Q: Why did the ‘Paul Is Dead’ controversy continue to hold credence with Beatles fans for as long as it did despite the Beatles’ insistence that there weren’t hidden messages about it in any of their album covers/songs etc? Did the Paul is Dead belief/conspiracy theory reflect changes in the mood of the Beatles fan base/60s youth in general?

A: It’s amazing that Abbey Road wasn’t as critically acclaimed as other Beatles albums upon its release in the fall of 1969. I personally rank it in the top three after The Beatles and Revolver. The overall sound is different from the others because it was recorded using a brand new 16-track TG12345 Mark I mixing console providing a slicker more polished sound.

The infamous concert at Altamont Raceway in December of 1969 pretty much put the nail in the coffin of the ‘peace & love’ generation. That free concert by the Rolling Stones also featured Crosby Still Nash & Young and Jefferson Airplane. Things took an ominous twist early on when Airplane lead singer Marty Balin was knocked unconscious by one of the Hell’s Angels who had been hired as security for the event. Later that night as the Stones tried to open their set with Sympathy for the Devil a concert-goer was stabbed to death in front of the stage.

Altamont is now recognized as the official end of the 60s.

Clearly fans were starting to grow as tired of the Beatles as the Beatles were of being Beatles; especially John. In Can’t Buy Me Love Author Jonathan Gould connects the lackluster response of Abbey Road to the rumors of Paul’s death. The mood of the Beatles’ fan base by the time the ‘Paul is Dead’ myth appeared was highly cynical and pessimistic; understandably so.

McCartney was said to have been replaced by a lookalike named William Shears Campbell or William Sheppard. The rumors gained momentum on October 12^th 1969 after an on-air phone call to radio DJ Russ Gibb on WKNR-FM in Michigan. The caller claimed that McCartney had died in 1966 and he instructed Gibb to play Revolution 9 backwards where the repeated “number nine” phrase was heard as “…Turn me on, dead man…turn me on, dead man…” Quite how this proved anything was not explained.

The Beatles are said to have covered up the death, despite inserting a series of clues into their songs and artwork. Although The Beatles and their press office at Apple were initially bewildered and annoyed by the story’s refusal to go away, there is evidence that the group members found it less than amusing.

The idea Paul McCartney’s mysterious death and the subsequent cover up was an intriguing concept and fun to consider at the time – even though it was utterly ridiculous to believe that the entire inner sanctum of the Beatles could be in on such a bizarre scheme. None of the supposed clues were remotely valid. Clearly the whole thing was a hoax.

By November 1969, the idealism of the early sixties was essentially over. Nixon was president, the Vietnam War was ramping up – not winding down – and The Woodstock generation was already starting to become jaded and demoralized. The Manson murders happened in August, immediately following the Woodstock Festival. It was a bizarre, confusing and fearful time. MLK and RFK had been dead for over a year and the ‘peace and love’ paradigm had been exposed as a naive pipedream.