Saturday, December 15, 2012

Was This Paul's Yellow Submarine?

In my September 28th. (2012) post, I talked about Los Angeles radio station KRLA's magazine article that hinted that our Paul's hometown was Leeds, England.  This led to the idea that the B/Featles' Magical Mystery Tour film comment about "the bus being ten miles north on the Dewsbury Road" might have been a reference to our Paul.

I was reading a book called Yorkshire West Riding written in 1950 by Lettice Cooper.  She was talking about Huddersfield, West Riding, which is ~ 21 miles southwest of Leeds.  (See map on right.)  On page 132 she said:  "During the second German War, when she [Huddersfield] was happily untouched by air-raids, she produced an enormous quantity of munitions of all kinds, even turning out midget submarines, fitted to the last detail and complete with crews."


   At the top left is a photo of the HMS Expunger XE8 that was made by the manufacturer Broadbent in Huddersfield in 1944.  At the top right is an image of the famous "yellow submarine." 

When Paul wrote the song, was he making reference to a little of his past in Yorkshire, West Riding? 

Monday, December 3, 2012

paulumbo's back

Just a note to explain that I have not published for some time due to an accident.  I'll have a new post up in a few days .  And . . .   Paul fans have waited over forty years to have the truth told and I really believe that people researching this mystery must step up the pace, collaborate and get the truth out!  We have waited long enough.  I'll do my part.


                                                                        ---paulumbo (again)

Monday, October 22, 2012

Other Voices, Part 11: Moody Blues, 1968

The Moody Blues is an English rock band formed in 1964.  (Until late 1966, one of the group's members was Denny Laine who joined the last Paul replacement's--the current "Paul McCartney"--band, Wings.)  On May 17, 1968, the Moody Blues recorded a spoken word track, Departure that led into the next track, the song, Ride My See-Saw.  The song was released as a single on October 5, 1968.  It was described on a Paul-Was-Replaced discussion board as a song about Paul.  It is.

The spoken word introduction is about an LSD trip.   Some of the relevant lyrics of the song that follows are:

          Run, run my last race,
          Take my place
          Have this number
          Of mine.
          .     .      .      .
         
          Left school with a first class pass,
          Started work but as second class.
          School taught one and one is two.
          But right now, that answer just ain't true.

 Our Paul had been a college student (the first class pass) according to an article in the L.A. fan magazine, KRLABeat. (See the September 28, 2012 post.)  The second class reference would probably be that our Paul was a replacement for the real Paul McCartney.  The "one and one is two" reference has to do with our Paul's replacement being considered (in 1968) the one Paul McCartney.

But, the proof that the song was about Paul is that it has extended backmasked sequences with just one word:  PAUL----
     At he beginning of the reversed song until ~ 27 seconds into it,  the name Paul is sung three times.
     From 1:35-2:01, the name Paul is sung several times, in an extended, choir-like way.
     At 3:37-4:14, there is a strange, electronic, descending chord with unintelligible (reversed) talk
     that starts loud and screaming and becomes softer and softer as the chord descends.

It gets murky in these backmasked songs whether they are talking about the real Paul or our Paul, but my feeling is that if the band was talking in the present tense and the real Paul died in late 1965 or early 1966, then this song was about our Paul.
   

Thursday, October 18, 2012

The Movie, Masculin Feminin

In the June 12, 2011 post, I talked about the French movie, Masculin Feminin.  Director Jean-Luc Godard started filming the movie on November 22, 1965 and completed filming it in January, 1966.

It was the story of a young man named Paul who was enamored with a French pop singer.  She is more interested in her career and he either has an accident or commits suicide.  According to a December, 1965 interview with Chantal Goya, the actress who played the pop singer, the Paul character commits suicide.

Take a look at the frame from the scene at the police station. where Madeleine (the pop singer) and her friend Catherine are giving statements about Paul's death.

In the upper left hand corner of the frame, there is a poster and the frame cuts off the head of the man in the poster.  Is the framing of the scene a coincidence?  No.  According to an April, 2005 interview with Willy Kurant director of photography for the film:
          "Godard asked for alot of odd framings, explaining to me he was wanting the additional person in the frame without being in the frame.  He didn't mind or he was wanting them 'chopped in two', just with having an arm or a nose.  Alot of directors have absolutely no position on the framing.  They don't know what they want.  When they arrive on the set, they tell, 'What are we doing today?'  That's not what Godard was saying.  Godard had a point of view."
Now look at the photo of Paul McCartney in the Beatles' famous 1963 collarless jackets.  A resemblance to the poster?
The French words on the poster -- "avec nous" means  "with us" so the whole statement on the poster is:  "with us, EZ".
In the Paul-Is-Dead clues, there are several that show a headless Paul McCartney.  On the right is one of them.  The image is from the Magical Mystery Tour movie the B/Featles made in 1967. 
 
I think this film was about the REAL Paul McCartney and his real or virtual (in the old-fashioned sense of the word) suicide sometime in late 1965 or the early 1966.


Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Narrowing Down Paul's Apparent "Underwear" Incident

In the September 27th. (2012) post I talked about the Los Angeles radio station's fan magazine KRLABeat's July 2, 1966 column describing a "dream" about Paul running in his underwear into "a posh fountain in front of a posh bank."  I went researching and I believe I've found the bank and the fountain mentioned in the column's "dream."

I posted the lyrics to Procol Harum's Lime Street Blues in the June 19, 2012 post.  The song talks about a man (who I believe is Paul) being arrested.  So I started looking for a bank and fountain near Lime Street.

