“Good old Charlie”: the song Paul McCartney ripped off from Charlie Chaplin
Were you to make a true Mount Rushmore of Britain’s entertainment elite, you would have to make space for both Paul McCartney and Charlie Chaplin.
While the pair represent somewhat different ends of the entertainment spectrum, they both share a level of cultural reverence that simply supersedes anything that came before or after them. Together, they are the pillars of creative invention, with Chaplin often being cited as the baseline for modern comedy, while McCartney is similarly the subject of claims that he too invented the blueprint for popular songwriting.
Moreover, they almost act as baton passers through British culture. Chaplin was, of course, a pioneer of the silent comedy era, set out in the early parts of the 20th century, long before the advent of technological broadcasts. One of his final movies, Countess from Hong Kong, was released in 1967, the same year Paul McCartney released his experimental masterpiece, Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
While their disciplines were separate, the stewardship they had over British art was in sync, and you could argue that McCartney was tasked with taking on Chaplin’s mantel and thrusting British art into a state of innovation towards the latter stages of the century.
As the recipient of that honour, McCartney was acutely aware of the impact that Chaplin had on British art and so sought to commemorate it on his 2005 album Chaos And Creation In The Backyard.
“The actual inspiration of ‘Too Much Rain’ is Charlie Chaplin’s song, ‘Smile’,” McCartney explained. Then he continued to shed light on the range of Chaplin as an artist. “Not many people know he wrote it, because, you know, you just think of him as a comedian. But I was always amazed to hear he’d written that, you mean, you know, beautiful song. Good old Charlie wrote it.”
The very crux of Chaplin’s work as a comedian, particularly in those early days of silent film, was just to create a pure sense of comic relief. It was charming in how rudimentary it was, and sought to simply lift the mood of its audience, who were otherwise bogged down by the trials of day-to-day life. While channelling the sonic inspiration of Chaplin’s song ‘Smile’, McCartney also wanted to make ‘Too Much Rain’ a song that offered a similar sense of relief to some of Chaplin’s early work.
He continued, “You know, when you’re really down, this song could get you up. You know, just remind you that, as the ‘Smile’ song does too, to just sort of, you know, push through it, feel good, because it’ll be all right, I think in some way, I know I was thinking of my missus, Heather, who’s had a lot of sort of rough times in her life.”
He added, “The chorus, which sort of says, ‘It’s not right / In one life / Too much rain,’ that was that kind of inspiration, and you know, I’m never that specific. I wouldn’t sort of say that’s exactly what it’s about. It then widens out, and it’s for everyone who’s had just too much in their lives, you know, to cope with. And that applies to an awful lot of people. It was really just a sort of helpful song.”
It’s one of many songs that McCartney wrote as a means of helpful, just this one was a direct ode to one of his cultural predecessors. And while it’s charming, he felt compelled to honour him, the real reason McCartney’s name is placed alongside his in the pantheon of greats is for the original work he created that provided a similar sense of emotional relief.
