Chapter 67: (Just Like) Starting Over (December 1980 - October 1981)

5 December 1980

Denny Laine and Wings - Clock on the Wall

Released: 5 December 1980

Recorded: April - June 1980

Producer: Denny Laine

Track listing[1]

Side A

Say You Don't Mind

Nothing to Go By

Maisie

Silver

Go Now

Side B

Guess I'm Only Fooling

Clock on the Wall

Same Mistakes

Somebody Ought to Know the Way

Japanese Tears

As a member of Smile, Denny Laine was simply regarded as "the guy who wasn't Paul McCartney or Freddie Mercury", and even though he had a few vocal spots such as "I Would Only Smile" and "Time to Hide", the latter of which was a hit, Laine was often overlooked in favor of the rest of the members. By mid-1980, both Laine and McCartney had parted ways with Smile, with the former wanting to start a solo career of his own with Laurence Juber (guitar), Steve Holley (drums and percussion) and Gordon Sellar (bass guitar) as part of a band called Denny Laine and Wings.

LAURENCE JUBER: "Denny wanted to get out of Paul's shadow, and so he quickly assembled a band to record our first album, Clock on the Wall, and then maybe we'd go on a tour shortly after the album and a single. It bombed pretty badly with critics, sales were very poor, and no one was more affected about it than Denny." (1996)

On 28 January 1981, Denny Laine was found dead in his car from alcohol poisoning at the age of 36. He was survived by his wife Jo Jo Laine and their children Laine and Heidi, with Jo Jo taking custody of the children. It has often been believed that Denny had suffered from chaotic financial difficulties by the end of the 1970s, which was why he was so desperate to try and make money, hoping that Clock on the Wall would kick off a successful side career. When that failed commercially (possibly due to a lack of prior promotion), an autopsy confirmed that Laine had died from excessive alcohol consumption. The planned Wings tour was cancelled in light of Laine's death, and the band disbanded shortly afterward, becoming regarded as a footnote in Apple history (although "Say You Don't Mind" would turn up on one of their Best of... compilations). None of Laine's former Smile bandmates attended his funeral.[2]

PAUL McCARTNEY: "Denny's death was kind of a drag, y'know. I felt bad that he and I parted on somewhat bitter terms, and I wish I could've done something to make it up to him somehow. But at the time, I was recording for [Quadruple] Fantasy with the others [John, George and Ringo] and didn't have much time to grieve." (2011)

March 30, 1981

US President Ronald Reagan (near center) waving to a supportive crowd just seconds before John Hinckley Jr. fired at him, March 30, 1981. Two months prior, he had been re-elected to a second term by a landslide, anticipating the 1980s to be a decade for conservatism.

If John Hinckley Jr. had been a second or two later, perhaps he would've missed Ronald Reagan altogether, but there was also the chance that the 39th President of the United States of America, having been re-elected to a second term that January, would still have been hit by a ricocheted bullet. Whether he would've survived or not had that been the case is debatable, but President Reagan was dead upon arrival at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, D.C., at the age of seventy.[3]

But why would someone like John Hinckley Jr. want to kill the President? His motivations came down to a stalker-like obsession with child actress Jodie Foster, who played a preteen child prostitute named Iris in the 1976 classic Taxi Driver, starring Robert De Niro as protagonist Travis Bickle. The film's plotline was about a lonely taxi driver barely making a living in a morally bankrupt New York City post-Vietnam War wanting to assassinate the presidential candidate for a woman with whom he is madly in love with.

Hinckley believed that he identified strongly with Bickle and followed Foster all across America in the past few years, even enrolling at Yale University where she studied, but she had no interest in him, though it didn't stop him from trying, eventually leading to the death of the President. By the end of the 1970s, there had been a great decline of confidence in New Deal and Great Society programs that had dominated America's political agenda since the 1930s. Prior to his death, Reagan was confident about the 1980s being the decade for conservatism.

George Herbert Walker Bush, Texas Republican, the 40th President of the United States, 1981.

Reagan's vice-president, George Herbert Walker Bush, was quickly sworn in at his home in Texas as the 40th President of the United States of America; the vacancy for vice-president was later taken up by Reagan's close friend, former Governor of Nevada Paul Laxalt, often referred to as "The First Friend". Bush was more moderate than his predecessor, so up to January 1985, anything could happen following Reagan's assassination, but no one in America knew what. John Hinckley Jr. was now behind bars, but it did little to quell people's worries.

