My Conversation with the excellent Ian Leslie
I loved his new book on John and Paul, of the Beatles, and I am delighted to see it doing so well on the UK bestseller lists, and now also on the US lists. Here is my audio, video, and transcript with him. Here is the episode summary:
In this deep dive into one of music’s most legendary partnerships, Ian Leslie and Tyler unpack the complex relationship between John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Leslie, whose book John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs examines this creative pairing, reveals how their contrasting personalities—John’s intuitive, sometimes chaotic approach and Paul’s methodical perfectionism—created a unique creative alchemy that neither could fully replicate after the Beatles split.
They explore John’s immediate songwriting brilliance versus Paul’s gradual development, debate when the Beatles truly became the Beatles, dissect their best and worst covers, examine the nuances of their collaborative composition process, consider their many musical influences, challenge the sentiment in “Yesterday,” evaluate unreleased tracks and post-Beatles reunions, contemplate what went wrong between John and Paul in 1969, assess their solo careers and collaborations with others, compare underrated McCartney and Lennon albums, and ultimately extract broader lessons about creative partnerships.
Here is one excerpt:
COWEN: Do you think Paul’s song, “Yesterday,” is excessively sentimental?
LESLIE: No, I don’t. First of all, it’s not really sentimental in any way. I think it acquired this reputation because it does seem to come from a different tradition, perhaps a more easy-listening tradition in the first instance, although, I can hear echoes of music going far back from that in history.
But as a song about this person, this woman has left me and I have no idea why, it doesn’t then go on to describe how wonderful this girl is. Just says she’s gone and I don’t know why. It’s bleak. [laughs] The way he sings it is clipped, it’s brusque, it’s northern. It’s almost this northern folk sound to the way he sings it.
The string arrangement — he made sure that it wasn’t sentimental. He said to George Martin explicitly, “We’ve got to find a way of not making this sound saccharine.” So, George Martin asked the players not to play with vibrato or to play with very little vibrato. I think it’s very unsentimental, and in a way, it’s not that far off from “For No One,” which is an anti-sentimental song, where there’s very little hope.
COWEN: Or “Another Girl” even, right? The girls were leaving all the time in that song. It’s quite brutally about something very particular.
LESLIE: It’s interesting because I think in that year, 1965, with “Another Girl” and “I’m Looking Through You,” he is really soaking up, I think, from John. Or “The Night Before.” He’s leading into his Johness in the sense of he’s finding some anger and some hostility.
COWEN: “You Won’t See Me,” most of all.
The only topic was the Beatles, plus a bit on artistic collaboration more generally. In any case this was one of the most fun episodes for me. Definitely recommended, and again I am a big fan of Ian’s book John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs.