Jordan Karlesson
Narcissists and ego maniacs aside, few artists would say flat-out that they changed the word with their art. But one of the musicians who gets a pass is Sir Paul McCartney. Additionally, his comment seems reasonable after John Lennon famously remarked in 1966 that The Beatles were “more popular than Jesus.”
Videos by Rare
While Paul McCartney said he didn’t agree with Lennon’s statement, adding that the general public took it out of context. However, he wasn’t averse to making grandiose declarations of his own.
Paul McCartney, in His Own Words
It may seem odd that Macca used his own website, PaulMcCartney.com, to say The Beatles changed the world. Then again, the legendary musician surely has full control over all content on his website, including the softball interview. In turn, that would ensure that none of his remarks would be misconstrued, like Lennon’s.
The relatively brief interview is titled You Gave Me the Answer — Becoming a Musician. In it, Paul McCartney discusses his childhood and when he started playing music. Moreover, he reveals how he didn’t “feel like a real musician” until he started taking his musicianship seriously.
Clearly, Paul McCartney details many revelations about The Beatles in the interview. Macca also describes how greatly The Beatles influenced not only other musicians but culture on a whole.
Specifically, he pointed to the Fab Four catching on rapidly in the U.S. Back then, it was tough for foreign musicians to win over music fans with songs not written in the American homeland.
Paul McCartney said he knew when The Beatles had “arrived,” which is music-industry speak for when a band has developed an ardent fanbase, gained significant exposure, and gotten a strong foothold on in the public sphere.
McCartney said he felt vindicated with his “changing the world” claim after traveling the world. He noticed that Beatles fans everywhere wore outfits resembling the ones from Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
A Peek Inside You Gave Me the Answer — Becoming a Musician
Macca said The Beatles’ first big success in America opened his eyes to the importance of his little band from Liverpool.
The below excerpt from the PaulMcCartney.com interview sheds more light on the aforementioned matters.
“I started to realise that the attention was not just local, and it was around the time of Sgt Pepper when we started seeing our clothes and the music we were making getting copied on an international level,” Paul McCartney said. “Although this had happened before at home, with people getting the Beatle haircut and all dressing in a similar fashion, it was around about Sgt. Pepper that you could feel the worldwide movement.”
Finally, he remarked: “You could feel that people in California were thinking about what you were thinking about. And that’s when people started saying to us, ‘Wow man, you know your music changed my life!’ So, I think around about that time I started to think it was changing the world.
