British film historian Richard Jeffs has discovered a long lost 9-minute interview of John Lennon and Paul McCartney while celebrating the peak of their career. The tape, which aired on BBC Radio Tuesday, includes vital information on how the singer/songwriter duo met, along with details of their creative process.
The recovered audio was found “in a film can in a damp garage in south London,” Gregory Katz of the Associated Press reports. The tape was recorded at Scottish Television studios on April 30, 1964 just after the group toured America and won the hearts of the entire Atlantic with help from the Ed Sullivan show. At the time the interview only aired in Scotland. It isn’t clear who owned the tapes or why they were left there, but the discovery was purely by chance.
Both Paul and John speak of how they came to meet as teenagers in their home city of Liverpool. “I was playing at a garden fete in the…village where I lived just outside Liverpool, playing with a group, and he came along and we met,” says Lennon. McCartney adds that they were formally introduced by a mutual friend named Ivan, who surely must be proud of his feat to this day. McCartney admitted to starting out writing exclusively comic material, referencing his first effort, “I Lost My Little Girl.”
The 2 musically inclined teens shared a love for American rock n’ roll influences Little Richard and Fats Domino. They became fast friends as they realized their common tastes and talents in music. The younger guitarist George Harrison would soon join the duo to almost complete the marketing dream known as The Beatles. Drummer Ringo Starr would come much later.
The tape also holds vital details of their creative process together where it was revealed that the 2 often wrote together but occasionally Lennon would go off and write on his own. McCartney said, “There’s no formula, because he (Lennon) can come up with one one day completely finished. We still say we both wrote it, though.” They also discussed their love of attention from female fans during live performances. “The atmosphere in theatres. It’s marvelous,” McCartney declares with ease.
The interview was relaxed, goofy and friendly, unlike the band’s wicked break up just 5 years later. Who knew these 2 would become a couple of the finest British songwriters of the entire 20th century? Well, they did. “We always knew we were good,” Paul has been quoted as saying later in life.
The BBC has announced that the tapes are now being held in a temperature-controlled warehouse to ensure its preservation. The interview will be broadcasted again later in the week on BBC Radio 4. Try catching it if you have access to Podcast downloading or satellite radio.
