An Accidentally Accurate Rumor: Paul McCartney Dies In 1969.

Glass Onion

I was rereading Norton's thread about what might have happened if Paul McCartney had actually died in 1966, and that got me thinking about a rather morbid idea. What if in the time period when that rumor was spreading Paul McCartney actually died? I'm not sure how something like that would happen, but if we want to be really convergent let's say it happens in a car accident. This occurs after Abbey Road has already been completed and released. So around September 1969 or so.

What happens next? How does Lennon and the rest of the group react to McCartney's death?

How is McCartney viewed in the present day?
 
Emperor Norton I

Emperor Norton I

Name drop, yay!:D

Is the OTL "Paul is Dead" rumor still spread before the incident, or does this accident intercept that before it's spread?
 

The Dude

Banned
Yoko Ono laughs and rubs her hands together, readying herself to carry our the rest of her plan. First, she cut the brakes in Paul's car. Then, she slipped something in Jimi Hendrix's drinks. Finally, she suggested that Bob Dylan buy a motorcycle. All according to plan......
 

Glass Onion

Emperor Norton I said:
Name drop, yay!:D

Is the OTL "Paul is Dead" rumor still spread before the incident, or does this accident intercept that before it's spread?
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Let's say it's begun to spread but it hasn't yet reached it's height. The death occurs before "Paul is dead'' reaches the radio, since the death happens sometime in September 1969. So it's after the Harper article, but before the radio call in thing.
 

maverick

Banned
Paul McCartney is the saintly guy who sung love songs and all and John Lennon is remembered as the hippie drug addict slacker who brought Yoko Ono and killed Paul.

Maybe.

I was just going with the simple "switch their roles" idea so I thought that Dead Paul would be remembered fondly as a genius or something, like Lennon is today.

Paul doesn't have the benefit of Lennon's post-Beatles activism, though, so he'd be remembered by girl who fall in love with his love songs rather than with Lennon's annoying Hippie peace-activism "Imagine Giving Peace a Change in Ireland for the Irish" memory.
 

Glass Onion

You're probably right that McCartney would be seen as a genius. He's the man behind Pepper after all, to a greater extent than Lennon ever was. He is also remembered basically as "The lead Beatle" with the others pushed to the side to an extent. Lennon probably still has a pretty good reputation, since McCartney does in OTL. Overall Paul is thought of in much better light critically, simply because he doesn't have a problematic solo career. He's died at the absolute height of his creative powers, or at least what I see as that height.

On Lennon, it is odd that he's mostly remembered for the peace stuff. In my opinion the whole "St. John Prince of Peace" angle doesn't actually give Lennon that much credit, since it makes the area's in his life where he was clearly talented completely incidental. Personally I like him for his songwriting generally. His activism was an important part of his life-but it wasn't the whole thing. He was first and foremost from our standpoint a singer songwriter/writer/performer and in so far as he should be remembered he ought to be remembered for that rather than simply for his opposition to the Vietnam War/British actions in Northern Ireland.
 
Emperor Norton I

Emperor Norton I

If you'd like a nice, if brief, documentary on where the "Paul is Dead" myth came from, there's a Dutch documentary called "Who Buried Paul McCartney". I'll link pt. 1, and you can go from there. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqBf6iNPVOg

Overall, if Paul is dead, I don't expect the Beatles to carry on. It seems to me like there'd be a weight here added on to the other weights (fame, bickering, feeling like the band was dying already) that would just finally break the camel's back. The Beatles barely finished Get Back/Let it Be as it was (In the OTL, they pretty much abandoned the sessions and turned it over to various people who could take the scrap and complete something); this could see the project abandoned totally without any album following. Maybe some singles out of the finished material, especially related to McCartney's finished songs, but not an album.

There's an interesting side of this too, if I'm correct and the source I heard this from is correct (granted, its a "Paul is Dead" source, but there may be historical accuracy here): It's that, when people were told the rumor that McCartney was actually killed in a car accident, a lot of artists released songs memorializing Paul McCartney because they thought he was dead, and there were blocks of programing dedicated to it for a little while. For example, Terry Knight's "Saint Paul" (linked; this was actually released a short time before the "Paul is Dead" rumor took off). There's more than that; it's somewhere in the middle of the documentary "The Winged Beatle". If true, that's a good indicator of the reaction you'd get in the OTL and it could balloon.

Another interesting side to this is how it'd meld into the "Paul is Dead" rumor where he died in 1966 if that rumor is out of the bag but still not mainstream; maybe some rationalization that all that happened, but the replacement Paul McCartney felt so guilty that he committed suicide or that he was going to reveal the truth but the others had him killed or something like that.
 

Glass Onion

Emperor Norton I said:
If you'd like a nice, if brief, documentary on where the "Paul is Dead" myth came from, there's a Dutch documentary called "Who Buried Paul McCartney". I'll link pt. 1, and you can go from there. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqBf6iNPVOg

Overall, if Paul is dead, I don't expect the Beatles to carry on. It seems to me like there'd be a weight here added on to the other weights (fame, bickering, feeling like the band was dying already) that would just finally break the camel's back. The Beatles barely finished Get Back/Let it Be as it was (In the OTL, they pretty much abandoned the sessions and turned it over to various people who could take the scrap and complete something); this could see the project abandoned totally without any album following. Maybe some singles out of the finished material, especially related to McCartney's finished songs, but not an album.

