February 7, 2024 • 25 mins
Countless decisions, large and small, aided The Beatles’ ascent to the top of popular culture. The release of their debut single, “Love Me Do,” in the UK in the fall of 1962 was one of those decisions. Their debut on American television was another. In this first episode of season two, Paul McCartney and Paul Muldoon discuss the early evolution of The Beatles.
Season Two of McCartney: A Life in Lyrics comes out weekly starting February 7th, and features the stories behind songs like Yesterday, Band on the Run, Here, There and Everywhere, Picasso’s Last Words (Drink to Me) and many more. Follow the show to learn more about Paul McCartney’s songwriting process, the creation of Wings, the development of McCartney’s bass playing over the life of The Beatles and more! Binge the entire season early and ad-free starting February 7th by subscribing to Pushkin+ on our Apple show page or at pushkin.fm/plus.
“McCartney: A Life in Lyrics” is a co-production between iHeart Media, MPL and Pushkin Industries.
The series was produced by Pejk Malinovski and Sara McCrea; written by Sara McCrea; edited by Dan O’Donnell and Sophie Crane; mastered by Jason Gambrell with assistance from Jake Gorski and sound design by Pejk Malinovski. The series is executive produced by Leital Molad, Justin Richmond, Lee Eastman and Scott Rodger.
Thanks to Lee Eastman, Richard Ewbank, Scott Rodger, Aoife Corbett and Steve Ithell.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin. Hey there, it's justin Richmond. Sixty years ago this week,
the Beatles touched down in the US for the very
first time and appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show. That
appearance blew the minds of just about everybody who was
there to witness it. A lot of the musicians we
talked to on this very show cited as a moment
(00:36):
that they realized they were going to do music for
the rest of their lives. Most recently we heard that
from Mark Mothers bov Devo.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
So.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
To celebrate this momentous anniversary sixty years since the Beatles'
appearance on Ed Sullivan, we're releasing the second season of
McCartney A Life and Lyrics, another show that I worked
on here at Pushkin Industries. I'm going to share the
first episode from that season with you on Broken Record.
It's about the song Love Me Do. Paul McCartney and
Paul Muldoone sat down to discuss the origins of that
(01:05):
song and also a bit about the origin of the Beatles,
and also about that Ed Sullivan appearance. I hope you
like the episode. If you do, subscribe to McCartney Life
and Lyrics. We already have the second episode up on
Band on the Run, and we'll be releasing more episodes
a weekly through April. McCartney A life and Lyrics I
hope you enjoy.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
We admired a singer at that time called Bruce Chanelle
I think his name was, who had a song called
Hey Baby where there was a harmonica roof. So we
started doing Hey Baby. I sang it. John played the harmonica.
(01:56):
I think that was one of the contributory factors for
when we're going to write something that's a good idea.
This harmonica thing's a good idea. John could play it well.
We could write something that would feature you know, instruments
(02:18):
come in sort of vogues. I mean you think of
skiffle guitar was like a harmonics. What everyone got for
Christmas is what everyone got, and that then spawned the
sixties revolutions.
Speaker 3 (02:39):
I'm Paul will do and I've been fortunate to spend
time with one of the greatest songwriters of our era.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
And will you look at me, I'm going on to it.
I'm actually a performer.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
That is, Sir Paul McCartney. We worked together on a
book looking at the lyrics of more than one hundred
and fifty of his songs, and we recorded many hours
of our conversations.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
It was like going back to an old snapshot album
looking back on work I hadn't ever analyzed.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
This is McCartney, a life in lyrics, a masterclass, a memoir,
and an improvised journey with one of the most iconic
figures in popular music. In this episode, love Me.
Speaker 4 (03:29):
Too, BA, love Me Do you Know?
Speaker 2 (03:34):
I Love you?
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Balways be true soly.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Love Me Do.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
For a group like the Beatles to come into existence,
you need quite a few planets to align, but you
also need prodigious talent, clever strategy, and instiable drive. In
this episode, we trace the origins of one of the
(04:06):
earliest Beatles songs. These days it's difficult to remember a
time before the Beatles, but back when Paul McCartney and
John Lennon wrote Love Me Doo, there were merely school
boys trying to make a hit.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
In the afternoons, I sometimes had a rather kind of
light class that I could get out of, and so
I would say I had a dentist's appointment or something,
and they didn't check too heavily, so I would be
able to get on the bus go back home. And
arrange to meet John, who ran about that time was
(04:43):
going to the art college next door in my school,
So we'd meet up at my house is now National
Trust established twenty fourth in the road, and we would
meet there because that was the most convenient place, and
my mom and dad wouldn't be there, so we would
(05:03):
go there and start just knocking around, showing it other
stuff that we'd written already, and then writing new stuff together.
