A New Album and a New Love

In 1968, Cynthia and John Lennon's marriage ended. John was with Yoko Ono now. He first met the Japanese-American artist at an art show in 1966 and they slowly fell in love. STORY BEHIND THE SONG

Paul felt sorry for Cynthia and Julian Lennon. The boy was only five. Paul wrote a song for him. He later changed the words from 'Hey Jules' to 'Hey Jude'. Everything changed for John with Yoko. He often spoke of her as his teacher. Together they explored new ideas. These were called crazy by many people, but John and Yoko weren't worried. They made their first record together in one night. It was an exploration of sounds. But the biggest news was the cover. It showed John and Yoko without any clothes. 'We just wanted to be together all the time,' remembered John. John and Yoko were together in the studio, too, as the Beatles started their next album. This soon became a problem for the other Beatles. Ringo asked him, 'What's this all about?' The other two and George Martin were angrier. When Yoko was ill, John even brought a bed into the studio for her!

In 1968 the Beatles' White Album had other problems. Ringo left the band for a time. (The band recorded a few songs without him.) In his opinion, the other Beatles didn't need him. When they all asked him back, the drummer returned happily. 'I loved the White Album', he remembers now. But not everyone had this opinion. John spoke about the start of the band's 'slow death' at this time. The musical interests in the band were more and more different. The Beatles were less and less a real group. Sometimes the album was recorded in three different studios at the same time, as John, Paul and George worked on their own songs. The double album mixed many different kinds of music. 'Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da' was a happy pop song, while 'Revolution 9' was a strange piece of sound art.' In 'Back in the USSR' the band cleverly sounded like the Beach Boys. George's best song on the album was probably 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps'. His friend Eric Clapton joined the band to play on this song.

Secret messages

Two songs from the album later became famous for the wrong reasons. In the mind of Californian Charles Manson, the songs 'Piggies' and 'Helter Skelter' were secret messages telling him to kill. George Martin thought that there were too many different songs on the double album. He wanted it to be an excellent single album. But Paul has said, 'It's a fine little album.' John also liked the simpler way of recording.