The song Paul McCartney wrote when he was sick of The Beatles
We could talk for hours about the conception of The Beatles best songs but this Paul McCartney track is a revealing insight into the fab four
(Credits: Far Out / Linda McCartney)
Music » From The Vault
Fri 7 February 2025 17:19, UK
Arguably one of the greatest albums in living memory, The Beatles 1967 classic Sgt. Pepperâs Lonely Hearts Club Band has long been lauded as a conceptual masterpiece and the moment when Paul McCartney finally assumed control of The Beatles as their musical leader. McCartney had long been progressing as the bandâs musical director, slowly turning the majority of their songs into his own style, a process quickened with the untimely death of Brian Epstein and John Lennonâs more reclusive behaviour. With this record, he firmly established himself as the leading man of the Fab Four.
Owing to this, Sgt Pepper can now be seen as the moment McCartney stretched his musical legs and began to express himself more intently. And he did so with some serious aplomb, delivering a powerful LP that is still beloved to this day. It was not only a generational moment that has been touched upon ever since but also an album that provided some much-needed respite for the Fab Four.
The album and the songs on it gave John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr something they had craved for such a long timeâthey no longer had to be in The Beatles. Thanks to McCartneyâs genius concept for the new album â the group would ditch their image, throw away the mop tops, the suits and the preconceived notions of what it meant to be in The Beatles and become a brand new band. There was one song in which this concept was realised, and Macca pushed the quartet towards non-Beatle bliss.
Of course, the song in question is the albumâs opener, which acts in no small part as their plan of action. âSgt. Pepperâs Lonely Hearts Club Bandâ was the first song that came to Paul McCartney when he was trying to conceive what the next album may be like. But why such a long name? ââSgt. Pepperâ is Paul after a trip to America, and the whole West Coast long-named group thing was coming in,â remembers Lennon.
âYou know, when people were no longer the Beatles or the Cricketsâ they were suddenly Fred And His Incredible Shrinking Grateful Airplanes, right? So I think he got influenced by that and came up with this idea for the Beatles.â The bespectacled Beatle was always a bit of a cynic, and he certainly saw the graver side of McCartneyâs Technicolor dreams.
(Credits: Far Out / Alamy)The idea and the concept were relatively simple and underpinned by one thing, the band could no longer be The Beatles. As Macca remembers back in 1984: âIt was an idea I had, I think, when I was flying from LA to somewhere. I thought it would be nice to lose our identities, to submerge ourselves in the persona of a fake group.â
Having lived the majority of his life permanently attached to one group, it mustâve felt liberating to know that you would be departing, if only for an album. âWe would make up all the culture around it and collect all our heroes in one place. So I thought, A typical stupid-sounding name for a Dr. Hookâs Medicine Show and Traveling Circus kind of thing would be âSgt. Pepperâs Lonely Hearts Club Band.â Just a word game, really.â
The Beatles were at the height of their fame and, with the loss of their leader manager Brian Epstein, the four still very young men left straddling a jumbo-sized rocket heading out of the stratosphere but without much direction. It was at this point that McCartney arrived with the brand new concept. It was liberating, too. It allowed the band to truly experiment on the album. While the song was simple and imbued with the ragtime joy of golden-hued nostalgia, something deliberate about this new concept: it was to be anything but conforming.
McCartney was candid in 1994 when he spoke of the song, the album and the desperate need to break out of their perceived structure. âWe were fed up with being The Beatles. We really hated that fucking four little mop-top boys approach. We were not boys, we were men.â It was the moment the band truly broke out of their expected shackles and moved on to something far more defined.
To hear McCartney so vehemently defend his position is unusual and suggests the weight of being in the band was much larger than anyone had previously expected. âIt was all gone, all that boy shit, all that screaming, we didnât want anymore, plus, weâd now got turned on to pot and thought of ourselves as artists rather than just performers⊠then suddenly on the plane I got this idea.
âI thought, âLetâs not be ourselves. Letâs develop alter egos so weâre not having to project an image which we know. It would be much more free.'â
It was. the song and the album gave The Beatles the license to lose themselves in the music and allow their creativity to run wild. Freedom certainly permeated the album for McCartney but, upon reflection, much of the rest of the band felt hampered by the concept and McCartneyâs stringent vision. Nevertheless, the record would provide the band with another rich piece of their canon.
Itâs fair to say that without this song and this album, The Beatles wouldnât have produced perhaps their finest work in the following records.
Related Topics
Paul McCartneyThe Beatles
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