And that's involved a couple of songs that have never
been published or never been heard, songs like just Fun
(05:27):
was one of them, and they were very rough little things,
but you know it was.
Speaker 5 (05:31):
The start, right now? You still have copies of those?
Are there still copies of it?
Speaker 2 (05:35):
You know? I do? I say, or did have an
old school exercise book. It's a nice little blue book,
a hard pack, and in that I wrote just fun,
Just Fun. They said that our love was just fun
the day that our friendship begun. There's no blue moon
(05:57):
that I can see. There's never been in history, because
our love was just fun, kind of country picnic. And
then Too Bad about Sorrow's was sort of too bad
about Sartrose Wo wow wow ooh do do do do
I think? It's a little too opy thing. This was
(06:18):
the start. And then I'd written in angel voices.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
In that little blue notebook where the two school boys
had scribbled their very first lyrics, there was evidence Lennon
and McCartney envisioned themselves following in the footsteps of other
songwriting giants.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
And at the top of the page, I've written another
Lennon McCartney original.
Speaker 5 (06:45):
So you already had a sense, even though you were
what sixteen, a little older perhaps that you would have
a future.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Yeah, did you? I mean, I think it was more
a sort of wish than a sense. It was more,
you know, this thing, if you visualize it, it might
come true. And you know, when you think of Lena McCartney,
was because we'd heard of Gilbert Sullivan, Rodgers and Hammerstein,
Elena McCarney. It's good, there's two of us, and we
could we can make up one of those type names
(07:17):
liber and Stoller, Coffin and King. But these were magic
names to us. We didn't realize Coffin and King was
Carol King.
Speaker 5 (07:25):
I didn't realize it was a girl, and an amazingly
young woman.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
I was very young, yes, yeah, but you know it
was thrilling to know that there were these people out
there and this is what we wanted to be and
love me do game around that period, One after nine
or nine robbed me doing one after nine or nine
actually got published and actually got recorded. My baby did
(07:50):
another one half the nine or nine.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
I didn't move about it.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
The others didn't get recorded. And the school exercise book.
I found it probably about ten fifteen years ago, put
it in my bookcase and I've since lost it. I
don't know where it is. I think it might show
up somewhere, but it's the first ever Lenna McCartney manuscript. Anyway. Yeah, well,
(08:20):
oh dear is right, but you know you have to
let these things go right.
Speaker 4 (08:24):
Maybe Another duo which had a profound influence on young
Lennon and McCartney was the Everly Brothers.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
There are certain people that you can credit for pretty
much everything we did, because I think that's I think
that's true of everyone. I think everyone's got a hero
that forms them like this. Oh did I exist a
(09:12):
little like so? As John and I were two male
vocalists who sang in harmony, our biggest influence was the
Evely Brothers, who we loved adored to this day. I
just think they the greatest, And it was different. You'd
(09:34):
have barbershop quartets. You'd heard the Beverly Sisters, the Three Girls,
you'd heard all that, but just two guys, good lucking guys.
This is good.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Oh yeah, you're not albu.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
So. Yeah. We loved them and idolized them and wanted
to be like them, like.
Speaker 6 (10:03):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
It's like when people later would see the Beatles on
The Ed Sullivan Show and.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Gentlemen like Live from New York, The Sullivan Joe.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
I mean trillion people who say that I knew that's
what I wanted to be.
Speaker 6 (10:24):
Last on our show in New York, the Beatles played
to the greatest TV audience it's ever been assembled in
the history of American TV.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
When I saw you foreheaded monster on the Telly and
you I've got to be part of this. Our current
manager of Beatles Apple Records, says that Bruce Springsteen says
that David Lehnerman says that they all formed on that night,
formed this this future for themselves, and there we were
(10:54):
in Liverpool form in this future and the same kind
of deal.
