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mclennonlgbt · 2 days

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Paris in John and Paul’s life

30th September 1961:

“John and I went on a trip for his twenty-first birthday. John was from a very middle-class family, which really impressed me because everyone else was from working-class families. To us John was upper class. His relatives were teachers, dentists, even someone up in Edinburgh in the BBC. It’s ironic, he was always very ‘fuck you!’ and he wrote the song ‘Working Class Hero’ – in fact, he wasn’t at all working class. Anyway, one of John’s relatives gave him £100 for his birthday. A hundred smackers in your hand! That was a real windfall. None of us could believe it. To this day if you gave me £100 I would be impressed. And I was his mate, enough said? ‘Let’s go on holiday.’ – ‘You mean me too? With the hundred quid? Great! I’m part of this windfall.’” - Paul McCartney, Anthology

“We planned to hitchhike to Spain. I had done a spot of hitchhiking with George and we knew you had to have a gimmick; we had been turned down so often and we’d seen that guys that had a gimmick (like a Union Jack round them) had always got the lifts. So I said to John, ‘Let’s get a couple of bowler hats.’ It was showbiz creeping in. We still had our leather jackets and drainpipes – we were too proud of them not to wear them, in case we met a girl; and if we did meet a girl, off would come the bowlers. But for lifts we would put the bowlers on. Two guys in bowler hats – a lorry would stop! Sense of Humour. This, and the train, is how we got to Paris. - Paul McCartney, Anthology

“And Paul and I also did the same thing, once. We just cancelled. We’d made it, in Liverpool. We were making good money, for those days. I can’t remember what it was – maybe a couple of hundred dollars a week – but enough that you’d have a little extra. You’d have it in your back pocket. And Paul and I just— A relative of mine gave me a hundred pounds, for my birthday, which I’d never seen that much money in me life. Paul and I just canceled all the engagements, and left for Paris… And George was furious, because he needed the money – to work, you know. But that was another time when the group was in debate as whether it would exist or not.” - John Lennon, 1976, an interview with Elliot Mintz

“Last night I heard that John and Paul have gone to Paris to play together – in other words, the band has broken up! It sounds mad to me, I don’t believe it…” - Stuart Sutcliffe, Anthology

“We’d never been there before. We were a bit tired so we checked into a little hotel for the night, intending to go off hitchhiking the next morning. Of course, it was too nice a bed after having hitched so we said, ‘We’ll stay a little longer,’ then we thought, ‘God, Spain is a long way, and we’d have to work to get down there.’ We ended up staying the week in Paris – John was funding it all with his hundred quid.

We would walk miles from our hotel; you do in Paris. We’d go to a place near the Avenue des Anglais and we’d sit in the bars, looking good. I still have some classic photos from there. Linda loves one where I am sitting in a gendarme’s mac as a cape and John has got his glasses on askew and his trousers down revealing a bit of Y-front. The photographs are so beautiful, we’re really hamming it up. We’re looking at the camera like, ‘Hey, we are artsy guys, in a café: this is us in Paris,’ and we felt like that.

We went up to Montmartre because of all the artists, and the Folies Bergères, and we saw guys walking around in short leather jackets and very wide pantaloons. Talk about fashion! This was going to kill them when we got back. This was totally happening. They were tight to the knee and then they flared out; they must have been about fifty inches around the bottom and our drainpipe trousers were something like fifteen or sixteen inches. We saw these trousers and said, ‘Excusez-moi, Monsieur, où did you get them?’ It was a cheap little rack down the street so we bought a pair each, went back to the hotel, put them on, went out on the street – and we couldn’t handle it: ‘Do your feet feel like they are flapping? Feel more comfortable in me drainies, don’t you?’ So it was back to the hotel at a run, needle and cotton out and we took them in to a nice sixteen with which we were quite happy. And then we met Jürgen Vollmer on the street. He was still taking pictures." - Paul McCartney, Anthology

“Jürgen had a flattened-down hairstyle with a fringe in the front, which we rather took to. We went over to his place and there and then he cut – hacked would be a better word – our hair into the same style.” - John Lennon, 1963

Interviewer: I heard you took a trip to Spain before once, didn’t you? On Holiday? Paul: I didn’t go to Spain, no. I tried once to make Spain but… and John and I were gonna hitchhike. We hitchhiked down from Liverpool… We didn’t hitchhike. No, we got the train down from Liverpool ‘cause we thought we won’t hitchhike down the first bit. And we got the boat over to Paris. Then we got the train into Paris ‘cause we thought: “Well, it’ll be too hard to get a hitch here”. And we just stayed in Paris all week. And eventually… I mean, all the time trying to get out of Paris and make Spain! We never made it, we just flew home at the end. What a lazy hitchhiking Holiday!