Little did the citizens of America realized, however, was that lightning was about to strike twice with a little band from England giving them hope following this recent tragedy.

JOHN LENNON: "It was just insane, when Reagan died at the hands of a crazy person. You'd have thought that after Diana Ross was killed two years ago that they'd be more prepared to protect people who were famous, but now they went and caught America with its bloody trousers down." (1995)

8 May 1980

The Beatles - Quadruple Fantasy

Released: 8 May 1980

Recorded: 19 November 1980 - 12 February 1981

Producer: George Martin

Track listing[4]

Side A

(Just Like) Starting Over

Take It Away

Here Comes the Moon

Somebody Who Cares

I Don't Wanna Face It

Attention

Blow Away

Side B

Watching the Wheels

Wrack My Brain

Ballroom Dancing

Lay His Head

Woman

Wanderlust

Save the World

Recording for the Beatles' first album of new material since Everest had taken place over a period of three months, and throughout that time, there were positive feelings among the band that almost seemed to rival those during the sessions for Rock 'n' Roll Music five years earlier. Gone were the ego conflicts and getting into hissy fits over whose songs should be recorded. Many of the photos taken showed the group laughing together and enjoying themselves as they recorded their true comeback album.

About twenty songs were recorded during the sessions, and whittling it down to fourteen for the album was not an easy task. Among them was a demo version of Paul McCartney's song "Ebony and Ivory", although he was intending to give it to Stevie Wonder for a possible duet. George Harrison's "All Those Years Ago" was tried out, intended to be one of Ringo Starr's two vocal spots, but it was ultimately scrapped because Ringo didn't like the lyrics, as well as finding the vocal too high for his range. Instead, George offered up "Wrack My Brain", which was better received. Paul's "Attention" and John Lennon's "Life Begins at 40" were also given to Ringo to sing, and while the former made the album, the latter was relegated to a B-side. The remaining tracks recorded were "Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)", "The Pound is Sinking" and "Serve Yourself", with the latter remaining unreleased for over a decade.

GEORGE HARRISON: "We finished work on Quadruple Fantasy in February, and there was now the question as to which tracks we would release as singles. There were so many good contenders it was hard to choose. It was Ringo who suggested that we put out four singles, each featuring one of us on lead vocals, and the same would apply to the B-sides. This was a good marketing ploy as it showed our renewed unity as a group." (1995)

George Harrison, 1981.

The first single off of the album was "Blow Away", sung by George, and the B-side was the Ringo-sung "Life Begins at 40". Released on 6 April, it quickly reached #1 in both the United Kingdom and the United States, with the public quickly realizing that the Beatles had finally gotten back together again after years of speculation. This worked to build up hype for Quadruple Fantasy, released the following month alongside the second single, "Take It Away"/"Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)", which also hit #1, but only in America. On 27 April, Ringo married his new girlfriend Barbara Bach with the other three Beatles and their families attending at the Marylebone Register Office in London. "I love the man," Babs had told People magazine, "and that's it."

Quadruple Fantasy received wildly positive reviews from critics and fans, debuting at #1 on both sides of the Atlantic as well as several other countries, even staying there for weeks on end, remaining in the charts until the end of 1983. Within its first year, Quadruple Fantasy had sold well over a million copies, being one of the best selling albums of the decade alongside Michael Jackson's Thriller, Roger Waters' The Wall and Freddie Mercury's Greatest Hits, and won the 1981 Grammy Award for Album of the Year.[5] Long and short, it was a big deal at the time. However, critical opinion would cool off in later years, criticizing the 80s-styled production and claiming that all the praise at the time was due to how hyped-up the album was with the Beatles reuniting after being split into two camps for nearly a decade.

Still, it didn't take away the fact that the Beatles were back together again, and they were on top once again in a new decade.

22 May - 9 October 1981

The Beatles and their wives at the wedding of Ringo Starr and Barbara Bach, 27 April 1981.

