Paul McCartney can still recall his grief after learning of the death of his The Beatles bandmate, John Lennon.
Every year since December 1980, The Beatles fans have remembered John Lennon’s tragic death at the hands of an obsessed fan. McCartney is the most recent bandmate to reflect on the singer’s death and how it left him in deep grief.
During a recent interview with SiriusXM’s The Beatles Channel, the “Riding to Vanity Fair” singer discussed his “Here Today” song and how the death of John Lennon inspired him to write and record it. He added that things were so difficult that he couldn’t speak publicly about his late bandmate.
He said, according to Rolling Stone:
“I remember getting home from the studio on the day that we’d heard the news he died and turning the TV on and seeing people say, ‘Well, John Lennon was this,’ and ‘What he was, was this,’ and ‘I remember meeting him.’ And it was like, I don’t know, I can’t be one of those people. I can’t just go on TV and say what John meant to me. It was just too deep. It’s just too much. I couldn’t put it into words.”
Instead of forcing himself to speak about John Lennon, he channeled his emotions into the song “Here Today.”
The Beatles member recalled going to his recording studio to write the song’s opening chords while remembering the night he and John Lennon cried together in Florida. The band was unable to perform due to a hurricane at the time, so they instead drank.
At that point, the two exchanged “I love you”s and began to open up to each other.
On December 8, 1980, an obsessed fan named Mark David Chapman shot and killed John Lennon at close range.
He remained at the crime scene and awaited the arrival of the police. He told police that he committed the crime after hearing John Lennon say, “The Beatles were more popular than Jesus” in one of his interviews.
According to Chapman, he knew killing Lennon was wrong, but he had evil in his heart and was looking for fame when he shot the singer. He went on to say that he planned the murder for months while reading “The Catcher in the Rye.”
As of press time, the murderer was still imprisoned after failing to secure parole 12 times.
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