In the book, Seaport  Architecture & Townscape in Liverpool by Quentin Hughes (Percy Lund, Humphies & Co Ltd, 1964), Hughes described the area in Liverpool in 1964 that had the main civic buildings (See map from book on below right.)  In the upper right hand corner of the map is a little island bounded by LIME STREET, William Brown Street, and Islington.  On that island is the Duke of Wellington monument and the little circle in front of it on the map is the STEBLE FOUNTAIN.
(See photo below).  On Page 104 of the Seascape book, Hughes says:  "Along the east side all pretence at monumental grandeur ends and the Wellington monument stands against a row of mean buildings relieved only by the small-scale stone facade of a branch of the MIDLAND BANK."
It looks like this was the site of Paul's "incident."  The next thing to find is more details of it.
 
                                              

Tuesday, October 9, 2012

Other Voices, Part 10: Paul's Voice

People have commonly believed that the debut of backmasking began with The Beatles' song, Rain, recorded April 14-16, 1966 and released May 30, 1966 in the US and June 10, 1966 in the UK, but Paul wrote the song, Woman for Peter and Gordon and that song was released before Rain--in the US on January 10, 1966 and in the UK on February 11, 1966--and Woman has backmasked lyrics.  Here they are:     0:38-0:42:  He would make a sound.
                                               He would make us know.

What do those lyrics mean?  Remember, our Paul was not the real Paul McCartney:  our Paul was the first replacement.  I think our Paul was talking about the real Paul McCartney in the song, I'm Looking Through You.  That song was recorded October 24th. and November 10th. and 11th., 1965 for the Rubber Soul album.  The song was supposed to be about Jane Asher and Paul's disappointment with their relationship.  But I listened to take four of I'm Looking Through You (at   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OWrlVT6vF8 ) and at the end of the take, (11:49-11:53) you hear:   You've changed, you've changed, you've changed, you've changed,
                   You sea chain.
I was trying to think what "sea chain" would be and then I figured it out: our Paul meant,
                    You see Jane.
The song was sung about the real Paul McCartney who established the real relationship with a 17-year old Jane Asher in 1963 before our Paul replaced him.
Think about some of the lyrics to I'm Looking Through You:
                     Your lips are moving,
                      I cannot hear.
                      Your voice is soothing,
                      But the words aren't clear.
So while people are tracking down what happened to our Paul, it is still a mystery what happened to real Paul McCartney.

My best guess is that sometime in 1965 the real Paul was left virtually speechless from some accident, deliberate act or malady.  The backmasked lyrics from Woman say:
He would make a sound.  He would make us know, not, he makes a sound, he makes us know.    Our Paul is talking in the past tense.  So, again, my guess is that sometime between ~ late October, 1965 and the the recording of Woman in ~December, 1965, the real Paul McCartney lost his voice altogether, or died.

As further confirmation of this, check out The Rutles:  All You Need Is Cash mockumentary at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6PgzRizr6o where Eric Idle as the reporter is talking about the "Stig Is Dead" rumor (Stig being Paul).  At 0:23-0:29, he says:
     "He never said anything publicly.  Even as the quiet one, he'd not said a word since 1966."
                

Sunday, September 30, 2012

Paul Was In Los Angeles in June, 1966

I have been exploring the KRLABeat archives and I found another important bit of information.

The magazine had a column called, "'In' People Are Talking About . . .".  In the July 9, 1966 column, they wrote the following:  "['In' People Are Talking About . . .] . . . Paul McCartney's stop-over in L.A. and how in the world he pulled it off."

There was an approximately two week lag time between an event described in The Beat and the magazine's publication which would put Paul in L.A. sometime around the week of June 19-25, 1966.  The Beatles' schedule on that week was:
1.)  Two off days on June 19th. and 20th.
2.)  Work at the London EMI Studo on two songs for the Revolver album.
3.)  ~ two more days off on June 22nd. and 23rd.  (Although some sources said the 23rd. was a travel day
      to Germany.
4.)  The German concert tour of Munich, Essen, and Hamburg.  Our Paul was beginning to be replaced
      starting with the German tour:  he definitely played Munich; I'm still tracking down Essen; and there was
      a replacement for Paul in Hamburg.

The questions are:  What day or days in June, 1966 was Paul in Los Angeles, and--most importantly--why was he there?

Friday, September 28, 2012

What Is Ten Miles North on the Dewsbury Road?

In the B/Featles 1967 movie, Magical Mystery Tour, there is a scene where Ringo and Faul converse. Ringo asks Faul: "Where's the bus?" Faul answers: "It's ten miles north on the Dewsbury Road." People have been puzzling over this segment for years and, with the help (again) of KRLABeat, I believe I've found the answer.

 In the April 16, 1966 edition of the magazine, Tony Barrow, who was the press secretary for The Beatles, is writing about our Paul's authorship of the song, Woman. The title of the article is "Paul Exposed" (!) He talks about how Paul created a "fictional" fifth Beatle named Bernard Webb. This man "was a young university student whose hometown was Leeds, Yorkshire. He had sent in 'Woman' to Northern Songs as a possible number for The Beatles to record. The song had been passed on to Peter and Gordon. Apparently Bernard Webb had a current Paris address but had left it and disappeared on some kind of extended skiing trip in the Swiss Alps. On the face of it, the talented young Bernard might have met up with PAUL MCCARTNEY who has just returned to London after vacationing at a secluded ski center hideaway in the Swiss Alps."

 Was Paul exposed in this article as the author of Woman or as having been a (former) university student whose hometown was Leeds, England. I think Paul was talking about himself. Click the "View Larger Map" below the Google map below. The distance between Dewsbury, West Riding, Yorkshire and Leeds, West Riding, Yorkshire is ~ TEN miles.
View Larger Map

Thursday, September 27, 2012

Before All The Other Clues, There Was KRLABeat's "Dream"

I have been commenting in several posts about the idea that Paul was--let's say--nailed by the British government for an indecent exposure incident.  I traced the beginning of it from a New Musical Express interview with Paul published on July 29, 1966 where Paul said he had dreams of being caught out in the street in his underwear.  There was musical "chatter" following on this, beginning--from my research--with Procol Harum's 1967 song, Lime Street Blues, and continuing in 1968 with The Bonzo Dog's Band, We Are Normal and in 1969 with Jose Feliciano's So Long Paul.  But before even Paul's interview was published, the Los Angeles radio station KRLA's fan magazine, The Beat had in its July 2, 1966 edition a column that talked about a "dream" the writer (Shirley Poston) was "sent".

