The Rumour About Paul Mccartney

This little article is to tell you about the "Is PaulSome claimed to have found audio evidence in
McCartney dead?" debate that took place back incertain song tracks, notably in "Revolution 9" and
the 1960s."Helter Skelter" from the White Album by using
Around the late 60s, after the Beatles hadelectronic filtering techniques. The famous run-out
stopped touring as a band, a rumour started goinggroove on Sergeant Pepper was said to contain a
around that Paul McCartney had died, possiblysecret message when played backwards, and the
from a drug overdose, and that the man yousame was said about certain sections of
saw in the pictures and film news footage was a"Revolution 9." The Beatles were known to enjoy
look-alike. One version of the story claimed theexperimenting with reverse over-dubbing, as in,
man was Paul's brother, or his twin brother.for example, the George Harrison guitar solo in
There were various opinions as to why the death"I'm Only Sleeping" from Revolver, so it was
of Paul should have been hushed up, if it werenatural that people would try to look for less
true. Whatever these reasons might be, manyobvious examples.
people claimed to have found hidden clues whichWell, the rumour eventually blew over, as do all
served as evidence to back up the story. Thererumours once they have run out of new evidence
were many of these clues on the Sergeantto support them. One possible explanation is that
Pepper Album, but also elsewhere.the whole thing was some private joke or hoax
Here are some clues from Sergeant Pepper. Onstarted by the band themselves, just for fun. Or
the front cover is a flower bed with the bandperhaps it was giving a more artistic message.
standing behind it, along with pictures of famousBecause before all this happened, the Beatles had
people from history. One of the clusters ofannounced that they had tried the drug LSD, and
flowers is in the shape of a guitar. The shape isPaul described the experience he had as being
that of the unusual "violin bass" that Paul alwaysvery profound. He claimed that he had come face
played on gigs, and it is in the left-handed positionto face with God while under the influence of the
(Paul is famously left-handed.) The idea being thatdrug. This could be viewed as a type of "died and
the flowers look like those on a grave.went to heaven then came back to tell the tale"
The Sergeant Pepper album was one of the firstexperience. In those circumstances, it might well
to be packaged in the "gatefold" format, meaningbe artistically viable to hint at the death of the old
that the cover opened like a book or a gate,self and a birth of the new.
showing a wide angle inside picture. On this picture,The Beatles themselves were never forthcoming
you can clearly see that Paul is wearing on hiswith explanations whenever the media questioned
upper arm a black badge carrying the lettersthem about these speculations. This was quite
O.P.D. These letters are apparently used inright, artists should not need to explain their
hospitals and elsewhere to stand for "Officiallyartistic creation, if it is complete it can stand alone
Pronounced Dead."by itself.
On the back cover picture, Paul is shown facingThe most probable explanation is that all these
away from the viewer while the other members"clues" were just coincidences which people seized
face the camera. On the cover of the Abbeyon and tried to make something out of them
Road album, Paul is the only band member towhich was not really there. It is a familiar media
have bare feet. Some people saw bare feet astrick nowadays, but it was not so common at
symbolic of death.that time.