The phone rang again and it was his dad, asking about his proposed trip up to Liverpool at the weekend. ‘What time do you think you’ll be coming, son?’ said Jim. ‘Just so I can get ready.’
‘Ready for what?’ said Paul.
‘Oh you know, just get things ready.’
‘Don’t be so stupid, Dad. I don’t want you to get ready for anything. I’ll arrive when I arrive.’
Astrid in Germany was always a bit suspicious of Paul at first, though his relationship with Stu was also bound up in this. ‘It used to frighten me that someone could be so nice all the time. Which is silly. It’s ridiculous to feel at home with nasty people, just because you feel that at least you know where you are with them. It’s silly to be wary of nice people.’
A lot of Paul’s niceness comes from his dad. His brother Michael has it as well. At 17, when the others were in revolt against their parents, Paul was the only one who listened to his dad and his little homilies, and was mocked by the others for doing so.
Paul is the easiest to get to know for an outsider, but in the end he is the hardest to get to know. There is a feeling that he is holding things back, that he is one jump ahead, aware of the impression he is giving. He is self-conscious, which the others are not. John doesn’t care, either way, what people think. Ringo is too adult to think about such things, and George in many ways isn’t conscious. He is above it all.
Paul himself has come to terms with himself, having gone through a stage of trying not to be so nice or to appear keen. ‘I do find it more of an effort not to make an effort. It’s more false for me not to. So I might as well make the effort.’
Paul’s way of making an effort, by being polite and hardworking, was essential to the group. It was his PR approach that Brian Epstein brought out. Even before that, Paul gave them any gloss they had, writing little handout letters and making little speeches.
His way of making an effort has been especially vital to them since Brian Epstein died. Paul today makes most of the running. This is why it is true to say that, in some ways, Paul is the leader today, not John, though talking seriously about a leader of the Beatles is as pointless as it ever was. Paul is the businessman, he’s the pusher, he gets things done and wheedles the rest along with him. But no big decisions are ever taken unless they all agree.
Once they are taken, Paul starts moving and doesn’t put up with inefficiencies. There was some hold-up over a proof of the Sergeant Pepper cover. He hadn’t got one when he should have done, so he rang EMI and went through department after department till he found the person whose fault it was. He told them exactly what he thought of them. It was brought round immediately by car, covered by apologies.
Another time, during some other discussions with EMI, Paul rang up the boss himself, chairman Sir Joseph Lockwood. Sir Joseph told Paul on the phone to sit tight. Then he jumped into his Rolls-Royce and came round to Paul’s house personally to settle everything. He says that Paul has the sort of mind that could have made him a good lawyer.
Paul is keen, he wants things to go well. He also still has a slight residue of resentment, which they all had at one time. This came from being pushed around and looked upon as pretty stupid because they were just beat-group players. He hates any insinuation that he is thick. He came back from a meeting with the NEMS people one day, after he’d been trying to persuade them what a good idea Apple would be, furious at their attitude. ‘They think we’re all thick,’ he said, walking round and round his living room.
The whole Apple idea and impetus are Paul’s. It got going before Brian died, but it was still all Paul’s creation. John and the others agree with everything and are there for all the big meetings. Paul sees it as a huge corporation, with shops, clubs, studios and the best people in the business, from cameramen and engineers to artists, writers and composers.
‘We want to make it an environment. An umbrella where people can do things in the way they want. There’s thousands and thousands of pounds going through NEMS and not being properly used. They’ve got it all tied up for us in the Bingley Building Society or somewhere.
‘But it’s all just a hobby, really, like our music. We do that with our feet up. When we get Apple going big, we’ll do that with our feet up. You can have business meetings which are an uplift not a bring-down.’
The Magical Mystery Tour would never have got off the ground without Paul. He put his whole life into it for the 15 weeks, directing every stage. So it was a disappointment to him at first, when the British reviews were so bad. ‘We knew from the beginning we were just practising. We knew we weren’t taking time or doing things properly, but when you’ve spent a long time on something, even when it’s not good enough, you begin to feel perhaps it is better than you know it is.
‘I’m glad now it was badly received. It would have been bad to have got away with all that. It’s now a challenge to do something properly.’
Paul went straight from Magical Mystery Tour into thinking of subjects for full-length films. He and Jane went to see A Man For All Seasons and were inspired to do something with a big, lush setting. Then he thought of doing a love story. Why should they always be expected to always lark around? Then he thought of doing some realism, such as Liverpool during the Depression.
Paul and Jane have more time together, on their own, than probably the other Beatle couples. They do get away together, to places like their Scottish home, thanks to Jane. They were the first to want to move to the country for good, to a quieter smaller house, which John and George now also want to do.
‘I always wanted to beat Jane down,’ says Paul. ‘I wanted her to give up work completely.’
‘I refused. I’ve been brought up to be always doing something. And I enjoy acting. I didn’t want to give that up.’
‘I know now I was just being silly,’ says Paul. ‘It was a game, trying to beat you down.’
At various times, one of them wanted to get married, but the other didn’t. Jane says it was usually something happening with the Beatles, just when it looked all settled, which made her change her mind. Paul says it was her acting, although he agreed when the big tour of America came up, that she had to go on that.
‘When I came back after five months, Paul had changed so much. He was on LSD, which I hadn’t shared. I was jealous of all the spiritual experiences he’d had with John. There were 15 people dropping in all day long. The house had changed and was full of stuff I didn’t know about.’
His life is much quieter and more ordered now. Paul is very communicative about himself, unlike the others. He talks everything over with Jane. She knows what he’s thinking.
‘Another problem,’ says Paul, ‘was that my whole existence for so long centred round a bachelor life. I didn’t treat women as most people do. I’ve always had a lot around, even when I’ve had a steady girl. My life generally has always been very lax, and not normal.
‘I knew it was selfish. It caused a few rows. Jane left me once and went off to Bristol to act. I said OK then, leave, I’ll find someone else. It was shattering to be without her.’
This was when he wrote ‘I’m Looking Through You’. Jane has inspired several of his more beautiful songs, such as ‘And I Love Her’.
When they got engaged, on Christmas Day 1967, all these problems were in the past. Maharishi, for a long time, was the only little point of difference, although it was all amicable. Jane didn’t fall for him when the others did, although she understood the attraction. She would obviously have preferred to try to reach a spiritual state on their own. Paul wasn’t as committed as George and John when he went with Jane to India in 1968, but he felt there was something there that would help him, that might answer his questions. So Jane agreed to go with him. In the end they both had a rewarding and happy time in India.