She commented that a "Narcissa Nash" wrote her with a dream she had about The Beatles.  They were riding in her VW bus, nicknamed NIGEL (!) and Paul finds that his pants are on fire:
At this point, I pull Nigel to a
screeching halt and up to a fire
hydrant.  But before I can turn the
water on Paul, he has shed his
trousers and is now headed toward
the nearest fountain with purple-
polka-dot shorts on.  (No com-
ment).  As he leaps into a posh
fountain in front of a posh bank, a
loud sizzling is heard and a great
mass of steam rises.
      Indecent Exposure
At which time Paul is arrested
for indecent exposure and for con-
tributing to air pollution (the
steamin' nit).
In my July 6, 2012 post, I speculated that NIGEL was the code name they gave our Paul.  Now I'm convinced of it.  The next thing to look into is the setting of a posh fountain in front of a posh bank sometime in 1965.  We are getting closer to the truth.

                                                                      ---paulumbo



Thursday, September 20, 2012

Odds and Ends, Page 2

Continuing with my Odds and Ends post of July 13th., I found an interesting item about our John and something about the group that I'd like to put out a request to readers on:

                      A SPANIARD IN THE WORKS? 
1.)  In the February 19, 1966 KRLA Beat magazine, there was a small item that said:  "John is building a home on the Costa Brava [Spain] coast."  I did a little research and found that there is a place in the Sant Pere area next to the town wall at the section going up to MontJuic, at 17007 Girona, Spain called (and as the Brits say, wait for it):  Jardins de John Lennon.  It is very likely our John did indeed attempt a home there. 






2.)  In the June 4, 1966 KRLA Beat magazine, Tony Barrow (who was The Beatles' press secretary) wrote that during the Revolver album recording sessions all of The Beatles would meet at our John's Weybridge, Surrey home and:  "Quite frequently they give themselves a break from more serious work and shoot off some zany home movies in John's vast garden."  I have never read any other mention of these home movies and I would like to ask readers of this blog if they know of these movies and have seen any of them. 

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Jose Feliciano's 1969 Song

There were several songs released during the Paul-Is-Dead controversy that began in October, 1969.  One of them was Jose Feliciano's song, So Long Paul that Feliciano recorded under the pseudonym, Werbley Finster.  The lyrics coincide with the lyrics of The Bonzo Dog Band's We Are Normal and Procul Harum's Lime Street Blues that I talked about in my June 19, 2012 post and with the "dream" Paul described in the New Musical Express interview of June, 1966 that I outlined in my August 17, 2012 post.  Listen to the song at:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whAZ8aYztgU .

Here are some of the lyrics:

     I heard the radio the other day;
     I heard something that blew my mind.
     It was something that I didn't even believe atall:
     The news concerned itself with a young man everybody knows,
     And they said that he went, running, taking off his clothes.
     And I said, now, so long Paul, we hate to see you go,
     So long Paul after making all that dough.


Feliciano said in the song that he went to England and he knew and believed that Paul was still alive and that Paul had had himself  "a hard day's night."

Feliciano is hinting that Paul was removed from The Beatles.  The 1967 Beatles Christmas fan record with the famous refrain, "O-U-T spells OUT" suggests the same thing.

I think it's pretty conclusive that Paul was snatched up by the British government and held against his will.  The devil will be in getting the details---but they WILL be found.


                                                                                        ---paulumbo


 


Thursday, August 30, 2012

Other Voices, Part 9: Bee Gees, 1968

I had a feeling The Bee Gees would comment on Paul's situation and I found backmasked references to him in The Bee Gees song, I Started A Joke, recorded on June 25, 1968 for their  Idea album.

The forward lyrics suggest that the Paul-Is-Dead rumor was a joke but that Paul did die sometime between the beginning of the "joke" and the recording of the song--a variation on some of the theories.  The lyrics say Paul "fell out of bed, hurting his head."  I'm staying with the theory that Paul suffered some sort of accident, but survived it.

The backmasked lyrics say:

0:07-0:26    Paul, he moptop
0:44-0:47    Given up [his?] quest
1:15-1:17    He moptop
1:36-1:38    Given up [his?] quest
2:06-2:08    He moptop
2:32-2:33    He moptop

Monday, August 27, 2012

Somebody Else Had Other Ideas

I read an interview of (our) John and Ringo that appeared in the British pop/rock magazine Melody Maker on July 9, 1966.  Journalist Alan Walsh asked them ten questions.  The most interesting question was number 7:

    7. Could The Beatles cut out personal appearances and just make records, with the occasional big TV appearance?
    John:  Not the way the fans keep moaning about not seeing us all the time.
    Ringo:  No.

What's interesting, of course, is that after our Paul and John were replaced in 1966, that is exactly the plan the new, new Beatles followed--they never toured again, they made studio albums, and in the history of the group from 1967 to the break up, they had two big TV appearances:  the first was the live appearance on the international television "spectacular" Our World that was broadcast on June 25, 1967 and featured a live performance by The B/Featles doing All You Need Is Love with a boffo back-up chorus of The Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, Marianne Faithfull, Keith Moon and Graham Nash--truly a big TV appearance.  The second was their Magical Mystery Tour film first broadcast by the BBC on December 26, 1967.  After 1967, the friction between the artificially assembled members started wearing on them and--except for an occasional promo film for a new song--the only other big appearance they could put together was the rooftop concert of January 30, 1969.

Also interesting was that the Melody Maker journalist was aware that somebody had ulterior plans for The Beatles and it looks as though John and Ringo were not aware of the plans, given their answers.  So it looks as though John and Ringo were interested in keeping The Beatles together as they were and sometime between about June and August, 1966 they were informed that their plans were being changed.  Ringo and George went along with the Brits that be and John and Paul did not.

Friday, August 17, 2012

Was It A Dream?

(Note:  I'll comment on my last post in a future one.)

The New Musical Express is a British pop/rock magazine.  In the summer of 1966, they ran a series of interviews with each of The Beatles where they each talked about his "night dreams."  Paul's interview by writer Alan Smith--a Liverpudlian who later became editor of NME--was published July 29, 1966, within the time frame of our Paul's life and public presence, assuming it took several weeks for an interview to be published.  It is difficult to verify the validity of the interview because it's a print interview as opposed to a  filmed interview, but I'm assuming it was mainly our Paul's words.

In my post of June 19th. (2012), I wrote about three songs that I think were written about events in Paul's life.  Two of the songs have a lyric line that talks about someone running around in his underpants in publicIn the NME interview Paul says:
          "'I also have normal ones [dreams] everybody has, about being caught in the street in my underwear.'"

The question is:  was this a dream Paul had or was it something that he had done in real life?  My guess is that he was, in fact, caught in public in his underwear.  In one of the songs, Procul Harum's Lime Street Blues, he would have been in disguise with blonde hair.

The interesting aspect of this is that there have been accounts of "doings" by Paul that were effectively hidden from the public-- that he fathered at least one child, that an underage girl was found in The Beatles' hotel room on one of the American tours .

If the "Brits that be" were hell-bent on getting Paul out of the group, something as simple as being seen in public in his underpants--in whatever context it happened--might have been their excuse for getting their hands on Paul--and not letting go.

Sunday, July 29, 2012

Had The Wrong "Rose D'or": Here's The Right One

I had a post on March 5, 2011 talking about the Rose D'or song competition in France and how I thought it might be connected to a Time magazine cover that showed a papier mache Paul holding a yellow (gold) rose.  I didn't know until I was reading the KRLA Beat magazine (a fan magazine published in the mid-1960's by Los Angeles station KRLA) that there was another European competition called Rose D'or. 

This one has been held in Montreux, Switzerland since the early 1960's.   The KRLA Beat of March 12, 1966 (v.1, #52, p. 1) said the following:  "'The Music of Lennon and McCartney' will represent the U.K. in this year's [1966] Golden Rose of Montreux contest.  The festival takes place in Montreux, Switzerland throughout the final week of April."  See photo below.

There are several interesting aspects to this information.  The Lennon/McCartney entry did not win an award.  BUT, the winning entry was of an interview with a French director by the name of Paul Seban.  I did a little research on this man and found that in 1963 he was an assistant director for American director Orson Welles' film, The Trial.  In my second to last post I was talking about Paul's day in York, England on November 27, 1963 as reported by two authors, Michael Braun and Martin Creasy.  Creasy in his book, Beatlemania! also says about Paul on that day:
     "Paul was holding court about a film called The Trial which he had recently seen." [!]

I swear, you can't make these things up.  The plot of The Trial is about a man in a nightmare situation of being charged with some crime, but not knowing what the crime is and who his accusers are.  Was Paul commenting on one of the former Beatles in a situation like that or was he fearful that something like that would happen to him?

                                      More on this in the next post   ---paulumbo

Thursday, July 26, 2012

Hints To Us--And The Ball, Dropped (1966)

As I have tried to show, The Beatles were making anything but subtle hints in 1966 that they had trouble.  The American and English press were making strong hints that one or more of The Beatles had been, or were being, replaced.  The Beatles young fans were not aware there was that kind of trouble until Penny Lane came out and the new Paul was unveiled. 

I've found instances that the press was aware or suspicious that changes had happened within The Beatles.  The really crucial thing in my mind is that the press could have investigated what was happening to The Beatles and, at minimum, let the world public know what they found.  They did not--they dropped the ball--and it looks as though several of those Beatles suffered.

Here are three examples of what I found:

1.)  In the fan magazine put out by Los Angeles station KRLA, the March 12, 1966 issue has a cover drawing of Paul captioned "The Three Faces of Paul McCartney".  (See photo below.)
            The article in the magazine talks about Beatle marriages, but the cover drawing isn't followed
up with a story, so it is, essentially, a visual quote without comment.

2.)  English reporter Maureen Cleeve did an article for The New York Times published July 3, 1966 called "Old Beatles -- A Study In Paradox."  One of photos in the article (see below)
had the caption:  "Ye Olden Tempos -- There was a time when The Beatles weren't even famous.  Certainly they have come a long way since the days they were known as, from left:  John Lennon, George Harrison, Paul McCartney and Peter Best (later replaced by Ringo)."
Again, it was a a visual quote without comment because the article dealt with the current Beatles and made no reference that any of them had been replaced.

3.)  At The Beatles August 28, 1966 press conference in Los Angeles (see the video at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGbBAGzB7dw ), there was a question from a girl (possibly a young fan "reporter".)  She read the question as if it had been written for her:
5:33-5:36   Girl:  Have you ever trained or used Beatle double as decoys?
5:37-5:40   Paul: No.  John:  No.  Paul:  No, no.  We tried to get Brian Epstein
to do it.  He wouldn't do it.

Some people on discussion boards believe that Paul and John of the 1966 tour were our Paul and John but I think they were replacements.  (See my post of December 7, 2010:  from the photos I looked at in the Bob Bonis collection, our Paul (and John) never made it to America in 1966.)

Care to speculate why the world press left The Beatles hanging?



    


Saturday, July 21, 2012

Our Paul Had An Ulcer

This could be included in odds and ends about Paul, but it could point to more serious health problems that Paul had . . .

