When we think of the Liverpool, U.K.-born band the Beatles today, we likely think of two things: great music and the group’s unfortunate break-up.
Videos by American Songwriter
By the time the Beatles were done, none of the members were even 30 years old. Everything happened so quickly and then—poof! Even the Beatles’ former-co-frontman, Paul McCartney, felt some heaviness in his heart when thinking about the group as of late.
Well, that all might have changed, at least a bit.
McCartney spoke to the British paper, The Sunday Times, over the weekend after watching the upcoming three-part docu-series, The Beatles: Get Back, which is directed by the Oscar-winning Peter Jackson and arrives on Disney+ during the Thanksgiving weekend. “I’ll tell you what is really fabulous about [the documentary series], it shows the four of us having a ball,” McCartney said.
“It was so reaffirming for me. That was one of the important things about The Beatles, we could make each other laugh,” he added. “John and I are in this footage doing ‘Two of Us,’ and for some reason, we’ve decided to do it like ventriloquists. It’s hilarious. It just proves to me that my main memory of the Beatles was the joy and the skill.”
Speaking about the idea that he was the one who broke the band up, or that the lineage of the Beatles is a negative one, McCartney said the documentary series helped him get over that.
“And there is proof in the footage. Because I definitely bought into the dark side of the Beatles breaking up and thought, ‘God, I’m to blame,’” he said. “It’s easy when the climate is going that way, to think that. But at the back of my mind, there was this idea that it wasn’t like that. I just needed to see proof.”
As for the idea that Lennon’s wife, Yoko Ono, was the one to blame, the former Lord of the Rings director said that wasn’t the case either.
“Yoko didn’t break them up,” Jackson said to The Sunday Times. “There’s no doubt her presence in the studio is weird, but she does not interfere. She is very respectful sitting there writing or reading.”
On Friday (November 12), Disney+ released a new clip from the upcoming documentary series. In the 90-second clip, we can see the Mop Tops rehearse the song “I’ve Got A Feeling” from their inimitable LP Let It Be. That’s the album that Jackson’s docu-series centers on, the making of the record, and the relationship amongst the band members while doing so.