PAUL McCARTNEY: "While the sessions for Quadruple Fantasy drew to a close, there was the inevitable question as to whether or not we would go on tour. Save for a few one-off performances, we hadn't really done that since 1966, y'know, barring our University Tour in 1967. But then there was the news story about President Reagan being assassinated in public." (2011)

RINGO STARR: "America was under great distress [in 1981] now that their leader was dead; it almost felt like President Kennedy's assassination in 1963, and then we came to America on Ed Sullivan, and people cheered up when they saw us perform. It was as if history was repeating itself, only this time, we had gotten back together again." (1999)

If the Beatles were going to play live, what material would they perform? Would they stick solely to their material from the 60s as well as the hits from Quadruple Fantasy? Would they perform any material from the Ladders and Smile? And if so, how much compared to the Beatles material? Some of their biggest hits came from both bands in the 1970s, and so a compromise was found between all parties. In order to play some of their bigger songs and do them justice, Paul suggested bringing in a huge sound, and George supported that by hiring a horn section for some of the songs. Klaus Voormann was brought in to cover bass duties whenever Paul would play the piano, given that John and George would be occupied with their guitar parts. Billy Preston would also join the tour on keyboards, even playing a short setlist himself on stage before the Beatles came on for every performance.

JOHN LENNON: "I wasn't too big on these ideas for the tour. Here we were, trying to be more than four guys even though we were finally four guys once again. Paul went for that big sound when he played with Smile in the 70s, and George wanted to bring in the horns, but at the core, it's really four guys up on stage with guitars and drums. For God's sake, this is rock 'n' roll, not bloody Broadway." (1984)

John Hammel, tuning the Beatles' instruments prior to their Quadruple Fantasy World Tour, 1981.

Neil Aspinall and Alistair Taylor (having taken over the majority of managing the Beatles due to Brian Epstein and Peter Brown overseeing Apple) had begun booking dates with Mal Evans managing the tour, while most of the hands-on work was done by John Hammel, whom Paul McCartney was familiar with during his Smile days. McCartney hired him as their road manager just before the tour began, and would stay in that position for years to come, even ending up in the Beatles' inner circle.

By the end of the 1960s, the Beatles were a business affair, but come the start of the 1980s, they had gradually evolved into a family affair. Madeline Kahn (who had just made an appearance in Mel Brooks' fifth film under Apple, History of the World, Part I), Linda McCartney, Olivia Harrison and Barbara Bach would come with their husbands on the tour, as would the Beatle children. Julian Lennon had turned eighteen and after finishing school, would also come, having seen more of his father and little half-brother Freddie, recalling the tour with fond memories, especially the times he spent jamming with Zak Starkey on drums.

There was even happier news to come as the tour went on; Maddy was pregnant once again. The other three Beatles shared John's excitement as the greatest band in the world set to conquer it once more in a new decade.

The Beatles - Quadruple Fantasy World Tour 1981
North American Leg (United States, Canada) - 31 shows (May 22 - July 10)

Eastern Leg (Japan, Australia, New Zealand) - 20 shows (July 27 - August 21)

United Kingdom Leg (England, Wales, Scotland) - 10 shows (September 4 - 21)

Europe Leg (France, Germany) - 5 shows (October 2 - 9)

Setlist:[6]

First Electric Set:

1. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

2. It Don't Come Easy [originally played by the Ladders]

3. Come Together

4. Blow Away

5. Maybe I'm Amazed [originally played by Paul McCartney]

6. Yer Blues

7. I Want to Tell You

8. Mind Games [originally played by the Ladders]

9. Wrack My Brain

10. Let Me Roll It [originally played by Paul McCartney & Smile]

11. Lady Madonna

12. I Am the Walrus

13. What Is Life [originally played by the Ladders]

14. Live and Let Die [originally played by Paul McCartney & Smile]

Acoustic Set:

15. I've Just Seen a Face

16. Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)

17. Two of Us

18. Here Comes the Sun

19. Across the Universe

Second Electric Set:

20. Take It Away

21. Whatever Gets You thru the Night [originally played by the Ladders]

22. Something

23. Woman

24. Let It Be

25. Yellow Submarine

26. Silly Love Songs [originally played by Paul McCartney & Smile]

27. Taxman

28. Imagine [originally played by the Ladders]

29. Band on the Run [originally played by Paul McCartney & Smile]

Encore:

30. While My Guitar Gently Weeps

31. She Loves You

32. Hey Jude

The tour was a massive success, especially on the American leg, with the public once again feeling a sense of hope following the assassination of Ronald Reagan - lightning really did strike twice. The inclusion of material from the Ladders and Smile was met with praise, given that they were big hits from both groups; a particular highlight was John Lennon's guitar work on "Let Me Roll It", even singing co-lead vocals with Paul McCartney. The inclusion of the singles from Quadruple Fantasy also ensured that each would become hits, with "Woman" being the biggest of the four, remaining at the top of the charts in the United Kingdom all the way to the end of 1981.

