I saved your life - it now belongs to ME..!
Friday, 30 September 2016
Sacre Coeur
APPENDIX CHETH: HAGBARD'S ABDICATION
Readers who do not understand the scene in which Hagbard abdicates in favor of Miss Portinari should take heart.
Once they do understand it, they will understand most of the mysteries of all schools of mysticism.
The Rite of Shiva, as performed by Joe Malik during the SSS Black Mass, contains the central secret of all magick, very explicitly, yet most people can reread that section a dozen, or a hundred times, and never understand what the secret is.
For instance, Miss Portinari was a typical Catholic girl in every way— except for an unusual tendency to take Catholicism seriously— until she began menstruating and performing spiritual meditations every day.*
One morning, during her meditation period, she visualized the Sacred Heart of Jesus with unusual clarity; immediately another image, distinctly shocking to her, came to mind with equal vividness. She recounted this experience to her confessor the next Saturday, and he warned her, gravely, that meditation was not healthy for a young girl, unless she intended to take the oath of seclusion and enter a convent. She had no intention of doing that, but rebelliously (and guiltily) continued her meditations anyway. The disturbing second image persisted whenever she thought of the Sacred Heart; she began to suspect that this was sent by the Devil to distract her from meditation.
* These two signs of growth often appear at the same time, being DNA-triggered openings of the fourth neural circuit.
One weekend, when she was home from convent school on vacation, her parents decided she was the right age to be introduced to Roman society. (Actually, they, like most well-off Italian families, had already chosen which daughter would be given to the church— and it wasn't her. Hence, this early introduction to la dolce vita.) One of the outstanding ornaments of Rome at that time was the "eccentric international businessman" Mr. Hagbard Celine, and he was at the party to which Miss Portinari was taken that evening.
It was around eleven, and she had consumed perhaps a little too much Piper Heidseck, when she happened to find herself standing near a small group who were listening raptly to a story the strange Celine was telling. Miss Portinari wondered what this creature might be saying—he was reputedly even more cynical and materialistic than other international money-grubbers, and Miss Portinari was, at that time, the kind of conservative Catholic idealist who finds capitalists even more dreadful than socialists. She idly tuned in on his words; he was talking English, but she understood that language adequately.
" 'Son, son,'" Hagbbard recited, " 'with two beautiful women throwing themselves at you, why are you sitting alone in your room jacking off?'"
Miss Portinari blushed furiously and drank some more champagne to conceal it. She hated the man already, knowing that she would surrender her virginity to him at the earliest opportunity; of such complexities are intellectual Catholic adolescents capable.
"And the boy replied," Hagbard went on, " 'I guess you just answered your own question, Ma.' "
There was a shocked silence.
"The case is quite typical," Hagbard added blandly, obviously finished. "Professor Freud recounts even more startling family dramas."
"I don't see ..." a celebrated French auto racer began, frowning. Then he smiled. "Oh," he said, "was the boy an American?"
Miss Portinari left the group perhaps a bit too hurriedly (she felt a few eyes following her) and quickly refilled her champagne glass.
A half-hour later she was standing on the veranda, trying to clear her head in the night air, when a shadow moved near her and Celine appeared amid a cloud of cigar smoke.
"The moon has a fat jaw tonight," he said in Italian. "Looks like somebody punched her in the mouth."
"Are you a poet in addition to your other accomplishments?" she asked coolly. "That sounds as if it might be American verse."
He laughed— a clear peal, like a stallion whinnying. "Quite so," he said. "I just came from Rapallo, where I was talking to America's major poet of this century. How old are you?" he asked suddenly.
"Almost sixteen," she said fumbling the words.
"Almost fifteen," he corrected ungallantly.
"If it's any affair of yours—"
"It might be," he replied easily. "I need a girl your age for something I have in mind."
"I can imagine. Something foul."
He stepped further out of the shadows and closer. "Child," he said, "are you religious?"
"I suppose you regard that as old-fashioned," she replied, imagining his mouth on her breast and thinking of paintings of Mary nursing the Infant.
"At this point in history," he said simply, "it's the only thing that isn't old-fashioned. What was your birthdate? Never mind— you must be a Virgo."
"I am," she said. (His teeth would bite her nipple, but very gently. He would know enough to do that.) "But that is superstition, not religion."
"I wish I could draw a precise line between religion, superstition, and science." He smiled. "I find that they keep running together. You are Catholic, of course?"
His persistence was maddening. "I am too proud to believe an absurdity, and therefore I am not a Protestant," she replied— immediately fearing that he would recognize the plagiarism.
"What symbol means the most to you?" he asked, with the blandness of a prosecuting attorney setting a trap.
"The cross," she said quickly. She didn't want him to know the truth.
"No." He again corrected her ungallantly. "The Sacred Heart."
Then she knew he was of Satan's party. "I must go," she said.
"Meditate further on the Sacred Heart," he said, his eyes blazing like a hypnotist's (a cornball gimmick, he was thinking privately, but it might work).
"Almost sixteen," she said fumbling the words.
"Almost fifteen," he corrected ungallantly.
"If it's any affair of yours—"
"It might be," he replied easily. "I need a girl your age for something I have in mind."
"I can imagine. Something foul."
He stepped further out of the shadows and closer. "Child," he said, "are you religious?"
"I suppose you regard that as old-fashioned," she replied, imagining his mouth on her breast and thinking of paintings of Mary nursing the Infant.
"At this point in history," he said simply, "it's the only thing that isn't old-fashioned. What was your birthdate? Never mind— you must be a Virgo."
"I am," she said. (His teeth would bite her nipple, but very gently. He would know enough to do that.) "But that is superstition, not religion."
"I wish I could draw a precise line between religion, superstition, and science." He smiled. "I find that they keep running together. You are Catholic, of course?"
His persistence was maddening. "I am too proud to believe an absurdity, and therefore I am not a Protestant," she replied— immediately fearing that he would recognize the plagiarism.
"What symbol means the most to you?" he asked, with the blandness of a prosecuting attorney setting a trap.
"The cross," she said quickly. She didn't want him to know the truth.
"No." He again corrected her ungallantly. "The Sacred Heart."
Then she knew he was of Satan's party. "I must go," she said.
"Meditate further on the Sacred Heart," he said, his eyes blazing like a hypnotist's (a cornball gimmick, he was thinking privately, but it might work).
"Meditate on it deeply, child. You will find in it the essential of Catholicism — and the essential of all other religion."
"I think you are mad," she responded, leaving the veranda with undignified haste.
But two weeks later, during her morning meditation, she suddenly understood the Sacred Heart. At lunchtime she disappeared—leaving behind a note to the Mother Superior of the convent school and another note for her parents— and went in search of Hagbard. She had even more potential than he realized, and (as elsewhere recorded) within two years he abdicated in her favor. They never became lovers.*
*They were quite good friends, though, and he did fuck her occasionally.
*They were quite good friends, though, and he did fuck her occasionally.
We Sacrifice
777 "The Sacrifice Of Victor" 777
What is sacrifice?
(We s... we s... we s... we sacrifice)
NPG in mass attack, Sonny, please.
