Celebrities are often the center of many conspiracy theories. In this week’s blog, Aden McClune discusses one about John McCartney.
Paul is dead
This is one of my favorites, and one of the funnier ones.
In 1969, rumors spread that Paul McCartney of The Beatles died in a car accident, and was replaced by a lookalike, named William Shears, hence on “Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”, their 1967 extravaganza release, the intro song mentions a “Billy Shears”, and then it transitions into Ringo’s song, “With A Little Help From My Friends”.
The myth claimed that Paul, on a brisk wednesday morning in 1966, on their way to record “Sgt Pepper’s”, got into a car accident and died. This has been debunked, obviously, with Paul and Linda on holiday in France and Africa during the time of the supposed “accident”.
It is easy to get the facts mixed up and have these myths and rumors spread around. A major reason people might believe that Paul died, is the shock of how different their new albums were. Maybe some couldn’t believe Paul could write the songs he did. However, Paul’s distinctive Mini Cooper did crash in January 1967, but he was not in the car at the time of the crash.
Many references have been made, including members of The Beatles. In an interview in 1970, John Lennon said: “The whole thing was made up. We never went for anything like that.” Paul even parodied it in his 90’s album “Paul Is Live”.