The Hills Are Alive

August 24th, 1964 (Bel Air, Los Angeles): John and Paul happily demonstrate a variety of regional British accents for the benefit of Capitol Records’ Jack Wagner. (Note: This is joy. Incidentally, Bob Bonis was also there at the time to take photos of the band; as the interview was taking place with John and Paul sitting together at the piano, George and Ringo were out by the pool hamming it up for the camera.)

WAGNER: Say, can you speak with an American accent, Paul?

PAUL: Can I… no. [laughs]

WAGNER: You can.

PAUL: Yeah, sure, yes yes sir, yessirree, sir!

WAGNER: How about you, John? Do you speak American at all?

JOHN: Here’s one. Yes, hello, how are you? Is that American?

PAUL: More Liverpool, that.

JOHN: More West Coast, I think.

WAGNER: Where is Liverpool? [John and Paul laugh]

PAUL: In the Northern part of England, ‘tis. In fact, London’s at the far South, you see. And Liverpool’s about halfway up, but it’s called the North.

WAGNER: Are you experts on accents?

PAUL: Not really, no.

JOHN: We can recognize them, though, can’t we?

PAUL: [sage-like] We can recognize them anywhere, yes.

WAGNER: How are some of the accents, could you show us?

PAUL: Um, you’ve got the Cockney one, which is all – [cacophony of John and Paul’s voices talking over each other] – yeah, I ‘ad him half an hour ago, John, it’s alright, yeah.

JOHN: Are you alright, Paul?

PAUL: Then the Liverpool accent is a little different, because like, you can’t—

JOHN: Like – [drawling] Paul!

Texting back Paul McCartney, not caring that I’m replying to an automated PR team ploy to make $$$ 😜

👉 Because the Beatles taught me to always embrace whimsy, & I’m just living my best life following their sage advice ✌️🙂‍↕️

Do you think this will be a controversial tour like the Philippines?

—McCartney, by Chris Salewicz (1986)