The Paul is dead clues - why give the game away?

Paul McCartney died on 9 November 1966. He was replaced in The Beatles by a lookalike. The band then peppered their songs and album covers with clues about his death. Hold a mirror horizontally along the middle of the drum on the cover of Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and you see the words ‘HE DIE’ separated by an arrow pointing up at Paul. At the end of ‘Strawberry Fields Forever,’ John can be heard saying, “I buried Paul,” (or “cranberry sauce” or “I’m very bored” – the jury is still out.) John mumbles something at the end of ‘I’m So Tired.’ Play it backwards and you hear, “Paul is dead, man. Miss him, miss him, miss him.” (At least, it says that if you want it to. It never made any more sense to me backwards than forwards.) On the cover of Abbey Road, Paul is barefoot. In many cultures, people are buried without shoes, so it’s a clear sign Paul is ready for interment. He has tried to explain this away by saying it was a really hot day, so he slipped his shoes off to try and stay cool. It makes sense. On hot days, I like to walk barefoot on sizzling tarmac. He’s also holding a cigarette – or coffin nail – in his right hand. Everyone knows the real Paul was left-handed. In the background is a Volkswagen Beetle bearing the number plate LMW 281F. The first part is an abbreviation of ‘Linda McCartney weeps.’ Paul and Linda met for the first time on 15 May 1967. As this was after the death of the original Paul, the only one she’d ever known was the replacement, so it’s unclear who she was weeping for. The second part of the number plate indicates that Paul would have been 28 if he’d survived. Paul was 27 at the time of the photo shoot, but The Beatles were interested in Eastern religions, some of which believe we spend the first year of our life in the womb and are one year old at birth.

Some of the clues are born out of over-active imaginations. Others are harder to ignore.

However, if we believe The Beatles did genuinely plant clues about Paul’s death, the question is: why? Why would you engineer an elaborate cover-up and then risk giving the game away? Let’s look at some possible answers to this question.

They were taunting us. A serial killer will sometimes send notes to the police with oblique indications about when and where he’s going to strike next. He likes thinking he’s so much smarter than the police that they can’t catch him even with his help. Were The Beatles doing a similar thing? We’ve swapped out one of the most famous people in the world with a lookalike and you didn’t notice! We even gave you clues and you still couldn’t see it! How dumb are you guys? This would seem rather sick in the circumstances. John Lennon was known for his dry, caustic sense of humour. However, if your best friend and song writing partner has recently died and, for some reason, you’ve had to accept a replacement into your band, it seems odd to turn this into an opportunity to tease people with how clever you are.

They were breaking the news gently. It’s a controversial matter. If you have bad news for someone, is it better to rip the Band Aid and get it over with? I’m not sure. I’ve had relationships that fizzled out. We realised we hadn’t contacted each other in two months so we were probably finished. That was a lot less painful than thinking I was with the love my love only for her to say, “You’re fat, you’re ugly, you smell, and you’re moving out tomorrow.” A big headline announcing ‘PAUL McCARTNEY DIES’ would have caused mass hysteria and possibly even suicides. More than thirty years later, UK suicide rates rose by 17% following the death of Princess Diana. Did The Beatles fear a similar spike and didn’t want a lot of young people’s deaths on their conscience? If the news dripped out slowly through the clues, people would come to terms with his death gradually and so it would have a less dramatic impact on them.

I think the most plausible explanation – and the one I explore in my novel Sing the Dead Man’s Songs – is that The Beatles were forced into the deception. Paul died and a lookalike was put in place against their will. Some sort of threat or blackmail stopped them telling people what had happened directly so they used the clues to reveal the truth surreptitiously. But who would force them into it? A lot of people stood to lose money if Paul’s death became known. The Beatles were a cash cow for EMI records. Other bands had changed line-ups, but the names of John, Paul, George, and Ringo were as famous as the name The Beatles. Would the public accept anyone else in that second spot? A word in John’s ear about possible danger to his wife, Cynthia, or his Aunt Mimi could have secured his co-operation. Even if he continued making music like nothing had happened, respect for his friend’s memory demanded that the truth come out somehow. So he started planting clues. The bigwigs at EMI spent more time studying balance sheets than album covers. But he knew the fans would pore over every inch of them just as they obsessively analysed every second of sound he produced. He found a way of getting the truth out there.

What about you? Do you think the clues are really there or is it just a case of people seeing what they want to see? And if they are really there … why?

In defence of ‘Revolution 9’

Most rankings of Beatles’ songs are predictable. ‘Hey Jude,’ ‘A Day in the Life,’ and ‘Yesterday’ are normally near the top. At the other end of the scale, we find such numbers as ‘Wild Honey Pie,’ which is a man amusing himself with random noodling on a guitar and bass drum. It’s only because the man is called Paul McCartney that the track got released at all. The original Let It Be album features ‘Dig It’ and ‘Maggie Mae’ which are snippets from a raucous jam session. Beatles For Sale was recorded in a hurry. They’d used up most of their new songs on A Hard Day’s Night so filled up their next album with under-inspired covers such as ‘Honey Don’t’ and ‘Mr Moonlight,’ neither of which are likely to appear in anyone’s top ten.

            But if there’s one track that has even the most ardent Beatlemaniacs reaching for the skip button, it’s ‘Revolution 9.’ It squats near the end of the White Album like a troll ready to pounce on anyone who thinks the Beatles are all pretty harmonies and wanting to hold your hand. ‘Revolution 9’ isn’t a song but snippets of conversation, bursts of music, and a voice saying “number nine” over and over like he’s testing the microphone.

            I like ‘Revolution 9.’ There, I said it. To me, it captures the chaos of an uprising. There is revolutionary fervour as a new convert to the cause is handed a weapon and told, “Take this brother. May it serve you well.” Some of the music is upbeat and martial, suggesting an enthusiastic charge into battle. There are also screams of pain as people are caught up in the conflict. Someone spinning the dial on a radio desperate for any news might well hear random snatches of music and dialogue. The report from the front comes in, “They are standing still.” There are sad reflections. A man finds the only café still open and laments into his drink, “Every one of them knew that as time went by, they’d get a little bit older and a little bit slower.”

            If I could only take one Beatles’ track with me to a desert island, I might well choose this one. Much as I love songs like ‘Think For Yourself’ and ‘Hey Bulldog,’ I’d get bored if I could listen to nothing else because there are no more surprises in them for me. I’ve been listening to ‘Revolution 9’ for forty years and I hear something new in it every time. The only other Beatles’ song that does that for me is ‘I Am The Walrus.’

            I will add this to the list of unpopular opinions I hold:

            Diamonds Are Forever is my favourite James Bond film.

            I don’t think Sofia Coppola was that bad in The Godfather Part III.

            I prefer the Scissor Sisters’ version of ‘Comfortably Numb’ to Pink Floyd’s.

            And ‘Revolution 9’ is one of the most interesting things the Beatles ever did.