley.

Met George Harrison on a bus to school, and asked him to join the band that eventually became The Beatles.

Born on the same day as film critic Roger Ebert, and two days before fellow musician and composer Brian Wilson.

Owned a ranch in Tucson, Arizona; this was where first wife Linda McCartney died.

Owns a Hollywood Hills manor property purchased from Courtney Love, and Ellen DeGeneres.

The Beatles were voted the Greatest Rock 'n' Roll Artists of all time by Rolling Stone. They also topped a similar list complied by VH1.

Played bass on the Band Aid 20 re-recording of "Do They Know It's Christmas?". [November 2004]

At 5' 11", he was the tallest member of The Beatles, being about half an inch taller than the late George Harrison.

Several of his solo albums (and those with Wings) featured cover photos by first wife Linda McCartney, including "Ram", with a picture of him handling a ram at his Scottish farm (John Lennon later parodied this picture in his "Imagine" album, grasping the ears of a pig). The back cover included a photo of bugs mating; while it was unintentional, several fans thought this illustrated a negative attitude.

Is portrayed by Mark J. Richardson in Love and Betrayal: The Mia Farrow Story (1995) (TV)

As of 2005, has released 32 studio albums, of which 30 feature pop music and 2 feature classical compositions. He has stated that he hopes to compose more classical pieces in the future, as well as a desire to venture into jazz at some point.

Showed his paintings at Concert at HP Pavilion in San Jose (November 8th) leading up to his performance as apart of his US Tour

One of the guitars he used in his US tour (2005) was the one he used on The Beatles' appearance on "Toast of the Town" (1948) (aka The Ed Sullian Show) in the early 1960s.

Though a huge fan of 'Weird Al' Yankovic's work, turned down his request to parody Paul's James Bond song "Live and Let Die" as "Chicken Pot Pie" for vegetarian reasons.

According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industries in 2006, The Beatles are the biggest popular music act of all time, with over 400 million albums sold officially, while the total number of all Beatles' records sold was over 1 billion copies.

Released his new album 'Memory almost full' in 2007.

Created a collection of oil paintings, and had a one man art show in London.

He owns an interest in Apple Corps, and in MLP Communications, which owns a sizable publishing catalog with access to over 25 thousand copyrights (songs, poems, images, recordings, etc.. ).

He and John Lennon quibbled bitterly in the press after the break up of The Beatles. However, in 1977, they met in New York, and allegedly saw an episode of "Saturday Night Live" (1975) in which Lorne Michaels offered $3000 to see The Beatles get back together. He and Lennon joked that they should re-unite and appear, but decided not to.

All 34 of his solo albums have made the Billboard Top 200, something very few solo artists have achieved. 12 of them, including "Wingspan", went to #1.

Had a remarkable 62 top 100 singles from 1971-2005, under a variety of categories. 17 of them went to #1.

Won five Grammys, including two with The Beatles. His "Eleanor Rigby" was Best Pop/Rock and Roll or Contemporary song. His "Michelle" won for Song Of The Year. "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsy" won for Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s)/Best Background Arrangement, "Band On The Run" won for Best Pop Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocal and "Rockestra Theme" won for Best Rock Instrumental Performance.

He loved and was flattered by, Ray Charles' cover of "Eleanor Rigby", but John Lennon did not like the version.

Friends with Neil Young, who inducted him into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He and his long-time wife, Linda McCartney, said that Young was their favorite performer. His favorite song of Young's is "Only Love Can Break Your Heart".

Father-in-law of Alistair Donald and Alasdhair Willis.

Has four grandsons and one granddaughter: Mary McCartney's two sons Arthur Alistair Donald (b. 3 April 1999) and Elliot Donald (b. 1 August 2002) and Stella McCartney's sons Miller Alasdhair James Willis (b. 25 February 2005) and Beckett Robert Lee (b. 8 January 2008), and daughter Bailey Linda Olwyn Willis (b. 8 December 2006).

During his engagement to Jane Asher, Paul (with John Lennon) wrote several songs for Jane's older brother, Peter Asher, of the singing duo Peter and Gordon, including their #1 hit "World Without Love". He also wrote the song "Woman" for them, under the pseudonym of Bernard Webb.

Winner of the Sony Award For Technical Excellence in 1983.

Winner of the British Phonographic Industry Award for British Male Solo Artist in 1983.

Named "Man of the Year" at the GQ awards ceremony. (6 September 2006)

The Scissor Sisters' second album, Ta-Dah, has a song entitled Paul McCartney.

His grandchildren Arthur and Elliot are older than his daughter Beatrice.

Is portrayed by Gary Bakewell in The Linda McCartney Story (2000) (TV).

[Sunday 13 November 2005] Became the very first musician to perform live music for an audience in space. This music milestone occurred during his concert in Anaheim, California, when he sang "Good Day Sunshine" and "English Tea" for NASA Astronaut Bill McArthur and Russian Cosmonaut Valery Tokarev who were orbiting some 220 miles above earth in their Space Shuttle Discovery.

Has a stepsister Ruth McCartney, adopted by his father when he married Ruth's mother.

The Beatles were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame for their outstanding contribution to British music and integral part of British music culture. [11 November 2004]

Whilst he was looking for the right lyrics, the song Yesterday was temporarily known as "Scrambled Eggs". It became one of the most recorded songs of all time with more than 2500 versions.

The hit Yesterday does not feature any of the other members of The Beatles. It's just McCartney and a string section. As such, the record company considered releasing it as a McCartney solo song, but decided not to because of objections by John Lennon.

Paul, not Ringo, played drums on Back in the USSR, the classic 1968 hit by The Beatles.

Is portrayed by Gary Bakewell in Backbeat (1994).

Inducted with John Lennon into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1987.

In 1957, his ability to play guitar and sing in many styles impressed John Lennon so much that he was invited to join his band "Quarrymen" which became The Beatles, after several name changes.

Although he was clearly The Beatles' lead vocalist and bass player, he was also an accomplished lead guitarist whose vibrato-laced solos can be heard on "Taxman," "Drive My Car," "Ticket to Ride," "Another Girl," and other Beatles' hits.

Winner of the 2007 Q Icon Award.

Because of his 2008 divorce, he became the fourth and final member of The Beatles to get a divorce. Among the four, McCartney had the longest marriage (to Linda McCartney), although Ringo Starr is still married to his second wife (and has been since 1981).

28 October 2003: A daughter named Beatrice Milly was born to Paul and wife Heather Mills. She was named after Heather's late mother Beatrice and Paul's Aunt Milly.

In July 2001, shortly after their engagement was announced, his fiancée Heather Mills's engagement ring, which was lost, was found among the grass in a golf course.

In 2007, before completion of the film Across the Universe (2007), director Julie Taymor brought the post-production copy to a private screening with Paul McCartney, and he liked the film. Yoko Ono also approved the film.

In 2006, he donated $2 million to Adopt-a-Minefield.

Turned down the offer to write a new James Bond song for Quantum of Solace (2008), and recommended singer-songwriter Amy Winehouse for the job.

Winner of the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution in 2008.

Paul Biography

2008-04-24T13:00:00.000-07:00

Sir Paul McCartney is a key figure in contemporary culture as a singer, composer, poet, writer, artist, humanitarian, entrepreneur, and holder of more than 3 thousand copyrights. He is in the "Guinness Book of World Records" for most records sold, most #1s (shared), most covered song, "Yesterday," largest paid audience for a solo concert (350,000+ people, in 1989, in Brazil). He is considered one of the most successful entertainers of all time.

He was born James Paul McCartney on June 18, 1942, in Liverpool General Hospital, where his mother, Mary, was a medical nurse and midwife. His father, Jim, was a cotton salesman and a pianist leading the Jim Mac's Jazz Band in Liverpool. Young Paul McCartney was raised non-denominational. He studied music and art, and had a happy childhood with one younger brother, Michael. At age 11, he was one of only four students who passed the 11+ exam, known as "the scholarship" in Liverpool, and gained a place at Liverpool Institute for Boys. There he studied from 1953 to 1960, earning A level in English and Art.

At the age of 14, Paul McCartney was traumatized by his mother's sudden death from breast cancer. Shortly afterward, he wrote his first song. In July 1957 he met John Lennon during their performances at a local church fête (festival). McCartney impressed Lennon with his mastery of guitar and singing in a variety of styles. He soon joined Lennon's band, The Quarrymen, and eventually became founding member of The Beatles, with the addition of George Harrison and Pete Best. After a few gigs in Hamburg, Germany, the band returned to Liverpool and played regular gigs at the Cavern during 1961.

In November 1961, they invited Brian Epstein to be their manager, making a written agreement in January 1962. At that time McCartney and Harrison were under 21, so the paper wasn't technically legal, albeit it did not matter to them. What mattered was their genuine trust in Epstein. He improved their image, secured them a record deal with EMI, and replaced drummer Best with Ringo Starr. Brian Epstein and George Martin's helped consolidate their talents and mutual stimulation into beautiful teamwork, launching the most successful career in the history of entertainment.

The Beatles contributed to music, film, literature, art, and fashion, made a continuous impact on entertainment, popular culture and the lifestyle of several generations. Their songs and images carrying powerful ideas of love, peace, help, and imagination evoked creativity and liberation that outperformed the rusty Soviet propaganda and contributed to breaking walls in the minds of millions, thus making impact on human history.

All four members of The Beatles were charismatic and individually talented artists, they sparked each other from the beginning. Paul McCartney had the privilege of a better musical education, having studied classical piano and guitar in his childhood. He progressed as a lead vocalist and multi-instrumentalist, as well as a singer-songwriter. In addition to singing and songwriting, Paul McCartney played bass guitar, acoustic and electric guitars, piano and keyboards, as well as over 40 other musical instruments.

McCartney wrote more popular hits for the Beatles than other members of the band. His songs Yesterday, Let It Be, Hey Jude, Blackbird, All My Loving, Eleanor Rigby, Birthday, I Saw Her Standing There, I Will, Get Back, Carry That Weight, P.S. I Love You, Things We Said Today, "Hello, Goodbye," Two of Us, Why Don't We Do It in the Road?, Helter Skelter, Honey Pie, When I'm 64, Lady Madonna, She's a Woman, Maxwell's Silver Hammer, "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da," Mother Nature's Son, Long And Winding Road, Rocky Raccoon, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Fool on the Hill, You Never Give Me Your Money, Your Mother Should Know, The End, Yellow Submarine, and many others are among the Beatles' best hits. Yesterday is considered the most covered song in history with over three thousand versions of it recorded by various artists across the universe.

Since he was a teenager, McCartney honored the agreement that was offered by John Lennon in 1957, about the 50/50 authorship of every song written by either one of them. However, both were teenagers, and technically, being under 21, their oral agreement had no legal power. Still, almost 200 songs by The Beatles are formally credited to both names, regardless of the fact that most of the songs were written individually. The songwriting partnership of John Lennon and Paul McCartney was really working until the mid-60s, when they collaborated in many of their early songs. Their jamming on a piano together led to creation of their first best-selling hit 'I Want to Hold Your Hand' in 1963.

In total, The Beatles created over 240 songs, they recorded many singles and albums, made several films and TV shows. Thousands of memorable pictures popularized their image. In their evolution from beginners to the leaders of entertainment, they learned from many world cultures, absorbed from various styles, and created their own. Their cross-style compositions covered a range of influences from classical music and English folk ballads to Indian raga.

Epstein's 1967 death hurt all four members of The Beatles, as they lost their creative manager. Evolution of each member's creativity and musicianship also led to individual career ambitions, however, their legacy as The Beatles remained the main driving force in their individual careers ever since. McCartney and The Beatles made impact on human history, because their influence has been liberating for generations of nowhere men living in misery beyond the Iron Curtain.

Something in their songs and images appealed to everybody who wanted to become free as a bird. Their songs carrying powerful ideas of real love, peace, help, imagination and freedom evoked creativity and contributed to breaking chains and walls in the minds of millions. The Beatles expressed themselves in beautiful and liberating words of love, happiness, freedom, and revolution, and carried those messages to people across the universe. Their songs and images helped many freedom-loving people to come together for revolutions in Prague and Warsaw, Beijing and Bucharest, Berlin and Moscow. The Beatles has been an inspiration for those who take the long and winding road to freedom.

McCartney was 28 when he started his solo career, and formed his new band, Wings. His first solo album, "McCartney," was a #1 hit and spawned the evergreen ballad "Maybe I'm Amazed", yet critical reaction was mixed. He continued to release music with Wings, that eventually became one of the most commercially successful groups of the 70s. "Band on the Run" won two Grammy Awards and remained the Wings' most lauded work. The 1977 release "Mull of Kintyre" stayed at #1 in the UK for nine weeks, and was highest selling single in the UK for seven years. In 1978 McCartney's theme "Rockestra" won him another Grammy Award. In 1979, together with Elvis Costello, he organized Concerts for the People of Kampuchea. In 1979, McCartney released his solo album "Wonderful Christmastime" which remained popular ever since.

In 1980 McCartney was arrested in Tokyo, Japan, for marijuana possession, and after a ten-day stint in jail, he was released to a media firestorm. He retreated into seclusion after the arrest, and was comforted by his wife Linda. Yet he had another traumatic experience when his ex-band-mate, John Lennon, was shot dead by a crazed fan near his home in New York City on December 8, 1980. McCartney did not play any live concerts for some time because he was nervous that he would be "the next" to be murdered.

After almost a year of absence from the music scene, McCartney returned in 1982 with the album "Tug of War," which was well received by public and enjoyed great critical acclaim. He continued a successful career as a solo artist, collaborated with wife Linda McCartney, and writers such as Elvis Costello. During the 80s, McCartney released such hits as 'No More Lonely Nights' and his first compilation, "All the Best." In 1989, he started his first concert tour since the John Lennon's murder.

In 1994, the three surviving members of The Beatles, McCartney, Harrison, and Starr, reunited and produced Lennon's previously unknown song "Free as a Bird." It was preserved by Yoko Ono on a tape recording made by Lennon in 1977. The song was re-arranged and re-mixed by George Martin at the Abbey Road Studios with the voices of three surviving members. The Beatles Anthology TV documentary series was watched by 420 million people in 1995.

During the 1990s McCartney concentrated on composing classical works for the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Society, such as "The Liverpool Oratorio" involving a choir and symphony, and "A Leaf" solo-piano project, both released in 1995. That same year he was working on a new pop album, "Flaming Pie," when his wife Linda was diagnosed with breast cancer, and caring for his wife during her illness meant only sporadic public appearances during that time. The album was released in 1997 to both critical and commercial success, debuting at #2 on both the UK and US pop charts. That same year he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II as Sir Paul McCartney for his services to music.

In April 1998, Linda McCartney, his beloved wife of almost 30 years, mother of their four children, and his steady partner in music, died of breast cancer. He spent much of the next year away from the public eye, emerging only to campaign on behalf of his late wife for animal rights and vegetarian causes.

He eventually returned to the studio, releasing an album of rock n'roll covers in 1999. "Run Devil Run" made both Entertainment Weekly and USA Today's year-end top ten lists. McCartney also slowly returned to the public spotlight with the release of his another classical album, "Working Classical" in November 1999, in recording by the London Symphony Orchestra. His 2000 release "A Garland for Linda" was a choral tribute album, which raised funds to aid cancer survivors.

In 2000 he was invited by Heather Mills, a disabled ex-model, to her 32nd birthday. McCartney wrote songs dedicated to her, he and Mills developed a romantic relationship and became engaged in 2001. However, the year brought him a cascade of traumatic experiences. On September 11, 2001, Paul McCartney was sitting on a plane in New York when the World Trade Center tragedy occurred in front of his eyes, and he was able to witness the events from his seat. Yet there was another sadness, as his former band-mate George Harrison died of cancer in November, 2001.

Recouperating from the stressful year, McCartney received the 2002 Academy Award-nomination for the title song to the movie Vanilla Sky (2001), and also went on his first concert tour in several years. In June, 2002, Sir Paul McCartney and Heather Mills married in a castle in Monaghan, Ireland. Their daughter, Beatrice Milly McCartney, was born in October 2003. Four years later, the high profile marriage ended in divorce, after a widely publicized litigation.

In 2003 Paul McCartney rocked the Red Square in Moscow with his show "Back in USSR" which was attended by his former opponents from the former Soviet KGB, including the Russian president Vladimir Putin himself, who invited McCartney to be the guest of honor in the Kremlin. In 2004 Paul McCartney received a birthday present from the Russian president. In June 2004, he and Heather Mills-McCartney stayed as special guests at suburban Royal Palaces of Russian Tsars in St. Petersburg, Russia. There he staged a spectacular show near the Tsar's Winter Palace in St. Petersburg where the Communist Revolution took place, just imagine.

In 2005 the Entertainment magazine poll named The Beatles the most iconic entertainers of the 20th Century. In 2006, the guitar on which Paul McCartney played his first chords and impressed John Lennon, was sold at an auction for over $600,000.

On June 18, 2006, Paul McCartney celebrated his 64th birthday, as in his song "when I'm Sixty-Four." McCartney's celebrity status, made it a cultural milestone for a generation of those born in the baby-boom era who grew up with the music of The Beatles during the 1960s. The prophetic message in the song has been intertwined with McCartney's personal life and his career.

In 2007 McCartney left his longtime label, EMI, and signed with Los Angeles based Hear Music. He learned to play mandolin to create a refreshing feeling for his latest album "Memory Almost Full," then appeared in Apple Computer's commercial for iPod+iTunes to promote the album. In June 2007 McCartney appeared together with Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono, Olivia Harrison and Guy Laliberté in a live broadcast from the "Revolution" Lounge at the Mirage Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

His 3-DVD set "The McCartney Years" with over 40 music videos and hours of Historic Live Performances is set for release in November 2007. His classical album "Ecco Cor Meum" (aka.. Behold My Heart), recorded with the Academy of St. Martin of the Fields and the boys of King's college Choir, was voted Classical Album of the Year in 2007.

On the long and winding road of his life, Sir Paul McCartney has been a highly respected entertainer and internationally regarded public figure.

"Whenever you're going through difficult times, I'm at the moment, it's really cool to be able to escape into music" says Paul McCartney.

The Music of Lennon and McCartney

2008-04-24T12:16:00.000-07:00

This television music spectacular was conceived by Johnny Hamp of Granada Television, the producer and station which had given the group their first TV airing. Hamp had been made Head of Light Entertainment for Granada and after deciding he wished to pay tribute to the song writing talents of John and Paul he had discussions with them which resulted in ‘The Music of Lennon & McCartney’, the biggest spectacular yet produced by Granada Television.

Johnny produced and Phil Casson directed.

The 50-minute programme was filmed over a two-day period in one of Granada’s largest studios, Studio 6, on specially constructed sets. The completed show was fully networked at 9.40pm on Friday, 17 December 1965.

The Beatles had wanted Ella Fitzgerald to sing ‘Can’t Buy Me Love’, but she wasn’t available. French singer Richard Anthony had been due to appear but was involved in a road accident shortly before the recordings and was replaced by Dick Rivers who sang ‘Things We Did Today’ in French.

George Martin led a 25-piece orchestra in a rendition of ‘I Feel Fine’ and ‘Ringo’s Theme’ and Paul introduced the American composer, Henry Mancini with the words, “Now we introduce our favourite composer, Henry Mancini, who is known to all his friends as Hank. Welcome to the Beatles’ show, Henry.”

Mancini played ‘If I Fell’ and Peter and Gordon performed their major hit ‘World Without Love’, with a dozen attractive female models decorating the background.

Esther Phillips flew in from America especially to perform ‘And I Love Him’ and Lulu, who had been driven up from London by Peter Noone of Herman’s Hermits, belted out ‘I Saw Him Standing There.’ The Beatles closed the first half of the show with a rendition of ‘Day Tripper.’

Six members of the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra appeared under the name Fritz Speigel’s Barock And Roll Ensemble to perform ‘She Loves You’ in the style of Mozart. Peter Sellers, with a long wig and Shakespearean costume in the style of Richard III rendered a theatrical interpretation of ‘A Hard Day’s Night,’ although his contribution was filmed in a London studio. Billy J. Kramer & the Dakotas performed their two hits ‘Bad To Me’ and ‘Do You Want To Know A Secret.’

Cilla Black performed ‘It’s For You’ and was followed by Paul McCartney who began singing ‘Yesterday’ and Marianne Faithfull appeared and completed the song.

Organist Alan Haven performed another interpretation of ‘A Hard Day’s Night’, with backing from drummer Tony Crombie, and then the Beatles performed ‘We Can Work It Out.’ For the number John Lennon played harmonium – it was the instrument used in ‘Coronation Street’ which was familiar to viewers of the soap opera as the harmonium in the corner of Ena Sharples’ (Violet Carson) room.

Incidentally, among the spectators who were witnessing the production were members of the ‘Coronation Street’ cast and disc jockey Jimmy Saville. Also appearing on the special was the Spanish dance star Antonio Vargas, who performed ‘She Loves You.’.

Editor’s Note: Johnny Hamp originally booked the Beatles for his ‘People and Places’ programme on 17 December 1962 and used the group regularly.

A few years later he was to comment, “I first saw the Beatles in a club in Hamburg, They were very scruffy characters but they had a beat to their music which I liked.”

Esther Phillips was born Esther Mae Jones in Houston, Texas on 23 December 1935. At the age of 13 she began singing with the Johnny Otis Revue under the name Little Esther. She dropped the ‘Little’ in 1962 and had a number of hits, including ‘Release Me’ and ‘What a Diff’rence A Day Makes.’

She recorded the Lennon & McCartney composition ‘And I Love Him’, issued by Atlantic Records on 22 May 1965. Paul McCartney was so pleased with her rendition of the song at the time that he said it was the best cover version of any Beatles number. When John and Paul were involved in the making of ‘The Music of Lennon & McCartney’ they sent a cable to Esther, who was performing in cabaret in Bermuda, inviting her to appear on their show to sing ‘And I Love Him.’ She completed her engagement in the West Indies and flew to Manchester to appear in the special.

She was thrilled that they’d contacted her and said, “I wanted so much to meet the Beatles in the States but every time I hit town on my own tour, they’d either just been or were coming the next week. I never met four young men before who are all in the genius class.”

Esther died of liver and kidney failure on 7 August 1984.

‘A World Without Love’ was the first of four songs Paul gave to Peter Asher, brother of his girlfriend Jane Asher. The Beatles never recorded the number and it wasn’t part of their repertoire. John Lennon was particularly amused by the opening words to the song: ‘Please lock me away…”

I was particularly amused by Cilla’s performance of ‘It’s For You’ because, wearing a tiny mini skirt, she slowly sang as she walked down the stairs of a scaffolding section of scenery with John and Paul waiting at the bottom – with John obviously looking up her skirt! Like ‘A World Without Love’, ‘It’s For You’ was penned by Paul.

‘Yesterday’, of course, was also written by Paul. Paul had originally told Marianne that he’d give her a song and actually wrote one for her called ‘Etcetera’, but decided it wasn’t good enough to record. As a result, Marianne became Paul’s personal choice to record ‘Yesterday’ and during one evening at a party he played her an acetate of his version. When she recorded ‘Yesterday’, he attended her recording session at Decca Studios on 11 October 1965 and the record was released on 22 October 1965.

When she appeared on the special, Pail began singing the number for 22 seconds and the camera them moved to Marianne, who completed the song. The eighteen-year-old singer was three months pregnant at the time, so the camera concentrated on a head and shoulders shot throughout.

However, it was singer Matt Monro who reached No. 8 in the British charts with the number while Marianne barely scraped in, her highest position being No. 36.

Dick Rivers was one of the major French rockers of the Sixties, along with Johnny Hallyday. He was born Herve Fornieri in the south of France on 24 April 1945. He called himself Dick Rivers after the name of the character played by Elvis Presley in the film ‘Loving You’ and he recorded French versions of Lennon & McCartney numbers.

Fritz Spiegl was born in Austria in 1926 and moved to England at the age of 13, eventually settling in Liverpool where he became Principal Flautist with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. He died in March 2003.

Henry Mancini was a major film music composer with songs such as ‘Moon River’ to his credit. He was born in Cleveland, Ohio on 16 April 1924 and died on 14 June 1994.

IMDB page || Wikipedia page

Source: Mersey Beat

Quotes

2008-04-24T10:56:00.000-07:00

"It [LSD] opened my eyes. We only use on-tenth of our brain. Just think of what we could accomplist if we could only tap that hidden part! It would mean a whole new world if the politicians would take LSD. There wouldn't be any more war or poverty or famine."

"I now realize that taking drugs was like taking an aspirin without having a headache."

"I am alive and well and unconcerned about the rumors of my death. But if I were dead, I would be the last to know."

"There's a lot of random in our songs...writing, thinking, letting others think of bits-then bam, you've the jigsaw puzzle."

"There is one thing I used to regret and feel guilty about. When Ringo joined us I used to act all big time with him because I'd been in the business a bit longer and felt superior. I was a know-all. I'd been in the sixth form and thought I'd read a bit, you know. I began putting him off me, and me off me."

"I think the French girls are fabulous."

"Le Beatle! Le Beatle!"

"It's going to be such an incredible, comical thing in 50 years' time... for people to say, "They broke up 'cos Yoko sat on an amp."

"We've played many palaces, including Frisco's Cow Palace. But never this one before. It's a keen pad and I like the staff. Thought they'd be dukes and things but they were just fellas."

"Was Magical Mystery Tour really so bad compared to the rest of Christmas TV? You could hardly call the Queen's speech a gasser!"

Ringo: "If I was royal..."
Paul: "If I was royal, I would crack long jokes and get a mighty laugh...if I was royal."
George: "What would we do with Buckingham Palace? Royalty's stupid."

"Hamburg was our real introduction to the world of show business. People would appear at the door of the club, and our job was to convince them to come in and see us so that they would buy beer from the guy who was paying us. So this is obviously very important when it comes to show business. You're basically there as a means to sell beer. So we'd see someone at the door and we'd really turn it on. One of us would say quietly, "Hey, guys, this is it." And we'd launch into one of our big numbers like Twenty Flight Rock, or one of our other big numbers. We would make like we hadn't seen them, and we would just be rocking! And you'd see them walk in. Eventually we would fill the club up, and when that started to happen regularly, I would say then we started to know that we were going to make it."

"Meeting Jürgen Vollmer, and his friends Astrid Kirchherr and Klaus Voormann, was a very important event in my life and the lives of the other Beatles. His sense of style and excellent photographic skills where to have a profound effect throughout our careers... I thank him for being there at the right time."

"It simply became very difficult for me to write with Yoko sitting there. If I had to think of a line, I started getting very nervous. I might want to do something like, 'I love you, girl,' but with Yoko watching I always felt that I had to come out with something clever and avant-garde. She would probably have loved the simple stuff, but I was scared."

"The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated."

"I figure I've probably got a better chance of coming up with a good Paul McCartney song than Oasis has."

"I'm not religious, but I'm very spiritual."

"It was pretty rough. Just a thin mattress on the floor. I had to wash using water from the toilet cistern. I had to share a bath with a bloke who was in for murder. I was afraid to take my suit off in case I got raped. But I'd seen all those prisoner-of-war movies and I knew you had to keep your spirits up. So I'd organize sing-alongs with other prisoners." [regarding his ten-day jail term after his arrest for cannabis possession at Tokyo's Narita Airport, Jan. 6, 1980]

"I don't take me seriously. If we get some giggles, I don't mind."

"We didn't all get into music for a job! We got into music to avoid a job, in truth - and get lots of girls."

"I've seen those famous Nixon [Richard Nixon] transcripts where Elvis [Elvis Presley] actually starts to try to shop us - The Beatles! He's in the transcript saying - to Richard Nixon, of all people - 'Well, sir, these Beatles, they're very un-American and they take drugs.' I felt a bit betrayed by that, I must say. The great joke is that we were taking drugs, and look what happened to him. He was caught on the toilet full of them! It was sad, but I still love him, particularly in his early period. He was very influential on me."

"I don't take any notice of her. She's John's wife so I have to respect her for that, but I don't think she's the brightest of buttons. She's said some particularly daft things in her time. Her life is dedicated to putting me down but I attempt very strongly not to put her down."

"You try to concentrate on the lyrics, the music, the melody, and putting it all together, and there's a sign . . . and half of you is saying, 'Ignore it', but the other half is saying, 'Read it, go ahead.' 'My grandmother saw you at Candlestick.' That says it all." [referring to a sign in the audience]

"I used to think anyone doing anything weird was weird. Now I know that it is the people that call others weird that are weird."

"If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be a vegetarian."

"When we were kids, George [George Harrison] and I used to hang out and we had, we had one little party piece which was to show that we weren't stupid, so we used to do this thing by Bach that was our own little version of it, and we got it wrong,"

"Maybe our government went in too fast with the Americans. It would have been better if the UN had been together. Now it's become very bloody with Iraq, it's very difficult. If someone came to my house and blew it up, I wouldn't just want to sit there and say thank you. I'd be angry like I think anyone would be, so I could see America and Britain being angry. To look for [Osama Bin Laden] seemed reasonable to go against terrorism, but the war has become very difficult."

"I thought she was a cold woman. I think that's wrong. She's just the opposite. I think she's just more determined than most people to be herself." [on his updated feelings about Yoko Ono, 1995]

"Seeing that so many inaccurate stories have been written at the moment about [Heather Mills] and myself, all I can ask people to do is not believe them and understand that most of what is coming out is made up and entirely false. Thanks for your support."

"She's all around me, you know. And everybody I know knows her and remembers her. And so I talk a lot about her." [About Linda]

"No one is musically educated until they have heard The Beach Boys' 'Pet Sounds'"

"It's not a bad way to get through an afternoon". [On making music]

"There was one moment where they were riding their little ponies in Scotland, and Stella [Stella McCartney] said to me: 'Dad! You're Paul McCartney, aren't you?' 'Yes darling, but I'm Daddy really'"

"Everybody at EMI had become part of the furniture. I'd be a couch; Coldplay are an armchair. Robbie Williams, I dread to think what he was."

"I love to hear a choir. I love the humanity — to see the faces of real people devoting themselves to a piece of music. I like the teamwork. It makes me feel optimistic about the human race when I see them cooperating like that."

"I have no problem with bootlegs, although every time I say that, my lawyer says, "Oh yes you do.""

"It was Elvis who really got me hooked on beat music. When I heard "Heartbreak Hotel" I thought, this is it."

"She's [Bea] absolutely gorgeous. Heather and I are having a wonderful time. I could go on for hours and drag the photographs out, but I'd never get back to the studio."

"We don't eat anything that has to be killed for us. We've been through a lot and we've reached a stage where we really value life."

"We probably seem to be anti-religious...none of us believes in God."

"Someone from the office rang me up and said, 'Look, Paul, you're dead.' And I said, 'Oh, I don't agree with that.'"

"Sydney wasn't very good weather, was he? I think it must have been the mongoose season"

"I wrote that in bed on night. As a kids' story. And then we thought it would be good for Ringo to do."

"The thing that concerned me was the music, and that we get on musically, and we didn't. Same with Pete Best."

"The only thing I couldn't cure myself of was being left-handed. I do everything with my left hand, and no matter how I try I can't change the habit. I just seem to do everything back to front. I used to even write backwards. Every time the schoolmasters would look at my handwriting they would throw swinging fits."

"If an idea does pop in your mind, then you do sit down and say, 'Let's do it,' yea. If there are no ideas and say we've been told we've got a recording date in about two days time, then you got to sit down and sort of slug it out. You normally get just a little idea which doesn't seem bad and you go on and it builds up from there. It varies every time."

"Lots of people have asked us what we enjoyed best... concerts, television, or recording. We like doing stage shows because it's great to hear an audience enjoying themselves. But the thing we like best is going into the recording studio to make new records... which is what we've been doing all day before we started on this special message. What we like to hear most is one of our songs taking shape in a recording studio, and then listening to the tapes afterwards to hear how it all worked out."

Q: "What do The Beatles think of topless swimming suits?"
A: "We've been wearing them for years!"

You can send us more Paul quotes here.

The Divorce

2008-04-24T10:36:00.000-07:00

John leaves the band

In May 1969, Paul tried to get the band to play live. He suggested that they play unannounced in small clubs, maybe in disguise. Ringo liked the idea. George was a bit reserved about it. When Paul told John, John said Paul was daft and said "I might as well tell you, I’m leaving the group. I want a divorce, like my divorce with Cynthia." John had told Allen Klein already. Klein told John to keep silent, even to the other Beatles, until the Capital deal was done. John agreed, but found it impossible not to tell the others.

"A furious row developed, with John railing bitterly at Paul for his "granny" music, especially ‘Ob-la-di’ and ‘Maxwell's Silver Hammer,’ on the ‘Abbey Road’ which John had particularly detested. He told Paul he was sick of ‘fighting for time’ on their albums, and of always taking the B-sides on singles…George interrupted resentfully that songs he had recorded this year were often those he had written years earlier but not been allowed to release. He added that he never really felt the Beatles were backing him. After a six month silence, Paul called John and said he was putting out an album and was leaving the group also. John replied "That makes two of us who have accepted it mentally."

Paul Makes the Announcement

Paul notified what remained of Apple that he wanted his solo album, McCartney, to be released in early April. Klein said no because "Let It Be" and Ringo’s solo album "Sentimental Journey" were being released at the same time. Paul then appealed directly to Sir Joseph Lockwood who said Paul had to accept the majority decision. Ringo came in to deliver to Lockwood his personal explanation to the letters from John and George that confirmed that "McCartney" would have to be postponed. Ringo, in an affidavit described how upset he was when Paul "went completely out of control, prodding his fingers towards my face, saying ‘I’ll finish you all now, and you’ll pay.’" Ringo then talked John and George into letting Paul release on April 17, 1970 and pushing ‘Let it Be’ back and bringing ‘Sentimental Journey" forward.

On April 17, 1970 "McCartney" is released. The album contained an inserted questionnaire that reveals that the Beatles are broken up and have no plans on doing anything in the future. Paul’s reasons are "personal differences, business, differences, and musical differences. He doesn’t foresee another Lennon-McCartney writing partnership in the future. He also states that neither Allen Klein nor ABKCO Industries have been or ever will be in any way involved in with the production, manufacturing, distribution, or promotion of the record.

John had honored his agreement with Klein to stay silent about the breakup. George and Ringo also kept quiet. John had made it very clear that he was the one who was going to make the announcement. He found it hard to forgive Paul for using the split as a publicity stunt on his first solo album. Paul says he "didn’t realize it would hurt him that much or that it mattered who was first." Paul says he felt guilty about lying to the public by not saying anything and it was about time that someone told the public. The Beatles had been broken up for eight months before Paul’s announcement.

Paul’s Lawsuit

On December 31, 1970, Paul filed a law suit against the other three Beatles in order to dissolve the partnership. The Beatles had signed a ten year partnership agreement in 1967. At the time they really didn’t look at the agreement and they forgot about it. It had been discovered recently. It meant that if they wanted to do anything like put out an album, they would each have to get the three others’ permission. Paul wanted to just rip it up. The others had been advised that destroying it would cause serious bad consequences for them. To Paul, this was just another three-to-one vote, like the hiring of Allen Klein. The Beatles had broken up in every sense but not on paper. Paul took it to court to be done with it completely.

Reaction to the Breakup

Paul remembers that, "Our manager, Neil Aspinall, had to read the official wording dissolving the partnership. He was supposed to say it aloud to us in a deadly serious voice and he couldn't do it. He did a Nixon wobble. His voice went. And we were all suddenly aware of a sort of physical consequence of what had been going on. I thought, Oh, God, we really have broken up the Beatles. Oh, shit."

Paul was asked if he thought John ever missed the Beatles, he responded, "I don't know. My theory is that he didn't. Someone like John would want to end the Beatle period and start the Yoko period. And he wouldn't like either to interfere with the other. As he was with Yoko, anything about the Beatles tended inevitably to be an intrusion. So I think he was interested enough in his new life to genuinely not miss us."

Paul was probably right. John said in an interview: "I never went to high school reunions. My thing is, Out of sight, out of mind. That's my attitude toward life. So I don't have any romanticism about any part of my past. I think of it only inasmuch as it gave me pleasure or helped me grow psychologically. That is the only thing that interests me about yesterday. I don't believe in yesterday, by the way. You know I don't believe in yesterday. I am only interested in what I am doing now."

How Do You Sleep?

On August 8, 1971, John releases "Imagine." The song "How Do You Sleep?" is comically nasty. I don’t know what to say about this song except that is about Paul McCartney and its very nasty. I don’t think it could be a response to "Too Many People" because the albums were released two months apart. "Imagine was probably finalized and being pressed and packaged for retail by the time "Ram" was release. Here’s a slightly shortened version on John’s song:

So Sgt. Pepper took you by surprise
You better see right through that mother’s eyes
Those freaks was right when they said you was dead The one mistake you made was in your head

You live with straights who tell you was king
Jump when your momma tell you anything
The only thing you done was yesterday
And since you’re gone you’re just another day

A pretty face may last a year or two
But pretty soon they’ll see what you can do
The sound you make is muzak to my ears
You must have learned something in all those years

Ah, how do you sleep?
Ah, how do you sleep at night?

When asked about "How Do You Sleep" he says "You know, I wasn't really feeling that vicious at the time. But I was using my resentment toward Paul to create a song, let's put it that way. He saw that it pointedly refers to him, and people kept hounding him about it. But, you know, there were a few digs on his album before mine. He's so obscure other people didn't notice them, but I heard them. I thought, Well, I'm not obscure, I just get right down to the nitty-gritty. So he'd done it his way and I did it mine. But as to the line you quoted, yeah, I think Paul died creatively, in a way."

Paul and Linda’s reaction: "At the time, we tried to understand. But what should happen was, if we were the least bit bitchy that would be very hurtful to them in this... wild thing they were in. I was looking at my second solo album, Ram, the other day and I remember there was one tiny little reference to John in the whole thing. He'd been doing a lot of preaching, and it got up my nose a little bit. In one song, I wrote, 'Too many people preaching practices,' I think is the line. I mean, that was a little dig at John and Yoko. There wasn't anything else on it that was about them. Oh, there was 'You took your lucky break and broke it in two...They thought the whole album was about them. And then they got very upset... That was the kind of thing that would happen. They'd take one small dig out of proportion and then come back at us in their next album."

John’s thoughts on "Yesterday"

"Well, we all know about 'Yesterday.' I have had so much accolade for 'Yesterday.' That is Paul's song, of course, and Paul's baby. Well done. Beautiful-- and I never wished I had written it."

"I'm always proud and pleased when people do my songs. It gives me pleasure that they even attempt them, because a lot of my songs aren't that doable. I go to restaurants and the groups always play 'Yesterday.' I even signed a guy's violin in Spain after he played us 'Yesterday.' He couldn't understand that I didn't write the song. But I guess he couldn't have gone from table to table playing 'I am the Walrus.'"

The End

I’m not going rehash all the reasons and elements that led to the nastiness and resentment between John and Paul because, quite honestly, my head hurts. I have always wondered about John’s comment that "Paul died creatively". Died creatively? Oh please… Paul was never deep! I like to believe that Paul’s response to Lennon’s song came a little later in 1976 when he wrote "Silly Love Songs" - some people want to fill the world with silly love songs, and what’s wrong with that? …."

Credits: Linda Yadlon © beatlesnumber9

Songwriting Partnership

2008-04-24T10:34:00.000-07:00

The songwriting partnership of John Lennon and Paul McCartney, usually referred to as Lennon/McCartney (sometimes McCartney/Lennon), is one of the best-known and most successful musical collaborations of all time. In an agreement reached early in their partnership, the pair agreed to use the shared credit Lennon/McCartney on all songs written alone or in tandem for The Beatles. Their output constitutes the bulk of The Beatles' catalogue.

Lennon, with his cynical edge and knack for introspection, and McCartney, with his storytelling optimism and gift for melody, complemented each other. Lennon and McCartney formed a critically acclaimed and commercially successful partnership writing songs for The Beatles and other artists.

The working partnership

Lennon's and McCartney's first musical idols were the Drifters, Elvis Presley and Buddy Holly and they learned many of their songs and imitated their sound. Their first compositions were written at McCartney's home (20 Forthlin Road), at Lennon's aunt Mimi's house at 251 Menlove Avenue, or at the Liverpool Institute. They often invited friends such as George Harrison, Nigel Whalley, Barbara Baker, and Lennon's art school colleagues to listen to performances of their new songs.

A common misconception of Lennon and McCartney is that each of the duo composed his own songs alone and simply credited them to the partnership. While each of them did often write independently — and many Beatles songs are primarily the work of one or the other — it was rare that a song would be completed without some input from both. In many instances, one writer would sketch an idea or a song fragment and take it to the other to finish or improve; in some cases, two incomplete songs or song ideas that each had worked on individually would be combined into a complete song. Often one of the pair would add a so-called middle eight or bridge section to the other's verse and chorus. Lennon called it "Writing eyeball-to-eyeball", and "Playing into each other's noses". This approach of the Lennon/McCartney songwriting team — with elements of competitiveness and mutual inspiration as well as straightforward collaboration and creative merging of musical ideas — is often cited as a key reason for the Beatles' innovativeness and popular success.

The pair wrote songs together from 1958 until 1969. As time went on, the songs increasingly became the work of one writer or the other, often with the partner offering up only a few words or an alternate chord. "A Day in the Life" is a notable and well-known example of a later Beatles song that includes substantial contributions by both Lennon and McCartney, where a separate song fragment by McCartney ("Woke up, fell out of bed, dragged a comb across my head...") was used to flesh out the middle of Lennon's composition ("I read the news today, oh boy..."). "Hey Jude" is another example of a later Paul McCartney song that was improved by relatively minor, but significant, input from Lennon. While auditioning the song for Lennon, when McCartney came to the lyric "the movement you need is on your shoulder," McCartney assured Lennon that he would change the line — which McCartney felt was nonsensical — as soon as he could come up with a better lyric. Lennon advised McCartney to leave that line alone, saying it was one of the strongest in the song.

In his 1980 Playboy interview, Lennon said of the partnership, "[Y]ou could say that he provided a lightness, an optimism, while I would always go for the sadness, the discords, a certain bluesy edge. There was a period when I thought I didn't write melodies, that Paul wrote those and I just wrote straight, shouting rock 'n' roll. But, of course, when I think of some of my own songs -- "In My Life" -- or some of the early stuff -- "This Boy" -- I was writing melody with the best of them....Then again, I'd be the one to figure out where to go with a song -- a story that Paul would start. In a lot of the songs, my stuff is the "middle eight," the bridge.

A joint credit

Even before they formed the Beatles, McCartney and Lennon began writing songs together. Lennon suggested that all songs written by either one of the pair (whether written individually or in a collaborative effort) should be credited to both of them, in an effort to emulate the familiarity of the Leiber–Stoller partnership. Between January 1962 and December 1969 all songs published by either of them (with the exception of McCartney’s “Woman” (1966), McCartney’s The Family Way score (1966), McCartney’s “Cat Call” (1967), McCartney’s “Penina” (1969), Lennon’s solo single “Cold Turkey” (1969), and McCartney’s “Come And Get It” (1969)), were jointly credited. On The Beatles' first album, Please Please Me, as well as the "From Me to You" single, the credit appeared as "McCartney-Lennon"; on all later albums and singles Lennon's name appeared first. As a result of this mutual agreement, songwriting royalties for the bulk of The Beatles' catalogue were shared equally between the two.

There was known to be substantial disagreement between Lennon and McCartney over the authorship of only two songs: "In My Life" and "Eleanor Rigby". Although Lennon said that McCartney helped only with the middle eight of "In My Life", McCartney claims that he wrote the whole melody by taking inspiration from two Smokey Robinson songs: "You've Really Got a Hold on Me" and "Tears of a Clown". McCartney said that he wrote "Eleanor Rigby" on an upright piano in the Ashers' music room in Wimpole Street, and later played it to Donovan before it was finished — a claim which Donovan confirmed. Lennon claimed, in 1972, that he wrote 70% of the "Eleanor Rigby" lyrics, but Pete Shotton, Lennon's childhood friend, remembered Lennon's contribution as being "absolutely nil". Beatle experts assign credit to "In My Life" mainly to Lennon, and credit "Eleanor Rigby" mainly to McCartney, although it is generally agreed that neither song was a solo effort.

Controversy

The nature and billing order of the dual credit were an occasional source of controversy. When McCartney released his solo live album Wings Over America in 1976, the songwriting credits for five Beatles songs included on the album were reversed to place McCartney's name first; Lennon's wife Yoko Ono publicly objected to the change, though Lennon himself made no public statement.

When Lennon's 1997 posthumous compilation of solo hits, Lennon Legend: The Very Best of John Lennon, was released, "Give Peace a Chance", a song that had previously been credited to Lennon/McCartney, was listed as being composed solely by Lennon. The song was written by Lennon but was originally released in the period when all songs by both were credited to Lennon/McCartney regardless of the respective scale of contribution. Lennon stated that he had originally chosen to share the credit with McCartney "out of guilt"

In the late 1990s, McCartney and Yoko Ono were in a dispute over the writing credits for a number of Beatles songs. McCartney had wanted to change the credits from the traditional Lennon/McCartney to 'Paul McCartney and John Lennon' for the song "Yesterday". McCartney claimed that he and Lennon had agreed in the past that the credits could be reversed, if either of them wanted to, on any future releases, but he later withdrew his request. In a February 2005 statement, McCartney said, "It's something that I don't have a problem with anymore."

The Day John met Paul

2008-04-24T10:32:00.001-07:00

The centre of Woolton village has changed little since the day fifty years ago on 6 July 1957 when John Lennon and Paul McCartney met at the church fete.

The church hall where the two first met is still in use, although the stage that John Lennon and the rest of the Quarrymen performed on is absent, now dismantled and in storage.

Lennon and McCartney were introduced by mutual friend Ivan Vaughan after the Quarrymen’s evening performance in the church hall.

St Peter’s Church has organised several events to commemorate the meeting of John and Paul including performances from the surviving members of The Quarrymen and a musical festival featuring young local acts.

Prior to the evening meeting McCartney had watched The Quarrymen perform in a field behind St Peter’s Church.

The spot where Paul saw John and the Quarrymen perform in the afternoon, which features in the famous black and white photograph of Lennon wearing a checked shirt playing guitar, is now the site of Bishop Martin School.

Returning to St Peter's the surviving members of the Quarrymen Len Garry, Rod Davis and Colin Hanton recalled that day back in 1957.

"I was in there messing about on the drums," remembers Colin Hanton.

"One of the boy scouts was playing the bugle and Ivan Vaughan came in with this other dark haired lad that I didn't know, and they stood for about five or ten minutes talking to John."

The band then played an evening performance in the church hall with McCartney stood next to the stage watching.

Lennon accidentally impressed McCartney because of his habit of making up lyrics where he hadn't been able to make out the words when listening to the original.

Rod Davis says this happened with one particular song "We were playing this number and we'd had lots of problems trying to get the words of the songs. We were still schoolkids and we didn't have any money anyway.

"So John would fill the gaps in occasionally 'Come come go with me, down down to the penitentiary'. We did a lot of songs about trains and jails so that worked.

"Apparently Paul said how cool John was because he was throwing in these old blues lyrics and he thought he was improvising the words.

"But in fact we always sang it that way because we never got them right in the first place."

The actual lyrics of the song, Come Go With Me were 'Come go with me, please don't send me 'way beyond the sea'.

The Story

2008-04-24T10:26:00.000-07:00

John Lennon and Paul McCartney are considered by some to be the greatest songwriting team ever. Lead singers of the legendary band, The Beatles, and close friends, they wrote many hit songs together and helped create popular music as it is today.

The Beginning

John and Paul met in 1956, when John's relatively unknown Liverpool skiffle band, The Quarrymen, were playing at a church fete. Afterwards, Paul, who had been impressed by the group, was introduced to John and in turn impressed him by playing 'Twenty Flight Rock' on John's right-handed guitar, which the left-handed Paul held upside down. Soon afterwards, John somewhat reluctantly asked the talented Paul to join his group. They struck up a friendship, helped by the fact that they'd both experienced the death of their mothers at a young age.

They began writing songs together in 1957, although they'd been trying to write on their own for about five years. They would sometimes skip school and go to Paul's house while his father was at work, where they would write down lyrics to tunes they made up on the piano. Some of the songs that emerged from such sessions were 'I Saw Her Standing There' and 'When I'm 64'. It's not known for sure how many songs they wrote during this period, and although most of them remained unused, their claim of 'hundreds' is possibly exaggerated.

It was during this time that they struck an agreement, that any songs they wrote would be credited to both of them, giving them equal royalties. Originally, they decided that whoever wrote the majority of a song would have their name first, but they did not stick to this rule rigidly. 'Love Me Do', mainly written by Paul, was credited to Lennon-McCartney, while 'Please, Please Me', almost entirely by John, was credited to McCartney-Lennon. Their first album, also titled Please, Please Me read 'McCartney-Lennon' on all their songs. To make it more convenient, in 1963 they eventually settled on having Lennon-McCartney on all their songs, since the letter L comes before M in the alphabet. In the late 1990s Paul requested that some of the Beatles' songs were changed over to McCartney-Lennon, especially 'Yesterday', which John had no input into whatsoever, however this idea was rejected by the owner of John's estate, his widow, Yoko Ono.

Many of the songs they wrote between the time they met and when Beatlemania began to take off in 1963, were co-written equally; as Paul said, 'eyeball to eyeball'. Compositions from this period include 'She loves You', 'There's A Place', 'From Me To You', 'Thank You Girl', 'I'll Get You', 'I Wanna Be Your Man', 'Little Child' and 'I Want to Hold Your Hand'. According to John, in 1963;

All the better songs that we have written - the ones that anybody wants to hear - those were co-written. Sometimes half the words are written by me and he'll finish them off. We go along a word each, practically.

Most of the songs they wrote during this time were mainly started or conceived by one of the pair, with the other adding in a line or verse, completing the song, or helping out when inspiration was lost. Songs like this include 'Misery', 'Do You Want to Know a Secret', 'It Won't Be Long', 'Please Please Me' (all mainly by John), and 'All My Loving', 'Hold Me Tight', 'Love Me Do' (mainly by Paul).

Competing

In 1964, the sixth single by the Beatles, 'Can't Buy me Love' was released. This was the first time a song that was written solely by one of the partnership (in this case McCartney) was released as a single. This began a friendly rivalry between the two writers for the A-Side of the next single, and perhaps even to gain control of the group and not be second in command to the other. Even though they wrote separately, as Paul said;

Sometimes maybe he will write a whole song himself, or I will, but we always say that we've both written it.

The competitiveness also affected the band's lead guitarist, George Harrison, and he began writing, gradually getting better and better. Although he also was at times an exceptional songwriter, he was almost entirely left in the shadow of John and Paul's huge success, and many of his songs up until the fantastic hit single 'Something' in 1969 weren't taken seriously by the other Beatles, producer George Martin or anyone else.

The competition between Lennon and McCartney led to a creative outpouring of songs from both of them, and they both wrote more than they ever had before, to make sure they featured predominantly on the next album, or 'got' the next single. After 'Can't Buy me Love', Lennon had more songs on the next album, A Hard Day's Night, and scored the next four A-Sides, 'A Hard Day's Night', 'I Feel Fine', 'Ticket to Ride' and 'Help!'. It wasn't till December 1965, perhaps the pinnacle of their success, that McCartney once again became an equal partner to Lennon, when the next single, 'We Can Work it Out' was released much to John's objection, mainly written by Paul though John contributed the middle eight. Paul made a much bigger contribution, about equal to John's, to the albums Rubber Soul and Help!, which included perhaps his best known song 'Yesterday'. Both albums were released in 1965. The continuing rivalry between the partnership gave John and Paul an incentive to write even better songs, in an effort to outdo each other's and their own previous attempts.

Though they were writing songs separately, they were still also writing together, although a lot of their co-compositions before 1966 were just album-filler. Songs that were written collaboratively included 'If I Fell', 'I'm Happy Just to Dance with You', 'Eight Days a Week', 'Baby's in Black' and 'What Goes On', which was credited to Lennon-McCartney-Starkey (John, Paul and drummer Ringo Starr), though the latter said he only contributed 'about five lines'. Although they weren't writing so much as a team any more, even the compositions that were mainly a 'Paul song' or a 'John song' had some contribution from the other half of the partnership.

In 1966, it was largely the same, the only album of that year, Revolver, featured almost no 50-50 songs, though they still worked together. This really was the album where Paul shone; it features some of his better known songs including 'Eleanor Rigby' and 'Yellow Submarine'.

Love is All You Need

In 1967, The Beatles were heavily into the hippy scene. They'd developed an attitude that peace and love were the answer, and in a way, this was reflected by what John and Paul were writing. And as Paul put it;

We'd now got turned on to pot and thought of ourselves as artists rather than just performers.

For one thing, they were writing a lot more together. From the 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, they wrote 'With A Little Help From my Friends', 'Getting Better' and one of their best 50-50 co-compositions, 'A Day in the Life'. In the song, it's easy to see how John and Paul could work as a team when they wrote; whilst John came up with the original idea for a meditation on newspaper stories and the verses, Paul came up with the famous line 'I'd love to turn you on', the orchestra transition and the middle eight section. The song works as though it were written by one voice, despite actually being a combination of two songs. Without each other, Paul's middle eight and John's verses would sound bland and out of place. They complemented each other perfectly, creating a great song.

Even though most of the songs of the period were written mainly by John or Paul, they helped each other, and they respected each other's work for what it was instead of trying to beat it. It was a time when the partnership was working in a similar way to when it first formed, creating songs purely for their own sake rather than to outdo each others' writing.

In the End

By 1968, however, the love had gone. On the double album released that year, titled The Beatles yet more commonly known as The White Album, John and Paul wrote only one song together, the album-filler 'Birthday'. John was getting bored, as only John could, with the Beatles. Yoko Ono was now replacing Paul in John's mind as his collaborator and equal. John said he wrote 'Looking Through a Glass Onion' for Paul, to say;

Here, have this crumb, this illusion, this stroke, because I'm leaving.

Yoko was attending Beatles recording sessions, and even wrote Lennon-McCartney songs like 'Julia' with John. After the death of the group's manager, Brian Epstein, Paul was trying to take over the group, as was John to a lesser degree, and this only forced the two writers further and further apart. Both John and Paul were writing fantastic songs at the time, some of their best, and in a way, this created a jealousy that kept them from writing together.

It was The White Album that featured the Lennon-McCartney song that Paul absolutely despised. 'Revolution 9' was a sound collage created by John and Yoko, almost impossible to listen to. Meanwhile, John was greatly upset when Paul wrote and even recorded 'Why Don't We Do it on the Road' completely by himself. The fight for the next single was as competitive as ever, eventually, Paul's 'Hey Jude' won against John's 'Revolution'.

Things didn't improve in 1969. The Beatles had really already broken up beneath the surface, and John could hardly bear to be in the same room as Paul. They didn't write together at all, neither did they really care for The Beatles any more as they were both concentrating on their own work and projects. On the Let it Be album, recorded in 1969 but not released till 1970, John didn't really have his heart in writing for the Beatles, and Paul's songs were once again purely McCartney tracks.

Abbey Road was a bit better, John came up with 'Come Together'. For a while, John and Paul talked excitedly about the famous medley on Side Two, though John quickly bored of it, and left McCartney to write most of it. Some of the songwriting on Abbey Road was as good as anything they'd ever done, yet it suffered as whole because the band's two main composers couldn't work together as well they had done in the past.

Writing For Others

From the beginning of John and Paul's success, they began writing for others. Throughout most of the 1960s, any record with the words 'Lennon-McCartney' on it almost guaranteed a hit single, maybe even if it had been an out of tune 'Mary had a Little Lamb', accompanied by an orchestra of nine year olds playing the recorder. They 'gave' The Rolling Stones their first Top 20 hit, 'I Wanna be Your Man'. They wrote many hit songs for Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, including 'Do You Want to Know a Secret', 'Bad to Me' and 'I Call Your Name'. They wrote songs for The Fourmost ('I'm in Love'), Peter and Gordon ('Nobody I Know'), 'I Don't Want to See You Again') and Cilla Black ('Step Inside Love').

Writing Styles

In most Lennon-McCartney songs, it's easy to see which parts were written by Lennon, and which by McCartney. Although there were exceptions, John's songs were normally pessimistic, while Paul's were optimistic. Examples of this can be seen especially in The Beatles' 'We Can Work it Out', where Paul's optimistic chorus and verses complement the middle-eight section, with John's lyrics 'life is very short/and there's no time for fussing and fighting my friend'.

John always said that the main difference between Lennon and McCartney was that while he preferred to write about 'real' things, that actually happened to him, Paul would write what John described as 'soppy' pop songs. In 1980, John commented;

You hear lots of McCartney-influenced songs on the radio now. These stories about boring people doing boring things - being postmen and secretaries and writing home. I'm not interested in writing third-party songs. I like to write about me, 'cuz I know me.

Some have also said that while John, who often described himself as a 'poet', wrote songs that were more lyric-driven, Paul's songs were more noted for their actual melodies. Even John admitted that;

...there was a period where I thought I didn't write melodies, that Paul wrote those and I just wrote straight, shouting rock n' roll.

John and Paul's separate styles perfectly complemented each other, as can be proven by the fact that a lot of Lennon's stuff is crying out for someone with a bit of a pop sensibility to work on it, and some of McCartney's desperately needs a bit of 'edge' to take it away from the over-poppy or over-schmaltzy end of things.

Some people will actually question the quality of the Lennon-McCartney material. Whilst some songs did have very simple lyrics ('I Want to Hold your Hand') and some have few fans ('Good Morning', 'Revolution 9', 'Hello Goodbye'), it is fair to say that the songwriting team of John Lennon and Paul McCartney was one of the most influential and wrote some of the most popular music in rock and roll history.

A Toot and a Snore '74

2008-04-24T10:24:00.000-07:00

Lennon and McCartney's Studio Reunion. On March 28, 1974, John Lennon was in a Burbank studio producing Harry Nilsson's "Pussy Cats" album when Paul McCartney dropped in. The room froze and remained silent until John said, "Valiant Paul McCartney, I presume?" Paul responded: "Sir Jasper Lennon, I presume?" The tension broken, a jam session [Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4] ensued featuring Lennon on guitar and vocals, McCartney on drums and vocals, Stevie Wonder on electric piano and vocals, Harry Nilsson on vocals, Jesse Ed Davis on guitar and Bobby Keys on saxophone. A bootleg of the session has circulated under the title "A Toot and a Snore in '74".

Quotes

2008-04-23T23:04:00.000-07:00

If you have more quotes of John, you can send them to us.

"[LSD] went on for years. I must have had a thousand trips. I used to just eat it all the time."

"Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue about that. I'm right and will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first, rock 'n' roll or Christianity. Jesus was all right, but his disciples were think and ordinary. It's them twisting it that ruins it for me."

"Look, I wasn't saying the Beatles are better than God or Jesus. I said 'Beatles' because it's easy for me to talk about Beatles. I could have said TV or the cinema, motor cars or anything popular and I would have gotten away with it."

Q: Do you feel you are being cruicified?
A: No I wouldn't say that at all

"Will the people in the cheaper seats clap your hands? And the rest of you, if you'll just rattle your jewelry."

Q: What have you seen that you like best about our country?
A: You

Q: Why do you think you're so popular all of a sudden?
A: I don't know, it must be the weather

"We all have Hitler in us, but we also have love and peace. So why not give peace a chance for once?"

"When I was about twelve, I used to think I must be a genius, but nobody's noticed. If there is such a thing as a genius...I am one, and if there isn't, I don't care."

"Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue with that; I'm right and will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first - rock and roll or Christianity."

"Possession isn't nine-tenths of the law its nine-tenths of the problem. Wait..what?"

Q: Can we look forward to any more Beatle movies?
A: Well, there'll be many more, but I don't know whether you can look forward to them or not.

"Instead of penting up emotion or pain, feel it - rather than putting it away for a rainy day. Why shouldn't we cry? They tell us to stop crying about twelve: 'Be a man.' What the hell's that? Men hurt."

Q: Is the pope due to fly in?
A: No, he has to use a plane these days like everybody else.

"Make your own dream. That's the Beatles' story, isn't it? I can't cure you. You can cure you."

"I never wanted The Beatles to be has-beens. I wanted to kill the band while it was on top."

"I should have said television is more popular than Jesus; then I might have got away with it."

Q: Do you have any special advice for teenagers?
A: Don't get pimples.

Q: How do you add up success?
All: Money!
Q: What will you do when Beatlemania subsides?
John: Count the money.

Q: Some people have been calling your work 'un-American.' How do you respond to this?
A: Well, that's very observant of them.

"Jürgen Vollmer was the first photographer to capture the beauty and spirit of The Beatles (though I say it myself). We tried very hard to find someone with his touch after we returned from Hamburg, Germany... Nobody could. He loved rockers and rock'n'roll..."

"Maybe I've led a hard-centered life. I can only write what I feel and what I've felt. I can go all sloppy if I want to write a love ballad but I get a greater kick out of being a little more devious and crafty with my words than that."

"When real music comes to me - the music of the spheres, the music that surpasseth understanding - that has nothing to do with me, 'cause I'm just the channel. The only joy for me is for it to be given to me, and to transcribe it like a medium...those moments are what I live for."

"My role in society, or any artist's or poet's role, is to try and express what we all feel. Not to tell people how to feel. Not as a preacher, not as a leader, but as a reflection of us all."

"Love means having to say you're sorry every fifteen minutes."

"My defenses were so great. The cocky rock and roll hero who knows all the answers was actually a terrified guy who didn't know how to cry. Simple."

"I always remember to thank Jesus for the end of my touring days."

"My name's not John Beatle, it's John Lennon."

"The separation didn't work out." [About the long lost weekend]

"Reality leaves a lot to the imagination."

"If everybody wished for peace instead of another television set, then there would be peace."

"Elvis really died the day he joined the army. That's when they killed him, and the rest was a living death."

"Before Elvis there was nothing"

"He's [Ringo] not even the best drummer in The Beatles!"

"Time enjoyed wasting was not wasted."

"I was on acid, and she was on her way out."

"My wife forced me to become avant-garde when all I wanted to be was Tom Jones."

"Elvis dies and his manager lives. Our manager died and we lived."

"I was eating and drinking like a pig, and I was fat as a pig, dissatisfied with myself, and subconsciously I was crying for help. It was my fat Elvis period."

"Eternity is a hell of a long time."

"OK, so Flower Power didn't work. So what?! We start again."

"A lot of people thought it was just about my parents, but it's about ninety-nine percent of the parents, alive or half-dead."

"There's only one person in the United States we ever wanted to meet ... not that he wanted us. And we met him last night. We can't tell you how we felt. We just idolized him so much. ... You can't imagine what a thrill that was last night. Nothing really affected me until I heard Elvis. If there hadn't been an Elvis, there wouldn't have been the Beatles."

"I suppose if I had said television was more popular than Jesus, I would have gotten away with it. I'm sorry I opened my mouth. I'm not anti-God, anti-Christ, or anti-religion. I wasn't knocking it or putting it down. I was just saying it as a fact and it's true more for England than here. I'm not saying that we're better or greater, or comparing us with Jesus Christ as a person or God as a thing or whatever it is. I just said what I said and it was wrong. Or it was taken wrong. And now it's all this."

"If art were to redeem man, it could do so only by saving him from the seriousness of life and restoring him to an unexpected boyishness."

"We thought being offered the M.B.E. [Member of the Order of the British Empire] was as funny as everybody else thought it was. Why? What for? We didn't believe it. It was a part we didn't want. We all met and agreed it was daft."

"That's part of our policy, is not to be taken seriously, because I think our opposition, whoever they may be, in all their manifest forms, don't know how to handle humor. You know, and we are humorous, we are, what are they, Laurel and Hardy. That's John and Yoko, and we stand a better chance under that guise, because all the serious people, like Martin Luther King, and Kennedy, and Gandhi, got shot."

"All that business was awful, it was a fuckin' humiliation. One has to completely humiliate oneself to be what the Beatles were, and that's what I resent. I didn't know, I didn't foresee. It happened bit by bit, gradually, until this complete craziness is surrounding you, and you're doing exactly what you don't want to do with people you can't stand — the people you hated when you were ten."

"It's just natural, it's not a great disaster. People keep talking about it like it's The End of The Earth. It's only a rock group that split up, it's nothing important. You know, you have all the old records there if you want to reminisce."

"The thing the sixties did was to show us the possibilities and the responsibility that we all had. It wasn’t the answer. It just gave us a glimpse of the possibility."

"I really thought that love would save us all."

"I've sold my soul to the devil."

"Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. ... I think we're being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I'm liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That's what's insane about it."

"Well, I just want him [Julian] to grow up happy. That's the main thing."

"What’s Bagism? It’s like... a tag for what we all do, we’re all in a bag ya know, and we realised that we came from two bags, I was in this pop bag going round and round in my little clique, and she was in her little avant-garde clique going round and round, and you’re in your little tele clique and they’re in their...ya know? and we all sort of come out and look at each other every now and then, but we don’t communicate. And we all intellectualize about how there is no barrier between art, music, poetry... but we’re still all "I’m a rock and roller, he’s a poet" ... so we just came up with the word so you would ask us what bagism is, and we’d say "WE’RE ALL IN A BAG BABY!""

"If people take any notice of what we say, we say we’ve been through the drug scene, man, and there’s nothing like being straight."

"Part of me suspects that I'm a loser and the other part of me thinks I'm God Almighty."

"I've had cocaine, but I don't like it. The Beatles had lots of it in their day, but it's a dumb drug, because you have to have another one 20 minutes later. Your whole concentration goes on getting the next fix. Really, I find caffeine is easier to deal with. ... A little mushroom or peyote is not beyond my scope, you know, maybe twice a year or something. You don't hear about it anymore, but people are still visiting the cosmos. We must always remember to thank the CIA and the Army for LSD. That's what people forget. ... They invented LSD to control people and what they did was give us freedom. Sometimes it works in mysterious ways its wonders to perform."

"What would you suggest I do? Give everything away and walk the streets? The Buddhist says, "Get rid of the possessions of the mind." Walking away from all the money would not accomplish that. It's like the Beatles. I couldn't walk away from the Beatles. That's one possession that's still tagging along, right?"

"It takes time to get rid of all this garbage that I've been carrying around that was influencing the way I thought and the way I lived. It had a lot to do with Yoko, showing me that I was still possessed. I left physically when I fell in love with Yoko, but mentally it took the last ten years of struggling. I learned everything from her. ... It is a teacher-pupil relationship. That's what people don't understand. She's the teacher and I'm the pupil. I'm the famous one, the one who's supposed to know everything, but she's my teacher. She's taught me everything I fucking know. She's my Don Juan ... a Don Juan doesn't have a following. A Don Juan isn't in the newspaper and doesn't have disciples and doesn't proselytize."

"It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out. I don't appreciate worship of dead Sid Vicious or of dead James Dean or of dead John Wayne. It's the same thing. Making Sid Vicious a hero, Jim Morrison — it's garbage to me. I worship the people who survive. Gloria Swanson, Greta Garbo."

"I'll probably be popped off by some loony."

"I might have been born in Liverpool — but I grew up in Hamburg!"

"If all politicians were like Pierre Trudeau, there would be world peace."

"New York is what Rome used to be."

"If you tried to give rock and roll another name, you might call it 'Chuck Berry'."

"Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it"

"Fighting for peace is like f---ing for virginity."

Q: Does all the adulation from teenage girls affect you?
A: When I feel my head start to swell, I look at Ringo and know perfectly well we`re not supermen.

"You have to be a bastard to make it, and the Beatles are the biggest bastards in the world."

"Conquering America was the best thing. You see we wanted to be bigger than Elvis - that was the main thing. At first we wanted to be Goffin and King, then we wanted to be Eddie Cochran. then we wanted to be Buddy Holly, and finally we arrived at wanting to be bigger than the biggest -and that was Elvis. -' ~We reckoned we could make it because there were four of us. None of us would've made it atone, because Paul wasn't quite strong enough, I didn't have enough girl-appeal, George was too quiet, and Ringo was the drummer. But we thought that everyone would be able to dig at least one of us, and that's how it turned out."

Q: How did you find America?
A: Take a left at Greenland.

Q: What would you call that haircut youre wearing?
A: awful!

Q: what would you do if someone approached you aggressively?
A: Id run!!(laughs) well, id maybe try to talk to him as i was running: 'peace brother! peace!'"

"It's one of the best lyrics I've written; in fact it could be the best. It's good poetry, or whatever you call it. The ones I like are the ones that stand as words without melody."

"I don't mind writting or reading or watching or speaking, but sex is the only physical thing i can be bothered with any more"

"good night and thanks for the bread."

"I thought it was a kiwi because he started polishing my shoes"

"What does it mean when a person is such a pacifist that they get shot? I can never understand that."

"Woodbindes is the greatest little cigarette. For why? Because it says so on the packet."

"Malobaro Its a big cigarette for a big man"

"I'm prepared for death I don't know how it feels at the moment but I'm not afraid of dying because all I think its just getting into one car and getting into another."

"I never met a woman I considered as intelligent as me."

"I still believe in Love peace positive thinking while there's life there's hope because I like to consider my work on peace and I consider my work won't be finished till I'm dead and buried and I hope that's a long time."

"All my songs had tongue and cheek I' am The Walrus was tongue and cheek I'm the eggman? it could of been I'm the pudding basin."

"When I was a Beatle I thought we were the best fucking group in the goddamn world, and believing that is what made us what we were."

"I want people to Love me. I want to be loved"

"Here I am now, how are you? How's your relationship going? Did you get through it all? Weren't the '70s a drag? Lets try and make the '80s good"

"The worst thing was being separated from Yoko and realizing that I could not survive without her"

"I mean we're human too. I do get hurt when they attack Yoko or say she's ugly or something"

"How can I be lonely when I'm with Yoko day and night? I'm lonely in the universal sense, but there are no outside desires. We are the best things we can give each other"

"This is the truth my son came home with a drawing with this strange woman flying around I ask what is it he say's it's Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds I thought that's beautiful I immediately wrote a song about it. The song had gone out with the album being published when somebody noticed the letters spelt out LSD I had no idea about it and after that I was checking all the songs to see what the letters spelt out they didn't spell out anything or the others and it wasn't about that at all"

"We haven't been apart for more than one hour in two years. Everything we do is together, and that's what gives us strength."

"If The Beatles or the 60's had a message, it was 'Learn to swim. And once you've learned - swim!"

"I always was a rebel...but on the other hand, I wanted to be loved and accepted...and not just be a loudmouth, lunatic, poet, musician. But I cannot be what I am not."

"If I couldn't have worked with her, I wouldn't have bothered. I wouldn't enjoy just putting an album out by myself, having to go to the studio by myself, because, even though I had been in a group, I've had that kind of game before. I didn't want to work with another guy. We're presenting ourselves as man and wife and not as sexual objects who sing love songs and are available to the audience. We're presenting ourselves as a couple, and to work with your best friend is a joy".

"If you think you know me and know part of me because of the music and you think I'm being controlled like a dog on a leach because I do things with her then screw you brother or sister because you don't know what's happening I'm not here for you I'm here for me and her".

"It was like being in the eye of a hurricane. You'd wake up in a concert and think, Wow, how did I get here?"

"In 'Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds' I was visualizing Alice in Wonderland, an image of this female who would come and save me - a girl with kaleidescope eyes who would be the real love of my life. Lucy turned out to be Yoko."

"We've got this gift of love, but love is like a precious plant. You can't just accept it and leave it in the cupboard or just think it's going to get on by itself. You've got to keep on watering it. You've got to really look after it and nurture it."

"You can't cheat kids. If you cheat them when they're children they'll make you pay when they're sixteen or seventeen by revolting against you or hating you or all those so-called teenage problems. I think that's finally when they're old enough to stand up to you and say, 'What a hypocrite you've been all this time. You've never given me what I really wanted, which is you."

"It doesn't matter if people don't like our music or the way we look they are entitled on not liking us and we are entitled not have anything to do with them if we don't want to or regard them you know we all have our rights."

"Before Yoko and I met, we were half a person. You know there's an old myth about people being half and the other half being in the sky, or in heaven or on the other side of the universe or a mirror image. But we are two halves, and together we're a whole."

"The copper came to the door, to tell us about the accident. It was just like it's supposed to be, the way it is in the films. Asking if I was her son, and all that. Then he told us, and we both went white. It was the worst thing that ever happened to me."

"We're going to send two acorns for peace to every world leader from John and Yoko. Perhaps if they plant them and watch them grow they may get the idea into their heads."

'The only true songs I ever wrote were "Help!" and "Strawberry Fields Forever". They were the ones I wrote from experience, not projecting myself into a situation and writing a nice story about it, which I always thought was phoney. On "Help!", the lyric is as good now as it was then. It was just me singing help, and I meant it.'

"Whatever wind was blowing at the time moved The Beatles too. I'm not saying we weren't flags on top of the ship; but the whole boat was moving"

"Life begins at 40, so they promised. I believe it to... I feel great"

"Being a Beatle nearly cost my life, and certainly cost me a great deal of my health...all in an effort to reach 'out there'"

"It doesn't matter how long my hair is or what colour my skin is or whether I'm a woman or a man"

"All this thing about man; woman, man, woman, is a joke you know. Without each other, there ain't nothing"

"For all you folks out there who think that I'm having a wool pulled over my eyes by Yoko well that's an insult to me. Not that you think less of Yoko, because that's your problem. What I think of her is what counts."

"Sean was born on October 9 which I was so we're almost like twins. I didn't really think about music at all my guitar was sort of hug behind the bed literately and I don't think I took it down in 5 years"

"I've had this boyhood dream of being Elvis. Now I want to be with my best friend, and my best friend's my wife. Who could ask for anything more?"

"I would say, 'I'm baking bread,' and they'd (friends) say, 'What are you really doing?' I'd say, 'I'm looking after the baby. 'They'd say, 'But what else do you do?' I'd say, 'Are you kidding?' There was no secret projects in the basement, because bread and babies, as every housewife knows, is a full-time job..."

"I don't try and be the God Almighty kind of father figure that is always smiling and such a wonderful father. I'm not into putting out an image of this person who knows all about children. That's the thing. You look in the books. There are no real experts. But now I feel as though at least I've put my body where my mouth was and tried to really live up to my own preaching, as it were."

"I am a violent man who has learnt not to be violent and regrets his violence"

"I was a hitter. I couldn't express myself and I hit. I fought men and I hit women. That is why I'm always going on about peace you see."

"My childhood was not all suffering. It was not all slum. I was fed, well schooled, and brought up to be a nice lower-middle-class English boy"

"It's like we're four freaks being wheeled out to be seen, shake our heads about, and get back into our cage afterwards"

"If you can imagine a world at peace, with no denominations of religion not without religion but without this my-God-is-bigger-than-your-God thing then it can be true"

"The first album was recorded in one long twelve-hour session. The last song to be done was called 'Twist and Shout,' which nearly killed me. I was always bitterly ashamed of it, because I could sing it better than that. But now it doesn't bother me. You can hear I'm just a frantic guy, doing his best."

"We were smoking marijuana for breakfast...nobody could communicate with us, because we were just all glazed eyes, giggling all the time. In our own world."

"Nothing will stop me, and whether I'm here or wherever I may be, I'll always have the same feelings, I'll say what I feel."

"People come up & ask for autograph or say Hi but they don't bug you"

"I like to thank you on behalf of the group and we hope we pass the audition"

"I saw a man on a flaming pie and he said you're Beatles with a "A" and we are"

"When I was cleaning the cat shit and feeding Sean, she [Yoko] was sitting in rooms full of smoke with men in three-piece suits that they couldn't button."

"Why don't people believe us when we say we're simply in love?"

"I'm not going to change the way I look or the way I feel to conform to anything. I've always been a freak. So I've been a freak all my life and I have to live with that, you know. I'm one of those people."

"As usual, there is a great woman behind every idiot."

"Yoko looks upon men as assistants. . . . Of varying degrees of intimacy, but basically assistants. And this one's going to take a pee." (Exits to the restrooms)

"Anybody who knows our history knows that we went through all hell together - through miscarriages and terrible times."

"Newspaper people have a habit of putting you in the front pages to sell their papers, and then after they've sold their papers and got big circulations, they say, 'Look at what we've done for you"

"It all sounds complaining, but you know, we're not. We're just putting the point that it affects your home more than it does yourself, you know, because you know what to expect but your parents and family don't know what's happening."

"This time last year, we were all dead chuffed because 'Love Me Do' got in the top twenty. And we can't believe that so many things have happened in between already. I'd like to say thank you to all the Beatle people who have written to me during the year. I'd love to reply personally to everyone, but I just haven't enough pens."

What other people have said about John & Paul

2008-04-23T22:57:00.000-07:00

"The truth is, deep down they were very, very similar indeed. Each had a soft underbelly, each was very much hurt by certain things. John had a very soft inside to him. But, you see, each had a bitter turn of phrase and could be quite nasty to the other. It was like a tug of war. Imagine two people pulling on a rope, smiling at each other and pulling all the time with all their might. The tension between the two of them made for the bond." - George Martin.

"The most enduring evidence of the strength of John Lennon's relationship with Paul McCartney will always be the songs they wrote together, even when they were actually apart. It was the bonds they originally forged as bereaved teenagers which provided the spur to the magnificent Beatles catalogue. Neither of them has equalled in their solo careers the quality of the material that poured out under the Lennon-McCartney imprint - in short, they seem to have been somehow meant to be." - Robert Sandall.

"[How Do You Sleep?] was a particularly savage song, and the lyrics are distinctly brutal...I don't know whether Paul realised this at the time, but as we now know, Allen Klein was in the studio, suggesting lyrical ideas to John as he'd go through, verse by verse. Much of that venom is suggested by Allen Klein..." - Paul DeNoyes.

"There was always that sense of sibling rivalry, and I suppose that came to a head not long after the group officially broke up. One of the reasons that John wrote 'How Do You Sleep?' was that he had perceived certain lyrical insults in Paul's most recent album with Wings - Ram - particularly a song called '3 Legs.' Interestingly enough, on the day before Imagine - the album that came out with 'How Do You Sleep?' on it - John actually rang Paul and sort of said, 'Well, you know, this is coming out, I hope you don't mind, you know, it's nothing personal' - but of course it was." - Alan Clayson.

"There was a certain 'hipper-than-thou' attitude, and this was exacerbated later on when John was living with his first wife in Weybridge, and Paul was living in the heart of London, and also he was mixing with people like Barry Miles and John Dunbar, who ran the Indica bookshop, and sort of ran art exhibitions, you know, of a very avant-garde nature. Certainly John was very envious when Paul would say 'well, the other night I went to the Royal Festival Hall, to a concert by Luciano Berio' - which John couldn't do, because it was inconvenient to drive in from Weybridge - and I think a lot of his behaviour after he met Yoko was actually rooted in that - he was actually trying to prove that, you know, although he'd been living in this kind of provincial background in Surrey, that he was actually, you know, easily as 'way-out' as Paul was." - Alan Clayson

"It wasn't as cut-and-dried as it was between Andrew Lloyd-Webber and Tim RIce, or Rodgers and Hammerstein - they both contributed lyrics, they both contributed melodies, chord structures and all the rest of it. I mean, my own feeling is that John's material tended to be more experimental, but Paul's sold more, it was more commercial. Paul wrote the entire libretto and melody of 'Yesterday,' which is the most covered song of all time - John had nothing to do with it. The myth - and this was actually propagated in the sleeve notes of Beatles for Sale in 1964 - of raw John and melodic Paul - and I think that was actually a bit of a misnomer, because Paul was just as much of a raver as John was - you know, witness 'I'm Down' on the B-side of 'Help!' for example, and John was capable of being just as sort of twee, if you like, as Paul was - and certainly, his career after the Beatles - I'd say the adjective to describe John then would be 'uxorious' - meaning somebody with excessive love of his wife. I mean, if you think about things like 'Oh Yoko!' and 'Oh My Love' and 'Forgive Me My Little Flower Princess' - you know, I think that John was just as capable of being sentimental or cloying as Paul was." - Alan Clayson

"My fondest memory is when we went to Hamburg, when I was with Dot, Paul's girlfriend at the time, before fame. And we'd got the boat-train to Hamburg, and we got off the train at dawn and saw these two lunatic figures dancing down the station towards us. The dawn was breaking, we were exhausted, we'd been starving, having been on the train all night, waiting to see the loves of our lives and thinking that it was going to be all romantic and everything - they were absolutely off their trolleys with amphetamines and beer and God knows what - they'd been up all night. And just these two loony figures leaping down the station towards us - that was happy. That was fun." - Cynthia Lennon

"John loved Paul, no doubt about it. He once said to me: 'I'm the only person who is allowed to say nasty things about Paul. I don't like it when other people do so.' He knew what he didn't like about Paul, but he also knew what he liked about him." - Tony King

"If truth be told, the love was lost both ways, and it was a very healthy situation where they outgrew each other's company. So when John died, before the big reverence was noticed, there were some things that Paul said from which I know he was not that enamoured with John. And now it might be important for Paul that the world knows John loved him, because it is important that the person who is revered did love him. But if John had died and nobody cared, it wouldn't have mattered to Paul." - Yoko Ono

"Someone told me a few minutes ago they saw John walking on the street once wearing a button saying "I Love Paul." And this girl said she asked him, "Why are you wearing a button that says ' I Love Paul'?" He said, "Because I love Paul." - Harry Nillson

"John sneered at a lot of things, but that was part of the collaboration between the two of them. They tended to be rivals. Their collaboration as songwriters was never Rodgers and Hart, it was always more Gilbert and Sullivan. If John did something, Paul would wish he'd thought of it and go away and try to do something better and vice versa. It was a very healthy spirit of competition." - George Martin.

From "John" by Cynthia Lennon [Sent by Brenna]

"Paul was one of the three people John was closest to. Although he had plenty of cronies, he only really let down his guard with Paul, me, and Stuart Sutcliffe." - Cynthia Lennon

"John and Paul always had a special link between them, a chemistry that added to the heat; they knew intuitively how to share the stage and the limelight, how to spar with each other and how to play the audience so that the girls went wild." - Cynthia Lennon

"John's relationship with each of the other Beatles was different. .. He was closest of all to Paul, but their relationship was more complex. They spent a great deal of time composing together, other sitting at the piano, the other jotting down lyrics or strumming a guitar, both calling for vast amounts of sarnies and tea, totally immersed in what they were doing. The time they spent working together was intense, and when it was over they needed to let off steam and relax apart. John spent less of his free time with Paul than with either of the others." - Cynthia Lennon

( On John) "He had moved on in his life, not just from me but from Paul, the other person who was closest to him throughout the sixties. Yoko had replaced me as John's wife and Paul as his artistic collaborator." - Cynthia Lennon.

Send us more quotes.

John & Paul Quotes

2008-04-23T22:49:00.000-07:00

These are things that John and Paul have said about each other or together, if you know more I’d love if you could send them to me.