“The thing was all the kissing and holding that was going on in Paris. And it was so romantic just to be there and see them even though I was 21 and sort of not romantic. But I really loved it, the way the people would just stand under a tree kissing. And they weren’t not mauling at each other, they were just kissing.” - John Lennon

As was written in this post: That last picture is one Paul took of John sleeping in Paris. From what I remember of a performance he did of ‘Here Today’, and earlier comments, this picture hangs framed on a wall in Paul’s house.

Unconfirmed quote (may or may not be true):

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

In January 1964, only a few scant weeks before the Beatles took America by storm, the band mates settled in for an extended stay in Paris. For the group, the Parisian visit proved to be a magical experience, with the Beatles playing 18 shows at the Olympia Theatre between Jan. 16 and Feb. 4 (source).

The photo Paul took of John (in the "Eyes Of The Storm" book):

1969:

Hoping to get married in France, John Lennon and Yoko Ono flew to Paris on this day [16th March].

The couple had decided to marry on 14 March 1969, two days after the wedding of Paul McCartney to Linda Eastman; whether it was in response to this event on some level is open to conjecture.

On McCartney’s wedding day Lennon and Ono were travelling to Poole in Dorset, where he introduced her to his Aunt Mimi. During the journey he asked his chauffeur Les Anthony to go to Southampton to enquire about the possibility of the wedding being held at sea, on the cross-channel ferry to France.

(source)

“On March 12, Paul married Linda Eastman at Marylebone Register Office in London, amid scenes of hysterical grief from his female fans. None of the other Beatles was present. The news reached John as he and Yoko were driving down to visit Aunt Mimi in Poole. Yoko’s divorce decree had become final a few weeks earlier, and, in a resurgence of Beatle copycat, John told her they, too, must get married as soon as possible” - Philip Norman, John Lennon: The Life (2008)

"We chose Gibraltar because it is quiet, British and friendly. We tried everywhere else first. I set out to get married on the car ferry and we would have arrived in France married, but they wouldn’t do it. We were no more successful with cruise ships. We tried embassies, but three weeks’ residence in Germany or two weeks’ in France were required." - John Lennon

1974:

“After a late lunch, Linda launched into a long paean to the joys of living in England. When she was finished, she turned to John and said, “Don’t you miss England?”

“Frankly,” John replied, “I miss Paris.””

— May Pang, Loving John (1983)

1978:

Wings album "London Town" is released. It includes the song "Cafe on the Left Bank", the lyrics of which clearly refer to John and Paul's trip to Paris.

Late 1970s: John is singing to Paul about Paris in a home recording.

1994 - Paul inducting John to Rock and Roll Hall of Fame:

“And then on your 21st birthday you got £100 off one of your rich relatives up in Edinburgh, so we decided we’d go to Spain. So we hitch-hiked out of Liverpool. And we got as far as Paris, and decided to stop there for a week. And eventually got our haircut, by a fellow named Jürgen, and that ended up being the ‘Beatle haircut’.”

I also remember watching an interview with Paul about his album "Memory Almost Full" (2007). Interviewer: There is a very beautiful song called "The End Of The End", the way you talk about your whole ending, and the lyric goes: "It's a start of a journey to a much better place." You mean, better than England? Paul: It's basically a start of a journey to France. Or Spain through France. Yeah, that's what it is. It's a much better place, Paris. (unfortunately, I don't have a link)

Also worth mentoning:

"All You Need Is Love" begins with La Marseillaise.

"Picasso's Last Words (Drink To Me)" contains French-language speech by BBC broadcaster Pierre Le Sève.

#mclennon #mclennon is real #mclennon anthology #paris #frankly i miss paris #may pang #yoko ono #linda eastman #the beatles #gay #bisexual #france #insane #compilation #master post

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us-costco-official · 1 month

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‘we need more problematic women’ you guys couldn’t handle yoko ono

#silly #mainly #yoko ono #i love her dude…#from the shelves of costco #the beatles #beatles #meep

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johns-prince · 5 months

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“I’m sure that if [Paul] had been a woman or something, he would have been a great threat, because there’s something definitely very strong with me, John, and Paul.”

