Is "John" Our Paul's Real First Name?

In my April 22, 2013 post, I speculated that our Paul's real name might be David Black.  But I thought back to my Beatle fan days beginning in 1964 and how in Detroit we heard that Paul's real first name was JOHN and that he used his middle name, Paul:  1,) to not confuse fans with two Johns in the group; and 2.) because, John, being the founder of the group, should be the one to use his own first name.

Interesting . . . especially when the later claim was that Paul's first name was JAMES, (named after his father), and that the official recording of his first name is listed as JAMES.

In the first two editions of the book, The Beatles:  The Authorized Biography by Hunter Davies, Paul's first name is listed as JOHN.  Both editions (1968 and 1978) were, of course, published after our Paul was--I believe-- removed from the group.

But that detail  I heard as a kid Beatles fan coupled with the information from the book strongly suggest that our Paul's real first name was JOHN.

The Bill Haley Concert in Liverpool---And The Three Pauls

In my post of March 6, 2013, I talked about our Paul and our John's interview in Japan on June 30, 1966 where Paul talks about seeing Bill Haley and his Comets in England for their 1957 tour.  Paul says he was TWELVE when he saw them.  This would put his birth year at 1944 (or, possibly, 1945.)

I was curious to see if anyone writing about Bill Haley talked about Paul, and I found a 1990 book by Bill Haley's eldest son, John W. and co-author John von Hoelle called Sound And Glory that did.  They mention Paul being at a Bill Haley concert:
     "On the 20th. of February, the Comets play to enthusiastic audiences at the Odeon Theater in Liverpool.  Among the hand-clapping, foot-stomping kids were two very special young men; sixteen year old John Lennon and his new buddy Paul McCartney."  (pages 158-159.)

The official story is that real John and real Paul met for the first time on July 6, 1957.  It's possible real Paul and real John went to the concert separately.

But wait!  In a July 14, 2014 Rolling Stone interview, the man who took our Paul's place in late 1966--in other words, the current Paul--said he saw Bill Haley at the Liverpool Odeon in 1957 and was "about 13 or something" at the time.

Remember, real Paul McCartney's birthdate was June 18, 1942 and he would have been 14 not 12 or 13 at the time of the concert.

Twelve-year old our Paul saw Bill Haley but not with John Lennon and--very likely--not in Liverpool.  And as for the longest-lasting Paul?  Who knows?

The British Class System: A 1963 Scholarly Look

So's you don't think I'm unduly dwelling on the popular conception of a reordering of the class structure in England in the 1960's and the stiff class stratification that was the reality in England at that time, I started looking at the scholarly writings concerning the English class system and found a very interesting article by Cambridge University sociologists John H. Goldthorpe and David Lockwood that was published in the Sociological Review (new series), Volume 11, No. 2, July, 1963 called "Affluence and the British Class Structure."

They focused mainly on whether the working class was making any headway in pulling themselves up into the middle class--or whether there was a large glass ceiling in place preventing that.

The researchers looked at three studies of working and middle class attitudes and concluded:
     1.)  "The majority of people have a more or less clearly defined image of their society as being stratified in some way or other; that is to say they are aware of inequalities in the distribution of wealth, prestige and power."  (page 146.)
     2.)  "In particular, there is no firm evidence either that manual workers are consciously aspiring to middle class society, or that this is becoming any more open to them." (my emphasis; page 155.)

On the general values from a working class perspective, Goldthorpe and Lockwood quote working class parents who said that the best job for a son was:  "A trade in the hands" and "A good steady job." (page 147.)

Remember that three of the real Beatles had manual jobs when they first started out:  George worked as an apprentice electrician; Paul got work from the Labour Exchange coiling cables for an electrical firm; Ringo had an apprenticeship at a Liverpool equipment manufacturer.  John did go to art school, but was shifted over into learning lettering which--if he hadn't quit school (or gotten expelled)--would have led to a "good steady" manual office support job.

The article talked about the solidarity of working class people--an "us against them" attitude--that, of course, was expressed clearly by the real John at the Royal Command Performance in November, 1963 and got real Paul and real John ousted from the group.

Other Voices, Part 15: A George Harrison Backtracked Solo Song

George commented in an interview on the backmasking on The Beatles' song, "Rain" and it got me thinking that somewhere in his solo work he would also make a backmasked comment--on Paul.

I listened to "Windows" and "When We Was Fab" with no luck, but I DID find a very interesting backmasked song of his called "Be Here Now".

The song was written in Los Angeles in 1971 and released on George's 1973 solo album, Living In The Material World.

Some of the lyrics are:
     Why try to live a life that isn't real, no how.
     A mind that wants to wander 'round a corner is an un-wise mind.

Remember The Beatles' 1967 song, "Fixing A Hole"?  The parallel lyrics in that song are:
     I'm fixing a hole where the rain gets in
     And stops my mind from wandering
     Where it will go.
   
SO . . . the backmasking on "Be Here Now" consists of George saying the name Paul a minimum of EIGHT times and most interestingly at 0:26-0:30 and 2:39-2:42 in the reversed song, Paul B.

