John Lennon had plenty of thoughts about Paul McCartney‘s post-Beatles music, not all of them positive.
While he would allegedly be a fan of Coming Up, the McCartney II single, Lennon had some choice words for his ex-bandmate when it came to recording the final two Beatles albums. Speaking with Playboy in 1980, shortly before his death, Lennon shared an unconfirmed theory on who Get Back was about. The Beatles’ single, which had Don’t Let Me Down on its B-side, features McCartney on lead vocals. He made it clear the song was about Yoko Ono, Lennon alleged in an interview given shortly before his death. Both Lennon and Ono would suggest that the “Get back to where you once belonged” line was aimed at Ono, whose presence in the studio had proven controversial with other members of the band.
Ono said: “Even now, I just read that Paul said, ‘I understand that he wants to be with her, but why does he have to be with her all the time?’ He said it recently. I mean, what happened with John is like, I sort of went to bed with this guy that I liked and suddenly the next morning, I see these three in-laws, standing there.”
Ono presumably means George Harrison, Ringo Starr, and McCartney when she mentions the “three in-laws.” Lennon went a step further and suggested that McCartney had intended Get Back as a dig at Ono. He explained: “I’ve always thought there was this underlying thing in Paul’s ‘Get Back.’ When we were in the studio recording it, every time he sang the line ‘Get back to where you once belonged,’ he’d look at Yoko.”
Lennon was then asked if he was “kidding” about such a theory, to which he replied: “No. But maybe he’ll say I’m paranoid.” McCartney would also receive barbed comments from Lennon regarding his post-Beatles work with Wings.
He said: “They want to hold on to something they never had in the first place. Anybody who claims to have some interest in me as an individual artist or even as part of the Beatles has absolutely misunderstood everything I ever said if they can’t see why I’m with Yoko.
“And if they can’t see that, they don’t see anything. They’re just jacking off to… it could be anybody. Mick Jagger or somebody else. Let them go jack off to Mick Jagger, OK? I don’t need it.”
Lennon went on to ask for fans who wanted more similar-sounding records to simply leave him alone rather than pressure him into making music they had already heard before. The veteran songwriter went on to use Wings as an example of what fans should obsess about instead of him.
He added: “I absolutely don’t need it. Let them chase Wings. Just forget about me. If that’s what you want, go after Paul or Mick. I ain’t here for that. If that’s not apparent in my past, I’m saying it in black and green, next to all the tits and asses on page 196. Go play with the other boys. Don’t bother me. Go play with the Rolling Wings.”
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