Why is Paul McCartney barefoot on the album cover of ‘Abbey Road’?
As we saw in the beautifully restored footage in Peter Jackson’s The Beatles: Get Back, The Beatles navigated a tumultuous patch in the late 1960s while recording material for its final two albums, Abbey Road and Let It Be. The former, released in September 1969, is often regarded as one of the band’s finest accomplishments.
Abbey Road sported two of George Harrison’s finest songwriting contributions, the most popular of Ringo Starr’s three songwriting attempts, and a continuation of form from Paul McCartney and John Lennon, with the exception of ‘Maxwell’s Silver Hammer’. It felt like a final flourish of coherence before the uneven Let It Be, which reflected division within the band.
The Beatles were no strangers to an attractive album cover, with the colourful psychedelia of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and the opposing effect of “The White Album” reinventing record marketing between 1967 and ’68. Still, Abbey Road remains the band’s most iconic record sleeve, thanks to its bold and elusive image of the Fab Four crossing the famous London road near the like-titled studio.
The image is crisp, taken on a rare sunny, blue-sky day in the south of England. However, the weather is the least of our concerns. Each member’s contrasting fashion choices appear to symbolise something, yet no conclusive reasoning has ever been offered. Supposedly, there was no definitive dress code, and the band members got dressed in separate rooms that morning, but let’s not allow that to get in the way of a good ol’ conspiracy theory.
Central to the wild theories surrounding the cover art is McCartney’s choice to go barefooted. If he had worn beach shorts and a vest, the decision might have seemed less peculiar, but as it happened, he wore a full suit. I assume he simply sought to take smart-casual to its extremities, highlighting the gulf between hippies and the humble office worker, but fans will have their lunacies, and I’m not here to stop them.
What is the Abbey Road album cover conspiracy?
Since the arrival of The Beatles’ penultimate album in 1969, some fans have clubbed together to spread conspiracy theories surrounding the cover art image. As far-fetched as some of them seem, they are entertaining to dissect. Without a doubt, the most famous of the theories is that claiming the cover depicts a funeral precession for Paul McCartney.
“But Paul McCartney isn’t dead, is he?” I hear you ask. Indeed, as far as we know, the star is still kicking today in his 80s, but some say that guy is just a talented substitute. The evidence for such claims comes from the fact that Lennon, leading the precession dressed in white, represents a religious leader. Meanwhile, Harrison in denim represents the gravedigger, Ringo in black is the undertaker and McCartney out of step and shoeless represents a corpse. Go figure.
Where is Abbey Road?
As well as being the name of one of the 1960s’ greatest albums, Abbey Road is a street located in the St John’s Wood area of London, England. It trails through the City of Westminster and the London Borough of Camden. The road was put on the musical map thanks to The Beatles’ work at Abbey Road Studios and the famous zebra crossing photoshoot, but they weren’t the only artists to grace the building. Pink Floyd, Fela Kuti, Kate Bush, Oasis, Radiohead, Florence + The Machine, Kanye West, Frank Ocean and Amy Winehouse are among the other big names to record here over the years.
Listen to ‘I Want You (She’s So Heavy)’ from Abbey Road. If Paul McCartney had really died, perhaps the song should have been titled ‘He’s So Heavy’.
