Who do you think is the most popular band of all time? I bet that we all can agree that the band would be none other than the Beatles. They are the best-selling music artists of all time with 183 million units of certified sales. And the incredible part is that they were not even together for more than fifteen years.
All the band members were super-talented musicians which is the reason they were successful even after starting their solo careers. It was really a shame that they could not work out their differences but if they did then surely they would have rocked the world more than they have today.
It is known to all that Michael Jackson is known as the king of pop, likewise, Elvis Presley is known as the king of rock n roll, however, with their short career together the Beatles are the world’s number one best-selling artist pushing back even Jackson and Presley.
And it is also no secret that all the band members of the Beatles could write and sing however, it was Lennon and McCartney’s partnership that they were this successful. So how did their songwriting process work? McCartney has revealed how they used to write songs sitting together in twin beds.
Paul McCartney reveals how he and John Lennon used to write songs
Well, every musician has their own way of writing songs and so did Lennon and McCartney. After Paul released his solo album Flowers in the Dirt in 1989, he appeared on BBC, and in the interview, he revealed how he and Lennon used to write songs, he said that they would sit together in twin beds either in a hotel or somewhere else.
Paul explained, “There are a million ways to write, but the way I always used to write was with John and it would be across from each other, either in a hotel bedroom on the twin beds, with an acoustic guitar and we’re just looking at each other. He’d make up something, I’d make up something and we’d just spin off each other. The nice thing for me is seeing John there, him being right-handed, me being left-handed, it felt to me like I was looking in a mirror.”
So how did their method of songwriting work out for them? well, Paul says, “Obviously, it was very successful. So that was a way I had learned to write and it was the way I liked to write and Elvis [Costello, his new collaborator] was very happy to work like that. So it was like a repeat of that process, and so he was John, basically, and I was Paul.”
It is unfortunate that we can never get new songs from the duo because Lennon was brutally shot to death on December 8, 1980, at The Dakota Apartments in New York, United States. Apparently, it was Lennon’s crazy fan named Mark David Chapman who murdered him. And he said that the reason why he killed John was because of religious conversion. He did not like Lennon’s statement the Beatles are “more popular than Jesus,” and this statement was given in 1966 more than a decade before his death.
However, that does not mean McCartney has no one to work with. He has collaborated with several musicians including Michael Jackson, Elvis Costello, Martin Glover, Kanye West, as well as with Rihanna. However, McCartney has explained no one could be as good as Lennon. He says that his collaboration or partnership with Lennon was the best thing.
He said, “I know I can never have a better collaborator than John. That is just a fact. So I don’t try and escape it. I just know there’s no way I can find someone now who will write better stuff with me than I wrote with John.”
Well, it is clear from McCartney’s words that the best collaborator he has ever had was Lennon. And as mentioned above it’s a shame that we will never get to hear anything new from this legendary duo. However, if Lennon was still alive and if they had collaborated then they would be breaking record after record because that is what this legendary duo is great at doing.
