John's reaction to Paul's death

[LordChinfist]

Stuart Sutcliffe was a close friend of John's. After learning the news of his death, Paul and Pete Best could not stop crying, but John, who should have been hit the hardest showed no emotion. Stu's mother always thought that John was unmoved by his death. John comforted Stu's fiancee Astrid. According to Astrid, "He convinced me, after Stu was gone, that I couldn't behave as if I were a widow. He pretended to be heartless, but I knew what he said came from the heart. 'Make up your mind,' he told me. 'You either live or die. You can't be in the middle.'" (This is according to Phillip Norman in his book "Shout").

One thing I was wondering is how the Beatles carried on in such a seemingly seamless fashion after Paul's alleged death. You would think that the group would not be able to carry on as well as they did after such an influential member of the band, and friend, had died. But if we take from the Stuart Sutcliffe experience, we can see John was a realist who would not dwell on the bad and be effected by it. The show must go on. Make the best of a bad situation and live for today. It was probably this attitude that kept the band together and continue to create great music.

[PaulBearer]

Paul was much closer to John's heart than Stu. Some deaths don't affect one, some do...

John never really got over Paul's death.

And not being able to grieve publicly made it all the more harder.

[TheeCavendeshLane]

Something happened to that band during the time
period before Sgt Pepper's release that turned each member of the
band from child to adult and from care free if even only in appearance
to heavy hearted individuals. Ringo is not a happy men. They
behaved like men who knew drama and tragedy notwithstanding
the fact the George appeared to be content in the years before
he died but clearly he worked hard to accept death. For innocent
care free young men they all turned to occupy themselves with
death. When Lennon told her that he was speaking from experience,
he was speaking from the world in between living and dying. Many
people believe that drug use and marijuana use causes these
changes in the personality that you might describe as depression or
being moribund or lugubrious. Was it the drug use? They didnt
turn into Ozzy they turned into tortured souls. I think that if
McCartney died and was replaced it was done with the knowlege
and approval and maybe even at the insistence of authorities. I think
they suffered under the weight of knowing they were tools. Yeah
thats what I wanted to say--they went from being care free to
carrying a weight on their shoulders.

[LordChinfist]

I'm not necessarily doubtiing what you guys are saying, you may be right, but I don't think one can presume to know what was going on through John, George, or Ringo's heads. Only they knew what was going on in their heads. Yes, they don't look like the happiest men during the Sgt. Pepper photo shoots. I've also seen it said on some posts that they look very depressed during the Paperback Writer video (at least I think it was that video). But I also remember seeing the I am the Walrus video and John looked pretty happy during that shooting, although that was a little more time after the Sgt. Pepper photo shooting. I'll be getting the Beatles anthology DVD in a couple weeks, so I'll be interested in seeing these videos if they are on there and I'll check it out.

As for how they turned from care free young lads into "tortured souls"...These were very intelligent and intellectual men. People of this mental calliber sometimes get introspective as they get older. Maybe they were thinking more deeply about the meaning of life. Maybe they became disillusioned with spirituality after their experience with the Maharishi. Maybe the ongoing Vietnam war made them more cynical. As for the Sgt. Pepper photos, maybe they were just on acid, or maybe except Paul they just didn't want to be there and dressed in those suits, as I think the whole Sgt. Pepper concept was supposed to be Paul's idea (not meaning to mix this last sentance with the Paul-Faul argument).

Basically, I was skimming through the "Shout" book, and the part about John's reaction to Sutcliffe's death caught my eye, particulary since the whole Paul is dead thing is on my mind. I posted it to see if it might offer some insight as to how the Beatles were able to cope and continue with the band. You guys may very well be right in saying they did not recover very well from Paul's death. I just don't think we can say what was truly going on in their heads, but just offering a documented prior experience to see if it could relate to their reaction to Paul's death.