John to Paul: 'You’re Daft, I Want a Divorce'

New interview tapes reveal Lennon as engineer of Beatles' break up
By Mat Probasco,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 6, 2009 8:33 AM CDT
John to Paul: 'You’re Daft, I Want a Divorce'
The Beatles perform their last live public concert on the rooftop of the Apple Organization building in 1969.   (Getty Images)

Long-forgotten interviews with the Beatles emerged today when rock journalist Ray Connelly dug out reels of tape he'd stored away in a forgotten suitcase. On the 40th anniversary of the band's descent into dissolution, Connelly reveals new information upending some impressions that Paul McCartney was responsible for the split.

John blurted out to Connelly that he was the one who killed the world's favorite band. At a meeting between the two, "Paul just kept mithering on about what we were going to do, so in the end I just said, ‘I think you’re daft. I want a divorce,'" Connelly quotes him in the Times of London. Lennon also admits that McCartney wrote more of the Beatles' early material "because he was quite competent on guitar—Paul taught me quite a lot of guitar, really." (More John Lennon stories.)

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