However, for all the positive vibes that were going on, the tour was long and grueling, with the last show taking place in Hamburg, Germany, on John Lennon's 41st birthday. "Sure, it was all well and fun," he admitted to the press, "but I doubt we'll ever do another one like it. Definitely not on an annual basis. We're no longer teenagers messing about with the girls; we're grown men in our forties, married and with children."

"Whatever will you do next?" asked a reporter. "Will there ever be another Beatles album?"

"We've not ruled it out entirely," said Paul, "but never say never. For now, we'll be taking a break for a few months and focus on our families."

The McCartney family, 1981. Left to right: Linda, James, Stella, Paul and Mary.

The Beatles spent the remainder of 1981 and the first half of 1982 with their families. Ringo and Barbara would later go to the Bahamas for a holiday, while Paul and George rested from the spotlight to spend time with their respective families. As for John, he would film some scenes for the upcoming Apple Films project WarGames, directed by John Badham and with a script by Lawrence Lasker and Walter F. Parkes, playing the character Dr. Stephen Falken, living under the alias Robert Hume, who created a computer system called Joshua after his son, who died in a car crash along with his unnamed wife.[7] Maddy had been offered a role in a screenplay by independent director Steven Paul, Slapstick of Another Kind, but she rejected it, even citing the script as "one of the most ridiculous [she'd] ever read. I wouldn't wish that upon anybody."

John and Maddy's second child, Alice Paula Lennon[8], his first daughter, would be born on 7 February 1982 in New York City. While her middle name is sometimes attributed to being named after Paul McCartney, Maddy would clarify that she was named after her own mother, John's mother-in-law. "But she could still be named after Paul himself!" she quipped, with some of John's humor having rubbed off on her.

Summary of Beatles releases, 1981

• "Blow Away" / "Life Begins at 40" - 6 April 1981 (#1 UK and US)
• Quadruple Fantasy - 8 May 1981 (#1 UK and US)
• "Take It Away" / "Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)" - 11 May 1981 (#3 UK, #1 US)
• "Wrack My Brain" / "The Pound is Sinking" - 20 July 1981 (#1 UK, #6 US)
• "Woman" / "Lay His Head" - 7 September 1981 (#1 UK, #2 US)

4 September 1981

Freddie Mercury - Greatest Hits

Released: 4 September 1981

Recorded: February 1973 - May 1980

Producer: Freddie Mercury (all tracks), Paul McCartney (1973-1975), Roy Thomas Baker (1973-1975, 1978), Mike Stone (1977) and Reinhold Mack (1980)

Track listing[9]

Side A

Bohemian Rhapsody

Another One Bites the Dust

Killer Queen

Bicycle Race

You're My Best Friend

Don't Stop Me Now

Side B

Crazy Little Thing Called Love

Somebody to Love

Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy

Play the Game

Seven Seas of Rhye

We are the Champions

With Freddie Mercury becoming a full-time member of Smile and taking over as lead vocalist, he put out a compilation album that covered his greatest hit singles from The Kingdom of Rhye, Bohemian Rhapsody, Champions of the World and The Game. It topped out at #1 in the United Kingdom, often finding itself competing with the Beatles' Quadruple Fantasy, but it was kept out of the top spot in the United States by the same album, at #2. Greatest Hits remains one of the best-selling albums of all time, and by 2020, it has spent over 900 weeks on the UK Albums Chart, having been certified platinum twenty-two times, while it spent over 400 weeks on the Billboard 200 in America, being certified platinum nine times.

Mercury's first single as a member of Smile was released on 26 October, "Under Pressure", a duet with David Bowie, becoming recognized as one of the greatest duets of all time, and even showing promise that Smile could sustain itself without Paul McCartney to back then up.

