By the late 1960s, John Lennon was tired of The Beatles. After the band disbanded, he clarified this in several interviews.
John Lennon had had enough of The Beatles by the end of the 1960s, and he made it quite apparent when the band disbanded. Lennon disparaged the group’s music, chemistry, and the individual careers of his former colleagues in several interviews. Here are seven of his most inconsiderate remarks on his old band and fellow musicians, out of the hundreds he made many of which were aimed at Paul McCartney.
John Lennon said The Beatles were all a con
Lennon said that it worried him that others enjoyed The Beatles’ music, even though it was pleasant.
He said in The Beatles: The Authorized Biography by Hunter Davies, “None of it is important. It just takes a few people to get going, and they con themselves into thinking it’s important. It all becomes a big con.”
John explained, “We’re a con as well, We know we’re conning them, because we know people want to be conned. They’ve given us the freedom to con them. Let’s stick that in there, we say, that’ll start them puzzling. I’m sure all artists do, when they realize it’s a con.”
John Lennon said The Beatles made ‘wallpaper music’
Lennon was glad to leave The Beatles and pursue a solo career as he was tired of their music. Even the songs he composed for the band were derided by him, and he expressed the hope that going solo would enable him to create more meaningful music.
May Pang wrote in her book Loving John, “[His solo albums] would make a meaningful statement and not be wallpaper music the term John and Yoko used to describe the music of The Beatles. He was also determined that it be more successful than McCartney’s solo albums.”
He publicly criticized a Paul McCartney solo album
Following the dissolution of the band, each ex-member started a solo career. Many of these records didn’t appeal to Lennon, he said. Although he said he wouldn’t listen to George Harrison‘s CD, he thought it was superior to McCartney’s.
John said to Rolling Stone in 1971, “I thought Paul’s was rubbish, I think he’ll make a better one, when he’s frightened into it. But I thought that first one was just a lot of … Remember what I told you when it came out? ‘Light and easy.’ You know that crack.”
He admitted Ringo Starr’s debut solo album embarrassed him
Even after The Beatles broke up, Lennon and Ringo Starr remained friends. However, this did not shield Starr from Lennon’s censure. Lennon praised Starr’s second solo album, Beaucoups of Blues, pointing out that it was a good thing it wasn’t as bad as his first.
He said, “I think it’s a good record. I wouldn’t buy any of it, you know, I think it’s a good record, and I was pleasantly surprised to hear ‘Beaucoups of Blues,’ that song you know. I thought, good. I was glad, and I didn’t feel as embarrassed as I did about his first record.”
He once admitted that he regretted not punching George Harrison
A contributing factor to the escalating discord among Beatles members was the group’s cold handling of Yoko Ono. He declared that he could not forgive his bandmates’ actions. And he wished he had struck Harrison when he’d had the opportunity.
Lennon recalled, “George, s***, insulted her right to her face in the Apple office at the beginning, just being ‘straight-forward,’ you know that game of ‘I’m going to be up front,’ because this is what we’ve heard and Dylan and a few people said she’d got a lousy name in New York, and you give off bad vibes, That’s what George said to her! And we both sat through it. I didn’t hit him, I don’t know why.”
John Lennon said he felt no sadness when he stopped working with Paul McCartney
Despite working together for more than ten years, Lennon claimed he felt nothing was lost when they parted ways. He believed McCartney could not provide him with much.
“I never actually felt a loss,” he said, per the book, All We Are Saying: The Last Major Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono. “I don’t want it to sound negative, like I didn’t need Paul, because when he was there, obviously, it worked. But I can’t — it’s easier to say what my contribution was to him than what he gave to me. And he’d say the same.”
John Lennon described The Beatles as ‘the biggest bastards on earth’
Lennon claimed that Davies was too kind when describing the band, in one of his sharpest critiques of them.
He said, “Those things are left out by Davies, about what bastards we were, F***in’ big bastards, that’s what the Beatles were. You have to be a bastard to make it, that’s a fact, and the Beatles are the biggest bastards on earth.”