My speculation is that our Paul's real last name began with the letter B, and I think George's song lends credence to that theory.

More On The English Class System

In my post of November 26, 2010, I described our John's comment on the British class system.  Basically, John was making a sarcastic remark on the exploitation of the working class by the ruling class.

The bull that the English media was propounding in the mid-1960's was that the British class system was dissolving under years of "unprecedented prosperity" in England.

The American writer Tom Wolfe went to London at that time and in an essay called "The Noonday Underground" concluded that class stratification was alive and well in England---and the kids knew it:

     "There is hardly a kid in all of England who harbors any sincere hope of advancing himself in any very striking way by success at work.  Englishmen at an early age begin to sense that the fix is in, and all that work does is keep you afloat at the place you were born into."  

The real Beatles were useful to publicly promote the myth.  But at the Royal Command Performance they thumbed their noses at being used by the British ruling class and their media front men to push the myth.  And the two "instigators" of the rebellion--John and Paul--were replaced.

Our Paul and our John stepped into this social-political minefield and our Paul ended up fighting for his life to survive it.

Is "The Trojan Women" Another View of The Beatles' Woes?

In my post of June 11, 2014, I was talking about Jane Asher's role in the 1966 English adaptation of Euripides' play The Trojan Women.  I thought it was an intriguing title, so I read the play and the content was even more intriguing given the woes of The Beatles.

Give it a thought for a minute:  the original Beatles--John Lennon and Paul McCartney--were, I believe, replaced immediately following the Royal Command Performance concert of November 4, 1963.  The real John married Cynthia Powell on August 23, 1962.  The real Paul first met Jane Asher on April 18, 1963.  When the real John and the real Paul were replaced, our John and our Paul acquired the public personas and--publicly--the relationships of the real John and Paul.  I believe that reality was the theme of The Trojan Women.

In ancient times, armies warred and the victors plundered the wealth and captured the people of the vanquished.  The officers of the winning army would divide up the women as they wished:  "marrying" some of the women, making servants of the other women.

Look at the public photos of our Paul and our John--Cynthia and Jane were at their sides at The Beatles' movie premieres; they were together attending plays; they even went on vacations together.

Ronald Duncan who wrote the English version of the play was a pacifist and there is an anti-war element to the play, but the focus was on the despair of the women who survived when their husbands, fathers, sons, etc. were killed by the invading army.

I think Duncan might have had some knowledge of The Beatles' "rotating personnel" and decided to talk about the wife and girlfriend plight through the play.

I think Jane Asher was, in part, playing herself as the character Cassandra.  In the play, Cassandra was to become the concubine of Agamemnon and possibly be secretively wed to him.  Cassandra vows revenge and predicts she will see him killed.  We'll take the action as far as the brink of her being a concubine.  As she goes off stage she says:  "Dong!  Dong!  Toll the wedding bells!"  Which Paul was Cassandra predicting the death of?

The other interesting figure was the character Andromeda.  I think Duncan had an eye toward Cynthia Lennon when he wrote the character's lines.  Andromeda's husband Hector was killed and she had a small son who was killed by the Greeks in the play.  Julian Lennon lived, but part of the "terms of silence" might have been the threat of Cynthia's son dying if she didn't play along.

Jane and Cynthia worked themselves free of what must have seemed like an never-ending nightmare when the third version of Paul and John took over and established lives of their own.

But there was definitely the atmosphere of the ancient conduct toward women and families that I believe Ronald Duncan so deftly converted into a commentary on The Beatles with his adaptation of The Trojan Woman.

Other Voices, Part 14: A Message From Motown?

I heard a Smokey Robinson and The Miracles song last week that interested me because I had never heard it in Detroit (and I grew up there) and because it sounded like it might be about Paul and his song, "Yesterday."

The song is "Yester Love", recorded on December 12, 1967 and released May 13, 1968.  I probably never heard it in Detroit because it was recorded for Motown's European label, Tamla.  Tamla-Motown records were released in England by Parlophone, who recorded The Beatles' records.

Smokey Robinson used his usual wordplay on the word yesterday.  One of the lines of the song reads:       Today I'll be on my way to love my yester love.
Remember Paul's song, "I'll Be On My Way"?

I thought there might be backmasking on "Yesterlove" and, in fact, there is:

     In the reversed song at:
0:08-0:18:  Say goodbye to me (x3)
1:06-1:12:  Say goodbye to me (x2)
1:36-1:43   Say goodbye to Mickey (x2)

This isn't Smokey Robinson wanting to say goodbye to The Miracles, because, from what I've read, he didn't start wanting to retire from performing until 1969.  And, true, he doesn't say Paul, but because they released it on the Tamla label meant for an English audience, it might have been a message about the real Paul and our Paul.


Note: To let people know that The Miracles wanted people to understand there was intentional backmasking on the song, the beginning chords on the reversed song are the same as the ending chords on the forward song:   a clever way to alert people of the backmasking.