I was very impressed by Paul playing 'Twenty Flight Rock.' He could obviously play the guitar. I half thought to myself -- he's as good as me. I'd been king pin up to then. Now, I thought, if I take him on, what will happen? It went through my head that I'd have to keep him in line if I let him join. But he was good, so he was worth having. He also looked like Elvis. I dug him." - John

"['Here Today' was] a song saying, 'Well, if you were here today you'd probably say what I'm doing is crap. But you wouldn't mean it, 'cos you like me really.' It's one of those 'come out from behind your glasses, look at me' kind of things. It was a love song about my relationship with him. I was trying to exorcise the demons in my own head, because it's tough when you have somebody like John slagging you off in public. He was a major influence on my life, as I suppose I was on his. But the great thing about me and John was that it was me and John, end of story. Everyone else can say, 'Well, he did this and so-and-so.' But that's the nice thing, that I can actually think when we got in a little room it was me and John who wrote it, not any of these other people who think they all know about it. I was the one in the room with him." - Paul

'"That was the day,' says John, 'the day that I met Paul, that it started moving.'" - John

“You remember little things about people. I remember sort of seeing him and he comes in and gives me a hug and says 'touching is good.' I'll never forget that. Touching is good. So I do a lot of hugging now.” - Paul

"I remember thinking, 'He looks good - I wouldn't mind being in a group with him.' ... Then, as you all know, he asked me to join the group, and so we began our trip together. We wrote our first songs together, we grew up together and we lived our lives together. And when we'd do it together, something special would happen. There'd be that little magic spark." - Paul

"When Paul emerged publicly as a painter in 2000 he mentioned that John was often the subject of his work, commenting: 'John is a central figure in my life. I will always be grateful for having so much intimate time with him. The more distant his stuff becomes, the greater he seems. I used to do caricatures of John. He was the only person I knew with an aquiline nose. When I painted him recently, I found myself saying: "How did his lips go? I can't remember." Then I would think: "Of course you know, you wrote all those songs facing each other."'" The Paul McCartney Encyclopedia by Bill Harry.

"I am not the Beatles. I'm me. Paul isn't the Beatles...The Beatles are the Beatles. Separately, they are separate." - John.

"John was much more accessible and lovable... he was a darling then, because he was just so generous and warm." - Paul

"I remember when we first met in Woolton, at the village fete. It was a beautiful summer day. I walked in there and I saw you on the stage and you were singing 'Come Go With Me' by the Del Vikings. But you didn't know the words. So you made them up." - Paul, at John Lennon's 1994 Induction into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame

"Looking back on it with John, you know, he was a really great guy. I always idolized him. I don't know if the others will tell you that, but he was our idol." - Paul

Q: "Has success spoiled the Beatles?"
John: "Well, you don't see us running out and buying bowler hats, do you? I think we've pretty much succeeded in remaining ourselves."
Paul: "The great thing about it is that you don't have big worries anymore when you've got where we have - just little ones, like whether the plane is going to crash."

Q: "Did you really use four-letter-words on the tourists in the Bahamas?"
John: "What we actually said was 'gosh.'"
Paul: "We may have also said 'heavens.'"
John: "Couldn't have said that, Paul. More than four letters."

Q: "When do you rehearse?"
John: "We don't!"
Paul: "Yeah, of course we do."
John: "Paul does, we don't."

Q: "Now that you've made a movie, do you dig the acting bit?"
John: "We don't profess to be actors."
Paul: "It's American, that 'dig.'"
John: "Dig?"
Paul: "Dig your baby, daddy!"
John: "Oh I get it."
Paul: "'With it.'"

Q: "How do you like not having any privacy?"
Paul: "We do have some."
John: "We just had some yesterday, didn't we, Paul? Tell them."

Paul: "Let's order some drinks. Scotch or Coke?"
John: "I'll have chocolate."
George: "Scotch for me and Paul...and chocolate for the Beatle teenager."

"At the beginning I was annoyed with [John], jealous because of Yoko, and afraid about the breakup of a great musical partnership. It took me a year to realize they were in love." - Paul

"When John and Cynthia broke up, I was devastated. I tried bribing Cynthia and John to get back together. I even asked Cynthia to marry me. She declined. Awww." - Paul

"I couldn't sit down with Paul in some sort of working situation, like in an office job. If I was told the two of us had to sit at a table until we finished our next song, the job would never get done. I have to grab bits of inspiration when they fly by. I should have a recording machine taped to my back or I should carry a guitar. I never know when ideas will come. It's worse with individual words. I wait ages for the right rhyme and then it comes and goes before I am able to get it down. Once it's lost, the whole process has to begin again." - John

"Well, first I started off on my own. Very early on I met John, and we then, gradually, started to write stuff together. There's a lot of random in our songs - writing, thinking, letting others think of bits - then bang, you have the jigsaw puzzle." - Paul

"When we started off we were uncertain as to exactly where our writing would take us. Paul was a rocker with one eye on Broadway musicals, vaudeville, and shit like that. I, on the other hand, was inspired by Buddy Holly's songwriting and was determined to show I was as capable as any Yank. To me Buddy was the first to click as a singer-songwriter. His music really moved and his lyrics spoke to us kids in a way no one ever bothered before." - John

"Paul wrote the main structure of this when he was sixteen or even earlier. I think I had something to do with the middle eight." - John

"It was pretty much co-written, John and I doing a work song for Ringo. I think it was probably the best of the songs we wrote for him" - Paul

"That's Paul's writing with only a little help from me." - John

"Paul has a special gift when it comes to making up tunes. I find myself using tunes which already exist and fitting my words to them. I have to back off and begin again all the time. I realized I'm pinching an old American hit. With me, I have a theme, which gets me started on the poetry side of the thing. Then I have to put a tune to it, but that's the part of the job I enjoy least. Words come easier." - John

"If John came in and said he'd just written three songs, I'd go away and try to write three just as good." - Paul

"It's simply a question of waiting for ideas to arrive. Sometimes this will happen in the van or on a train when we're halfway between engagements. Once one of us has come up with a few introductory phrases or a good theme for the lyrics we can bang the whole thing into shape within an hour." - John

"My contribution to Paul's songs was always to add a little bluesy edge to them. He provides a lightness, an optimism, while I would always go for the sadness, the discords, the bluesy notes." - John

"There was a period when I thought I didn't write melodies, that Paul wrote those and I just wrote straight, shouting rock 'n' roll. but, of course, when I think of some of my own songs - 'In My Life', or some of the early stuff, 'This Boy' - I was writing melody with the best of them." - John

"In the early days the majority of singles were mine. Only when I became self-conscious and inhibited did Paul start dominating the group a little too much for my liking." - John

"Usually we'd spend hours doing little detailed cleaning-ups of Paul's songs, but when it came to mine, especially if it was a great song like 'Strawberry Fields Forever' or 'Across The Universe', somehow this atmosphere of looseness and casualness and experimentation would creep in: subconscious sabotage." - John

"Most of the time we wrote separately, not in the same room together, not even aware of what the other was working on at any given time. If I was stuck I'd see what John thought. He'd do the same, bringing stuff to me for comment. If the other half of the team gave it the go-ahead, that was great. Otherwise we'd accept honest criticism from each other. We had that degree of respect, a two-way thing. The second opinion was always very important. Often it only led to lines being changed here and there. Occasionally one of us would go away and start again but more often it was a matter of getting into the recording studio and making last-minute changes there and then on the studio floor before a session got under way. If there were things we disliked about a song, we were open with one another. It was the only possible way to make the relationship work. That was the basic value of being in a song writing team, getting a reaction which you could trust, hearing an opinion you'd be prepared to act upon." - Paul

"We only ever wrote together because in the early days it was fun and later on convenient. But our best songs were always written alone." - John

"One of us might think of a song completely, and the other might just add a bit. Or we might write alternative lines. We never argue. If one of us says he doesn't like a bit, the other agrees. It just doesn't matter that much. I care about being a song writer, but I don't care passionately about each song." - John.

"Somebody said to me, [The Beatles] were anti-materialistic.' That's a huge myth. [John Lennon] and I literally used to sit down and say, 'Now, let's write a swimming pool.'" - Paul

"The two of us were on fire every time we sat down to write." - Paul

"It's a drag, isn't it?" [on John's murder] - Paul

"I've made two 'discoveries' in my life: Paul McCartney and Yoko Ono. I think that's a pretty damned good choice." - John

"Well, we all know about "Yesterday." I have had so much accolade for "Yesterday." That is Paul's song, of course, and Paul's baby. Well done. Beautiful - and I never wished I had written it." - John.

"It can never be again! Everyone always talks about a good thing coming to an end, as if life was over. But I'll be 40 when this interview comes out. Paul is 38. Elton John, Bob Dylan — we're all relatively young people. The game isn't over yet. Everyone talks in terms of the last record or the last Beatle concert — but, God willing, there are another 40 years of productivity to go. I'm not judging whether "I Am The Walrus" is better or worse than "Imagine." It is for others to judge. I am doing it. I do. I don't stand back and judge — I do." - John

"I go to restaurants and the groups always play "Yesterday." I even signed a guy's violin in Spain after he played us "Yesterday." He couldn't understand that I didn't write the song. But I guess he couldn't have gone from table to table playing "I Am The Walrus." - John

"By the time we made "Abbey Road", John and I were openly critical of each other's music, and I felt John wasn't much interested in performing anything he hadn't written himself" - Paul

"We did it this way because both John and I had a number of songs which were great as they were but which we'd never finished." - Paul.

"My original idea for the cover was better - decapitate Paul - but he wouldn't go along with it" - John

I copped money for 'Family Way', the film music that Paul wrote while I was out of the country making How I Won The War. I said to Paul, 'You'd better keep that,' and he said 'Don't be soft.' It's the concept - we inspire each other. We write how we write because of each other. Paul was there for for five or ten years and I wouldn't write like I write now if it weren't for Paul, and he wouldn't write like he does if it weren't for me." - John

Q: Paul, what kind of girls do you like?
Paul: John's wife.
John: No one like's a smart aleck!

John: "Yes, all your best friends let you know what's going on. I was trying to put it round that I was gay. I thought that would throw them off...dancing at gay clubs, flirting with boys...but it never got off the ground."
Q: I think I've only heard that lately about Paul.
John: "Oh, I've had him, he's no good (laughs)"

"Paul can be very cynical and much more biting than me when he's driven to it. Of course, he's got more patience, but he can carve people up in no time at all, when he's pushed. He hits the nail on the head and doesn't beat about the bush, does Paul." - John

"I can't tell you how much it hurts to lose him. His death is a bitter, cruel blow. I really loved the guy." - Paul

"One of my great memories of John is from when we were having some argument. I was disagreeing and we were calling each other names. We let it settle for a second and then he lowered his glasses and he said: "It's only me." And then he put his glasses back on again. To me, that was John. Those were the moments when I actually saw him without facade, the armour, which I loved as well, like anyone else. It was a beautiful suit of armour. But it was wonderful when he let the visor down and you'd see the John Lennon that he was frightened to reveal to the world." - Paul

"But, yeah, I definitely did look up to John. We all looked up to John. He was older and he was very much the leader; he was the quickest wit and the smartest and all that kind of thing. So whenever he did praise any of us, it was great praise, indeed, because he didn't dish it out much. If ever you got a speck of it, a crumb of it, you were quite grateful. With Come Together, for instance, he wanted a piano lick to be very swampy and smoky, and I played it that way and he liked that a lot. I was quite pleased with that. He also liked it when I sang like Little Richard--Tutti- Frutti and all that. All my screaming songs, the early Beatles screaming stuff--that's me doing Little Richard. It requires a great deal of nerve to just jump up and scream like an... idiot, you know? Anyway, I would often fall a little bit short, not have that little kick, that soul, and it would be John who would go, "Come on! You can sing it better than that, man! Come on, come on! Really throw it!" All right, John, OK.... He was certainly the one I looked up to most - definitely." - Paul

"I'll be thinking of all the great times that we had together and I'll be remembering him with all the love in my heart," - Paul

"The thing you must remember is that I'm the Number One John Lennon fan. I love him to this day and I always did love him." - Paul

"We had a great collaboration, I mean, I don't think there's any doubt about that. Certainly from my point of view, John was like a great person to work with. He must've thought I was a great person to work with 'cause we stuck together for all that time. We'd grown up together." - Paul

"well, no - how can you be surprised by your own brother?" - John [when asked if he was surprised about Paul's success post-Beatles]

Q: I'd like to direct this question to messrs. Lennon and McCartney. In a recent article, 'Time' magazine put down Pop music. And they referred to 'Day Tripper' as being about a prostitute...
Paul: (nodding jokingly) Oh yeah.
Q: ...and 'Norwegian Wood' as being about a lesbian.
Paul: (nodding) Oh yeah.
Q: I just wanted to know what your intent was when you wrote it, and what your feeling is about the 'Time' magazine criticism of the music that is being written today.
Paul: We were just trying to write songs about prostitutes and lesbians, that's all!
(room erupts with laughter and applause)
John: ... quipped Ringo.
Paul: (chuckles) Cut!!

"I met Paul and said 'Do you wanna join me band?' Then George joined and the Ringo joined. We were just a band who made it very, very big. That's all." - John

"The way we work it is like, we just whistle. John will whistle at me, and I'll whistle back at him, and he'll whistle back at me, and sometimes we'll keep whistling at each other for days." - Paul

Q: Is your wife expensive?
John: Quite, quite...
Paul: How much did she cost when you bought her?
John: Er, she was about fifty pounds in Nairobi.
George: But she was second hand, wasn't she?
Q: Was she second hand??
John: How dare you!

"When I look back on Julia's death, all I can see is the word TRAGEDY written in big black letters. The only way I could help John was to empathise, as I'd had the same thing happen to me. There wasn't anything I could say that would magically patch him up. That kind of hurt goes far too deep for words." - Paul

"At that time I was still in my love cloud with Yoko. I thought, Well, I'll just say something nice to Paul, that it's all right and you did a good job over these years, holding us together. He was trying to organise the group and all that, so I wanted to say something to him. I thought , 'Well, he can have it, I've got Yoko. And thank you, you can have the credit.' The line was put in partly because I was feeling guilty because I was with Yoko and I was leaving Paul. It's a very perverse way of saying to Paul, 'Here, have this crumb, this illusion, this stroke-because I'm leaving.' - John

"I've always thought there was this underlying thing in Paul's 'Get Back.' When we were in the studio recording it, every time he sang the line 'Get back to where you once belonged," he'd look at Yoko." - John

"John thought of it first of all. Just as a name; just for a group, you know. We just didn't have any name. Well, oh yeah; we did have a name, but we had about ten of 'em a week, you know... and we didn't like this idea so we had to settle on one particular name. And John came up with the name Beatles one night. And he sort of explained how it was spelled with an 'E-A,' and we said, 'Oh yes, it's a joke.'" - Paul

"No, if I write... You get ghost writers for novels and things. I wrote in the beginning, Paul wrote the intro, and helped with a couple of the stories. He was only mentioned on one because they forgot. But that's all." - John.