Several years ago, I was reading Love Me Do:  The Beatles' Progress, a 1964 book by American author Michael Braun.  He spent at least three days traveling with The Beatles on their late November, 1963 UK tour.  In the 2010 book, Beatlemania!  The Real Story of The Beatles UK Tours 1963-1965, by author Martin Creasy, Creasy mentions Braun traveling with them on November 26, 27, and 28, 1963.   According to Braun, after the November 27th. concert, Paul ran off the stage shouting, "'Oh my God, my ulcer.'"  Our Paul replaced the real Paul McCartney in early November, 1963, so this was definitely our Paul who had the ulcer.  Paul was approximately 21 at the time (because he obviously didn't have real Paul's birth date and--as far as I'm aware--no one has yet  tracked his birth date down.)  A young age to have an ulcer!  A Paul-is-dead discussion board speculated that Paul had another intestinal disease--a possibility.  As the pressure of Beatlemania built, Paul could have had other health problems and this might lead to another approach at finding out what happened to him.  But I do not think it was health problems that led to his being replaced.

Friday, July 13, 2012

Odds and Ends

As I do the research I come across interesting bits of information that do not directly have to do with the Paul mystery but are fascinating nevertheless and might fill in a blank for someone else doing research on The Beatles.  So here is the post Odds and Ends, where I'll put those tidbits I find.  Here are three I've found to start----

1.)  I was looking at the England & Wales Death Index 1916-2006 with the off chance that one of The Beatles not known as officially dead might have had his death index entry transcribed there.  I found the following:
                         Name:                             John Ono Lennon  [!!!]
                         Birth Date:                      27 Aug 1965
                         Date of Registration:      Jan 1996
                         Age at Death:                  30
                         Registration district:        Portsmouth
                         Inferred County:              Hampshire
                         Register Number:            E48A
                         District and Subdistrict:  4971E
                         Entry number:                 234
I could speculate on this, but I haven't done enough research on name changing to know how easy or difficult it is for anyone to change his or her name in England.  I did  look in the England & Wales Birth Index and didn't find a John Ono Lennon listed.  There is a possibility that our John and Yoko Ono had a son in 1965, but I don't have the time to track this down.  For someone who does, happy hunting!

2.)  There has been alot of speculation on one of the Paul-Was-Replaced boards about the egg-shaped trophy on the cover of the Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album.
On the diagram on the right it's the little figure below and between the drum (#81) and the bust of the man (#78) and right above the "L" in "BEATLES".  I was reading The Beatles:  The True Beginnings by Roag, Pete, and Rory Best, and on p. 173 they have a photo of the "trophy" and they identify it as a Cash Box International Award and say it was given to Mona Best (their mother) as a thank-you gift by John Lennon.                                  
3.)  Brian Epstein (the manager of The Beatles, in case you don't know) went to see a Dr. John Flood, a psychiatrist, on June 8, 1967.  Dr. Flood admitted him to a hospital in Roehampton, England, gave him antidepressant drugs, and--on Epstein's release from the hospital two weeks' later--gave him prescriptions for Tryptizol and Carbrital.  The bromide in the Carbrital built up in Epstein's system and caused his death on August 27, 1967.  I wanted to know what happened to Dr. Flood and found his obituary in the British Medical Journal of August 16, 1980 (p. 513):
"Dr. Flood fought a long illness with courage and it was tragic that he should have been stabbed by intruders in his own home four days before his elder daughter's wedding earlier this year." [!] 
I haven't tried to track the incident down any further, but someone else might want to.


Thursday, July 12, 2012

Who Was OUR Paul?

If you look at the videos immediately following The Beatles' "Royal Command Performance" on November 4, 1963, you will see that Paul McCartney changed:  the man who I call "our Paul" took the place of real Paul.  There have been many photo comparisons on several Paul-Was-Replaced discussion boards, and I'll add mine on the blog in the future.  So in my research, I have been trying to get an idea of where our Paul came from--who he was.  I've come up with three references spanning ten years that suggests that our Paul was an English World War 2 orphan.

1.)  From 1965:  Youtube has a video that I commented on in my November 28, 2011 post of outtakes from The Beatles' 1965 Christmas fan record.  Listen to the entire video at:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=50dI7WJZbBo .  Beginning at 5:18, George is commenting on a "Virgil Glyn" that he's seen at the "Labor Club" in Blackburn, England:
     5:47-5:52 (George):  "And so, here he is . . . here he is . . . "
     5:52-5:53 (Paul):       "And what is his name?"
     5:54-6:01 (George):  "We've had trouble finding his name due to the fact that he lost his birth certificate when he was born, you see."
     6:01-6:02 (Paul):       "Ooh, yes."
     6:02-6:05 (George):   "So, anyway, whoever he may be . . ."
***Note:  during this entire segment on the video, there is a photo of Paul.  Do you think the poster knows something?
I originally thought this exchange might be a biting comment on the fact that replacements for Paul and John were being contemplated, but I now think that they were referring to the fact that our Paul was an orphan.

2.)  From 1967:  I posted the lyrics to Procul Harum's song Lime Street Blues on the June 19, 2012 post.  This song was the flipside of their song, A Whiter Shade of Pale which has backmasked references to Paul.  Lime Street Blues has lyrics that are referenced in the Bonzo Dog Band's record, We Are Normal and I believe all three songs are about Paul. 
Lime Street Blues talks about a man being charged with--apparently--indecent exposure and defending himself in court:
     "'Mr. Judge,' I said, 'Won't you please be kind?
       Have pity on me, a poor orphan child?'
       Mr. Judge, he says with a long, mean frown,
      'Orphan or not, you're going down!'"

