Alongside John Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, The Beatles’ most enduring songwriter, Paul McCartney, changed the face of popular music almost single-handedly in the latter half of the 20th century.
The early Lennon-McCartney songwriting partnership put the swing into the ’60s, injecting much-needed colour and energy into a drizzly post-war climate. While their early efforts may have been eclipsed by later, more experimental and seminal releases, The Beatles’ first five albums served as a vital bridge between their musical influences of the 1950s and the exciting path ahead.
In a 2007 interview with Classic Rock, McCartney outlined the vital breadth of his early pool of influence. “I listened a lot to Lead Belly, to all of those guys,” he revealed. “But I never got stuck in one groove. One day, it would be, ‘Oh wow, Chuck Berry!’ and the next, ‘Oh wow, Scotty Moore!’
Continuing, the former Beatle admitted to taking aspects he liked from the material of his early heroes. “I was a bit of a magpie, really, picking up various styles and gradually assimilating them,” he said. “It’s probably a bit of the same in my vocal thing, you know. I loved Elvis and sang some songs trying to be like him. But then I also had my Little Richard stuff.”
Of all the 1950s rock progenitors and roots blues musicians in McCartney’s teenage record collection, nobody was more prominent than Little Richard. The iconic star brought vitality to the stage by standing up behind the piano and belting out high-energy hits, including ‘Tutti Frutti’, ‘Long Tall Sally’, ‘Good Golly, Miss Molly’ and ‘Lucille’.
Following Richard’s death in 2020, McCartney took to social media to pay tribute. “Little Richard came screaming into my life when I was a teenager,” McCartney tweeted. “I owe a lot of what I do to Little Richard and his style, and he knew it. He would say, ‘I taught Paul everything he knows’. I had to admit he was right.”
Mccartney then remembered the first time The Beatles performed alongside their hero in 1962. “In the early days of The Beatles, we played with Richard in Hamburg and got to know him,” McCartney wrote in a follow-up tweet. “He would let us hang out in his dressing room, and we were witness to his pre-show rituals, with his head under a towel over a bowl of steaming hot water, he would suddenly lift his head up to the mirror and say, ‘I can’t help it cos I’m so beautiful.’ And he was.”
“A great man with a lovely sense of humour and someone who will be missed by the rock and roll community and many more,” McCartney added. “I thank him for all he taught me and the kindness he showed by letting me be his friend.”
