Anyone who toils in the arts knows that it’s almost impossible to avoid incidental thefts. Frankly, it’s arguably impossible to create something truly original. However, that is a philosophical debate for another time. Contrary to incidental thefts, there are very deliberate ones as well. And surprisingly, one musician to perform a deliberate intellectual theft is none other than The Beatles’ Paul McCartney.
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Now, you are probably thinking, “Why in the world does Paul McCartney need to steal a song?” Well, he doesn’t. But, there was one opportunity he simply could not pass up. And luckily, the lyrical theft amounted to an incredibly successful Beatles classic.
Paul McCartney Once Stole an Age-Old Victorian Classic
In an episode of his podcast Paul McCartney: A Life In Lyrics, McCartney candidly divulged how and why he stole the lyrics for the classic Beatles song, “Golden Slumbers”.
“That chorus that I’ve used as a chorus, literally, is the lyrics to an old Victorian song,” McCartney admitted.
He was then asked, “Is this what we call sampling?” McCartney bluntly replied, “Well, it’s called stealing.”
On the surface, this seems rather nefarious and immoral, and to an extent it certainly is. However, that is the name of the game, and McCartney is not alone. However, the former Beatle did have a somewhat justifiable reason for lifting the song’s lyrics. He tried to justify his act by stating that he couldn’t read music.
“I don’t read music,” he admitted. “I didn’t know what the melody that went with this was. [I] put my own melody to it and just took these words.”
In a way, it seems the only way Paul McCartney could write “Golden Slumbers” effectively was by stealing the song’s lyrics. Even though this is certainly a frowned-upon practice, McCartney seemingly knew he could get away with the robbery given the age of the song and its obscurity. The specific old song McCartney stole from is still unknown to this day, at least to the public.
McCartney doesn’t need any help when songwriting, but it seems this lyrical theft really gave him the creative edge he needed to complete “Golden Slumbers”. Released in 1969 on The Beatles’ final album Abbey Road, “Golden Slumbers” remains an epic staple on The Beatles’ grand farewell. Even if McCartney did commit a tiny wrongdoing, who cares? The world of music and Beatlemania has heavily benefited from his slightly nefarious action.
Photo by Jim Dyson/Getty Images
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