The Hit Beatles Song That Almost Got Paul McCartney Beaten Up
The Beatles never performed any music intended to offend a group or rile up a crowd. Most of the members were non-violent and advocated for peace worldwide. However, the hit Beatles song “Hey Jude” almost got Paul McCartney beaten up after a particular lyric led to a misunderstanding.
Paul McCartney almost titled ‘Hey Jude’ as ‘Hey Jules’
Paul McCartney wrote “Hey Jude” in 1968, shortly after John Lennon and Cynthia Lennon divorced. In an interview with GQ, the singer-songwriter reveals he wrote the song as a comforting message to Lennon’s son, Julian, who McCartney felt pity for. Initially, he wanted to title the track “Hey Jules” to make the message more direct. However, he later changed it as he thought “Jude” sounded better.
“John and his wife Cynthia had divorced, and I felt a bit sorry for their son, who is now a child of a divorce,” McCartney recalled. “I was driving out to see their son and Cynthia one day, and I was thinking about the boy whose name’s Julian. I started this idea ‘Hey Jules. Don’t make it bad. It’s gonna be ok,’ like a reassurance song. So that was the idea that I got driving out to see them, I saw them, and then I came back and worked on the song some more.”
Paul McCartney was close to getting beat up over the hit Beatles song
The decision to change “Jules” to “Jude” almost turned violent for McCartney. In Germany, “Jude” means “Jew.” This translation made some believe the singer-songwriter was spreading antisemitism. The singer-songwriter revealed he had no idea “Jude” referred to Jewish people, and that was never his intention. However, the misunderstanding almost led to someone fighting him.
“I didn’t realize it meant Jewish, which it does. Actually, I nearly got into trouble because we put it up on a window of a shop. We had a little shop because we were into fashion, would you believe, for a while. On the shop window, we put, ‘Hey Jude,’ so that people going by on the buses would see and say, ‘What’s that?’”
“Well, I got this furious phone call from this guy who was Jewish, and he said, ‘What are you doing? How dare you do this! Hey Jude,’ because in Hitler’s day, in the Nazi thing, ‘Judenraus’ meant ‘Jews out.’ And I didn’t connect. I actually heard the name first in one of the musicals, and I like the name. Anyways, he rings me up and he’s furious. ‘Why are you doing this? Making fun of the Jews! We got enough…’ I said, ‘No, wait a minute. I swear to you it’s nothing like that.’ He said, ‘I’m gonna send my son around to beat you up.’ I said, ‘Hey, baby. Let’s cool it down. Nothing to do with that’… Anyway, I calmed him down. He was cool. And his son didn’t come around to beat me up.”
‘Hey Jude’ is one of The Beatles’ biggest hits
Despite the misinterpretation, “Hey Jude” became one of The Beatles’ biggest hit song after it debuted in 1968. In the U.S., the song peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and remained at the top of the chart for nine weeks. In the U.K., the track also reached No. 1 and remained on the official charts for two weeks.