(We Sacrifice)
Church if u will, please turn 2 the book of Victor (We s, We s)
We like 2 start at the top if u don't mind
(We Sacrifice)
(Don't say it, preacher)
I was born on a blood stained table
Cord wrapped around my neck
Epilectic 'til the age of 7
I was sure heaven marked the deck
(We Sacrifice)
I know joy lives 'round the corner
{Joy for sale down on the corner}
(We Sacrifice)
One day I'll visit her I'm gonna
{Out on my block I'm just a loner}
(We Sacrifice)
When she tell me everything {tell me}
That's when the angels sing {Sacrifice}
That's when the victory is sho 'nuff {sho 'nuff down with the Sacrifice}
(We Sacrifice)
(Help me!)
(Don't say it, preacher!)
Mama held up her baby 4 protection
From a man with a strap in his hand
Ask the Victor 'bout pain and rejection
U think he don't when he do understand
(We Sacrifice)
I know joy lives 'round the corner
{Joy for sale down on the corner}
(We Sacrifice)
One day I'll visit her I'm gonna
{Out on my block I'm just a loner}
(We Sacrifice)
When she tell me everything {tell me}
That's when the angels sing {Sacrifice}
That's when the victory is sho 'nuff {sho 'nuff down with the Sacrifice}
(We Sacrifice)
(Help Me)
{S.A.C.R.I.F.I.C.E}
(we-we-we sacrifice)
(Don't say it preacher)
(sac-sacrifice)
(we-we-we sacrifice)
(we-we-we sacrifice)
(sacrifice... if u turn the page)
(Don't say it, preacher)
1967 in a bus marked public schools
Rode me and a group of unsuspecting political tools
Our parents wondered what it was like 2 have another color near
So they put their babies together 2 eliminate the fear
We sacrifice yes we did
Fighting one another, (we sacrifice) (don't say it preacher)
All because of color
The angel of hate - she taught me how 2 kick her
If she called me anything but Victor (u mean like nigger?)
If the only thing that tells me is father time
Then sacrifice is the mutha sublime - we love it
Listen mutha - we sacrifice
(don't... don't... don't say it preacher)
(we sacrifice)
(Well, well, well, well)
(What is sacrifice?)
Hold yo' text, deacon
Never understood my old friends laughing
They got high when everything else got wrong (pass the booze up here)
Dr. King was killed and the streets
They started burnin'
When the smoke was cleared, their high was gone
Education got important, so important 2 Victor
A little more important than ripple and weed
Bernadette's a lady, and she told me (what she say?)
"Whatever u do son, a little discipline is what u need,
Is what u need, u need to sacrifice"
(we sacrifice)
I know joy lives 'round the corner
{Joy for sale down on the corner} (we sacrifice)
One day I'll visit her I'm gonna
{Out on my block I'm just a loner} (we sacrifice)
When she tell me everything {tell me}
That's when the angels sing {sacrifice}
That's when the victory is sho 'nuff {sho 'nuff down with the sacrifice}
(we sacrifice)
(what is sacrifice?)
(we sacrifice)
{S.A.C.R.I.F.I.C.E}
(we sacrifice) (joy around the corner)
Hey Wendy, how come we... (we sacrifice)
'scuse me y'all (we sacrifice)
We don't don't mean 2 take up yo time (joy around the corner)
But we got something
Heavy on our minds (we sacrifice)
Yes, we do (we sacrifice)
Sometimes, u gotta leave the one u love
Somebody, anybody, everybody wave your hand
Around the corner, there's another sacrifice (joy around the corner)
But u got 2 do the best u can y'all (we sacrifice)
Say u got 2 go through it (go through it)
U got 2 go through it all (go through it all)
High glory, yeah
Sell it, don't tell it, don't tell me (joy around the corner)
...nice at my feet
Lord I might get tired,
But I, I've got 2 keep on (we sacrifice)
Walkin' down this road, (we sacrifice)
Keep on walkin' down this road (joy around the corner)
When I reach my destination (we sacrifice)
My name will be Victor
Amen
777 "The Sacrifice Of Victor" 777
We Sacrifice.
We Sacrifice
We Sacrifice
We Sacrifice.
We Sacrifice.
Very few readers of the Golden Bough have pierced Sir Prof. Dr. Frazer's veil of euphemism and surmised the exact method used by Isis in restoring life to Osiris, although this is shown quite clearly Left-hand Pentagram Right-hand Pentagram (two horns exalted) (one horn exalted) in extant Egyptian frescoes. Those who are acquainted with this simple technique of resurrecting the dead (which is at least partially successful in all cases and totally successful in most) will have no trouble in skrying the esoteric connotations of the Sacred Chao— or of the Taoist yin-yang or the astrological sign of cancer.
The method almost completely reverses that of the pentagrams, right or left, and it can even be said that in a certain sense it was not Osiris himself but his brother, Set, symbolically understood, who was the object of Isis's magical workings.
In every case, without exception, a magical or mystical symbol always refers to one of the very few * variations of the same, very special variety of human sacrifice: the "one eye opening" or the "one hand clapping"; and this sacrifice cannot be partial— it must culminate in death if it is to be efficacious.
The literalmindedness of the Saures, in the novel, caused them to become a menace to life on earth; the reader should bear this in mind. The sacrifice is not simple. It is a species of cowardice, epidemic in Anglo- Saxon nations for more than three centuries, which causes most who seek success in this field to stop short before the death of the victim. Anything less than death—that is, complete oblivion—simply will not work.**
(One will find more clarity on this crucial point in the poetry of John Donne than in most treatises alleging to explain the secrets of magick.)
* Fewer than seventy, according to a classical enumeration.
** The magician must always identify fully with the victim, and share every agonized contortion to the utmost. Any attitude of standing aside and watching, as in a theatrical performance, or any intellectualization during the moments when the sword is doing its brutal but necessary work, or any squeamishness or guilt or revulsion, creates the twomindedness against which Hagbard so vehemently warns in Never Whistle While You're Pissing.
In a sense, only the mind dies.
A. YIN-YANG; B. SACRED CHAD; c. OUROBOROS, THE SERPENT EATING ITS OWN TAIL; D. ASTROLOGICAL SIGN OF CANCER; E. SWASTIKA; F. ROMAN CATHOLIC SACRED HEART; G. HEXAGRAM.
The symbolism of the swastika is quite adequately explained in Wilhelm Reich's Mass Psychology of Fascism.
Ouroboros, the serpent eating its own tail, is chiefly emblematic of the Mass of the Holy Ghost.*
* See Israel Regardie, The Tree of Life.
The Roman Catholic symbolism of the Sacred Heart is strikingly overt, especially to readers of Frazer and Payne-Knight. In essence, it is the same notion conveyed by the cartoonist's conventional rendering of Cupid shooting his arrow into a red pulsating heart.
This is the basic meaning of the Dying God and the Resurrection. The identification of Christ with the pelican who stabs its own heart with its beak (to feed its young) is an analogous rendering of the same motif. We repeat that it was only because the Saure family so misread these simple symbols that they became cruel and sadistic. In essence, then, the basic symbols, of magic, mythology, and religion—whether Eastern or Western, ancient or modern, "right-hand" or "left-hand"—are so simple that only the pernicious habit of looking for alleged "profundities" and "mysteries" prevents people from automatically understanding them almost without thinking. The meaning of the hexagram— the female equivalent of the male pentagram— was explicated by Freud himself, but most students, convinced that the answer could not be so elementary and down -to-earth, continue to look into the clouds. The same principles apply to written symbols.
The all-important name YOD HE VAU HE, for instance, has traditionally been scanned in various ways, of which the most significant correlations are given in the following table:
The traditional lion-man-eagle-bull symbolism also fits this table,* as do Joyce's Four Old Men in Finnegans Wake;** it can also be found in the Aztec codices and Buddhist mandalas.