Speaker 3 (11:06):
The day when you say goodbye and McCartney were working
in the wake of all these great songwriting dues who
wrote songs for others to sing, and singers like the
Everly Brothers who sang other people's songs. But there were
also people like Buddy Holly who could do it all.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
You know, you know me, baby, dude, you tell me
baby that songday.
Speaker 6 (11:34):
You will loudly bad what you say goodbye.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
Buddy Holly to us was amazing for a number of reasons.
He sang and played guitar. Elvis just sang and Scotty
Moore played guitar. He normally played guitar, he played the solos. Normally,
if you played guitar, there was another guy in the
group was a lead guitar played the sols. But Buddy
(12:02):
sang played the guitar and played the sols. He also
wrote the stuff. So this was like all inclusive, one
man band, and we really thought that was great. So
this is what we have to do.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Buddy Holly inspired the youngsters to explore their full musical potential,
and he also helped John Lennon overcome his embarrassment about
wearing glasses.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
He also wore these big horn room glasses, as did
John and ifever there would be a girl coming up.
John with witness glasses off and put them in his
pocket and squint as she went by, and I see
you look pretty good. The glasses are good. But one
buddy came along, the glasses stayed on. It was like
Harry Potter with all the kids.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
Like Buddy Holly had more than just the musical chops
and the suave image that John Lennon and Paul McCartney
covet it for themselves. The name of his group, Buddy
Holly and the Crickets, had a certain entomological ring to it.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
The name the Crickets. You know, we wanted something with
a dual meaning, and it turned out they didn't know
how the dual meaning the crickets. They didn't know about
the game cricket. Oh, I say, And they just thought
it was grasshoppers, right, So we said to them. Ice
met them years later, fantastic man, the Beatles, We loved crickets,
(13:37):
chopy little things and the great game of cricket. A
brilliant name for a group. And they went, you know,
oh no, we just heard a grasshopper in the studio wall.
Speaker 5 (13:47):
You know, did you do you remember setting around thinking
the buddy Holly and the Crickets. The Beatles will be
a great name for us.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
My memory of it was that we were striving to
find something with a dual meaning because of the Crickets.
This is the idea. Now the origin of it is
clouded in mystery.
Speaker 3 (14:14):
You know, I missed you.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
It was just a club split up. I missed you.
Because there are all sorts of theories about this, says
The Wild Ones with Marlon Brando, and at one point
Lee Marvin says, he Johnny, Johnny or Johnny. I think
he's cool.
Speaker 6 (14:28):
Come on, Johnny, we all missed you.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Miss him. Yeah, Johnny, we love you, you know, coming back
to the gang or something like that. Johnny, we love you.
The Beatles love you.
Speaker 6 (14:37):
Miss Yeah, Beatles mischief all the Beatles, mister.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
It turns out the Malls, the girls in the Motorcycle
Gang were called Beatles, says The Beatles love you, Johnny
for all times. And I know John and Stuart his
art school friends, Stuart Suckliffe loved that film as we
all did. I think they had seen it. I think
(15:02):
we just loved it and hadn't seen it anyway. So
that's one of the.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
Theories today it's easy to forget how the creation of
the Beatles required thousands of small choices. Songs which are
now canonized were once simple phrases. Two boys having fun
(15:26):
when no parents were home, one of them with a
notebook in hand, the other playing a harmonica.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
At one of those writing sessions, twenty fourth in road,
a little garden path past my dad's lavender hedge. You know,
we would write, let me do and John come up
with this little harmonica roof. It's so simple. I mean
you look at it here.
Speaker 5 (15:55):
Yes, there's nothing to it.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
It's a will have a wisp little song, lovely.
Speaker 3 (16:07):
So what do you think made it become such a
potent part.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
I think our image and our energy as the four
Beatles was what was potent. And it had a very
fresh sound. That's the sort of thing that people noticed.
And we had a very fresh image. Nobody looked like us.
And we've been working at it a long time in Liverpool.
(16:37):
Originally as really a bunch of rockers, you know, the
cliffs and everything gone over to Hamburg as the rockers
had got a little bit leatherified there, and then it
moved from leather to suits at the request of Brian Epstein.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
Brian Epstein, an entrepreneurial young man from a family of
successful retailers in Liverpool, had stumbled upon the Beatles at
a nineteen sixty one lunchtime concert. He had no experience
managing artists, but he did have lots of confidence, so
in short order he signed the contract to manage the
(17:17):
band and told them to get suited up.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
And so we all went over to Beno Dawn who
was in the wirrald back and head a Taylor. We'd
never been to a tailor really, you know, so certainly
not on maps. We all went over and got suits.