Footnotes

1. All tracks are sourced from Denny Laine's Japanese Tears, excluding "Maisie", sourced from Laurence Juber's Standard Time. "Maisie" had been recorded during the Back to the Egg sessions and featured Paul McCartney on bass, Denny Laine on harmonica and Steve Holley on drums.
2. Denny Laine is still living as of 2021. In OTL, he was going through a financial crisis following Wings' breakup in the 1980s, even telling The Sun that Paul McCartney was a cheap employer, even reluctant to give credit to the other band members (which was why many members came and went, with the only other permanent member being Linda). Laine did fare better whenever he got a writing credit, but it was always Paul McCartney in the spotlight, mainly due to his status as an ex-Beatle. The beginning of the end of Wings came when McCartney was busted in Tokyo for marijuana possession, and Laine grumbled that he could've made five thousand pounds off of their planned Japanese tour. By the mid-1980s, Laine was declared bankrupt following a costly divorce from his wife Jo Jo and being forced to sell his share of "Mull of Kintyre" and other songs he wrote for Wings to McCartney.
3. In OTL, John Hinckley Jr. fired six shots at President Reagan within two seconds, and all six shots missed. In addition, Reagan had been elected to his first term in 1980, not 1976 per TTL.
4. John's tracks are sourced from Double Fantasy ("Watching the Wheels" is the single edit sourced from Gimme Some Truth), excluding "I Don't Wanna Face It", sourced from Milk and Honey. All of Paul's tracks are sourced from Tug of War, with "Take It Away" being the single edit sourced from Wingspan, also giving the track a clean opening. George's tracks are sourced from his eponymous 1979 album ("Here Comes the Moon" is the single edit found on Best of Dark Horse 1976-1989) and Somewhere in England ("Lay His Head" was rejected from the final album, but was later released as the B-side to "Got My Mind Set on You" in 1987). Both of Ringo's tracks are sourced from Stop and Smell the Roses.
5. In OTL, Double Fantasy had won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 1982. Tug of War was also nominated for the same award the following year, but it lost to Toto IV.
6. Barring "She Loves You", none of these songs were ever performed live by the Beatles, although Paul, George and Ringo did play some, if not most, of their vocal spots as solo artists.
7. John Lennon had expressed interest in playing Dr. Stephen Falken in WarGames, but, in OTL, he was murdered while the script was being developed, and so John Wood took on the role instead. On a side note, Wood looked uncannily like Lennon in the film despite being a decade older.
8. Alice Lennon is named for Alice in Wonderland, John's favorite book. Her middle name Paula comes from Madeline Kahn's mother, Paula Kahn.
9. The track listing follows that of OTL's Greatest Hits, with the exclusion of the Brain May-penned tracks "Fat Bottomed Girls", "Save Me", "Now I'm Here", "Flash's Theme" and "We Will Rock You".

Author's Comments

Strawberry Peppers finally makes its grand return for 2021! Hooray! This is the chapter I've looked forward to writing, and I figured it'd be best to kick off the new year with a bang. Right now, I'm working on a video review series, so chapters for Strawberry Peppers may be a bit more sporadic, but bear with me; they'll come out whenever I can get to them. I don't want to rush anything, after all.

While killing off Diana Ross in 1978 wasn't part of the original plan, killing off Denny Laine was, because after Wings broke up in 1981, I don't feel like he contributed much to music, so it probably isn't a huge loss in the long run. Likewise, I've killed off Ronald Reagan, having been inaugurated as president in 1977 instead of 1981; I've kind of went with the idea of a more liberal 80s for the story. Even though the main focus is pop culture, it'd be interesting to see how politics would've been affected, especially with a McGovern presidency in 1973-1977 as well as earlier Reagan and Bush presidencies.

I don't know what else I can say for the Beatles' part of the story that hasn't been said already; they're back together for real, and all seems to be well among them, but can they survive the first half of the 80s, especially with John still living? That is what we shall find out in the coming chapters! Though there probably won't be much for them to do in 1982, but there will certainly be more for them in 1983.

Side note: There was one image I wanted to include, with John and Madeline at Ringo and Barbara's wedding with the other Beatles and their wives, but I didn't know how I could pull it off. If anyone would like to provide a deep-fake of that image for me, that would be great.