John Lennon Worried How People Would Remember Him After He Died, Says Paul McCartney

Death was something the late John Lennon thought about for years before his untimely death in 1980, according to his Beatles bandmate Paul McCartney.

McCartney reflected on the life of his close friend and musical collaborator on Wednesday’s episode of his iHeart Radio podcast, McCartney: Life in Versewhile revealing that Lennon, who was 40 when he was gunned down outside his New York apartment, was nervous about how he would be remembered posthumously.

“I remember him saying to me, ‘Paul, I’m worried about how people will remember me when I die,’ and it kind of shocked me,” McCartney, 81, recalled in the podcast. “I said ‘OK, wait, just hold it there. People will think you were great, you’ve already done enough work to show it.’ ”

The bass guitarist continued: “I was like his priest. I would often have to say, ‘My son, you’re great, don’t worry about it,’ and he would take it. He would be better off.”

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McCartney also reflected on how well he and Lennon worked together on the episode, which was titled “Here Today” in reference to the 1982 solo track he released in light of his friend’s death the year before.

“If someone asks me, ‘What was it like working with John?’ The fact is that it was easier, much easier, because there were two minds at work. And that interlude was nothing short of miraculous,” said McCartney. “Now I’m aware that I really don’t have it. And you know, we’ll often refer to, ‘What would John say about this? Is this too wet? He would say yes yes yes, so I will change.’ But my songs have to reflect me, and you don’t have that opposing element as much. I have to do it myself these days.”

John Lennon playing guitar in a Paris hotel room in January 1964.

Harry Benson/Express/Hulton Archive/Getty

He described the 1982 single as “a love song for John”, saying that he wrote it after Lennon’s death and that it was a way of looking back at some of their fondest memories.

“I remembered things about our relationship and things about the million things we did together. From being at each other’s front parlors or bedrooms, or walking down the street together, or hitchhiking,” said McCartney.

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Writing the song was “very moving, very emotional,” he added, “because I was just sitting there in this bare room thinking about John and realizing I’d lost him.”

Still, it was healing in its own way.

“And it was a powerful loss, so talking to him in the song was a kind of consolation. Somehow I was with him again.”

Paul McCartney and John Lennon, along with the rest of the Beatles, appear on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, their first appearance on American television.

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The Rock and Roll Hall of Famer has in the past openly addressed the immense grief he experienced following Lennon’s death.

In 2022, he talked about the same song, “Here Today,” during an interview on SiriusXM’s The Beatles Channel, describing the loss as “so hard.”

“I remember coming home from the studio the day we heard the news that he had died and turning on the TV and seeing people saying, ‘Well, John Lennon was this, and what he was was this,'” he recalled. with McCartney. “It was like, I don’t know, I can’t be one of those people.”

“I can’t just go on TV and say what John meant to me,” he explained. “It was just too deep. It’s just too much.”

Paul McCartney and John Lennon at the Variety Club Showbusiness Awards in London in 1964.

William Vanderson/Fox/Getty Photos

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McCartney added of the emotions after Lennon’s death: “I couldn’t put it into words.”

“It was hard for everyone in the world because he was such a beloved character and such a crazy guy. He was so special.”

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Source: HIS Education