So we had this image. We had all the experience
musical experience of Hamburg, of playing a lot your ten
(17:41):
thousand hours, mister Gladwell's right, ten thousand hours. So when
we kind of then came on the scene and was
seen on television, we had a freshness, complete simplicity. Let
me do It's got a slightly sort of bluozy thing.
I mean, it's not a blues but it's got a simplicity,
(18:07):
like a little sort of down home on the porch
with a couple of guitars on harmonica.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
At the heart of these simple lyrics is a familiar story,
a young man yearning for a woman to love Salmack.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
It's a funny thing. You try and recreate that stuff now,
and it's almost impossible. Why Because you were sixteen. That's
why you were looking at the world, and the world
was good and there was this marvelous rock and roll
future unfolding itself, and you were about to become part
(18:59):
of it. So your longings for a girl, which was
impossible to achieve, you know, he had that little, perfect
high school sweetheart, you know. So there was this great
longing for your career is you didn't know what you
(19:20):
were going to do, and it was a dread of
all dreads. I was about to go to teacher's training college.
I was trying to put that off forever. I did
not want to go into that mold. So there was
all these different kinds of longings. John and I's mothers
had both died, which was this amazing bond between us.
(19:42):
We both understood the anguish of that, and at that
age it's largely unspoken. You just said, oh, your mother died, Yes,
so did I. We knew I knew the circumstances of
his mother, says he knew the circustance in mind, and
we would talk about it a little bit, but being
(20:04):
young boys, you didn't talk about it much. All this
was rolled up into this package, this longing, and it's
spilled out, which is the best way to write lovely love.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
Some of this longing for their mothers, for love. For
artistry was fairly abstract, but they also had more concrete ambitions.
They had met other songwriting teams who turned out hits
and made good money.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
John and I looked at thought, the right we could
do that? What a good idea. If we get hits,
that will then get money and it may not buy
us love, but it will buy us a car. I
must admit, you know, we were young guys without any money,
coming from Liverpool with dreams, and once we realized that
(21:06):
to write a hit song would get you some money,
it was very attractive, very attractive thought. And it wasn't
just the money. It was then the joy of pulling
our song out of a hat, being able to play
it with our band, which needed songs, so we were
sort of feeding the machine. Take one No.
Speaker 3 (21:32):
Later, when the Fab four removed from writing in the
parlor room to writing in the studio, they learned to
crank out hits at an impressive piece.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Take four one. Our recording hours, Well what now classical
people do? It's it's the norm for recording. You normally
go in ten o'clock, you get yourself together, you start
(22:03):
at ten thirty. You then will work three hours. You
don't have it our right in. You work two thirty
to five thirty, and that's it. And in those two
periods of three hours, it was expected that we would
be able to finish two songs. So so we did.
And that's that was the output and the great the
(22:26):
flow of just having to come up with two complete things.
But the great thing about this was you were finished
by five thirty.
Speaker 6 (22:37):
When a harmonica like the Beatles playing not a toy
but a genuine huner marine band harmonica, just like those
play by the Beatles.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Maybe what allowed the Beatles to come together was the
force of their belonging. Maybe it was the long studio days,
the churning out of albums, the carefully crafted image. Whatever
the case, they went from looking at other artists dreaming
of becoming them, to being the artists others would dream
(23:07):
of becoming.
Speaker 6 (23:08):
Way along with the with your own genuine owner Marine
band harmonica from Klim.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
When what the Beatles would become was beyond what any
of its members could have dreamt off when they were
sixteen and playing harmonica in their living rooms.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
There were all sorts of things. As I say that
you instinctively knew, don't try too hard, don't work too
hard at reaching for it, because the more you reach,
the more it will receive. Just kid on that you
(23:50):
don't even want it right, something will happen where everyone
else around us be worrying, no more other than I
was going to oh my god, ah my god. We
always related back to this accident we'd had on the
motorway going from running up to Liverpool, where we'd skid
it off in the snow down the bank with our
van and at the bottom of the van were this,
(24:13):
how the hell are we ever going to get home?