3.)  From 1975:  The Hollies, an English pop/rock group (in case you don't know), recorded a song called I'm Down.  Pretty remarkable title, huh?, given that Paul recorded a song with the same name 10 years' before.  I haven't found backmasked references to Paul in The Hollies' songs, but I think the group wanted to pay tribute to Paul--if nothing else--by doing a song about him, giving it the same title as his song, and maybe getting people to ponder if the song was biographical of Paul.  Here are the relevant lyrics:
     Had my ways
     With days of sunshine.
     Life came easy, it all fell in line.
     But then again, I didn't realize
     When you're used to one thing
     It's hard to accept another.
     Like the woman who brought you up:
     Well, she ain't your mother.
     How do you cope
     With a thing like that?
         ---- ----- -----
     To the folks who brought me up
     I'm not ungrateful.
     Kept the secret from me:
     Thought it was shameful.
     It hurt me so
     To be the last one to know.
     Maybe someone's out there
     Looking for me.
     Left on their own.
     Couldn't afford to clothe me
     And I . . . I don't even know my real name
     I'm down,
     I'm down,
     I'm down.

I think Paul was an orphan.
    
  

Friday, July 6, 2012

Dr. Robert (cont. from 6/26/2011) and Paul

I said in my last post that I would be writing about what I found in regards to our Paul's identity.  I think he was a World War 2 war orphan adopted by a family probably near Liverpool.  But, before I get to that-- I wrote a post last year about our John's song, Dr. Robert and how I found an interview in 1966 that definitively identifies Dr. Robert as an English National Health doctor.  I think the "Robin, the butterfly stomper" in the animated film, Yellow Submarine is supposed to be Dr. Robert; (the name Robin is a nickname [diminutive] for Robert.) 

In the film, Robin is wearing a t-shirt with the number 7 on it.  (See
image on right.)  I was watching a video on Youtube that featured our John and "poetry" from his book, In His Own Right.  John appeared on the English comedians Peter Cook and Dudley Moore's BBC television program, Not Only . . . But Also.  The program was filmed in late November, 1964.  See the entire segment at:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmjvoXeP2Pg  .
From 5:12-5:29 in the segment, John and actor Norman Rossington recited John's poem, "Good Dog, Nigel":

5:12-5:18 (Rossington):  Arf, arf, he goes, a merry sight, our little hairy friend.  Arf, arf upon the lamppost bright.
5:18-5:25 (John):  Arfing 'round the bend.  Nice dog, goo boy, waggy tail and beg:  Seven, Nigel, jump for joy . . .
5:25-5:29 (John and Rossington):  Because we're putting you to sleep at 3 o'clock, Nigel!
In the original poem, John used the word clever instead of seven.

In my post of 3/3/2012, I was talking about the impromptu song, There You Are Eddie that Paul's replacement recorded in January, 1969.  Again, the whole song can be heard at:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijwI7wgXbxE .  At 2:05 in the song it sounds like George suggesting that Faul sing about NIGEL, so from 2:06-2:17, Faul sings, "There you go, Nigel, Nigel, Nigel.  There you go, Nigel, Nigel you dog."

Sooo, connecting the dots, Nigel was code for our Paul and he was being abused by a National Health doctor with--I'm guessing-- the real name of Robert.

Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Other Voices, Part 8 (continued)

As I said in yesterday's post, Love's The Red Telephone was referenced in The Bonzo Dog Band's song, We Are Normal.  Listen to the song on Youtube at:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZXI9RJSgok .  The relevant lyrics are:

          Well, it's ah, it's not for me to deter really, is it?
          I mean, it's for a psychiatrist to deter these things, isn't it?
                       -   -   -   -
          I don't know, it's just not like normal people do.
          You're not running around in your underpants, are you?  [See Lime Street lyrics below.]
                        -   -   -   -
          We are normal                        [Referencing The
          And we want our freedom.      Red
          We are normal                         Telephone
          And we want our freedom.      lyrics]

In my post, Other Voices, Part 7, I talked about the backmasked references to Paul in Procol Harum's single of May, 1967, A Whiter Shade of Pale.  The flipside of the single had a song called Lime Street Blues.  Listen to the song at:  http:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUqaieKiELc
Here are the lyrics:
     Lime Street in the afternoon.
     I'm running around in my underpants [The lyrics of We Are Normal, in the first person]
     Trying to find some kinda romance.

     Quarter past three on Lime Street.
     I got whipped right offa my feet.
     Didn't realized that I'd been caught
     'Til I found myself in the county court.

     'Mr. Judge,' I said, 'Won't you please be kind?
     Have pity on me, a poor orphan child?'
     'Orphan or not, you're going down!'

     Well, I screamed on my knees in the witness box,
     'Lord have mercy on my golden locks.'
     The judge, I could see that he was snide.
     He says, 'The only kind of blonde you are's a peroxide!'

     Oh Lime Street, Lime Street
     Lime Street, that's where we meet.

I think the three songs were about Paul, with definite hints about Paul's background, what he may have been accused of, and what was done to him.

My next post will be about what can be pieced together about OUR Paul.  He wasn't Paul McCartney and he's not the man calling himself Paul McCartney today.       ---paulumbo

Monday, June 18, 2012

Other Voices, Part 8: The American Voice, The Bonzo Dog Band and Procol Harum

Love was an American psychedelic band of the 1960's who had what is now considered a classic album called Forever Changes, recorded from June - September, 1967 and released in November, 1967.  One track on the album is called The Red Telephone.  What got me interested in the song is the fact that The Bonzo Dog Band mocked the song in their album, The Doughnut in Granny's Greenhouse.  (See my March 28, 2012 post for a discussion of a backmasked reference to Paul in that album's track, Trouser Press.)

Before I get to the song, I tried to track down what significance there was in the song's title.  I found that there were red telephone boxes in England in 1966--the "K6" (Kiosk #6.)  And I found that red telephones existed in England as far back as 1937.  The "Type 706" telephone was available from 1959.  There's a nice British Pathe film that shows Queen Elizabeth introducing the phone to the English public, if you're interested.  I assume Arthur Lee of Love who wrote the song heard something, but I couldn't track it down any further.

