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Paul is dead

"Paul is dead" is an urban legend and conspiracy theory alleging that English pop musician Paul McCartney of the Beatles died in 1966 and was secretly replaced by a look-alike. The rumour began circulating in 1966, gaining broad popularity in September 1969 following reports on American college campuses.

"Paul Is Dead" redirects here. For the graphic novel, see Paul Is Dead (comics). For the Miracles episode, see Paul is Dead (Miracles episode).

According to the theory, McCartney died in a car crash, and to spare the public from grief, the surviving Beatles, aided by Britain's MI5, replaced him with a McCartney look-alike, subsequently communicating this secret through subtle details of their albums. Proponents perceived clues among elements of Beatles songs and cover artwork; clue-hunting proved infectious, and by October 1969 had become an international phenomenon. Rumours declined after Life published an interview with McCartney in November 1969.


The phenomenon was the subject of analysis in the fields of sociology, psychology and communications during the 1970s. McCartney parodied the hoax with the title and cover art of his 1993 live album, Paul Is Live. The legend was among ten of "the world's most enduring conspiracy theories" according to Time in 2009.

Growth[edit]

On 12 October 1969, a caller to Detroit radio station WKNR-FM told disc jockey Russ Gibb about the rumour and its clues.[17] Gibb and other callers then discussed the rumour on air for the next hour,[28] during which Gibb offered further potential clues.[29] Two days later, The Michigan Daily published a satirical review of Abbey Road by University of Michigan student Fred LaBour, who had listened to the exchange on Gibb's show,[17] under the headline "McCartney Dead; New Evidence Brought to Light".[30][31] It identified various clues to McCartney's alleged death on Beatles album covers, particularly on the Abbey Road sleeve. LaBour later said he had invented many of the clues and was astonished when the story was picked up by newspapers across the United States.[32] Noden writes that "Very soon, every college campus, every radio station, had a resident expert."[17] WKNR fuelled the rumour further with its two-hour programme The Beatle Plot, which first aired on 19 October. This show has been called "infamous", a "fraud" and a "mockumentary". It brought enormous worldwide publicity to Gibb and WKNR.[33]


The story was soon taken up by more mainstream radio stations in the New York area, WMCA and WABC.[34] In the early hours of 21 October, WABC disc jockey Roby Yonge discussed the rumour on-air for over an hour before being pulled off the air for breaking format. At that time of night, WABC's signal covered a wide listening area and could be heard in 38 US states and, at times, in other countries.[35] Although the Beatles' press office denied the rumour, McCartney's atypical withdrawal from public life contributed to its escalation.[36] Vin Scelsa, a student broadcaster in 1969, later said that the escalation was indicative of the countercultural influence of Bob Dylan, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, since: "Every song from them – starting about late 1966 – became a personal message, worthy of endless scrutiny ... they were guidelines on how to live your life."[17]


WMCA dispatched Alex Bennett to the Beatles' Apple Corps headquarters in London on 23 October,[37] to further his extended coverage of the "Paul is dead" theory.[34][38] There, Ringo Starr told Bennett: "If people are gonna believe it, they're gonna believe it. I can only say it's not true."[37] In a radio interview with John Small of WKNR, Lennon said that the rumour was "insane" but good publicity for Abbey Road.[39][nb 2] On Halloween night 1969, WKBW in Buffalo, New York, broadcast a program titled Paul McCartney Is Alive and Well – Maybe, which analysed Beatles lyrics and other clues. The WKBW DJs concluded that the "Paul is dead" hoax was fabricated by Lennon.[41]