* YOD, the fiery father, is the lion (fire-sign); HE, the watery mother, is man as humanity; VAU, the air spirit, is eagle; final HE, earth, is bull.
** Marcus Lyons (i.e., the lion) is the fiery father; Matt Gregory (i.e., the ego) is the watery mother; John McDougall (i.e., eagle) is the airy son; Luke Tarpey (taur, the bull) is the earthy daughter.
The essential and original meaning, of course, is a program for a ritual, and the ritual is magick. The four letters are simply the four beats in Wilhelm Reich's formula: muscular tension --> electrical charge --> electrical discharge --> muscular relaxation. In short, as Freud once noted, every sexual act involves, at a minimum, four parties. The father and son provide a "fist" and a "nail"; the mother YOD HE VAU HE
True meaning of the Hebrew Letters Fist (or spermatazoon) Window Nail Window Traditional Magick code Father Mother Son Daughter Tarot suit Wands Cups Swords Pentacles (or Discs) Tarot trump Hermit Star Hierophant Star Tarot Royal Card Knight Queen Prince Princess Element Fire Water Air Earth and daughter provide two "windows."
The case of the Chicago schizophrenic killer William Heirens, who experienced orgasm when climbing through windows, demonstrates that this symbolism does not have to be taught and is inherent in the human mind, although always subject to the distortion exemplified by the Saures.
Finally, the universal blessing given on page 218 is intimately involved with the YHVH formula:
I bless Ra, the fierce sun burning bright
I bless Isis-Luna in the night
I bless the air, the Horus-Hawk
I bless the earth on which I walk
The fiery father, the watery mother, the airy son, and the earthy daughter are all there, just as they are in every alchemical formula.* But we say no more at this point, lest the reader begin seeking for a 5 = 4 equation to balance the 5 = 6.
* In this connection—and also, en passant, as an indication that Adolf Hitler's link with the Illuminati was not invented for this work of "fiction"— we suggest that the reader look into The Morning of the Magicians, by Pauwels and Bergier.
We conclude with a final warning and clarification:
Resort to mass sacrifice (as among the Aztecs, the Catholic Inquisition, and the Nazi death camps) is the device of those who are incapable of the true Rite of the Dying God.
The Beatles Will Open Up Your Chakras
The first vowel sound is :
ooo
The second vowel sound is :
aah
Well, shake it up baby now
Twist and shout
Come on, come on, come, come on baby now
Come on and work it on out
Well work it on out, honey
You know you look so good
You know you got me goin' now
Just like I know you would
Well, shake it up baby now
Twist and shout
Come on, come on, come, come on baby now
Come on and work it on out
You know you twist, little girl
You know you twist so fine
Come on and twist a little closer now
And let me know that you're mine,
Twist and shout
Come on, come on, come, come on baby now
Come on and work it on out
Well work it on out, honey
You know you look so good
You know you got me goin' now
Just like I know you would
Well, shake it up baby now
Twist and shout
Come on, come on, come, come on baby now
Come on and work it on out
You know you twist, little girl
You know you twist so fine
Come on and twist a little closer now
And let me know that you're mine,
OOO !
Yeah, shake it up baby now
Twist and shout
Come on, come on, come, come on baby now
Come on and work it on out
You know you twist, little girl
You know you twist so fine
Come on and twist a little closer now
And let me know that you're mine
Well shake it, shake it, shake it, baby now
Well shake it, shake it, shake it, baby now
Well shake it, shake it, shake it, baby now
aah
aah
aah
AAH
Throughout the ritual at Shea Stadium, they are all wearing The Seal of Solomon over their heart.
Then, when We decreed (Solomon's) death, nothing showed them his death except a little worm of the earth, which kept (slowly) gnawing away at his staff: so when he fell down, the Jinn saw plainly that if they had known the unseen, they would not have tarried in the humiliating Penalty (of their Task).
— Quran, sura 34 (Saba’), ayah 14
034.012
YUSUFALI:
And to Solomon (We made) the Wind (obedient): Its early morning (stride) was a month's (journey), and its evening (stride) was a month's (journey); and We made a Font of molten brass to flow for him; and there were Jinns that worked in front of him, by the leave of his Lord, and if any of them turned aside from our command, We made him taste of the Penalty of the Blazing Fire.
PICKTHAL:
And unto Solomon (We gave) the wind, whereof the morning course was a month's journey and the evening course a month's journey, and We caused the fount of copper to gush forth for him, and (We gave him) certain of the jinn who worked before him by permission of his Lord. And such of them as deviated from Our command, them We caused to taste the punishment of flaming Fire.
SHAKIR:
And (We made) the wind (subservient) to Sulaiman, which made a month's journey in the morning and a month's journey m the evening, and We made a fountain of molten copper to flow out for him, and of the jinn there were those who worked before him by the command of his Lord; and whoever turned aside from Our command from among them, We made him taste of the punishment of burning.
034.013
YUSUFALI:
They worked for him as he desired, (making) arches, images, basons as large as reservoirs, and (cooking) cauldrons fixed (in their places): "Work ye, sons of David, with thanks! but few of My servants are grateful!"
PICKTHAL:
They made for him what he willed: synagogues and statues, basins like wells and boilers built into the ground. Give thanks, O House of David! Few of My bondmen are thankful.
SHAKIR:
They made for him what he pleased of fortresses and images, and bowls (large) as watering-troughs and cooking-pots that will not move from their place; give thanks, O family of Dawood! and very few of My servants are grateful.
034.014
YUSUFALI:
Then, when We decreed (Solomon's) death, nothing showed them his death except a little worm of the earth, which kept (slowly) gnawing away at his staff: so when he fell down, the Jinns saw plainly that if they had known the unseen, they would not have tarried in the humiliating Penalty (of their Task).
PICKTHAL:
And when We decreed death for him, nothing showed his death to them save a creeping creature of the earth which gnawed away his staff. And when he fell the jinn saw clearly how, if they had known the Unseen, they would not have continued in despised toil.
SHAKIR:
But when We decreed death for him, naught showed them his death but a creature of the earth that ate away his staff; and when it fell down, the jinn came to know plainly that if they had known the unseen, they would not have tarried in abasing torment.
Wednesday, 28 September 2016
I Have Seen The Enemy
I have seen The Enemy,
and He is I as You are Me as You are He and We are Altogther
[Goo Goo Ki-Chu]
See how They run,
Like pigs from a gun,
See how They fly
I'm crying.
Philemon
"Carl Gustav Jung and the Red Book," an all day symposium, featured presentations by prominent Jungian scholars.
Speaker Biography: Jung scholar Sonu Shamdasani is a London-based author, editor, and professor at the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London WIHM/UCL. Shamdasani works discuss the history of psychiatry and psychology from the mid-nineteenth century to current times. Shamdasani holds a BA from Bristol University, followed by MSc, History of Science and Medicine, University College London/Imperial College and gained his Ph.D. in History of Medicine from WIHM/UCL.
Speaker Biography: James Hillman is a psychologist, scholar, international lecturer, pioneer psychologist, and the author of more than twenty books. Hillman has held teaching positions at Yale University, the University of Chicago, Syracuse University, the University of Chicago, and the University of Dallas, where he cofounded the Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture.
