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[Paul McCartney about John Lennon, 1994]

In 1971, John Lennon released the song "How Do You Sleep?", which contained direct attacks on Paul, including aggressive lines like "The only thing you done was 'Yesterday'."

Years later, McCartney explained that he did not want to engage in a public exchange of insults and ultimately let the provocation slide.

[The Beatles Anthology, 1995]

Lennon: 'The Life’ - Phillip Norman, page 299 (via goddamnthebeatles)

Young Paul McCartney holding his 35mm Pentax camera during the peak of Beatlemania in early 1964.

John Lennon and Paul McCartney in Paris in late September 1961, during a holiday trip they took together to celebrate John's 21st birthday.

Paul: "He must have been fond of me to spend that money. He let me have all the banana milkshakes I wanted."

On one McCartney photo, Lennon scribbled the words, "I'm always perfect" as coming from McCartney's mouth. He drew a Hitler-style moustache on another photo of McCartney. In an entry noting McCartney's marriage to Linda Eastman, Lennon crossed out "wedding" and wrote "funeral".

According to accounts based on Cynthia's memories and inner circles, she heard an old audio recording of a band rehearsal, recorded on a cassette tape long before they achieved worldwide fame. On this tape, John Lennon called for Paul McCartney repeatedly: "Paul... Paul..." What impressed Cynthia the most was not the words themselves, but the tone of voice used by John. She described that he sounded in a "strangely subservient and pleading" (or vulnerable) way. Upon witnessing this moment focused purely on the dynamics between the two, Cynthia went on to comment in later conversations: "I knew there was something going on there. From his [John's] point of view, not necessarily Paul's".

This photo shows Paul McCartney and John Lennon at Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's ashram in Rishikesh, India, in 1968. The image was taken by Pattie Boyd, who was traveling with the band and taking part in the famous Transcendental Meditation retreat.

Pattie Boyd: "I've got one shot of Paul and John sitting together. John is just looking at Paul and Paul is making some sort of face and I just wish I knew what they'd be saying. But something, there's something going on!"

I didn't mention this in the book, but from time to time John would say to me, "What do you think Paul is thinking right now?" I'd say, "John, I've only met the man a couple of times in my life. You know, I've never had any in-depth conversations with him. I have no idea, dude."

Then John would ask, "Do you think he thinks about me at all?" That question always made me sad, and my knee-jerk response was, "I'm sure he does. I'm sure he does." Then he would move on. But I think that his curiosity about Paul McCartney, I'm not going to call it an obsession, was always present.

The Magnificent Others podcast, 2025

(John was spiked with LSD) "I thought, maybe this is the moment where I should take a trip with him… It was my first [acid] trip with John, or any of the guys."

"You’re looking into each other’s eyes, and you would want to look away, but you wouldn’t, and you could see yourself in the other person."

This experience took place in 1967. That year, while recording the song "Getting Better" for the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album, John accidentally took LSD after mistaking it for a stimulant. Concerned about his friend and aware of what was happening, Paul took John back to his house after the studio session. It was there that Paul decided to join him and take LSD for the first time, leading to the intense visual experience in which they gazed deeply into each other's eyes. That moment of vulnerability ultimately strengthened both their friendship and their artistic partnership in a profound way.

Interview by David Sheff, September 1980

(About McCartney) LENNON: "Really talked to him, no, that's the operative word. I haven't really talked to him in ten years. Because I haven't spent time with him. I've been doing other things and so has he. You know, he's got 25 kids and about 20,000,000 records out. How can he spend time talking? He's always working."

McLennon Funfacts #1

"I Don’t Know (Johnny, Johnny)" is an unreleased demo from John Lennon and Paul McCartney, likely recorded around April 1960 at Paul’s house on Forthlin Road in Liverpool. It’s an informal, partly improvised blues/jam number not included on any official Beatles releases.

February 23, 1965 — Bahamas

The Beatles: Photo History.