Forever Loved And Missed. May You Never Be Forgotten

Reblogging because of Bob Spitz being yet another person who has no idea what Working Class Hero is about. In the song when John says “a working class hero is something to be” he is being sarcastic. A working class hero is a sucker who believes the lies of the upper classes that if they keep working harder and harder that corner office will be theirs when of course the upper classes have no intention of ever giving them “room at the top”. Not only is John not saying he’s a working class hero, he’s criticising people who are. If you post things about Paul being the “true working class hero” it shows you have no idea what the song is about. I’m not referencing the original OP for this post when I say this but rather similar quotes I’ve seen around here. Listen to the song! It’s very powerful and it helps to educate yourself

No doubt about it, they were tuned to the same groove. But aside from a musical passion and amiability, they filled enormous gaps in each other's lives. Where John was impatient and careless, Paul was a perfec-tionist-or, at least, appeared to be- in his methodical approach to music and the way he dealt with the world. Where John was moody and aloof, Paul was blithe and outgoing, gregarious, and irrepressibly cheerful. Where John was straightforward if brutally frank, Paul practiced diplomacy to manipulate a situation. Where John had attitude, Paul's artistic nature was a work in progress. Where John's upbringing was comfortably middle-Class (according to musician Howie Casey," the only claim he had to being a working-class hero was on sheet music"), Paul was truly blue-collar Where John was struggling to become a musician, Paul seemed born to it.

And John gave Paul someone to look up to. Their age difference and the fact that John was in art college- a man of the world! - made John "a particularly attractive character" in Paul's eyes. There was a feral force in his manner, a sense of "fuck it all" that emanated great strength. He had a style of arrogance that dazed people and started things in motion. And he scorned any sign of fear. John's response to any tentativeness was a sneer, a sneer with humbling consequences.

John occasionally felt the need to reinforce his dominance, but he never required that Paul cede his individuality. He gave the younger boy plenty of room in which to leave his imprint. The Quarry Men would try a new song, and John would immediately seek Paul's opinion. He'd allow Paul to change keys to suit his register, propose certain variations, reconfigure arrangements. "After a while, they'd finish each other's sentences," Eric Griffiths says. "That's when we knew how strong their friendship had become. They'd grown that dependent on one another."

Dependent--and unified. They consolidated their individual strengths into a productive collaboration and grew resentful of those who questioned it. Thereafter, it was John and Paul who brought in all the new material; they assigned each musician his part, chose the songs, sequenced the sets-they literally dictated how rehearsals went down. "The rest of us hadn't a clue as far as arrangements went," Hanton says slowly. "And they seemed to have everything right there, at their fingertips, which was all right by me, because their ideas were good and I enjoyed playing with them." But the two could be unforgiving and relentless. "Say the wrong thing, contradict them, and you were frozen out. A look would pass between them, and afterwards it was as if you didn't exist.

Even in social situations, the Lennon-McCartney bond seemed well defined. The unlikely pair spent many evenings together browsing through the record stacks in the basement of NEMS, hunting for new releases that captured the aggressiveness, the intensity, and the physical tug about which they debated talmudically afterward over coffce. Occasionally, John invited Paul and his girlfriend, a Welsh nurse named Rhiannon, to double-date.

To John's further delight, he discovered that Paul was corruptible. In no time, he groomed his young cohort to shoplift cigarettes and candy, as well as stimulating in him an appetite for pranks. On one occasion that still resonates for those involved, the Quarry Men went to a party in Ford, a village on the outskirts of Liverpool, out past the Aintree Racecourse.

"John and Paul were inseparable that night, like Siamese twins," says Charles Roberts, who met them en route on the upper deck of a cherry red Ripple bus. "It was like the rest of us didn't exist." They spent most of the evening talking, conducting a whispery summit in one corner, Roberts recalls. And it wasn't just music on their agenda, but mischief. "In the middle of the party they went out, ostensibly looking for a cigarette machine, and appeared some time later carrying a cocky-watchman's lamp. The next morning, when it was time to leave, we couldn't get out of the house because [they] had put cement stolen from the roadworks into the mortise lock so the front door wouldn't open. And we had to escape through a window."

Through the rest of the year and into the brutal cold spell that blighted early February -every day that winter seemed more blustery than the last-the two boys reinforced the parameters of their friendship. Afterschool hours were set aside for practice and rehearsal, with weekends devoted to parties and the random gig. It left little time for studies, but then neither boy was academically motivated anyway.

I love this take! Also I agree diagnosis of a mental health disorder is something between and patient and therapist and not something for an observer. Speculation is fine but formal diagnosis is not.

Hello! Your reblog just now about John’s thinking re: Paul made me think of something I read the other night on Borderline Person Disorder. I am sure none of us feel comfortable diagnosing John and if you want to ignore this question bc it’s a bit sensitive, I understand. But I was reading about the “favourite person” aspect to BPD, in particular the tendency to put that person on a pedestal but then be very hurt if that person does anything wrong, and it did seem to fit the John/Paul dynamic. Do you have an opinion about that? I always love reading your takes on things.