It's snowing, we're freezing, and someone in the group, so
something will happen, And it was like that became a mantra,
and you know, as I say, it's actually a very
good one. It's this, it's not reaching for it, it's
letting it go. Love me, love me, love me? Do
(25:03):
you know I love you?
Speaker 5 (25:06):
Ah me?
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Through sound Please.
Speaker 6 (25:13):
Love Me, Love.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Love Me Doe from the beatles nineteen sixty three album
Please Please Me. In the next episode, McCartney starts over
with a ragtag band on the run.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
I just thought we would just start something that feels
good and we'll build it up like the Beatles, did you.
Speaker 5 (25:52):
Sau.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
McCartney. A Life in Lyrics is a co production between iHeartMedia,
NPL and Pushkin Industries.
Pushkin. Hey there, it's justin Richmond. Sixty years ago this week,
the Beatles touched down in the US for the very
first time and appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show. That
appearance blew the minds of just about everybody who was
there to witness it. A lot of the musicians we
talked to on this very show cited as a moment
(00:36):
that they realized they were going to do music for
the rest of their lives. Most recently we heard that
from Mark Mothers bov Devo.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
So.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
To celebrate this momentous anniversary sixty years since the Beatles'
appearance on Ed Sullivan, we're releasing the second season of
McCartney A Life and Lyrics, another show that I worked
on here at Pushkin Industries. I'm going to share the
first episode from that season with you on Broken Record.
It's about the song Love Me Do. Paul McCartney and
Paul Muldoone sat down to discuss the origins of that
(01:05):
song and also a bit about the origin of the Beatles,
and also about that Ed Sullivan appearance. I hope you
like the episode. If you do, subscribe to McCartney Life
and Lyrics. We already have the second episode up on
Band on the Run, and we'll be releasing more episodes
a weekly through April. McCartney A life and Lyrics I
hope you enjoy.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
We admired a singer at that time called Bruce Chanelle
I think his name was, who had a song called
Hey Baby where there was a harmonica roof. So we
started doing Hey Baby. I sang it. John played the harmonica.
(01:56):
I think that was one of the contributory factors for
when we're going to write something that's a good idea.
This harmonica thing's a good idea. John could play it well.
We could write something that would feature you know, instruments
(02:18):
come in sort of vogues. I mean you think of
skiffle guitar was like a harmonics. What everyone got for
Christmas is what everyone got, and that then spawned the
sixties revolutions.
Speaker 3 (02:39):
I'm Paul will do and I've been fortunate to spend
time with one of the greatest songwriters of our era.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
And will you look at me, I'm going on to it.
I'm actually a performer.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
That is, Sir Paul McCartney. We worked together on a
book looking at the lyrics of more than one hundred
and fifty of his songs, and we recorded many hours
of our conversations.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
It was like going back to an old snapshot album
looking back on work I hadn't ever analyzed.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
This is McCartney, a life in lyrics, a masterclass, a memoir,
and an improvised journey with one of the most iconic
figures in popular music. In this episode, love Me.
Speaker 4 (03:29):
Too, BA, love Me Do you Know?
Speaker 2 (03:34):
I Love you?
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Balways be true soly.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Love Me Do.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
For a group like the Beatles to come into existence,
you need quite a few planets to align, but you
also need prodigious talent, clever strategy, and instiable drive. In
this episode, we trace the origins of one of the
(04:06):
earliest Beatles songs. These days it's difficult to remember a
time before the Beatles, but back when Paul McCartney and
John Lennon wrote Love Me Doo, there were merely school
boys trying to make a hit.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
In the afternoons, I sometimes had a rather kind of
light class that I could get out of, and so
I would say I had a dentist's appointment or something,
and they didn't check too heavily, so I would be
able to get on the bus go back home. And
arrange to meet John, who ran about that time was
(04:43):
going to the art college next door in my school,
So we'd meet up at my house is now National
Trust established twenty fourth in the road, and we would
meet there because that was the most convenient place, and
my mom and dad wouldn't be there, so we would
(05:03):
go there and start just knocking around, showing it other
stuff that we'd written already, and then writing new stuff together.
And that's involved a couple of songs that have never
been published or never been heard, songs like just Fun
(05:27):
was one of them, and they were very rough little things,
but you know it was.
Speaker 5 (05:31):
The start, right now? You still have copies of those?
Are there still copies of it?