Speaker Biography: Ann Ulanov is a professor of psychiatry and religion at the Union Theological Seminary in New York City. She is the author of several books, including Religion and the Spiritual in Carl Jung and The Healing Imagination: The Meeting of Psyche and Soul.
For captions, transcript, and more information visit http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/feat...
Cranberry Sauce
EHCATSUOMEKAFASAWTI
"Realizing the dire implications should the police find a box full of drugs in Paul McCartney's car, Mohammed manages to pull himself out of the wreckage, locate the box, hobble across the dark highway (scaling a high barrier fence and a traffic island in the process), throw the box as far down a ravine as he can, and still make it back to the accident site before the police arrive.
Hot on the heels of the police come the spectators. They immediately recognize the Mini Cooper as belonging to McCartney, and an audible buzz goes up after they see a slight, dark-haired man being pulled from the car and placed into an ambulance. Putting two and two together and coming up with three, the word quickly spreads that Paul McCartney's been in a car accident.
Chtaibi is taken to a nearby hospital where he is treated for multiple cuts, bruises and other injuries. After the doctors remove all of the glass from his face and body, Mohammed (still bolstered from the drugs at McCartney's) decides he's okay, checks himself out and goes home. Once back at Mount Street he spends a few anxious hours waiting for the phone to ring. "Surely they're going to call," he thinks. "If only to know what happened to the drugs." But, surprisingly, the phone never rings. He decides to go to a party instead. The next morning, hurting and hung-over, he gets a call from Robert Fraser demanding to know what happened. Fraser tells Chtaibi that McCartney and the others were plenty pissed off he never bothered to show up with the drugs, accusing him of giving them the slip and making his own party. Chtaibi tells Fraser the story of what happened and asks Fraser to ask McCartney if his insurance can cover his injuries. [ Questionable - be cautious around such ambiguous phrasing, because remember kids from America, we have Socialised Medicine, this is a National Health Service hospital, so there are no medical bills resulting from his being hospitalised and patched up, and no cost incurred to Chtaibithat would be covered by any insurance ] Fraser says he'll relay the tale to McCartney.
On Monday, Chtaibi is somewhat surprised by an unusual visit from McCartney. But far from being pleased by—or even acknowledging—Chtaibi's super-human efforts to get rid of the stash, McCartney lashes into the Moroccan for wrecking his prized car. Chtaibi pleads with McCartney for help, saying he doesn't have enough money to go to the hospital and he'd like to collect on the insurance. McCartney is adamant. "That car's only insured for me, my chauffeur, Jane [Asher, his fiancé at the time] and Jane's mum," he says. Chtaibi later complains to Fraser about McCartney's lack of sympathy. Fraser tells Chtaibi to not worry about it, that things would be fixed.
They never were."
ARCHIVE HIGHLIGHT
The Man Who Killed Paul McCartney
The incredible, never-before-revealed true-life event that sparked the greatest rock 'n' roll rumor of all time
By Jim Yoakum
From Gadfly May/June 2000
The setup...
In the February 1967 (#43) issue of The Beatles Monthly Book, the Beatles' official fan club magazine, the following blurb appeared in the "Beatle News" section, entitled "FALSE RUMOUR":
"Stories about the Beatles are always flying around Fleet Street. The 7th of January was very icy, with dangerous conditions on the M1 motorway, linking London with the Midlands, and towards the end of the day, a rumor swept London that Paul McCartney had been killed in a car crash on the M1. But, of course, there was absolutely no truth in it at all. As the Beatles' Press Officer found out, when he telephoned Paul's St. John's Wood home and was answered by Paul himself, that he had been at home all day with his black Mini Cooper safely locked up in the garage."
The story goes...
On October 12, 1969, Detroit disc jockey Russ Gibb of WKNR-FM received a bizarre late-night phone call from a listener. This Deep Throat told him that, if he played several tracks off of the Beatles' The White Album backwards, he'd hear some rather interesting things. Curious, Gibb decided "to hell" with his stylus and turntable, and spent the next several hours shredding his copy of The White Album. What Gibb heard was amazing. When played backwards, he discovered a formerly indecipherable mumbling from John Lennon at the end of "I'm So Tired" could now clearly be made out as the literary Beatle moaning "Paul is a dead man, miss him, miss him, miss him." Also, the oft-intoned words "number nine, number nine" from Lennon's music concrete opus, "Revolution #9," miraculously transformed into the eerie phrase "turn me on dead man" when spun counterclockwise.
Clearly, Gibb thought, something was up. So certain he was on to something big, Gibb started digging deeper. He soon discovered various other "clues" relating to the supposed demise of the cute Beatle sprinkled on various other Beatle songs and album covers, going as far back as their Yesterday....And Today LP, released a full three years earlier! Soon after Gibb began enlightening his Motor City listeners to "The Great Cover-up," disc jockey's from competing stations in New York City and beyond picked up this shaggy dog tale, and it wasn't too long before the news "Paul McCartney was dead" began to spread around the world. Within weeks, the sale of new and old Beatles albums soared as both the distraught fan and the merely curious bought clean copies just to play them backwards. (The rumors helped the sales of the just-released Abbey Road, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Magical Mystery Tour, and The White Album. Both Sgt. Pepper's and Magical Mystery Tour, which were released in 1967, re-entered Billboard's Top 200 charts in November 1969. Both LP's stayed in the Top 200 until the spring of 1970).
Faced with this preponderance of "evidence," and coupled with the Beatles' own real lack of comment, the public decided the story must be true. "Okay then," the public said, "we've come not to bury Paul (besides, Lennon had already admitted to doing just that at the end of "Strawberry Fields Forever"), but to ask if Paul is dead, then how did it happen?"
Although many more tales developed than tellers in this story, by 1970 a fairly conclusive and mutually agreed-upon scenario began to develop regarding exactly how Paul had come to meet his maker. As the story goes, on an evening in November 1966 (probably the eighth, a "stupid bloody Tuesday"), an argument took place between McCartney and the other Beatles at Abbey Road Studios. A livid McCartney stormed out of the building, hopped into his Aston Martin and sped off into the night. In his anger, he failed to notice the traffic light change and he spun out of control, smashing into a light pole at full speed, thus decapitating him (in other words, he "blew his mind out in a car"). He was later "Officially Pronounced Dead" on the scene, in the early hours of Wednesday the ninth ("number nine, number nine...). McCartney was then carried in secret to the morgue (note the "O.P.D" patch on McCartney's left sleeve on the inside gatefold of Sgt. Pepper's). Faced with the prospect of losing revenue due to the untimely death of the most popular member of the band, (the story goes) the three "surviving Beatles" hired one William Campbell, a man who supposedly once won a McCartney look-alike contest, to fill in for the dead Beatle. The "clues" then became the Fabs way of subtly and gently breaking the tragic news to the fans. (The entire crash scenario is supposed to be played out in full if you play "Revolution #9" backwards).
Anyway, that's the story of the Paul Is Dead rumor. But there's another story that's never been told—until now. The story of an incredible true-life event that accidentally sparked the greatest rock 'n' roll rumor of all time.
First some background...