Sent by Brenna.

"I always find myself wanting to excuse John's behavior, just because I loved him. It's like a child, sure he's a naughty child, but don't you call my child naughty. Even if its me he's shitting on, don't you call him naughty. That's how I felt about this and I still do. I don't have any grudge whatsoever against John. I think he was a sod to hurt me. I think he knew exactly what he was doing and because we had been so intimate he knew what would hurt me and he used it to great effect." - Paul

"I would ring him when I went to New York and he would say, 'yeah, what'd you want?' 'I just thought we might meet?' 'Yeah, what the fuck d'you want, man?' I used actually to have some very frightening phone calls. Thank God they're not in my life anymore. I went through a period when I would be so nervous to ring him and so insecure in myself that I actually felt like I was in the wrong. It was all very acrimonious and bitter. I remember one time John said, 'you're all pizza and fairy tales.' I thought, what a great album title! I said, 'Well, if that's what I am, I'm not wholly against that description of me. I can think of worse things to say.' But another time I called him and it was 'Yeah? Yeah? Whadda ya want?' He suddenly started to sound American. I said, "Oh, fuck off, Kojak,' and slammed the phone down; we were having those kind of times, it was bad news." - Paul

"I was just beginning to wrestle with it and it was just sinking in, and someone said, 'What d'you think of the death of John Lennon?' And I really couldn't think of anything more to say than 'It's a drag.' and it came out really slow. But of course when it got printed - "Paul McCartney, asked for his definitive version of how he felt, said, 'its a drag'' - it looked so callous in print. You can't take the print back and say, 'look, let me just rub that print in shit and pee over it and then cry over it for three years, then you'll see what I meant when I said that word.'" - Paul

"When I got home I wept buckets, in the privacy of my own home. I controlled it all during the day, but that evening when it was on the news and all the in-depth shit, and all the pundits were coming out, trotting out all their little witticisms, I did a lot of weeping. I remember screaming that Mark Chapman was the jerk of all jerks; I felt so robbed and so emotional. It shocked me for months afterwards and you couldn't talk to me about guns. Any mention of the word 'gun', 'rifle', 'pistol', 'shoot', just shocked me, sent a wave of reverberation through me like a little echo of the pistol shot." - Paul

"We used to have wanking sessions when we were young at Nigel Whalley's house in Woolton. We'd stay overnight and we'd all sit in armchairs and we'd put all the lights out and being teenage pubescent boys we'd all wank. What we used to do, someone would say, 'Bridgitte Bardot.' 'Oooh!' that would keep everyone on par, then somebody, probably John, would say, 'Winston Churchill.' 'Oh no!' and it would completely ruin everyone's concentration." - Paul

From "The Paul McCartney Encyclopedia" by Bill Harry [Sent by Brenna]

"I'd go through it all again and have him slagging me off again just because he was so great; those are all the down moments. There was much more pleasure than has really come out. I had a wonderful time, with one of the world's most talented people." - Paul

"I talked to Yoko the day after he was killed and the first thing she said was, "John was really fond of you." The last telephone conversation I had with him we were still the best of mates. He was always a very warm guy, John. His bluff was all on the surface. He used to take his glasses down, those granny glasses, and say, "It's only me." They were like a wall, you know? A shield. Those are the moments I treasure." - Paul

"It was written for John, to John. It was like a letter. With the business pressures of the Beatles breaking up it's like a marriage. One minute you're in love, the next minute you hate each other's guts. Its a pity, because its very difficult to cut through all that. So you do what we all seemed to do, which was write it in songs. I wrote "Dear Friend" as a kind of peace gesture." - Paul

Part of a letter John sent to Paul and Linda in 1971 [Sent by Brenna]

"I hope you realize what shit you and the rest of my kind and unselfish friends laid on Yoko and me since we have been together. Linda, if you don't care what I say, shut up! Let Paul write or whatever.
I know the Beatles are 'quite nice people', I'm one of them. They're also just about as big bastards as anyone else, so get off your high horse. They ask me about Paul, and I answer I know some of it gets personal, but whether you believe it or not, I try to answer straight, and the bits they use are obviously the juicy bits. I don't resent your husband, I feel sorry for him." - John

From "Many Years From Now" by Barry Miles [Sent by Brenna]

"I always heard it as a song to me. If you think about it ... Yoko's just come into the picture. He's saying, 'Hey Jude' - 'Hey John'. I know I'm sounding like one of those fans who reads things into it, but you can hear it as a song to me. The words 'go out and get her' - subconsciously he was saying, 'go ahead, leave me.' On a conscious level, he didn't want me to go ahead. The angel in him was saying, 'bless you'. The devil in him didn't like it at all because he didn't want to lose his partner." - John

"I don't often get nostalgic, but the memory of sitting listening to records in John's bedroom is so lovely, a nice nostalgic feeling, because I realize just how close I was to John. It's a lovely thought to think of a friend's bedroom then. A young boy's bedroom is such a comfortable place, like my son's bedroom is now; he's got all his stuff that he needs: a candle, guitar, a book. John's room was very like that. James reminds me very much of John in many ways: he's got beautiful hands. John had beautiful hands." - Paul

"John and I used to hitch-hike places together, it was something that we did together quite a lot; cementing our friendship, getting to know our feelings, our dreams, our ambitions together. It was a very wonderful period (1960). I look back on it with great fondness. I particularly remember John and I would be squeezed into our little single bed..." - Paul

"He [Stu Sutcliffe] and I used to have a deadly rivalry. I don't know why. He was older and a strong friend of John's. When I look back on it I think we were probably fighting for John's attention. He was older and John was a year older than me, and that years makes hell of a lot of difference at the age of eighteen. So I wasn't such a big friend of Stuart's." - Paul

".. And we wrote, 'I'd love to turn you on.' John and I gave each other a knowing look: 'uh-huh, its a drug song. You know that, don't you?''yes, but at the same time, our stuff is always very ambiguous and "Turn you on" can be sexual, so ... C'mon!' As John and I looked at each other, a little flash went between our eyes, like 'i'd love to turn you on', a recognition of what we were doing, so I thought, 'okay, we've got to have something amazing that will illustrate that.' - Paul

"I thought, Maybe this is the moment where I should take a trip with him [John]. It's been coming for a long time. It's often the best way, without thinking about it too much, just slip into it. John's on it already, so I'll sort of catch up. It was my first trip with John, or with any of the guys. We stayed up all night, sat around and hallucinated a lot. Me and John, we'd known each other for a long time. Along with George and Ringo, we were best mates. And we looked into each other's eyes, the eye contact thing we used to do, which is fairly mind-boggling. You dissolve into each other. But that's what we did, round about that time, that's what we did a lot. And it was amazing. You're looking into each other's eyes and you would want to look away, but you wouldn't, and you could see yourself in the other person. It was a very freaky experience and I was totally blown away... I would walk out into the garden - 'oh no, I've got to go back in.' It was very tiring, walking around made me very tired, wasted me, always wasted me. But 'I've got to do it, for my well-being.' In the meantime John had been sitting around very enigmatically and I had a big vision of him as a king, the absolute Emperor of Eternity. It was a good trip. ... I mean, I could feel every inch of the house, and John seemed like some sort of emperor in control of it all. It was quite strange. Of course, he was just sitting there, very inscrutably." - Paul.

John/Paul

2008-04-23T22:44:00.000-07:00

- The Day John met Paul
Here's an article/story of how John and Paul met in 1957

- Songwriting Partnership
This is how John and Paul worked together.

- The Story
A step by step story of the evolution of John and Paul songwriting partnership.

- The Divorce
Some details about the nasty divorce between John and Paul.

- John & Paul Quotes
What they've said about each other. Transcripts of magazines, videos, interviews, etc.

- What other people have said about John & Paul
Transcripts of magazines, videos, interviews, etc.

- The Music of Lennon & McCartney
Everything about the tv tribute to the song writing talents of John and Paul

- A Toot and a Snore '74
The last time John and Paul were on a recording studio together.

- Paul's speech at John's induction into the Rock Hall of Fame
Paul gave this emotional and heartfelt speech on Jan. 19, 1994 at ceremonies inducting John into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame.

- Slash
Because they had to hide their love away.

Multimedia

2008-04-23T22:30:00.000-07:00

- Pictures Gallery
A complete pictures gallery of John, Paul, The Beatles and more.

- Icons
Some icons (avatars) you can use on message boards, MSN Messenger, LiveJournal, etc. you can send us yours.

- Wallpapers
Some wallpapers you can use on your desktop, you can send us yours.

- Videos
Videos of John & Paul (or The Beatles) I think are worth watching.

Fans

2008-04-23T22:24:00.000-07:00

- Fan Art
The things the fans have done about John & Paul

- Fan Fictions
Stories (completely fictional) the fans have wrote about John & Paul.

- Fan Videos
A list of videos made by the fans.

Paul

2008-04-23T22:23:00.001-07:00

- Biography
His life and work

- Facts
Little things you must know about Paul

- Quotes
Transcripts of magazines, videos, interviews, etc.

- Articles
Articles I think are interesting about Paul.

- Interviews
Some interviews with Paul from different places

John

2008-04-23T22:18:00.000-07:00

- Biography
Life and work of John.

- Facts
All the little things you must know about John.

- Quotes
Transcripts of magazines, videos, interviews, etc.

- Artificial Intelligence Project
This is a recreation of John's personality and it's like you're chatting with him.

- Articles
Articles I think are interesting about John.

The Webmiss

2008-04-23T22:06:00.000-07:00

Name: Maria
Nickname(s): Chester, MaryMac, Deanie
Age: 22
Star Sign: Cancer
Gender: Female
Location: Mexico
Pet: A salt and pepper mini-Schnauzer called Paul (yes, after Paul)
Education: Finished high school in 2005, took a year off school and right now I’m in college to be an English teacher.

Likes: Reading, Movies, Photograph, Graphic Design, Web-design, music, Love, Magic, Chocolate, Laugh, etc.
Dislikes: Close-minded people, copy cats, lies, fights, people yelling it really gets on my nerves and stupidity.

Interests [other than Beatles]:
Music: Linkin Park, The Doors, Nirvana, & Elvis are my personal favorites but I listen to all kind of music.
Movies: SUPERMAN (All of 'em), Star Wars (especially episode III), Moulin Rouge, Alfie (Caine's version better), Love Me Tender (Love Elvis there :D), The Godfather, etc.
Talents: I write, I think my writing is ok, I kind of draw too specially when bored, but they're not that fancy anyway. Uhmm... Graphic Design and Web design, not too bad I guess.
Hobbies: Reading, writing, web and graphic design, drawing, video editing, and stuff like that....

Favourite Beatle: I've always said it's John, but thank god I don't have to decide, so it's John and Paul... but I love them all equally, those two just get along with my personality better, especially Johnny
Favourite Beatle Wife: Linda, no doubt about it.
Favourite Beatles Album: Rubber Soul
Favourite Post Beatles Album (Solo Material):
Paul's: Chaos and Chreation in The Backyard
John's: Double Fantasy
Ringo's: Ringo
George's: Could 9
Favourite Beatles Song: Can't really tell, but I'll say Don't Let Me Down because that's the song that got me into The Beatles.

About The Site

2008-04-23T21:40:00.000-07:00

Why I made this site
I've been a Beatles' fan for 5 years and I've been doing sites since I was 14, so I thought it would be nice to start one about my two favourite Beatles. There are also a lot of Beatles' sites, or Lennon sites or McCartney sites, but I've only seen a few dedicated only to this duo.

Why Lennon&McCartney?
Well, I think is kinda obvious now that these two are my favourite Beatles, but don't get me wrong, I love the four of them but my heart just beats a bit faster with these two. I admire them equally and I just can't choose which one is my top favourite.

The Name
I chose Lennon&McCartney because there are no other words (name) that can explain what the site is about better than their famous signature. Lyrics or song titles are quite common too, so I wanted it simple and straight to the point.

What are you going to find on the site?
I don’t want to make it a boring site full of news and no fun. Everything is going to be John/Paul related, so I want to talk about their work, their lives and why not?... some slash too. I also want to make it as interactive as possible with other fans, firstly ‘cause I love making new friends and because I want you guys to enjoy the site.

The Content
My memory sucks, I can't always remember little details or dates and stuff, so I'm not able to make big posts from my own knowledge, so I will try to collect everything I find about John & Paul from different places (sites, books, videos, etc) to use on the site. I know anyone can do that, but I think is better to find everything related to them in one single place than having to research in several places to only find a few things.

Link Us

2008-04-23T21:20:00.001-07:00

Here are some banners for you to put on your site. Remember, if you add us please let me know so I can add you back. Save the banner to your own server and link it back to lennon-mccartney.co.nr.

100x35

88x31

Thanks to flaming-pie.net

I'll be adding more with time.

The Site

2008-04-23T20:57:00.000-07:00

- About The Site
A list of the many reasons why I made this site.

- Link Us
Some banners you can put on your site.

- The webmiss
The mind behind all this.

- Contact Us
To mail me or send stuff for the site all you have to do is fill a simple form.

- Help
We really need somebody.

- ~~Past Layouts~~
This is how the site has looked in the past.

Contact Form

2008-04-23T20:35:00.000-07:00

If you want to contact me or send me stuff for the site, all you need to do is fill this simple form.
If you want to send us fan art, all you have to do is write "Fan Art" in our "Category" space and leave the link to your fan art on our "Message" space. And that's how it works with any category.