Speaker 2 (05:35):
You know? I do? I say, or did have an
old school exercise book. It's a nice little blue book,
a hard pack, and in that I wrote just fun,
Just Fun. They said that our love was just fun
the day that our friendship begun. There's no blue moon
(05:57):
that I can see. There's never been in history, because
our love was just fun, kind of country picnic. And
then Too Bad about Sorrow's was sort of too bad
about Sartrose Wo wow wow ooh do do do do
I think? It's a little too opy thing. This was
(06:18):
the start. And then I'd written in angel voices.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
In that little blue notebook where the two school boys
had scribbled their very first lyrics, there was evidence Lennon
and McCartney envisioned themselves following in the footsteps of other
songwriting giants.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
And at the top of the page, I've written another
Lennon McCartney original.
Speaker 5 (06:45):
So you already had a sense, even though you were
what sixteen, a little older perhaps that you would have
a future.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Yeah, did you? I mean, I think it was more
a sort of wish than a sense. It was more,
you know, this thing, if you visualize it, it might
come true. And you know, when you think of Lena McCartney,
was because we'd heard of Gilbert Sullivan, Rodgers and Hammerstein,
Elena McCarney. It's good, there's two of us, and we
could we can make up one of those type names
(07:17):
liber and Stoller, Coffin and King. But these were magic
names to us. We didn't realize Coffin and King was
Carol King.
Speaker 5 (07:25):
I didn't realize it was a girl, and an amazingly
young woman.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
I was very young, yes, yeah, but you know it
was thrilling to know that there were these people out
there and this is what we wanted to be and
love me do game around that period, One after nine
or nine robbed me doing one after nine or nine
actually got published and actually got recorded. My baby did
(07:50):
another one half the nine or nine.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
I didn't move about it.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
The others didn't get recorded. And the school exercise book.
I found it probably about ten fifteen years ago, put
it in my bookcase and I've since lost it. I
don't know where it is. I think it might show
up somewhere, but it's the first ever Lenna McCartney manuscript. Anyway. Yeah, well,
(08:20):
oh dear is right, but you know you have to
let these things go right.
Speaker 4 (08:24):
Maybe Another duo which had a profound influence on young
Lennon and McCartney was the Everly Brothers.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
There are certain people that you can credit for pretty
much everything we did, because I think that's I think
that's true of everyone. I think everyone's got a hero
that forms them like this. Oh did I exist a
(09:12):
little like so? As John and I were two male
vocalists who sang in harmony, our biggest influence was the
Evely Brothers, who we loved adored to this day. I
just think they the greatest, And it was different. You'd
(09:34):
have barbershop quartets. You'd heard the Beverly Sisters, the Three Girls,
you'd heard all that, but just two guys, good lucking guys.
This is good.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Oh yeah, you're not albu.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
So. Yeah. We loved them and idolized them and wanted
to be like them, like.
Speaker 6 (10:03):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
It's like when people later would see the Beatles on
The Ed Sullivan Show and.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Gentlemen like Live from New York, The Sullivan Joe.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
I mean trillion people who say that I knew that's
what I wanted to be.
Speaker 6 (10:24):
Last on our show in New York, the Beatles played
to the greatest TV audience it's ever been assembled in
the history of American TV.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
When I saw you foreheaded monster on the Telly and
you I've got to be part of this. Our current
manager of Beatles Apple Records, says that Bruce Springsteen says
that David Lehnerman says that they all formed on that night,
formed this this future for themselves, and there we were
(10:54):
in Liverpool form in this future and the same kind
of deal.
Speaker 3 (11:06):
The day when you say goodbye and McCartney were working
in the wake of all these great songwriting dues who
wrote songs for others to sing, and singers like the
Everly Brothers who sang other people's songs. But there were
also people like Buddy Holly who could do it all.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
You know, you know me, baby, dude, you tell me
baby that songday.
Speaker 6 (11:34):
You will loudly bad what you say goodbye.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
Buddy Holly to us was amazing for a number of reasons.
He sang and played guitar. Elvis just sang and Scotty
Moore played guitar. He normally played guitar, he played the solos. Normally,
if you played guitar, there was another guy in the
group was a lead guitar played the sols. But Buddy
(12:02):
sang played the guitar and played the sols. He also
wrote the stuff. So this was like all inclusive, one
man band, and we really thought that was great. So
this is what we have to do.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Buddy Holly inspired the youngsters to explore their full musical potential,
and he also helped John Lennon overcome his embarrassment about
wearing glasses.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
He also wore these big horn room glasses, as did
John and ifever there would be a girl coming up.