— Yoko Ono, Revolution Tape, June 4th 1968. [x]

“. . . I mean, I think really what it was, really all that happened was that John fell in love. With Yoko. And so, with such a powerful alliance like that, it was difficult for him to still be seeing me. It was as if I was another girlfriend, almost. Our relationship was a strong relationship. And if he was to start a new relationship, he had to put this other one away. And I understood that. I mean, I couldn’t stand in the way of someone who’d fallen in love. You can’t say, “Who’s this?” You can’t really do that. If I was a girl, maybe I could go out and… But you know I mean in this case I just sort of said, right – I mean, I didn’t say anything, but I could see that was the way it was going to go, and that Yoko would be very sort of powerful for him. So um, we all had to get out the way.”

— Paul McCartney, interview with German tv program Exclusiv, April 1985. [x]

“It’s just handy to fuck your best friend… and once I resolved the fact that it was a woman as well, it’s all right. I liked her cause she was like a bloke in drag… like a mate.”

— John Lennon talking about Yoko Ono - Powers of Two by Joshua Wolf Shenk. [x]

“I still think at the back of John’s mind was this fascination of wanting to get back with the first girlfriend, if you like, and that was to get back with Paul, who he had so much history with.”

— Tony Barrow, The Beatles’ press officer, on the Lennon/McCartney reunion that was never to be. [x]

“My “simplest, most logical” reason that Yoko treated Paul as her main rival for John’s affections was… he was the main rival for John’s affections… How many books have been written about Lennon and McCartney, and on that period specifically, and not one of them has seriously suggested that John might be a bisexual man in love with his songwriting partner and closest adult companion? Now, we have writers timidly peeking out and saying, “Gee, it’s almost as if John was in love with Paul.” Has the evidence changed? Not much. Have we as a society become more educated and tolerant? Yes.”

— Michael Gerber, Hey Dullblog. [x]

#mclennon #paul mccartney #john lennon #yoko ono #anthology of mclennon #i just needed these grouped together because there's definitely significance

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zegalba · 9 months

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Yoko Ono: Ceiling Painting (1966)

#Yoko Ono #Ceiling Painting #art #yes #black and white #1966

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happyheidi · 2 months

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Happy leap day everyone!

We need to use the day that’s been given to us, as best as we can. Do something you love, even if it’s just something small. I’m laying here reading with jazz in the background and my dog by my side while the rain pours outside. That’s a perfect day in my book 📚

(From “Grapefruit” by Yoko Ono)

Some Yoko instructional art that I love and wanted to share <3 make this day special

#hope u have a wonderful leap day today !!#leap year #leap day #cottagecore #text #february 29th #cozycore #cosycore #yoko ono #art

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disease · 2 months

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YOKO ONO WITH GLASS HAMMER from HALF-A-WIND SHOW [1967] @ LISSON GALLERY, LONDON PHOTOGRAPHY: CLAY PERRY

#yoko ono #clay perry #performance art #60s #black and white #monochrome #film photography #analog #half-a-wind show #lisson gallery #london #photography #u

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thinkingimages · 8 months

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Clay Perry

Yoko Ono (with glass sphere), 1967

#Clay Perry #Yoko Ono (with glass sphere)#Yoko Ono #1967 #photographic portraiture #portraits #portraits of artists

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iam-the-egg-boi · 2 months

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The heated climax at the end of George’s film when Yoko steals his biscuits and he loses it in a rage that knows no bounds

#the beatles #george harrison #yoko Ono

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nobrashfestivity · 4 months

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Yoko Ono

#yoko ono #fluxus #conceptual art

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midchelle · 5 months

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In the audience during Bob Dylan's concert at the Isle of Wight Festival: Pattie Boyd, George Harrison, Ringo Starr, Maureen Starkey, John Lennon, and Yoko Ono | August 31, 1969 © Jeffrey Mayer

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justlikedylansmrjones · 2 months

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Paul with John's Two Virgins album circa 1975.

Do you guys think he, you know, looked?

#god knows i looked when i first found out about it #but is paul a better person than me?#the beatles #paul mccartney #mclennon #john lennon #yoko ono #linda mccartney #1975 #70s #wings #two virgins

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twixnmix · 28 days

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John Lennon with Yoko Ono, filmmaker Jonas Mekas, and Andy Warhol's boyfriend Jed Johnson during a party at Allen Klein's home in Riverdale, Bronx, 1971.

Photos by Andy Warhol

#john lennon #yoko ono #jonas mekas #1971 #jed johnson #1970s #1970s fashion #the beatles #andy warhol #polaroids

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rockytheraccoon · 1 month

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why does he sleep like a baby in the womb??? 😭😭