If an era can be said to have a father, then London's Swinging Sixties was the bastard child of Robert Hugh Fraser. Fraser was the son of a wealthy Scots banker, and a man who appeared to have everything going for him: looks, class, youth and money. Yet for all of his privileges, Fraser was a frustrated artist at heart who sublimated his creative longings into running one of the best art galleries in London. By 1964, the Robert Fraser Gallery at 69 Duke Street was recognized around the world as being the sharpest, hippest gallery, exhibiting the latest and most important artists of the period. Fraser was also accumulating friends more accustomed to the pop charts than Pop Art. Musicians like Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Brian Jones and others were regular fixtures at both Fraser's gallery, and at his Mount Street apartment. To the still scruffy rockers, Fraser represented all that swung about the Swinging Sixties: the money, the sex and (especially) the drugs. Fraser was where all of the razz-ma-tazz of the era sprang. Without him, smoking dope was just getting high.
Mohammed Chtaibi first met Robert Hugh Fraser in the early 1960s. He was a young Moroccan student, the ward of Mark Gilbey, the multimillionaire heir to the Gilbey liquor fortune, and it wasn't long before Mohammed Chtaibi (then known as Mohammed Hadjij) and Robert Fraser became fast friends. Soon after he opened his gallery, Fraser asked Chtaibi to be his personal assistant and move into the adjoining penthouse on Mount Street, which Fraser watched for an aging movie star, who no longer bothered to drop by. Officially, Chtaibi's job was to pick up and deliver painters and paintings to the gallery, but he soon realized his real job was to baby-sit the gallery while Fraser ran off with his famous friends. Sometimes Fraser would invite Chtaibi along with him (usually to cook, drive or carry the dope), and this is what he did on the first Saturday of January in the winter of 1967. They were going to Paul McCartney's house to have a party.
Fraser and Chtaibi's taxi pulls up to the gate at 7 Cavendish Avenue, McCartney's London home located in the swank St. John's Wood area, late in the afternoon. Twenty or so fans, mostly girls, were already camped outside hoping to get a glimpse of the elusive Beatle. When the slight, dark-haired Chtaibi gets out of the cab the girls all scream, thinking at first glance that he's McCartney, but McCartney is already shuttered inside the three-story detached house, playing rock 'n' roll records. Fraser goes to the gate and presses the intercom button several times. It's many full minutes before McCartney (thinking it's the girls playing pranks again) answers with a laconic "Yeah?" After a brief exchange, the gate swings open just enough for Fraser and Chtaibi to squeeze through, and then clicks closed again.
Once safely ensconced inside the house, the trio retires to McCartney's cluttered back-room lounge to relax. After a few minutes of chat, McCartney exits, but quickly returns with a large book, which he places on a table. Chtaibi watches as McCartney opens up the book. He's surprised to learn it's actually hollowed out in the middle, making the book a secret box, and the box is filled with all manner of hard and soft drugs, from hashish to cocaine, heroin and acid. This is the stash, the heart of the party. McCartney takes out a bag of hash and assigns Mohammed the task of rolling the "Benson & Hashish B-52 Bombers," joints made from a mixture of dope and tobacco, while he and Fraser chat. A few Bombers later, the intercom buzzes again. Within moments, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Brian Jones and mutual hipster friend Christopher Gibbs (the nephew of a former British Governor of Rhodesia) are standing in the middle of the room. Now the party starts to get serious, and the Bombers are augmented by some of the harder drugs.
After a few hours of fun, and with darkness falling, the group decides to "make a weekender out of it." Plans are made to drive to Redlands, Richards' secluded thatched-roofed country mansion in West Wittering, Sussex, after a brief stop first at Jagger's place in Hertfordshire. Laughing and joking, they spill out of McCartney's door and shamble toward the cars. Even though three vehicles are parked in McCartney's drive (McCartney's Aston Martin and black Mini Cooper, and Jagger's Mini Cooper), they all decide for some reason to try and cram into Jagger's small car.
Crushed underneath the weight of Richards and Gibbs, Chtaibi suggests they take a second car. McCartney agrees, and tells Chtaibi to get out and follow them in his Mini. (Unlike Jagger's Mini Cooper, McCartney's was especially designed for him as an almost toy version of a Rolls-Royce complete with arm chairs, a wet bar, smoke-tinted glass, a racing-style steering wheel about 12-inches wide and oversized tires. The car was the only one of its kind in Great Britain and was easily recognized as being McCartney's). As a special precaution against possible nosy cops, McCartney hands Chtaibi the book—the heart of the party—and says "meet you there." Moments later, the front gates fly open and the crowd of girls let out a collective shriek of "Paul!!" as the two cars speed past them, bound for the privacy of their home counties.
Although Chtaibi has driven McCartney's Mini many times, it's mainly been short distances, usually local hash runs, and he's a little uneasy with the car's tight steering. He curses to himself as he realizes his suggestion has put him in the dangerous position of driving the car at night, down unfamiliar roads, with no clear idea of his ultimate destination. He's also quite stoned and is having to concentrate hard just to keep the little car between the lines. Within minutes, the two Mini Coopers are well past the bright city lights of London, heading up the M1 into the country dark of Britain's outer regions. Before long they're traveling at speeds upward to 70 mph, dangerous indeed on such narrow black roads better suited for bicycles than automobiles. Chtaibi is having to push the Mini faster than he's comfortable with in order to keep Jagger's taillights in sight.
At about the halfway point in the journey, something crucial happens: Chtaibi runs out of cigarettes. Giving the car more gas, he succeeds in pulling McCartney's Mini up beside Jagger's car and motions to Fraser to toss him some ciggies. Amazingly, considering their speed, Fraser manages to land a few butts inside the car. Jagger and company then pull ahead and out of sight.
At this point, it should be mentioned that in his hurry to get into the Mini outside McCartney's house, Chtaibi accidentally left about a 12-inch section of the car's seat belt dragging on the ground. As he slows down to light his fag, another car comes up from behind him and begins to pass. As it does, the car's tires run over the dangling seat belt. Unaware of the passing car, Chtaibi immediately feels the Mini being tugged to the right. He compensates by instinctively pulling the steering wheel in the opposite direction. At this exact moment, the passing car drives off of the belt. The next thing Chtaibi knows, the Mini is leaving the asphalt and is flying through the air at incredible speed toward a large metal streetlight sitting atop a massive concrete pylon. As the Mini smashes headlong into the pole, the jagged metal of the light shaves the car straight up the middle like a tin can, breaking the engine in two, and leaving Chtaibi unconscious and bleeding and hugging the monstrous lamp between his legs.
He doesn't know how long he's been unconscious. Perhaps just a few minutes, maybe longer or maybe less. But not too long after the crash, Chtaibi starts to awaken. The first thought that occurs to him is not the state of the car, or of his bloodied head and body—it's of the box. The heart of the party. Realizing the dire implications should the police find a box full of drugs in Paul McCartney's car, Mohammed manages to pull himself out of the wreckage, locate the box, hobble across the dark highway (scaling a high barrier fence and a traffic island in the process), throw the box as far down a ravine as he can, and still make it back to the accident site before the police arrive.
Hot on the heels of the police come the spectators. They immediately recognize the Mini Cooper as belonging to McCartney, and an audible buzz goes up after they see a slight, dark-haired man being pulled from the car and placed into an ambulance. Putting two and two together and coming up with three, the word quickly spreads that Paul McCartney's been in a car accident.