John with witness glasses off and put them in his
pocket and squint as she went by, and I see
you look pretty good. The glasses are good. But one
buddy came along, the glasses stayed on. It was like
Harry Potter with all the kids.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
Like Buddy Holly had more than just the musical chops
and the suave image that John Lennon and Paul McCartney
covet it for themselves. The name of his group, Buddy
Holly and the Crickets, had a certain entomological ring to it.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
The name the Crickets. You know, we wanted something with
a dual meaning, and it turned out they didn't know
how the dual meaning the crickets. They didn't know about
the game cricket. Oh, I say, And they just thought
it was grasshoppers, right, So we said to them. Ice
met them years later, fantastic man, the Beatles, We loved crickets,
(13:37):
chopy little things and the great game of cricket. A
brilliant name for a group. And they went, you know,
oh no, we just heard a grasshopper in the studio wall.
Speaker 5 (13:47):
You know, did you do you remember setting around thinking
the buddy Holly and the Crickets. The Beatles will be
a great name for us.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
My memory of it was that we were striving to
find something with a dual meaning because of the Crickets.
This is the idea. Now the origin of it is
clouded in mystery.
Speaker 3 (14:14):
You know, I missed you.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
It was just a club split up. I missed you.
Because there are all sorts of theories about this, says
The Wild Ones with Marlon Brando, and at one point
Lee Marvin says, he Johnny, Johnny or Johnny. I think
he's cool.
Speaker 6 (14:28):
Come on, Johnny, we all missed you.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Miss him. Yeah, Johnny, we love you, you know, coming back
to the gang or something like that. Johnny, we love you.
The Beatles love you.
Speaker 6 (14:37):
Miss Yeah, Beatles mischief all the Beatles, mister.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
It turns out the Malls, the girls in the Motorcycle
Gang were called Beatles, says The Beatles love you, Johnny
for all times. And I know John and Stuart his
art school friends, Stuart Suckliffe loved that film as we
all did. I think they had seen it. I think
(15:02):
we just loved it and hadn't seen it anyway. So
that's one of the.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
Theories today it's easy to forget how the creation of
the Beatles required thousands of small choices. Songs which are
now canonized were once simple phrases. Two boys having fun
(15:26):
when no parents were home, one of them with a
notebook in hand, the other playing a harmonica.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
At one of those writing sessions, twenty fourth in road,
a little garden path past my dad's lavender hedge. You know,
we would write, let me do and John come up
with this little harmonica roof. It's so simple. I mean
you look at it here.
Speaker 5 (15:55):
Yes, there's nothing to it.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
It's a will have a wisp little song, lovely.
Speaker 3 (16:07):
So what do you think made it become such a
potent part.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
I think our image and our energy as the four
Beatles was what was potent. And it had a very
fresh sound. That's the sort of thing that people noticed.
And we had a very fresh image. Nobody looked like us.
And we've been working at it a long time in Liverpool.
(16:37):
Originally as really a bunch of rockers, you know, the
cliffs and everything gone over to Hamburg as the rockers
had got a little bit leatherified there, and then it
moved from leather to suits at the request of Brian Epstein.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
Brian Epstein, an entrepreneurial young man from a family of
successful retailers in Liverpool, had stumbled upon the Beatles at
a nineteen sixty one lunchtime concert. He had no experience
managing artists, but he did have lots of confidence, so
in short order he signed the contract to manage the
(17:17):
band and told them to get suited up.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
And so we all went over to Beno Dawn who
was in the wirrald back and head a Taylor. We'd
never been to a tailor really, you know, so certainly
not on maps. We all went over and got suits.
So we had this image. We had all the experience
musical experience of Hamburg, of playing a lot your ten
(17:41):
thousand hours, mister Gladwell's right, ten thousand hours. So when
we kind of then came on the scene and was
seen on television, we had a freshness, complete simplicity. Let
me do It's got a slightly sort of bluozy thing.
