Why John Lennon thought The Beatles were held back: “We were performers”
To hear anyone say that The Beatles, the biggest band in musical history, were ever held back or even to dare to suggest that they “never improved” during their career is insane. But to hear it from the mouth of John Lennon himself? It feels like total delusion, but a delusion that provides a fascinating insight into his view on things and the moments in the group he liked best.
For context, Lennon said all this in 1970, arguably the worst year for the members’ feelings about The Beatles. The split was underway, and it was messy. The same month that this interview was released, Paul McCartney sued his old bandmates to force a legal separation and dealt a blow that would kill the friendships, too. Everything was in tatters, so it’s understandable why Lennon would go on record with some less-than-celebratory comments about the group.
But still, it’s always fascinating to hear the members themselves talk about the group, and be utterly incapable of seeing the wood for the trees. Whenever they shared in interviews about their dislike for certain songs or their mixed feelings on certain albums, it felt strange and disconnected to the looming legacy and the mass love and appreciation the general public had for pretty much anything the group ever did.
This is definitely one of those instances. In a conversation with Rolling Stone, Lennon made some wild claims, like when he said, “We never improved as musicians”. He claimed that the band never got any better because, instead, they sold out at the start. He went back to the beginning and blamed it on that, stating, “You know Brian put us in suits and all that, and we made it very, very big. But we sold out, you know”. From that moment on, when Please Please Me launched them into a world of Beatlemania, Lennon claimed it was cursed from then, telling the magazine, “The Beatles music died then, as musicians,” he said, “We killed ourselves then to make it. And that was the end of it”.
It’s wild because, of course, the Beatles improved. That’s one of the things that they’re so celebrated for: their incredible evolution from the simplicity of their early records to the technicality and experimentation of their later ones. From teenage boys to adults, their career is fueled by that improvement. But maybe in 1970, as it all came crumbling, Lennon couldn’t bear to admit that they’d done good. Instead, he needed to curse something, so he cursed the start while subtly mourning for the group’s first-ever moments.
In the interview, he holds up one time period as truly golden. “We always missed the club dates because that’s when we were playing music,” Lennon said, reflecting on their pre-fame days in Hamburg or playing the clubs in Liverpool. He missed the days of them being just four lads playing rock and roll and claimed that that was their very best, though none of it was captured.
“Our best work was never recorded,” he noted, and when he was pushed on it, he revealed that he genuinely felt like the band had been held back because no studio could ever truly capture the energy of a bustling club. “We were performers—in spite of what Mick says about us—in Liverpool, Hamburg and other dance halls. What we generated was fantastic when we played straight rock, and there was nobody to touch us in Britain,” he relayed, adding, “As soon as we made it, we made it, but the edges were knocked off.”
That’s his issue. Instead of being allowed to be the club kids, they had their hair cut into bowls and were strapped into suits. It made them stars, but after everything had fallen apart, Lennon was clearly reflecting on those first steps and wondering what might have happened if they’d wandered a different road, stayed more wild and endeavoured to stick close to the spontaneous, rock and roller attitude the band were first built on. We’ll never know. Neither would he. And maybe that’s what was hurting him in 1970 as he threw wild comments out, attempting to understand his own history.
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