Fab: An Intimate Life of Paul McCartney (79 page)

Prior to their separation at the end of April 2006 the husband treated the wife abusively and/or violently culminating in the unhappy events of 25 April 2006 … He abused alcohol and drugs. He was possessive and jealous. He failed to protect the wife from the attention of the media. He was insensitive to her disability. Furthermore, it is alleged that post-separation the husband manipulated and colluded with the press against the wife and has failed to enforce confidentiality by his friends and associates. The wife blames the husband for the leaking to the media of her Answer and Cross-Petition which alleges in strong terms unreasonable behaviour by the husband against her. The husband has failed to provide her with a sufficient degree of security from the media and generally he has behaved badly.

In reply, Sir Paul’s QC told the court about Heather’s conduct
after
the separation. ‘First, it is said on 25 June 2006 the wife illegally bugged the husband’s telephone, in particular a call between him and his daughter Stella in which Stella made very unflattering comments about the wife,’ the judge summarised. ‘It is further said the wife subsequently leaked the intercepted material to the press so as to discredit him.’ (This had seemingly led to a
Sunday Mirror
story, ‘The Maccagate Tapes’).

Second, on 17 October 2006 the wife, or someone acting on her behalf, leaked to the media some or all of the contents of her Answer and Cross-Petition which contained untrue and distorted allegations against the husband in order to discredit him. Third, the wife has failed to abide by court orders re[garding] confidentiality. On 31 October 2007 and 1 November 2007 the wife gave several interviews to UK and US television stations in which she made many false statements about the husband and these proceedings in order to discredit him. Individually and collectively these actions, it is said, represent a deliberate attempt by the wife to ruin the husband’s reputation.

Somebody leaked Heather’s Answer and Cross-Petition to the press.

Both the wife and the husband accuse each other of doing it. The wife says that the husband did it in order to capitalise on his good press and to blacken the wife’s name for making such unfounded allegations. The husband says the wife did it in order to blacken his reputation.

The judge chose not to decide who was lying.

In his closing comments, Justice Bennett said that if an applicant came before him with an excessive claim, which they failed to back up with logical arguments, then they had themselves to blame if they failed to get what they wanted. ‘This case is a paradigm example of an applicant failing to put a rational and logical case and thus failing to assist the court in its quasi-inquisitorial role to reach a fair result.’ He ordered that neither Paul nor Heather disclose further details to the media. Even Heather learned to be bound by this order and, unable to say anything of substance about her husband, and with plenty of money to spend, she faded into the semi-obscurity from whence she had come, occasionally popping up on TV, and employing a succession of public relations consultants, who found themselves hard-pressed to improve her image. One spent much of his time trying to turn Heather’s Wikipedia entry to her favour.

BACK TO THE BEGINNING

Many of Paul’s associates had died prematurely, several worn down by the rigours of the rock ’n’ roll lifestyle. Brian, John, Linda and George had all passed away before their time, along with a host of supporting players in the epic story of Paul’s life. Now Neil Aspinall, the backroom boy who had as much claim as anyone to being the ‘fifth Beatle’, was dying of cancer in New York. Paul went to see him, as he had George, thanked Nell, as the boys always called their friend fondly, for all he had done for the band, discreetly paid his medical bills, and mourned his passing when he died in March 2008 at the age of 66.

Neither Paul nor Ringo attended Neil’s funeral in his adoptive home town of Twickenham, just outside London. ‘We went to Neil’s house for the reception afterwards and Yoko said to me, “Where is Paul and Ringo?” And I said, “I don’t know. You should know better than I do where they are’,” says Peter Brown, who attended the service along with Olivia Harrison, Sir George Martin and Mary and James McCartney.

Paul was represented through his children, but he and Ringo were not there. Now whether they thought it was more discreet for them not to go … but it wasn’t as if there was going to be a million paparazzi or anything. So I don’t know what happened that day.

Sir Paul spent a good part of the spring on holiday with Nancy Shevell, his
decree nisi
coming through in May, at the end of which he returned to Liverpool to help his home town celebrate its year as European Capital of Culture. In recent times Liverpool had been perceived not so much as a place to go to enrich one’s mind as a scruffy, declining seaport beset with social and economic problems. So the Capital of Culture accolade - a European Union initiative to boost investment in designated cities - was a welcome fillip to Merseyside. A huge amount of money was being invested in building works, including a new shopping arcade opposite the docks, part of which had some time since been restored and given World Heritage status, with the city hosting an impressive series of cultural events in 2008 ranging from art shows to symphony concerts. Art with a capital A was all very well, but for millions Liverpool was the Beatles, and the city’s year as Capital of Culture would ring hollow without a Beatle or two in attendance. They got both.

