The one singer John Lennon and Paul McCartney called better than everyone
There’s no way of accurately describing the kind of relationship that John Lennon and Paul McCartney had throughout The Beatles.
Every great partnership in music has descended from what they did, and when looking at the broad scope of music, they deserve a spot next to people like Gilbert and Sullivan for the melodies they wrote. But for all of the great guitar licks that they made together and the pure sonics of their records, the real magic came whenever they opened their mouths to sing.
Harmony lines were nothing new in rock and roll at the time, but hearing ‘The Nerk Twins’ sing together was absolutely perfect whenever they locked in. Those influences from the Everly Brothers never failed to get the fans screaming whenever they launched into one of their tunes and tousled their hair back and forth, but when it comes to rock and roll, you needed something more than a few sweet ditties.
After all, rock and roll didn’t start life as one of the cleanest genres in the world. If anything, people were thinking that this form of music was making a mockery of everything that good taste stood for, and while that wasn’t necessarily the case every single time someone like Elvis Presley sang, people were sure to be in for a surprise when Little Richard stepped up to the microphone to sing.
Blues was nothing new in the underground at the time, but whereas someone like Howlin’ Wolf sounded like his voice was coming from hell, Richard pushed that intensity to 11 whenever he sang ‘Long Tall Sally’ or ‘Good Golly Miss Molly’. It was impossible to think that much noise could come out of one man, but John Lennon was willing to give up all of those Presley records to hear what Richard was doing.
Of course, they were both great in their own field, but Lennon felt a more natural connection with Richard’s music than to Presley’s, saying, “When I heard ‘Long Tall Sally’, it was so great I couldn’t speak. I didn’t want to leave Elvis, but this was so much better.” But while Lennon did everything he could to capture that energy when he sang, Macca was always the true Richard disciple whenever he broke out into his trademark scream.
Looking back on his time growing up, McCartney felt that Richard was the voice that he followed more than anyone, saying, “He had one of those voices that you wouldn’t believe. That was probably the first high voice I ever heard, and it was from gospel. We were kids and it was such an influence. We worked with [him] in Hamburg. We were just on the cusp. He was a character. He used to do that steaming thing with the towel over his head. I do that actually before a show, copying him.”
But when looking at the band’s catalogue, there are many moments where both Lennon and McCartney took their cues from him. It’s a bit more obvious when McCartney ends up reaching that higher register during songs like ‘Helter Skelter’, but when you look at what Lennon was doing in the latter half of his career, anything from ‘I Want You (She’s So Heavy)’ to ‘Cold Turkey’ was like a more primal version of what Richard was doing back in the day.
And compared to everyone from Robert Plant to Steven Tyler to Chris Cornell that came after him, there’s no debate that Richard is where many of the great rock and roll frontmen start with. It’s one thing to have a smooth voice, but if you want to truly excite an audience, you need to reach that kind of register.