Hello, yes. I think that it’s not something we can know from a distance and without training. Like, it’s clear that John wanted and needed more support than he got. But we can’t say any more than that, and I’m not sure what it would even achieve to do so. Even with a diagnosis, every case would be different so I don’t know what it’d even tell us.

I will say that this behaviour is also just something that a lot of people do. Some people just prefer to have very close, intense relationships than having loads of acquaintances. John also kept a lot of friends throughout his life (Paul included with more or less good will depending on the time period). I think it’s just as fair to say that John was impulsive and loud in his emotions. So when he liked something/someone he’d going to let everyone know, but then he’d also do the opposite

I also wonder how much John did put Paul on a pedestal. Like, he adored him, but the vibe I get from John isn’t so much, “Oh God you betrayed me by being something you pretended not to be”. It’s more, “You never really cared and I should have known that sooner but you kept me around unfairly.” There was also so many ups and downs between them, that I don’t think it’s as simple as John idolised Paul right up until he didn’t any more. I agree with Paul that his impulse to shit all over Paul is more about affirming to Yoko that she’s the only one he cares about. That, I think we know, is a pattern that Mimi likely helped install in him. But anyway.

This is the stupidity I know and love on tumblr. Ooo Paul. What a hero for sending a LETTER to Maggie Thatcher. Never mind the years he has kissed the ass of the royals and the establishment in general. Bonus points for throwing Johns name in to shit on him for no reason. No one in Johns camp ever compared the incident with the MBE to Paul’s no doubt slightly less than vanilla letter but Paul’s camp has to sling arrows that Paul is the true hero TM. Lol

“Did you know Paul sent a telegram to Margaret Thatcher in 1982? He did. It wasn’t friendly. He lost his temper over her treatment of health workers and fired off a long outraged message, comparing her to Ted Heath, the prime minister (tweaked in “Taxman”) felled by the 1974 coal strike. McCartney warned, “What the miners did to Ted Heath, the nurses will do to you.” This controversy is a curiously obscure footnote to his life—it seldom gets mentioned in even the fattest biographies. He doesn’t discuss it in Many Years from Now. I only know about it because I read it as a Random Note in Rolling Stone, not exactly a hotbed of pro-Paul propaganda at the time. (The item began, “Reports that Paul McCartney is intellectually brain-dead appear to have been premature.”) But the telegram was a major U.K. scandal, with Tory politicians denouncing him. In October 1982, Thatcher was at the height of her power, in the wake of her Falkland Islands blitz. Many rock stars talked shit about Maggie—Elvis Costello, Morrissey, Paul Weller—but Paul was the one more famous than she was. He had something to lose by hitting send on this, and nothing to gain. What, you think he was trying for coolness points? This is Paul McCartney, remember? He was in the middle of making Give My Regards to Broad Street. He could have clawed Thatcher’s still-beating heart out of her rib cage, impaled it on his Hofner on live TV, and everybody would have said, “Yeah, but ‘Silly Love Songs’ though.” Why did he feel so intensely about the nurses? He didn’t mention his mother in the telegram, but he must have been thinking of Mary McCartney’s life and death. So he snapped, even though it was off-message. (He was busy that week doing interviews for the twentieth anniversary of “Love Me Do”—the moment called for Cozy Lovable Paul, not Angry Paul.) He didn’t boast about it later, though fans today would be impressed that any English rock star of that generation—let alone Paul—had the gumption to send this. You can make a case that it was a braver, riskier, and more politically relevant move than John sending his MBE medal back to the Queen in 1970. Still, John’s gesture went down in history and Paul’s didn’t, though his fans would probably admire the move if they knew about it. He couldn’t win. He was Paul. All he could do was piss people off.”

—

Rob Sheffield, Dreaming the Beatles. (2017)

This is one of the best books I’ve read on them. Go get it.

I love your stories and the Rise and Fall of John Lennon is one of my fav stories in the fandom. It was such a great mix of humiliation, angst, fluff and intimacy. I really hope you continue with your stories. I’ve never re read a story more than that one lol

i might elaborate later but fanfic replies literally develop writer’s metacognition and make them better writers

John Lennon & George Harrison (1964)

I agree-they both needed each other. What’s most frustrating in this fandom is that some people think saying Paul needed John or vice versa somehow takes away from their individual talents and achievements but surely it only enhanced it? There is nothing wrong with needing people in this life otherwise we would all be recluses living a nomadic existence. Both John and Paul were wildly talented on their own but with each other they went further then they would have alone not just musically but through giving each other the love, support and confidence to succeed.