The song itself talks about a man trapped in an apparent mental institution, about the man being hypnotized and "medicated" and losing track of time.  Listen to the track on Youtube at:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRILyCLHXDE .  Some of the significant forward lyrics are:
         
          Sitting on a hillside  [Fool on the Hill?]
          Watching all the people die. 
          I'll feel much better on the other side;
          I'll hitch a ride.  [If you know the Beatle songs, there are many references to Paul
                                      asking for wheels (a car), asking for a "jam jar"  (English rhyming slang
                                      for a motor car, etc.]
                           - - - -
          And if you want to count me
          Count me out.  [ In the Beatles' 1967 Christmas record (which has the jam jar reference), there
                                     are several times when Ringo sings O-U-T spells OUT.]

                           - - - -
          They're locking them up today.
          They're throwing away the key.
          I wonder who it will be tomorrow
          You or me?

                           - - - -

          We are normal
          And we want our freedom.
          We are normal
          And we want our freedom.
The entire song, sung and spoken, is done in an English accent.

Reversed, you can here "Let me out" sung three times beginning at 1:28.

                                            ---references in The Bonzo Dog band song and the Procol Harum song
                                                tomorrow.             paulumbo


Thursday, June 14, 2012

Other Voices, Part 7: A Whiter Shade of Pale

This post was going to be about the only American song I found with what I believe are reversed (and forward) references to our Paul.  The song is the American group Love's The Red Telephone and I'll get to that song in the next post.

I have been reading the 2010 book, Beatlemania! The Real Story of The Beatles UK Tour 1963-1965 by Martin Creasy.  Of course, it is not the real story because it fails to mention that both the real Paul and John were replaced in late 1963 (by our Paul and John), but I did find several interesting bits of information that I'll comment on in future posts.

Creasy talks about the other singers and musicians that toured with The Beatles.  One group was The Paramounts.  The Paramounts toured with The Beatles on their sixth and final UK tour, December 3-December 12, 1965.  In 1966 (or 1967 depending on the source) Gary Brooker of the group founded another group, Procol Harum with his friend Keith Reid.  The group's first single, A Whiter Shade of Pale was released on May 12, 1967, and it has several pointed backmasked references to Paul.

The reversed references:

0:06-0:09 - Paulie was
0:36-0:41 - Everybody heard I was hurt
0:55-0:57 - Yeah, Yeah, Yeah
0:58-1:01 - Paulie was
1:17-1:18 - A Beatle
2:20-2:24 - Everybody heard I was hurt
2:41-2:45 - Paulie was I

The evidence I've found on consistent and widespread backmasking by British groups shows that The Beatles were not carrying on a hoax commenting on serious problems in Paul's life, and--because the references are so widespread over many British groups--there was alot of knowledge out there in bits and pieces and a large cover-up that is still going on.  The truth needs to be told.

Friday, June 1, 2012

Other Voices, Part 6: American Voices?

I have been looking into backmasked references to Paul in American songs and--so far--I have found only one definite reference and one possible one.  (More on those in the next post.)

It's interesting that the fate of our Paul was a hot topic for discussion from the British groups but  not the American groups, but I'm speculating that the British groups were more worried about their personal situations vis-a-vis the English government.

Monday, May 14, 2012

Other Voices, Part 5

When you listen to the B/Featles' 1968 song, Revolution 9 backwards, there are several instances when someone is shouting "Let me out!"  This song was commented on extensively during the first exploration of the Paul-Is-Dead rumor in 1969.  Revolution 9 was released November 22, 1968.

The Move, an English rock band recorded a song called Blackberry Way and released it on November 28, 1968.  It was a bouncy little pop song with a hidden agenda.  Here are the lyrics to that song and alongside are the lyrics to Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds, which I think Blackberry Way referenced:

     Blackberry Way:                                             Picture yourself on a boat on a river,
     Absolutely pouring down with rain.       With tangerine trees and marmalade skies.
     What a terrible day.                                        Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly,
                                                                                     The girl with kaleidoscope eyes.
                                                                   
                                                                                  Cellophane flowers of yellow and green,
     Up with the lark.                                            Towering over your head.
     Silly girl I don't know what to say.          Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes
     She was running away.                                And she's gone.
                                                                   
                                                                                  Lucy in the sky with diamonds (X3)
     So now I'm standing on the corner         Ohh, oh.
     Lost, in the things that I said.               
     What am I supposed to do now?             Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain,
                                                                                  Where rocking horse people eat marshmallow
                                                                                          pies.
     (Chorus)                                                            Everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers
     Goodbye Blackberry Way:                          That grow so incredibly high.
     I can't see you,                                              
     I don't need you.                                              Newspaper taxis appear on the shore,
     Goodbye Blackberry Way,                            Waiting to take you away.
     Sure to want me back another day.         Climb in the back with your head in the clouds
                                                                                     And you're gone.    
                                                                                   
     Down to the park.                                            (Chorus)
     Overgrowing but the trees are bare;                     
     There's a memory there.                              Picture yourself on a train in a station,
                                                                                   With plasticine porters with looking-glass ties,
                                                                                   Suddenly someone is there at the turnstile:
     Boats on a lake:                                                  The girl with kaleidoscope eyes.
     Unattended now, the laughter drowned;                
     I'm incredibly down.                                        (Chorus -- repeat to fade)
                                                                                      
     Just like myself they are neglected.
     Turn with my back to the wall.
     What am I supposed to do now?

     (Chorus)

     Run for the train.
     Look behind you for she may be there.
     Say a thing in the air.
     Blackberry Way.
     See the battlefields of careless sins
     Cast to the winds.

     So full of emptiness without her.
     Lost in the words that I said.
     What am I supposed to do now?