Chtaibi is taken to a nearby hospital where he is treated for multiple cuts, bruises and other injuries. After the doctors remove all of the glass from his face and body, Mohammed (still bolstered from the drugs at McCartney's) decides he's okay, checks himself out and goes home. Once back at Mount Street he spends a few anxious hours waiting for the phone to ring. "Surely they're going to call," he thinks. "If only to know what happened to the drugs." But, surprisingly, the phone never rings. He decides to go to a party instead. The next morning, hurting and hung-over, he gets a call from Robert Fraser demanding to know what happened. Fraser tells Chtaibi that McCartney and the others were plenty pissed off he never bothered to show up with the drugs, accusing him of giving them the slip and making his own party. Chtaibi tells Fraser the story of what happened and asks Fraser to ask McCartney if his insurance can cover his injuries. Fraser says he'll relay the tale to McCartney.
On Monday, Chtaibi is somewhat surprised by an unusual visit from McCartney. But far from being pleased by—or even acknowledging—Chtaibi's super-human efforts to get rid of the stash, McCartney lashes into the Moroccan for wrecking his prized car. Chtaibi pleads with McCartney for help, saying he doesn't have enough money to go to the hospital and he'd like to collect on the insurance.
ARCHIVE HIGHLIGHT
The Man Who Killed Paul McCartney
The incredible, never-before-revealed true-life event that sparked the greatest rock 'n' roll rumor of all time
By Jim Yoakum
From Gadfly May/June 2000
The setup...
In the February 1967 (#43) issue of The Beatles Monthly Book, the Beatles' official fan club magazine, the following blurb appeared in the "Beatle News" section, entitled "FALSE RUMOUR":
"Stories about the Beatles are always flying around Fleet Street. The 7th of January was very icy, with dangerous conditions on the M1 motorway, linking London with the Midlands, and towards the end of the day, a rumor swept London that Paul McCartney had been killed in a car crash on the M1. But, of course, there was absolutely no truth in it at all. As the Beatles' Press Officer found out, when he telephoned Paul's St. John's Wood home and was answered by Paul himself, that he had been at home all day with his black Mini Cooper safely locked up in the garage."
The story goes...
On October 12, 1969, Detroit disc jockey Russ Gibb of WKNR-FM received a bizarre late-night phone call from a listener. This Deep Throat told him that, if he played several tracks off of the Beatles' The White Album backwards, he'd hear some rather interesting things. Curious, Gibb decided "to hell" with his stylus and turntable, and spent the next several hours shredding his copy of The White Album. What Gibb heard was amazing. When played backwards, he discovered a formerly indecipherable mumbling from John Lennon at the end of "I'm So Tired" could now clearly be made out as the literary Beatle moaning "Paul is a dead man, miss him, miss him, miss him." Also, the oft-intoned words "number nine, number nine" from Lennon's music concrete opus, "Revolution #9," miraculously transformed into the eerie phrase "turn me on dead man" when spun counterclockwise.
Clearly, Gibb thought, something was up. So certain he was on to something big, Gibb started digging deeper. He soon discovered various other "clues" relating to the supposed demise of the cute Beatle sprinkled on various other Beatle songs and album covers, going as far back as their Yesterday....And Today LP, released a full three years earlier! Soon after Gibb began enlightening his Motor City listeners to "The Great Cover-up," disc jockey's from competing stations in New York City and beyond picked up this shaggy dog tale, and it wasn't too long before the news "Paul McCartney was dead" began to spread around the world. Within weeks, the sale of new and old Beatles albums soared as both the distraught fan and the merely curious bought clean copies just to play them backwards. (The rumors helped the sales of the just-released Abbey Road, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Magical Mystery Tour, and The White Album. Both Sgt. Pepper's and Magical Mystery Tour, which were released in 1967, re-entered Billboard's Top 200 charts in November 1969. Both LP's stayed in the Top 200 until the spring of 1970).
Faced with this preponderance of "evidence," and coupled with the Beatles' own real lack of comment, the public decided the story must be true. "Okay then," the public said, "we've come not to bury Paul (besides, Lennon had already admitted to doing just that at the end of "Strawberry Fields Forever"), but to ask if Paul is dead, then how did it happen?"
Although many more tales developed than tellers in this story, by 1970 a fairly conclusive and mutually agreed-upon scenario began to develop regarding exactly how Paul had come to meet his maker. As the story goes, on an evening in November 1966 (probably the eighth, a "stupid bloody Tuesday"), an argument took place between McCartney and the other Beatles at Abbey Road Studios. A livid McCartney stormed out of the building, hopped into his Aston Martin and sped off into the night. In his anger, he failed to notice the traffic light change and he spun out of control, smashing into a light pole at full speed, thus decapitating him (in other words, he "blew his mind out in a car"). He was later "Officially Pronounced Dead" on the scene, in the early hours of Wednesday the ninth ("number nine, number nine...). McCartney was then carried in secret to the morgue (note the "O.P.D" patch on McCartney's left sleeve on the inside gatefold of Sgt. Pepper's). Faced with the prospect of losing revenue due to the untimely death of the most popular member of the band, (the story goes) the three "surviving Beatles" hired one William Campbell, a man who supposedly once won a McCartney look-alike contest, to fill in for the dead Beatle. The "clues" then became the Fabs way of subtly and gently breaking the tragic news to the fans. (The entire crash scenario is supposed to be played out in full if you play "Revolution #9" backwards).
Anyway, that's the story of the Paul Is Dead rumor. But there's another story that's never been told—until now. The story of an incredible true-life event that accidentally sparked the greatest rock 'n' roll rumor of all time.
First some background...
If an era can be said to have a father, then London's Swinging Sixties was the bastard child of Robert Hugh Fraser. Fraser was the son of a wealthy Scots banker, and a man who appeared to have everything going for him: looks, class, youth and money. Yet for all of his privileges, Fraser was a frustrated artist at heart who sublimated his creative longings into running one of the best art galleries in London. By 1964, the Robert Fraser Gallery at 69 Duke Street was recognized around the world as being the sharpest, hippest gallery, exhibiting the latest and most important artists of the period. Fraser was also accumulating friends more accustomed to the pop charts than Pop Art. Musicians like Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Brian Jones and others were regular fixtures at both Fraser's gallery, and at his Mount Street apartment. To the still scruffy rockers, Fraser represented all that swung about the Swinging Sixties: the money, the sex and (especially) the drugs. Fraser was where all of the razz-ma-tazz of the era sprang. Without him, smoking dope was just getting high.
Mohammed Chtaibi first met Robert Hugh Fraser in the early 1960s. He was a young Moroccan student, the ward of Mark Gilbey, the multimillionaire heir to the Gilbey liquor fortune, and it wasn't long before Mohammed Chtaibi (then known as Mohammed Hadjij) and Robert Fraser became fast friends. Soon after he opened his gallery, Fraser asked Chtaibi to be his personal assistant and move into the adjoining penthouse on Mount Street, which Fraser watched for an aging movie star, who no longer bothered to drop by. Officially, Chtaibi's job was to pick up and deliver painters and paintings to the gallery, but he soon realized his real job was to baby-sit the gallery while Fraser ran off with his famous friends. Sometimes Fraser would invite Chtaibi along with him (usually to cook, drive or carry the dope), and this is what he did on the first Saturday of January in the winter of 1967. They were going to Paul McCartney's house to have a party.