I mean, it's not a blues but it's got a simplicity,
(18:07):
like a little sort of down home on the porch
with a couple of guitars on harmonica.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
At the heart of these simple lyrics is a familiar story,
a young man yearning for a woman to love Salmack.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
It's a funny thing. You try and recreate that stuff now,
and it's almost impossible. Why Because you were sixteen. That's
why you were looking at the world, and the world
was good and there was this marvelous rock and roll
future unfolding itself, and you were about to become part
(18:59):
of it. So your longings for a girl, which was
impossible to achieve, you know, he had that little, perfect
high school sweetheart, you know. So there was this great
longing for your career is you didn't know what you
(19:20):
were going to do, and it was a dread of
all dreads. I was about to go to teacher's training college.
I was trying to put that off forever. I did
not want to go into that mold. So there was
all these different kinds of longings. John and I's mothers
had both died, which was this amazing bond between us.
(19:42):
We both understood the anguish of that, and at that
age it's largely unspoken. You just said, oh, your mother died, Yes,
so did I. We knew I knew the circumstances of
his mother, says he knew the circustance in mind, and
we would talk about it a little bit, but being
(20:04):
young boys, you didn't talk about it much. All this
was rolled up into this package, this longing, and it's
spilled out, which is the best way to write lovely love.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
Some of this longing for their mothers, for love. For
artistry was fairly abstract, but they also had more concrete ambitions.
They had met other songwriting teams who turned out hits
and made good money.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
John and I looked at thought, the right we could
do that? What a good idea. If we get hits,
that will then get money and it may not buy
us love, but it will buy us a car. I
must admit, you know, we were young guys without any money,
coming from Liverpool with dreams, and once we realized that
(21:06):
to write a hit song would get you some money,
it was very attractive, very attractive thought. And it wasn't
just the money. It was then the joy of pulling
our song out of a hat, being able to play
it with our band, which needed songs, so we were
sort of feeding the machine. Take one No.
Speaker 3 (21:32):
Later, when the Fab four removed from writing in the
parlor room to writing in the studio, they learned to
crank out hits at an impressive piece.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Take four one. Our recording hours, Well what now classical
people do? It's it's the norm for recording. You normally
go in ten o'clock, you get yourself together, you start
(22:03):
at ten thirty. You then will work three hours. You
don't have it our right in. You work two thirty
to five thirty, and that's it. And in those two
periods of three hours, it was expected that we would
be able to finish two songs. So so we did.
And that's that was the output and the great the
(22:26):
flow of just having to come up with two complete things.
But the great thing about this was you were finished
by five thirty.
Speaker 6 (22:37):
When a harmonica like the Beatles playing not a toy
but a genuine huner marine band harmonica, just like those
play by the Beatles.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Maybe what allowed the Beatles to come together was the
force of their belonging. Maybe it was the long studio days,
the churning out of albums, the carefully crafted image. Whatever
the case, they went from looking at other artists dreaming
of becoming them, to being the artists others would dream
(23:07):
of becoming.
Speaker 6 (23:08):
Way along with the with your own genuine owner Marine
band harmonica from Klim.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
When what the Beatles would become was beyond what any
of its members could have dreamt off when they were
sixteen and playing harmonica in their living rooms.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
There were all sorts of things. As I say that
you instinctively knew, don't try too hard, don't work too
hard at reaching for it, because the more you reach,
the more it will receive. Just kid on that you
(23:50):
don't even want it right, something will happen where everyone
else around us be worrying, no more other than I
was going to oh my god, ah my god. We
always related back to this accident we'd had on the
motorway going from running up to Liverpool, where we'd skid
it off in the snow down the bank with our
van and at the bottom of the van were this,
(24:13):
how the hell are we ever going to get home?
It's snowing, we're freezing, and someone in the group, so
something will happen, And it was like that became a mantra,
and you know, as I say, it's actually a very
good one. It's this, it's not reaching for it, it's
letting it go. Love me, love me, love me? Do
(25:03):
you know I love you?
Speaker 5 (25:06):
Ah me?
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Through sound Please.
Speaker 6 (25:13):
Love Me, Love.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Love Me Doe from the beatles nineteen sixty three album
Please Please Me. In the next episode, McCartney starts over
with a ragtag band on the run.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
I just thought we would just start something that feels
good and we'll build it up like the Beatles, did you.
Speaker 5 (25:52):
Sau.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
McCartney. A Life in Lyrics is a co production between iHeartMedia,
NPL and Pushkin Industries.
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