I’m asking you this question because I really value your opinion. Judging from some people’s opinions;some without knowledge and some with knowledge seem to feel that Paul didn’t need John, that he never needed John. Paul was IT. My question is , do you think he was just humoring John or did Paul feel that they were equals? I find it interesting that Paul felt that John was being credited for everything after he was killed, but now,IMO, it has gone WAY overboard in the other direction. Your thoughts? Thanks.😎

This is a very in depth question ha! Sorry I have been M.I.A lately things have been a little crazy...

Anyways... We all know that once John met Paul, and Paul met John, something magic just clicked. They were discovering things within each other that no one previously had been able to bring out. Yes, Paul was more "musically talented" in technical terms at the time, but John added that special something that made them excellent. Even after John’s passing, Paul still says he “looks to John” for guidance when he's stuck with a song, melody, or whatever it may be he needs a trusted opinion on... John was virtually the other half of Paul’s brain in human form, as was he to John.

Moral of the post, to make it short and sweet, I do believe they needed each other to a point. Then after that point ended, hanging onto each other (musically) would have held them back. Both boys branched out to what they wanted to do after the split, however continued to be influenced by each other, they did their own thing and thrived while doing so. If John was alive today, I know we would have gotten loads of more beautiful music, and whatever else his unique mind came up with. John and Paul set eachother up for greatness, yet always had each other to fall back on if need be <3

Apologies for the quickly thrown together response, but thank you for writing in! I love sharing my thoughts and opinions on the 4 boys we love the most!

This isn’t a shitpost though. It’s a literal play by play of what happened between these 2 idiots. I wonder if Paul lies in bed late at night and regrets not taking John up on his offer of a repeat performance?

Get Back Part 2 - India Conversation: The Subtext

Paul: "You just sort of see us, what we're doing..." "It's unbelievable, you know?"

Subtext: Boy did we act completely abnormally in India!

George: "What were you doing?"

Subtext: You and John have been acting extremely weirdly since India, what the hell happened between you guys there???"

John: "Yes, what were we doing?"

Subtext: Yes George, something significant *did* happen between Paul and I but we're not going to explicitly tell you what it was.

Paul: "I don't really know, you know?" "But it's like, we totally sort of put our own personalities under for the sake of it..."

Subtext: I do not want to address what happened between us in India, as far as I'm concerned it wasn't the "real" us anyway so I'm not going to acknowledge it, you can't make me!

John: "Who was writing all them songs?"

Subtext: Nice try Paul, if it wasn't really us how did we write all those songs while we were in India???

Paul: "Oh that was- that was..."

Subtext: Damn, you got me there!

John: "In the room..."

Subtext: Don't push me Paul, I'll happily tell George about what we got up to in the privacy of your room...

Paul: "Yeah right, I remember yeah..."

Subtext: I remember *exactly* what happened John, do not say another word!!!!

George: "Do you regret having gone there?"

Subtext: Since neither of you will tell me what the hell happened, can you at least tell me whether it was worth it??? Was it good or bad???

Paul: "No no, oh no no"

Subtext: No I don't regret it, I just never want to acknowledge it ever again

John: "I don't regret anything... ever..." *Intense simulation of d*ck s*cking while staring intensely at Paul*

Subtext: Well, judging from the fact you can barely string a coherent sentence together, I clearly blew your mind... Literally. If you want a repeat performance you know where I am ;)

Yes thank you!! The man is treated like a God. I especially like how everyone else’s actions are appalling but if Paul acts in a similar way there is always an excuse. The Beatles were all amazing and all bastards in equal measure. They all had flaws and sometimes were just plain wrong regardless if circumstance

The endless circle jerk of Paul discussion going on around here has made me roll my eyes to the point of a nauseated headache.

Going to dip out for a while

Behold my purchases from the Eyes of the Storm exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery on Saturday. I had a discussion with the women on the till in the gift shop about how hot John looked in his sunglasses 😎

Reposting because John looks so good in this picture. I don’t even care about the anecdote. This is a beautiful man.

“John and I went hitchhiking. George and I did it a couple of times too. It was a way to get a holiday. Maybe our parents booked holidays, but we wouldn’t have known how to. So we would head out, just the two of us, with our guitars. John was older, but I was in on the decision about where we might go. He’d got a hundred pounds from his uncle, who was a dentist in Edinburgh, for his twenty-first birthday, and we decided we’d hitchhike to Spain by way of Paris. We’d start over on the other side of a particular bridge because that’s where all of the long-distance lorries started. We’d wear little bowler hats to get their attention! When we got the lift, we sat together; we’d experience the lorry driver together. We knew what it was like to go on the cross-channel ferry; we knew what it was like to try and hang out in Paris. We would walk for miles around the city, sit in bars near Rue des Anglais, visit Montmartre and the Folies Bergère. We felt like we were fully paid-up existentialists and could write a novel from what we learnt in a week there, so we never did make it to Spain. We’d been together so much that if you had a question, we would both pretty much come up with the same answer.”

Paul McCartney, “Ticket to Ride” from The Lyrics: 1956 to the Present (2021)