Paul McCartney and John Lennon Had a ‘Terrifying’ Fight While Recording ‘The White Album’
By the late 1960s, the once close relationship between Paul McCartney and John Lennon had grown threadbare. They argued more frequently, and while their songs were credited to Lennon-McCartney, they mostly wrote separately. The tension between them boiled over one day in the studio. An employee who overheard their argument said the fight was terrifying.
Paul McCartney and John Lennon got into a vicious argument in the studio
Tensions among members of The Beatles were at an all-time high as they recorded The White Album. The frostiness of their dynamic struck everyone who spent time around the band. They were frustrated with one another and, at least for McCartney, Ringo Starr, and George Harrison, Yoko Ono’s constant presence in the studio with them.
According to author Bob Spitz in the book The Beatles: The Biography, McCartney tried to be civil toward Lennon. After a while, though, he snapped.
“I could hear them going at it in the hall and it was terrifying,” an EMI employee recalled. “Paul was positively livid, accusing John of being reckless, childish, sabotaging the group.”
Lennon wasn’t receptive to McCartney’s anger.
“It wasn’t making the least bit of an impression,” the employee said.
Lennon believed that Ono had done nothing to invite The Beatles’ anger. He was not receptive to his bandmate’s feelings on the matter.
John Lennon remained angry with Paul McCartney after The Beatles broke up
Not long after this argument, Lennon told his bandmates that he no longer wanted to be in The Beatles. When they publicly announced their split in 1970, Lennon began airing out his problems with McCartney to the press. Much of his frustration had to do with his treatment of Ono.
“You can quote Paul, it’s probably in the papers, he said it many times at first he hated Yoko and then he got to like her,” Lennon told Rolling Stone in 1971. “But, it’s too late for me. I’m for Yoko. Why should she take that kind of s*** from those people?”
He added that he didn’t think he could forgive McCartney or Harrison.
“Ringo was all right, so was Maureen, but the other two really gave it to us,” Lennon said. “I’ll never forgive them, I don’t care what f***in’ s*** about Hare Krishna and God and Paul with his ‘Well, I’ve changed me mind.’ I can’t forgive ’em for that, really. Although I can’t help still loving them either.”
Paul McCartney and Yoko Ono are on better terms now
While McCartney and Ono didn’t have a great start to their relationship, they have since grown more friendly. McCartney said that he began to better understand her after Lennon’s death.
“I feel I started to get to know her then, to understand what she was going through instead of only my point of view all the time… which I think is part of growing up anyway,” he told Playboy (via Beatles Interviews). “And I think then I was able to find quite a lot of things in common with Yoko.”
These days, they have a much friendlier relationship, with both speaking about the admiration they have for one another.