Fraser and Chtaibi's taxi pulls up to the gate at 7 Cavendish Avenue, McCartney's London home located in the swank St. John's Wood area, late in the afternoon. Twenty or so fans, mostly girls, were already camped outside hoping to get a glimpse of the elusive Beatle. When the slight, dark-haired Chtaibi gets out of the cab the girls all scream, thinking at first glance that he's McCartney, but McCartney is already shuttered inside the three-story detached house, playing rock 'n' roll records. Fraser goes to the gate and presses the intercom button several times. It's many full minutes before McCartney (thinking it's the girls playing pranks again) answers with a laconic "Yeah?" After a brief exchange, the gate swings open just enough for Fraser and Chtaibi to squeeze through, and then clicks closed again.
Once safely ensconced inside the house, the trio retires to McCartney's cluttered back-room lounge to relax. After a few minutes of chat, McCartney exits, but quickly returns with a large book, which he places on a table. Chtaibi watches as McCartney opens up the book. He's surprised to learn it's actually hollowed out in the middle, making the book a secret box, and the box is filled with all manner of hard and soft drugs, from hashish to cocaine, heroin and acid. This is the stash, the heart of the party. McCartney takes out a bag of hash and assigns Mohammed the task of rolling the "Benson & Hashish B-52 Bombers," joints made from a mixture of dope and tobacco, while he and Fraser chat. A few Bombers later, the intercom buzzes again. Within moments, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Brian Jones and mutual hipster friend Christopher Gibbs (the nephew of a former British Governor of Rhodesia) are standing in the middle of the room. Now the party starts to get serious, and the Bombers are augmented by some of the harder drugs.
After a few hours of fun, and with darkness falling, the group decides to "make a weekender out of it." Plans are made to drive to Redlands, Richards' secluded thatched-roofed country mansion in West Wittering, Sussex, after a brief stop first at Jagger's place in Hertfordshire. Laughing and joking, they spill out of McCartney's door and shamble toward the cars. Even though three vehicles are parked in McCartney's drive (McCartney's Aston Martin and black Mini Cooper, and Jagger's Mini Cooper), they all decide for some reason to try and cram into Jagger's small car.
Crushed underneath the weight of Richards and Gibbs, Chtaibi suggests they take a second car. McCartney agrees, and tells Chtaibi to get out and follow them in his Mini. (Unlike Jagger's Mini Cooper, McCartney's was especially designed for him as an almost toy version of a Rolls-Royce complete with arm chairs, a wet bar, smoke-tinted glass, a racing-style steering wheel about 12-inches wide and oversized tires. The car was the only one of its kind in Great Britain and was easily recognized as being McCartney's). As a special precaution against possible nosy cops, McCartney hands Chtaibi the book—the heart of the party—and says "meet you there." Moments later, the front gates fly open and the crowd of girls let out a collective shriek of "Paul!!" as the two cars speed past them, bound for the privacy of their home counties.
Although Chtaibi has driven McCartney's Mini many times, it's mainly been short distances, usually local hash runs, and he's a little uneasy with the car's tight steering. He curses to himself as he realizes his suggestion has put him in the dangerous position of driving the car at night, down unfamiliar roads, with no clear idea of his ultimate destination. He's also quite stoned and is having to concentrate hard just to keep the little car between the lines. Within minutes, the two Mini Coopers are well past the bright city lights of London, heading up the M1 into the country dark of Britain's outer regions. Before long they're traveling at speeds upward to 70 mph, dangerous indeed on such narrow black roads better suited for bicycles than automobiles. Chtaibi is having to push the Mini faster than he's comfortable with in order to keep Jagger's taillights in sight.
At about the halfway point in the journey, something crucial happens: Chtaibi runs out of cigarettes. Giving the car more gas, he succeeds in pulling McCartney's Mini up beside Jagger's car and motions to Fraser to toss him some ciggies. Amazingly, considering their speed, Fraser manages to land a few butts inside the car. Jagger and company then pull ahead and out of sight.
At this point, it should be mentioned that in his hurry to get into the Mini outside McCartney's house, Chtaibi accidentally left about a 12-inch section of the car's seat belt dragging on the ground. As he slows down to light his fag, another car comes up from behind him and begins to pass. As it does, the car's tires run over the dangling seat belt. Unaware of the passing car, Chtaibi immediately feels the Mini being tugged to the right. He compensates by instinctively pulling the steering wheel in the opposite direction. At this exact moment, the passing car drives off of the belt. The next thing Chtaibi knows, the Mini is leaving the asphalt and is flying through the air at incredible speed toward a large metal streetlight sitting atop a massive concrete pylon. As the Mini smashes headlong into the pole, the jagged metal of the light shaves the car straight up the middle like a tin can, breaking the engine in two, and leaving Chtaibi unconscious and bleeding and hugging the monstrous lamp between his legs.
He doesn't know how long he's been unconscious. Perhaps just a few minutes, maybe longer or maybe less. But not too long after the crash, Chtaibi starts to awaken. The first thought that occurs to him is not the state of the car, or of his bloodied head and body—it's of the box. The heart of the party. Realizing the dire implications should the police find a box full of drugs in Paul McCartney's car, Mohammed manages to pull himself out of the wreckage, locate the box, hobble across the dark highway (scaling a high barrier fence and a traffic island in the process), throw the box as far down a ravine as he can, and still make it back to the accident site before the police arrive.
Hot on the heels of the police come the spectators. They immediately recognize the Mini Cooper as belonging to McCartney, and an audible buzz goes up after they see a slight, dark-haired man being pulled from the car and placed into an ambulance. Putting two and two together and coming up with three, the word quickly spreads that Paul McCartney's been in a car accident.
Chtaibi is taken to a nearby hospital where he is treated for multiple cuts, bruises and other injuries. After the doctors remove all of the glass from his face and body, Mohammed (still bolstered from the drugs at McCartney's) decides he's okay, checks himself out and goes home. Once back at Mount Street he spends a few anxious hours waiting for the phone to ring. "Surely they're going to call," he thinks. "If only to know what happened to the drugs." But, surprisingly, the phone never rings. He decides to go to a party instead. The next morning, hurting and hung-over, he gets a call from Robert Fraser demanding to know what happened. Fraser tells Chtaibi that McCartney and the others were plenty pissed off he never bothered to show up with the drugs, accusing him of giving them the slip and making his own party. Chtaibi tells Fraser the story of what happened and asks Fraser to ask McCartney if his insurance can cover his injuries. Fraser says he'll relay the tale to McCartney.
On Monday, Chtaibi is somewhat surprised by an unusual visit from McCartney. But far from being pleased by—or even acknowledging—Chtaibi's super-human efforts to get rid of the stash, McCartney lashes into the Moroccan for wrecking his prized car. Chtaibi pleads with McCartney for help, saying he doesn't have enough money to go to the hospital and he'd like to collect on the insurance.
McCartney is adamant. "That car's only insured for me, my chauffeur, Jane [Asher, his fiancé at the time] and Jane's mum," he says.
Chtaibi later complains to Fraser about McCartney's lack of sympathy. Fraser tells Chtaibi to not worry about it, that things would be fixed. They never were.
So, the question is: was Mohammed Chtaibi's unfortunate encounter with Paul McCartney's Mini Cooper the inspiration behind the ensuing Paul Is Dead rumors? While there is no definitive proof that it was, there are an awful lot of coincidences between what did happen and what was rumored.
To start, although it didn't take place in late fall of 1966 (as went the rumor), there really was a car crash involving Paul McCartney's Mini Cooper on Saturday, January 7, 1967 on the M1. While it did not involve McCartney, the car was driven by a man who resembled him enough to start tongues wagging and stories flying.