There's an interesting side of this too, if I'm correct and the source I heard this from is correct (granted, its a "Paul is Dead" source, but there may be historical accuracy here): It's that, when people were told the rumor that McCartney was actually killed in a car accident, a lot of artists released songs memorializing Paul McCartney because they thought he was dead, and there were blocks of programing dedicated to it for a little while. For example, Terry Knight's "Saint Paul" (linked; this was actually released a short time before the "Paul is Dead" rumor took off). There's more than that; it's somewhere in the middle of the documentary "The Winged Beatle". If true, that's a good indicator of the reaction you'd get in the OTL and it could balloon.

Another interesting side to this is how it'd meld into the "Paul is Dead" rumor where he died in 1966 if that rumor is out of the bag but still not mainstream; maybe some rationalization that all that happened, but the replacement Paul McCartney felt so guilty that he committed suicide or that he was going to reveal the truth but the others had him killed or something like that.
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I think Abbey Road probably still gets released. It was released on September 26 1969. Sure that might be after Paul's death, but I think the production was already well underway. The actual recording was finished so I think that George Martin get's that finished. If the release is after McCartney's death then it's probably dedicated to Paul.

I'm divided on the Get Back/Let it Be issue. On the one hand their might be a desire to get Paul's work out there as you say but I think they were pretty sick of that tape. I wonder if there would be a desire to release all of McCartney's unreleased imput, including Junk and Teddy Boy? Even if there's no Let it Be album it's possible most of those songs could end up in singles if McCartney's material is released. I Me Mine is straight out because that song wasn't entirely finished as I recall.

After all, Get Back/Don't Let Me Down had already been released And Let it Be is probably still turned into a single albeit without McCartney's supervision.

There was already a version of Across the Universe so we can cross that off the "Let it Be" list. I think we can also remove "Dig it" and "Maggie May" if there's no album. Deleting "Get Back" "Let it Be" "Dig it" "Maggie May" "I me Mine" "Across the Universe" reduces the song count to six songs. 3 of which are McCartney songs or at least half McCartney in the case of I've Got a Feeling.

Of course if they are willing to get singles together it might mean they're really to actually make an album. But there's at least an opportunity for at least three extra McCartney singles maybe as many as four if there's a Junk/Teddy Boy single.

Perhaps "Paul is dead" Morphs into "The Beatles predicted Paul's death"?
 

blackmath

The James Bond film Live and Let Die will need someone else for the soundtrack. Maybe I'm Amazed will not be played TO DEATH, the John Lennon song "How Do You Sleep" will have a whole new meaning, and we will never have to see a gifted photographer try and play keyboards and sing for some reason...

Seriously though, the Beatles would have broken up. Paul was really the only member of the band that wanted to keep going by this point, so his death would have just sped up the inevitable.
 

Glass Onion

blackmath said:
The James Bond film Live and Let Die will need someone else for the soundtrack. Maybe I'm Amazed will not be played TO DEATH, the John Lennon song "How Do You Sleep" will have a whole new meaning, and we will never have to see a gifted photographer try and play keyboards and sing for some reason...

Seriously though, the Beatles would have broken up. Paul was really the only member of the band that wanted to keep going by this point, so his death would have just sped up the inevitable.
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If Lennon isn't angry at Paul McCartney for "Too Many People" and other subtle attacks in Ram, "How Do You Sleep" never gets written. Maybe I'm Amazed might still be played to death. I think McCartney was working on his solo album in the time period in question If I'm remembering things correctly. If "Maybe I'm Amazed" is the last song McCartney gets relatively finished it might very well be played to death. And yes Live and Let Die is much more forgettable.
 
Emperor Norton I

Emperor Norton I

I do think the effects on history after Paul McCartney dies deserves some further discussion. For example, McCartney was the most successful Beatle after the break up, and -at least after John Lennon's death- the most recognized. Perhaps, for lack of McCartney, some of that is spread around due to that void.

Also, no Wings.:(
 

Orville_third

Banned
There would also be no "Back Off Boogaloo".
Some would no doubt consider Paul to have been killed of either as part of a satanic sacrifice ritual (by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the British Royal family or someone else), a US (or UK or Irish or Swedish or Soviet) government conspiracy or both.
 

Glass Onion

Emperor Norton I said:
I do think the effects on history after Paul McCartney dies deserves some further discussion. For example, McCartney was the most successful Beatle after the break up, and -at least after John Lennon's death- the most recognized. Perhaps, for lack of McCartney, some of that is spread around due to that void.

Also, no Wings.:(
Click to expand...

I'm admittedly not as knowledgeable about McCartney's solo career as I am about Lennon's. But as far as I know the line up of the Wings revolved around McCartney, his wife, and Denny Laine. Without Paul, I don't think Linda goes into music. Though maybe I'm misreading her character. Denny Laine might still have a successful career in the seventies. He was already involved in the music business by the time he joined with Paul McCartney. So perhaps in the seventies we see a Denny Laine centered group?
 
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