     (Chorus -- repeat to fade)

According to a Wikipedia article about this song, it was supposed to have been inspired by the B/Featles song, Penny Lane, but the lyrics are an un-psychedelicized, post-events unmistakably parallel version  of Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.  The references to a girl running away, a boat on a river (although in Blackberry Way, it's boats on lake), being in a park, the reference to being at a train station---the parallel lyrics are all there.  So I listened to the song reversed and I found a run of lyrics (five in all) starting at 0:22 in the reversed song that says:

     "Please let me out.  Please snake me out."

The word "snake" threw me, so I did some research and found that snake used as a verb meant sneak  as in "sneak me out" according to The English Dialect Dictionary, Volume 5, ed. by Joseph Wright (1898, and reprinted by Hacker Art Books, 1962.)  I confirmed that the pronounciation of the word continued by finding the same definition in The Oxford English Dictionary, Second Edition, Volume 15 (1989.)

Again, it's a strong indication that the rumor I have been exploring in past posts has validity and that there were musicians other than the new Beatles who knew something about what happened to Paul and were commenting on it, both forward and backward, in their songs.

Thursday, May 3, 2012

Other Voices, Part 4 (Stupid Bloody Tuesday?)

The next song I found with a backmasked reference to Paul is the Marianne Faithfull/Rolling Stones song, Sister Morphine.  Originally released as a single by Marianne Faithfull in 1969, it was included in the Stones' 1971 album, Sticky Fingers.  According to my research, the Stones recorded the song in March or May-June, 1969 (depending on the source) during their Let It Bleed album recording sessions.  The forward lyrics are grim and ominous:

     Here I lie in my hospital bed.
     Tell me Sister Morphine
     When are you coming 'round again.
     Oh, an' I don't think I can wait that long.
     Oh, you see that I'm not that strong.

     The scream of the ambulance
     Is sounding in my ears.
     Tell me, Sister Morphine,
     How long have I been lying here?

     What am I doing in this place?
     Why does the doctor have no face?
     Oh, I can't crawl across the floor.
     Ah, can't you see, Sister Morphine
     I'm trying to score.

     Well, it just goes to show
     Things are not what they seem.
     Please, Sister Morphine,
     Turn my nightmares into dreams.
     Oh, can't you see I'm fading fast?
     And that this shot will be my last.

     Sweet cousin cocaine
     Ah, lay your cool, cool hand on my head.
     Come on, Sister Morphine
     You better make up my bed.

     'Cause you know and I know
     In the morning I'll be dead.
     Yeah, and you can sit around, yeah,
     And you can watch all the
     Clean white sheets stained red.

I went looking into this song because of the allusions to hospitals and ambulances.  (In England, nurses are called sisters.)  I didn't find any backmasking in the Marianne Faithfull version, but when I reversed The Rolling Stones track  (listen to the forward track at:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IWF509L3H4 ), I found the following line beginning at 1:15 in the reversed song:

     Paul looking dead.  Ahhh, [mumbled] looking dead.

The Rolling Stones knew The Beatles and were rivals of them.  Marianne Faithfull was a friend of Paul.  In her autobiography, Faithfull (with David Dalton; 1994:  Little Brown), Ms. Faithfull said of Paul:  "Paul and I had a very close and unique friendship.  He helped me on a lot of my work.  He always had a special kind of vision."  (P. 159.  Note how Faithfull refers to Paul in the past tense.)

This is the first time I have ever heard of anything connecting Paul with a drug addiction and I'm not convinced that the song is totally autobiographical concerning Paul, but it is another indication that Paul WAS involved in some sort of accident and the "stupid bloody Tuesday" line in I Am The Walrus might have been a comment on a bloody accident that Paul had.
    

Friday, April 27, 2012

Other Voices, Part 3

Then I was listening to Manfred Mann's Fox On The Run.  Manfred Mann was a popular British pop/rock band of the 1960's (for those of you who don't know.)  The bass player of the group Klaus Voormann was a friend of The Beatles.  He designed The Beatles' Revolver album cover.  His friendship with The Beatles spanned from their early days in Hamburg through the group's break-up, so obviously he had some knowledge about what was happening with them.

Fox On The Run was released on November 29, 1968 and was basically a lament about a young man brought down by a girl.  The lyrics:

     She walked through the corn leading down to the river.
     Her hair shone like gold in the hot morning sun.
     She took all the love a poor boy could give her.
     And left me to die like the fox on the run.

     Everybody knows the reason for the fall:
     When woman tempted man down in paradise's hall.
     This woman tempted me all right, then took me for a ride.
     But like the lonely fox I need a place to hide.

     Come take a glass of wine and fortify your soul.
     We'll talk about the world and friends we used to know.
     I'll illustrate, a girl put me on the floor.
     The game is nearly up, the hounds are at my door.
     Like the fox on the run.

Listening to the song in reverse, I found three runs--beginning at 0:16, 1:27, and 2:20 where Manfred Mann sings the words:  PAUL FORGOT.

The group wouldn't have been talking about Paul Jones, their former bandmate, who, from my research, was "scandal"-less.

An interesting note on the imagery in the song:  The Rolling Stones had a promotional video filmed for the 1967 song We Love You I wrote about in my last post. Take a look at the video at:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cF5sDwYSTCM .  From 2:32-3:08 in the video, there is a sequence where Marianne Faithfull presents an animal skin--a fox or wolf--to the "judge" at the "trial".  Then later--at 3:32-3:49--the animal skin is laying on a table and Mick Jagger (as the defendant) comes out from underneath it and looks at the camera.

Another interesting note on the song.  The area around Milton Keynes-Newport Pagnell, Buckinghamshire has been a rural area and was definitely one in 1966.  I found an internet listing for a 1965 sale of an estate in the area and the farm land on the estate was sown to cornhttp://www.mkheritage.co.uk/hav/docs/linhistory/llsale1965.html  .  At the edge of Bury Field, Newport Pagnell, by the River Ouse, is a street called Mill Street, named after the corn mills that were once located there.  So a woman walking through cornfields in Newport Pagnell in 1966 is very much a possibility.