Book Review – 'John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs'
The emotional and unfinished legacy of two of history's most compelling and famous songwriters, written through their chemistry and devotion in song
To take on the history of The Beatles’ most prominent and well-loved figures is always a daunting task. Without question, there were and are dozens of angles to investigate and define. Yet with John & Paul – A Love Story in Songs, author Ian Leslie demonstrates his keen insight — and love for — two men who had one of musical history’s most complicated, emotional, and heartbreaking situationships.
As Leslie begins the story in the moment leading up to their fortuitous meeting in July 1957, it is the shared heartbreak that both leaned into: McCartney’s mother Mary had already passed, and on the horizon, so would Lennon’s wayward Julia. But when 15-year-old McCartney sat down at the piano in St. Peter’s Church in Woolton, Liverpool, and banged out some real rock and roll, the one person who was impressed, behind the thin veneer of a posturing leader, was the 17-year-old slightly drunk Lennon.
“I’d been kingpin up to then,” Lennon recalled. “Now I thought, if I take him on, what will happen?”
Leslie points out early on that the Lennon-McCartney partnership was partly by design but with a hint of where the duo were headed. Neither was schooled in the traditional sense, and with that, they took on the role of words and music blindly, together. Bunking off from school, sitting in Aunt Mimi’s front parlour or at the McCartneys, it sealed the deal that whoever did what in a song, they would share in the riches of collaboration, even if only between them, in private. For now.
John Lennon sings Paul McCartney’s first ever song “I Lost My Little Girl” (The Beatles: Get Back)/℗© Apple Ltd./YouTube
The make-it-or-break-it time in Hamburg honed their playing chops and commitment to music. When they returned to Liverpool in rag-tag fashion, they became what the world saw later: Outliers that gave over of themselves to their Liverpool brethern and with Lennon and McCartney, making an effort to publicly acknowledge that their “private” songwriting did indeed have a place beyond the walls of Forthlin Road and Menlove Avenue.
When Brian Epstein entered the picture in late 1961, it appeared the power balance and friendship between the two would be thrown off the rails. However, even as McCartney tested Epstein for favoritism with Lennon or jockeyed into a better position as Epstein’s sounding board in equal step with Lennon (who Epstein gravitated toward), the real power-play was looming on the horizon. It didn’t matter that Epstein had a successful record store or would be devoting his life to the lads. It would be a test to see whether Lennon and McCartney had the actual chops to impress label reps and producers in the winners’ circle down in London.
Please Please Me Mini-Documentary/℗© Apple Corps Ltd./YouTube
Through the serendipitous set of circumstances that saw The Beatles drop into George Martin’s lap, it was the Lennon-McCartney chemistry that emerged, standing their ground that “Love Me Do” would be the A-side to their first single, b/w “P.S. I Love You.” Two originals, signed off that the credit going forward would be a fifty-fifty split. The pact they made as teenagers, sitting in chairs facing each other, strumming their guitars, was now officially in ink.
As Leslie points out, most of the forthcoming material was due to the proximity of the duo. Weeks spent on tour in cars, buses, and hotels, Lennon and McCartney honed their skills and love for the interplay of melody and words. But when the full-bodied narrative of “I Want to Hold Your Hand” with its hand claps, stuttering guitar, and falsetto harmonies began to reach the ears of America’s preteen females, how were the songwriters equipped to handle the pressure of international stardom?
John wasn’t derailed by the rock and roll lifestyle but saved by it. Paul understood this better than anyone.
What becomes clear in the portrait that Leslie paints is the dependence that Lennon has on the band and in particular, McCartney. During the touring, during the songwriting, it was McCartney who found the balance and was able to give that over to an emotionally unstable Lennon. But when “Yesterday” came to fruition, buoyed by its status as a Number One single in the US, it was of course, Lennon who came away with the feeling he was alone, cast aside. He was unloved by McCartney. When nothing could be further from the truth.
Yesterday (With Spoken Word Intro) / Live From Studio 50, New York City / 1965)/℗© Apple Corps Ltd./YouTube
The pot influence and the dreamy semi-melancholy of Rubber Soul gave way to the influence and otherworldliness of LSD and Revolver. As a group, this was the shift from the mindless and mad chaos of screaming and regurgitation of the sameness to one of R&D in the studio. The pinnacle would manifest itself with the recordings of Lennon’s “Tomorrow Never Knows,” as a paeon to acid tripping, Timothy Leary and experimental tape loops, twinned with “Eleanor Rigby,” the antithesis of a McCartney ballad, housed in as Leslie writes “latent anger at the meaninglessness of his mother’s death, and at the false consolations of a religion he did not believe in.”
The inner workings of “Strawberry Fields Forever” and “Penny Lane” segue to the largesse of Sgt. Pepper. The narrative of everyday activities that ends in finality was driven by the McCartney engine, fueled by Lennon’s all-consuming drug intake. If Lennon felt unmoored, McCartney felt invigorated to get the band to a place no one had thought possible. Reflected in that was an intense, shared acid trip the two had together, and then at the album’s release, the unprecedented accolades for its breathtaking concept and execution.
But when Epstein’s premature death signals panic and the Maharishi begins his hold over Lennon, is there room for a more deeply personal connection? In India, Lennon obliquely saw the guru as the One, the ‘Answer’ he had so desperately sought as a disenfranchised youth. He left there angry and despondent over rumors of the guru’s indiscretions and fought back against his inner turmoil, turning to McCartney, who could not truly see how damaged Lennon was in mind and spirit. As Lesley so eloquently points out, “John felt rejected and abandoned by Paul after Rishikesh.”
The Dirty Mac – Yer Blues (Official Video) [4K]/℗© 2018 ABKCO Music & Records, Inc./YouTube
“Hey Jude” and the fragmented cooperation during the White Album were the pieces of a larger puzzle that stubbornly could not be put together. No one, least of all Lennon and McCartney were prepared for what was transpiring around them: each of their soulmates arrived at the same time. In essence, there would be no sharing of that comfort time from their teenage years, their touring years and the recording sessions when it was only the four of them and George Martin.
Leslie details the Get Back sessions, the push-and-pull in the blind acceptance of Allen Klein, the capitulation in calling back Martin to produce Abbey Road, Lennon marvelling over McCartney’s delivery of “Oh, Darling!” and even a sweet, small chapter dedicated to the lovable sheepdog Martha.
When George threw a party for his wife, Pattie, at their new home on March 17, 1970, all of the Beatles turned up with their partners. Reports suggested that everyone got along. It would be the last time all four were present in the same location.
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“God.” Ram. Imagine. “Dear Friend.” “Jealous Guy.” Wings. Mind Games. Ringo. Band on the Run. “An old estranged fiancé of mine called Paul.” Sean. “Coming Up.” Double Fantasy. “Paul? My dear one.” “Here Today.”
In its entirety, the earthly partnership of Lennon-McCartney lasted 23 years. John Lennon has now been gone for 45 years. Poignantly, there are no correct terms to understand the bond these two men had. Leslie gives us several comparisons: Michel de Montaigne & Étienne de La Boétie, Vincent van Gogh & Paul Gauguin, and from the sciences, Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky. Each pairing is a soul-defining, inexplicable intertwining of each other’s joy, pain, and inventiveness. We may never have the definition that describes the bond of Lennon & McCartney.
Maybe those words will instead be seen in song.
John and Paul – A Love Story in Songs by Ian Leslie is available April 8 from Celadon Books. Additionally, here is an essay from Leslie in The Guardian that expands on the undefinable intimacy of Lennon and McCartney.
Fascinating, and a great read!