After Chtaibi's accident, the Beatles suddenly incorporated an inordinate number of references to car crashes and accidents into their lyrics. Rather odd topics for rock songs, and ones previously neglected by the Fab Four. To wit: "He blew his mind out in a car" ("A Day In The Life," recorded February 1967). "You were in a car crash and you lost your hair" ("Don't Pass Me By," recorded June 1968). And these rather bizarre excerpts from "Revolution #9," a song which acts almost as a recreation of a car accident, encompassing screams, crashes, flames and comments from spectators, including: "People ride, people ride. Ride, ride, ride, ride, ride... He hit a pole... He'd better go to see a surgeon... In my broken chair, my wings are broken and so is my hair... It's a fine chemical imbalance... Must've got it between his shoulder blades...", (recorded June 1968).
And for no apparent reason, there's a toy car sitting in a doll's lap on the cover of Sgt. Pepper's. The doll wears a sweater reading "Welcome, The Rolling Stones." The group that evening included McCartney and three of the Stones, and they were headed to Richards' home. Also, for no apparent reason, there's a picture of two cars meeting on a darkened road on page 14 of the Magical Mystery Tour booklet. If these aren't references to Chtaibi's accident, or to "Paul's death" (as denied by the Beatles), then what do they mean and why are they there?
So, did the Beatles use Chtaibi's accident as the inspiration for the hoax and, if so, why? Again, there's no definitive proof that the Beatles had a direct hand in the Paul Is Dead rumor. They have always denied culpability, but the sheer overwhelming abundance of "coincidences" and "clues" sprinkled across four or five albums does cast some shadow on their story. Clearly something was up. As to why they would even entertain doing such a bizarre thing, it's important to remember the times in which this all took place. Less than a year earlier the band had become fed-up with screaming Beatlemania and decided to stop touring in order to concentrate on their music. This was a risky move. No pop band had ever attempted to go from teen idol to serious artist. Would the kids relate to their new mature style? Would the sophisticos they were hoping to reach embrace the former Mop Tops?
Before Sgt. Pepper's was released, neither scenario looked very likely. In fact, the British press had taken to calling the Beatles "washed-up" and "out of ideas." A lot was riding on their next move and it was a tense time. Is it really such a stretch to think four clever men like the Beatles might want to take out a little insurance against the possible failure of Sgt. Pepper's by cooking up a fantastical scheme as bizarre as the Paul Is Dead Rumor? After all, aren't these the same guys who had previously played with our brains by putting backwards singing on "Rain," who sang "tit, tit, tit" on the choruses of "Girl" and who managed to slip the phrase "Paul's a queer" into the ultimate kiddies' song, "Yellow Submarine?" The thinking could have been, should Sgt. Pepper's go belly-up, the band could slowly reveal the "clues as to Paul's demise" some months, or even years, later in order to spur sagging album sales. Embarrassment at the premature discovery of the scheme could easily account for their later adamant denials. It's a brilliant idea. In fact, the whole thing has John Lennon written all over it. Assuming, of course, they had been involved.
When Mohammed Chtaibi first told me his tale nearly 12 years ago, I asked whether or not he believed McCartney and the other Beatles had been involved in the subsequent Paul Is Dead rumor. Chtaibi smiled and, placing tongue-firmly-in-cheek, sarcastically replied: "I hear if you play 'Silly Love Songs' (McCartney's mid-'70s hit) backwards, you can hear him say 'I wish I was dead!'"
Touché, Mohammed. And happy motoring.
So, the question is: was Mohammed Chtaibi's unfortunate encounter with Paul McCartney's Mini Cooper the inspiration behind the ensuing Paul Is Dead rumors? While there is no definitive proof that it was, there are an awful lot of coincidences between what did happen and what was rumored.
To start, although it didn't take place in late fall of 1966 (as went the rumor), there really was a car crash involving Paul McCartney's Mini Cooper on Saturday, January 7, 1967 on the M1. While it did not involve McCartney, the car was driven by a man who resembled him enough to start tongues wagging and stories flying.
After Chtaibi's accident, the Beatles suddenly incorporated an inordinate number of references to car crashes and accidents into their lyrics. Rather odd topics for rock songs, and ones previously neglected by the Fab Four. To wit: "He blew his mind out in a car" ("A Day In The Life," recorded February 1967). "You were in a car crash and you lost your hair" ("Don't Pass Me By," recorded June 1968). And these rather bizarre excerpts from "Revolution #9," a song which acts almost as a recreation of a car accident, encompassing screams, crashes, flames and comments from spectators, including: "People ride, people ride. Ride, ride, ride, ride, ride... He hit a pole... He'd better go to see a surgeon... In my broken chair, my wings are broken and so is my hair... It's a fine chemical imbalance... Must've got it between his shoulder blades...", (recorded June 1968).
And for no apparent reason, there's a toy car sitting in a doll's lap on the cover of Sgt. Pepper's. The doll wears a sweater reading "Welcome, The Rolling Stones." The group that evening included McCartney and three of the Stones, and they were headed to Richards' home. Also, for no apparent reason, there's a picture of two cars meeting on a darkened road on page 14 of the Magical Mystery Tour booklet. If these aren't references to Chtaibi's accident, or to "Paul's death" (as denied by the Beatles), then what do they mean and why are they there?
So, did the Beatles use Chtaibi's accident as the inspiration for the hoax and, if so, why? Again, there's no definitive proof that the Beatles had a direct hand in the Paul Is Dead rumor. They have always denied culpability, but the sheer overwhelming abundance of "coincidences" and "clues" sprinkled across four or five albums does cast some shadow on their story. Clearly something was up. As to why they would even entertain doing such a bizarre thing, it's important to remember the times in which this all took place. Less than a year earlier the band had become fed-up with screaming Beatlemania and decided to stop touring in order to concentrate on their music. This was a risky move. No pop band had ever attempted to go from teen idol to serious artist. Would the kids relate to their new mature style? Would the sophisticos they were hoping to reach embrace the former Mop Tops?
Before Sgt. Pepper's was released, neither scenario looked very likely. In fact, the British press had taken to calling the Beatles "washed-up" and "out of ideas." A lot was riding on their next move and it was a tense time. Is it really such a stretch to think four clever men like the Beatles might want to take out a little insurance against the possible failure of Sgt. Pepper's by cooking up a fantastical scheme as bizarre as the Paul Is Dead Rumor? After all, aren't these the same guys who had previously played with our brains by putting backwards singing on "Rain," who sang "tit, tit, tit" on the choruses of "Girl" and who managed to slip the phrase "Paul's a queer" into the ultimate kiddies' song, "Yellow Submarine?" The thinking could have been, should Sgt. Pepper's go belly-up, the band could slowly reveal the "clues as to Paul's demise" some months, or even years, later in order to spur sagging album sales. Embarrassment at the premature discovery of the scheme could easily account for their later adamant denials. It's a brilliant idea. In fact, the whole thing has John Lennon written all over it. Assuming, of course, they had been involved.
When Mohammed Chtaibi first told me his tale nearly 12 years ago, I asked whether or not he believed McCartney and the other Beatles had been involved in the subsequent Paul Is Dead rumor. Chtaibi smiled and, placing tongue-firmly-in-cheek, sarcastically replied: "I hear if you play 'Silly Love Songs' (McCartney's mid-'70s hit) backwards, you can hear him say 'I wish I was dead!'"
Touché, Mohammed. And happy motoring.
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