Beatlemania: Paul's Death, Playing the Record Backward, and Fans

Everyone was going crazy because of The Beatles. Beatlemania was defined by the multitude of crazed young women obsessed with this new rock 'n roll band. It began in 1963 and continued until they broke up in 1970. In 1969, a listener of WKNR-FM called in and made a comment that shocked the world: Paul McCartney, one of the four Beatles, was dead. The caller, who gave only the name Tom as an identity, claimed that in 1966, McCartney had been in a fatal car accident, but it had been withheld from the public to avoid riots and other mayhem by grief-stricken fans. The caller went on to inform the disk jockey, Russell Gibb, that the band had placed clues in some of their songs and album covers. Some songs had clues in them that you could only hear if you played them backwards. When the clues were aired on the radio, the mayhem that they had tried to avoid, began to break out. The Paul McCartney Death Hoax was The Beatles' method of secretly warning their fans of their possible breakup.

The Beatles consisted of four talented men: Paul McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison and Richard Starkey. They had met at all different times and had one thing in common. They all loved music. McCartney, Lennon and Harrison all played guitar and Starkey, also known as Ringo Starr, played the drums. They started out as The Quarry Men, but eventually they changed the name to The Beatles. They played a lot together over the years and at many different places. They started out as a “teenybopper” band, as Russell Gibb put it. They were like the Jonas Brothers of the fifties. When they made their way to America, they became more popular. Gibb also noted that they grew up with their fans. They did well all through the sixties, but around 1965 tension gre...

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...ls for that picture. There were five other pictures taken before they chose that one, and he had his shoes on in most of those. The story behind the Volkswagen Bug was that it was someone's actual car with their actual license plate. Everything interpreted by the fans was an over-analysis and complete coincidence.

In November of 1969, Life Magazine set the whole story straight. They went out to McCartney's house and got an interview. He told everyone once and for all that he was alive and well. And even though there were some skeptics, it was true. It became old news. What took all the attention away from McCartney's “death”, was The Beatles' breakup in April of 1970. It happened because Paul filed a lawsuit against Lennon, Harrison and Ringo. Although many people were upset about their breakup, their music and their history lived on and is still well-known today.