I was asking around about ideas for my radio show, and someone suggested a “Paul is Dead” show. I think I’m going to do it Tuesday–explain the story and play the songs with the supposed “clues”, maybe even some of the backmasked audio.
I have a pretty good idea of what I want to do, but I thought I’d throw it open to the Beatles nerds. (You know who you are.) I’ll post the link and everything before the show Tuesday night.
Where to start …
Day in the Life … He didn’t notice that the lights had changed … Paul’s Car Crash.
“I buried Paul” at the end of Strawberry Fields (even though it really says “Cranberry Sauce”)
“Number Nine” played backward says, “Turn Me On Dead Man”
“The Walrus was Paul,” common knowledge of course that the Walrus represents the dead.
The cover of Abbey Road … George dressed as the grave digger, Ringo dressed as the mortician, John dressed as the minister, and of course Paul as the corpse, shoeless, out of step with the others, holding a cigarette in his right hand (obviously an impostor as Paul is left handed).
The grave on the cover of Sgt Pepper with the bass guitar.
The hand over Paul’s head on Sgt Pepper.
The fact that Paul is the only Beatle not facing the camera on the back of Sgt Pepper.
I could go on all night.
Oh, I could play this game all night too. But it still gives me the willies, even after 39 years.
You could just get a copy of Andru Reeves’ book. Or visit one of the several websites.
Also from the Abbey Road cover - the Volkswagon with the License Plate number 28 IF (he had lived).
Also from Sgt. Pepper - George (I think) is pointing to a lyric from She’s Leaving Home: “Wednesday morning at five o’clock”, supposedly when the accident occurred.
The song “Baby you can drive my car” is about how the other Beetles are giving away Paul’s car, because he died.
Yeah, but this is more fun.
On the playlist:
“She’s Leaving Home” (as it apparently happened “Wednesday Morning at five o’clock…”)
“A Day in the Life” (“He didn’t notice that the lights had changed…”)
“SPLHCB” / “A Little Help From My Friends” (“The one and only Billy Shears” will “get by with a little help from his friends”)
“Strawberry Fields Forever”, with extra clips from the end
“I Am the Walrus”
“Glass Onion”
“Come Together” (“he say, one and one and one is three…”)
I’ll finish with Lennon’s “How Do You Sleep?” (“Those freaks was right when they said you was dead…”)
Plenty more to come.
From With a Little Help From My Friends–“Billy Shears”=“Billy’s here.” Paul’s supposed double was a man named Billy.
ETA: and I didn’t see DoctorJ’s post…
One of my personal favorite clues is that if you hold the cover of Sgt. Pepper’s up to a mirror so that the words “Lonely Hearts” on the drum are half-covered, the word “HEARTS” becomes “HE DIE” with an arrow pointing to Paul in between the two words.
On the cover of Sgt Peppers, the yellow flowers in the shape of a guitar are really spelling out “PAUL?”. That’s proof right there.
Beatles!
You have to dedicate a moment to who supposedly replaced Paul on the later Beatles recordings: Klaus Voorman. This will require spotlighting every bass line from Manfred Mann to compare and contrast Voorman with Mccartney.
And there’s so much history, too! Klaus was dating Astrid Kirchherr when they met the Beatles in Hamburg. Astrid falls in love with Stu Sutcliffe, Stu dies a tragic and untimely death. I always wondered if it was just a coincidence that Klaus seems to have picked up the bass after losing his lover to a bass player. But maybe he picked up the bass because of Paul’s influence! Thus it all comes full circle.
Any discussion of the false fab four fatality must certainly mention the infamous “Dirk is Dead” controversy. It is truly a legend that will last a lunchtime,
Time to dig out my old copy of “Sgt. Rutters!”
Comic nerds of a certain age will recognize the inverted myth in a late 60s DC comic - I think it was a Batman stoy - in which rumor circulates that one of the moptopped members of a hugely popular four-man rock band had died and been replaced by a double. Don’t remember why Batman (or whichever DC character) was investigating, but the twist ending was that he discovered the supposed “dead” member was the only real one, and he had been covering for the death of the other three. I remember being fairly intrigued at the time.
It was definitely an issue of BATMAN comics. I owned it as a lad.
Other mass media fun:
The issue of LIFE magazine the covered the hoax? If you held the cover up to the light, an advertisement on the inside showed the top of Paul’s head chopped off, and an automobile crossed over his chest.
MAD magazine’s Frank Jacobs:
Ringo, Paul, George and John
Played a trick and put us on.
Dropped hints that Paul was dead as nails
And rocketed their record sales!
On the inside of the Sgt Pepper album, Paul is wearing a armpath that says OPD - clearly an indication that he had been Officially Pronounced Dead.
That or it was an Ontario Police Department armpatch.
::nitpick::
Actually, if you rearrange the letters in “Sgt Rutter’s Only Darts Club Band”, it spells out “Stig has been dead for ages, honestly”.
Just bumping this up because the show is tonight (10/14)! I even have a bunch of audio clips from the show F. Lee Bailey did exploring the mystery.
7-10EST. You can stream it here. The “Paul is Dead” portion will probably start at 8:00, but I’ll have some great new stuff to play before then! (Dept. of Eagles, Mt. Eerie, Lucinda Williams, the Rosebuds, Marnie Stern, and more!)
Here is the Facebook page for the show, so join it (and add me!) if you do that sort of thing.