Before the end of October 1969, several record releases had exploited the phenomenon of McCartney's alleged demise.[34] These included "The Ballad of Paul" by the Mystery Tour;[42] "Brother Paul" by Billy Shears and the All Americans; "So Long Paul" by Werbley Finster, a pseudonym for José Feliciano;[43] and Zacharias and His Tree People's "We're All Paul Bearers (Parts One and Two)".[44] Another song was Terry Knight's "Saint Paul",[34] which had been a minor hit in June that year and was subsequently adopted by radio stations as a tribute to "the late Paul McCartney".[45][nb 3] A cover version of "Saint Paul" by New Zealand singer Shane reached the top of that nation's singles charts.[47] According to a report in Billboard magazine in early November, Shelby Singleton Productions planned to issue a documentary LP of radio segments discussing the phenomenon.[48] In Canada, Polydor Records exploited the rumour in their artwork for Very Together, a repackaging of the Beatles' pre-fame recordings with Tony Sheridan, using a cover that showed four candles, one of which had just been snuffed out.[49]

Analysis and legacy[edit]

Author Peter Doggett writes that, while he thinks the theory behind "Paul is dead" defied logic, its popularity was understandable in a climate where citizens were faced with conspiracy theories insisting that the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963 was in fact a coup d'état.[84] Schaffner said that, given its origins as an item of gossip and intrigue generated by a select group in the "Beatles cult", "Paul is dead" serves as "a genuine folk tale of the mass communications era".[18] He also described it as "the most monumental hoax since Orson Welles' War of the Worlds broadcast persuaded thousands of panicky New Jerseyites that Martian invaders were in the vicinity".[18]


In his book Revolution in the Head, Ian MacDonald says that the Beatles were partly responsible for the phenomenon due to their incorporation of "random lyrics and effects", particularly in the White Album track "Glass Onion" in which Lennon invited clue-hunting by including references to other Beatles songs.[13] MacDonald groups it with the "psychic epidemics" that were encouraged by the rock audience's use of hallucinogenic drugs and which escalated with Charles Manson's homicidal interpretation of the White Album and Mark David Chapman's religion-motivated murder of Lennon in 1980.[85]


During the 1970s, the phenomenon became a subject of academic study in America in the fields of sociology, psychology and communications.[86] Among sociological studies, Barbara Suczek recognised it as, in Schaffner's description, a contemporary reading of the "archetypal myth wherein the beautiful youth dies and is resurrected as a god".[18] Psychologists Ralph Rosnow and Gary Fine attributed its popularity partly to the shared, vicarious experience of searching for clues without consequence for the participants. They also said that for a generation distrustful of the media following the Warren Commission's report, it was able to thrive amid a climate informed by "The credibility gap of Lyndon Johnson's presidency, the widely circulated rumors after the Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy assassinations, as well as attacks on the leading media sources by the yippies and Spiro Agnew".[18]


American social critic Camille Paglia locates the "Paul is dead" phenomenon to the Ancient Greek tradition symbolised by Adonis and Antinous, as represented in the cult of rock music's "pretty, long-haired boys who mesmerize both sexes", and she adds: "It's no coincidence that it was Paul McCartney, the 'cutest' and most girlish of the Beatles, who inspired a false rumor that swept the world in 1969 that he was dead."[87]


"Paul is dead" has continued to inspire analysis into the 21st century, with published studies by Andru J. Reeve, Nick Kollerstrom and Brian Moriarty, among others, and exploitative works in the mediums of mockumentary and documentary film.[55] Writing in 2016, Beatles biographer Steve Turner said, "the theory still has the power to flare back into life."[54] He cited a 2009 Wired Italia magazine article that featured an analysis by two forensic research consultants who compared selected photographs of McCartney taken before and after his alleged death by measuring features of the skull.[54] According to the scientists' findings, the man shown in the post-November 1966 images was not the same.[54][88][nb 6]


Similar rumours concerning other celebrities have been circulated, including the unsubstantiated allegation that Canadian singer Avril Lavigne died in 2003 and was replaced by a person named Melissa Vandella.[89][90] In an article on the latter phenomenon, The Guardian described the 1969 McCartney hoax as "Possibly the best known example" of a celebrity being the focus of "a (completely unverified) cloning conspiracy theory".[89] In 2009, Time magazine included "Paul is dead" in its feature on ten of "the world's most enduring conspiracy theories".[56]

The June 1970 issue of the title Batman (#222) had a story titled "Dead ... Till Proven Alive" in which it was rumoured that Saul from the band the Oliver Twists was deceased and replaced with a double. On the cover of the comic book, Robin is holding an album that mimics the back of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.[91][92]

DC Comics

The 1972 comedy album Radio Dinner has several announced "clues" placed throughout, including backmasked segments and notes in the album's gatefold, all parodying the hoax.[93][94]

National Lampoon

In ' 1978 television film satirising the Beatles' history, All You Need Is Cash, the identity of the alleged dead band member was transferred to the George Harrison character, Stig O'Hara, who was supposed to have died "in a flash fire at a water bed shop" and been replaced by a Madame Tussauds wax model. Building on Harrison's reputation as the "Quiet Beatle", the "Stig is dead" theory was supported by his lack of dialogue in the film[95] and clues such as his trouser-less appearance on the cover of the Rutles' Shabby Road album.[96]

the Rutles

On the February 13th, 1993 episode of , Paul McCartney was interviewed on The Chris Farley Show, a recurring sketch where Chris Farley nervously asked questions of his guests, usually on if they remembered parts of their career. Regarding the "Paul Is Dead" rumours, Farley outlined the urban legend, then asked "That was, um, a hoax, right?" Paul responded by saying "Yeah. I wasn't really dead."

Saturday Night Live

McCartney titled his 1993 live album in reference to the hoax.[97] He also presented it in a sleeve that parodied the Abbey Road cover and its clues.[98]

Paul Is Live

The 1995 video for "" – a song recorded by Lennon in the late 1970s and completed by McCartney, Harrison and Starr for the band's Anthology project – references "Paul is dead", among other myths relating to the Beatles' impact during the 1960s. According to author Gary Burns, the video indulges in the same "semiological excess" as the 1969 hoax and thereby "spoof[s]" obsessive clue-hunting.[99]

Free as a Bird

In the 1995 episode of , "Lisa the Vegetarian", Paul McCartney guest stars and mentions that if his song "Maybe I'm Amazed" is played backwards, it contains a recipe for lentil soup. The song plays over the end credits, and, if played backwards, it not only contains the aforementioned recipe, but also Paul himself saying "oh, and by the way, I'm alive".[100]

The Simpsons

In 2010, American author published the mashup novel Paul Is Undead: The British Zombie Invasion, which depicts all of the Beatles as zombies except Ringo Starr.[101]

Alan Goldsher

A 2010 mockumentary, Paul McCartney Really Is Dead: The Last Testament of George Harrison, purports to tell the story of George Harrison, believing himself to be on his deathbed after being stabbed on Dec. 30, 1999, revealing that Paul had died in a car crash with a girl named Rita and that British intelligence agencies had orchestrated a coverup through which Paul was replaced by a lookalike. The film is narrated by a voice actor purporting to be George Harrison, describing over archival footage and reenactment the clues left behind in songs and album art that Paul was dead.[103][nb 7]

[102]

In 2015, the indie rock band released a song called "Paul Is Alive", which contains lyrics referencing Beatlemania[108] and partly addresses the 1969 rumour.[109]

EL VY

A 2018 comedy short film, Paul Is Dead, depicts a version of events where McCartney dies during a musical retreat and is replaced by a look-alike named Billy Shears.

[110]

A graphic novel co-created by Paolo Baron and Ernesto Carbonetti called was published in English by Image Comics in 2020.

Paul is Dead

There have been many references to the legend in popular culture, including the following examples.

Outline of the Beatles

The Beatles timeline

National Post's guide to "Paul is dead" clues, May 2017

"The 70 Greatest Conspiracy Theories in Pop-Culture History", Vulture, October 2016