Ringo Starr, now in his 68th year, opened Liverpool’s celebratory year by playing drums on the roof of St George’s Hall in the city centre on 8 January 2008, and proclaiming improbably that he might return from tax exile in Monte Carlo to live on Merseyside. When Ringo subsequently told Jonathan Ross on TV that he couldn’t think of a single thing about Liverpool he actually missed, and had only said he might come back to please the crowd, Liverpudlians were outraged. Many had long thought Ringo thick, and this seemed to prove it. Ringo’s head was cut off a topiary likeness of the band in Allerton, while cabbies told visitors to the city that if ‘that twat’ ever came back to Merseyside he’d be pelted with eggs.

The centrepiece of the year of culture was the Liverpool Sound concert on Sunday 1 June at Anfield, iconic home of Liverpool Football Club. The event was headlined, naturally, by the other, more important ex-Beatle, the one who, drugs and women aside, rarely put a foot wrong. Sir Paul McCartney arrived on Merseyside a few days in advance of the show, spending part of Saturday driving around the city with his major-domo John Hammel, son James and daughter Beatrice, a lively little kid now coming up for five. In contrast to Paul’s older children, Bea was being brought up by her mum in an atmosphere of conspicuous wealth. This tour of Liverpool was intended to show her the normal world Daddy came from.

Stopping at 72 Western Avenue, Speke, Paul led Bea up the garden path to the door of his old corpy house. ‘This is where Daddy used to live,’ he told the child, as they posed for a souvenir picture outside what was now a run-down terrace. As they did so, the man next door popped his head over the wall. ‘All right, Macca!’ James ‘Brickhead’ Gillat, a tattooed joiner, hailed the superstar.

‘All right, la,’ rejoined McCartney pleasantly. ‘Is there anybody in?’

Sir Paul rang the bell of number 72 to introduce himself to the current occupants, Paddy and Lyn Kearney. He hoped they didn’t mind him taking a souvenir picture on the doorstep. The Kearneys and Brickhead were charmed by Paul, who still seemed connected to ordinary people. ‘He never walked away from us, never turned his back on us,’ says Brickhead admiringly after the great man left.

When Paul cruised by Forthlin Road with John, James and Bea, he decided not to go up to the door, wary of the tourists who arrived every few minutes to stand outside this much better-known address, taking pictures and pulling off bits of the hedge as keepsakes. Visitors on the National Trust tour were admitted in small groups by the live-in custodian John Halliday, who calculates he’d shown 70,000 people around Paul’s old house in the ten years it had been open to the public. One of John’s ambitions was to give Paul himself the tour, and now here was his chance. ‘I glanced out of the corner of me eye. He wasn’t driving; he was in the front passenger seat - I thought,
that’s Paul!
He gives me the thumbs up. I thought he’d come in, but he drove past.’

National Trust ticketholders were taken to Mendips before Forthlin Road, Aunt Mimi’s old home, also now managed by the charity. The two houses were included in the same £15 tour. This particular afternoon, Mendips was closed for a private visit from Yoko Ono and her son Sean. A well-preserved little woman of 75, with clever, sparkling eyes, and a daringly low
décolletage
, Yoko attended a host of events in the city that weekend, including a rare coming together of most of the surviving members of the Beatles family at LIPA the following afternoon.

As her contribution to the festivities, and to raise money for LIPA, Stella McCartney staged a lunchtime fashion show at the Institute on Sunday 1 June. Sir Paul showed up with son James, taking a seat in the front row of the Paul McCartney Auditorium alongside Yoko Ono and Olivia Harrison. Paul kissed the widows and chatted with Yoko as if they’d never been anything but best friends. Watching them, one was reminded of a royal court, all eyes upon the heads of state, attended in turn by their lords and ladies. In the court of the Beatles, the followers included Paul’s brother Mike (his show business career as Mike McGear a distant memory), Sir George Martin, snowy-haired and almost stone deaf at 82, the rotund figure of the elderly court artist Sir Peter Blake, and LIPA chief Mark Featherstone-Witty. Every king needs a servant, and John Hammel hovered nearby, quick to tell the press photographers they’d taken enough pictures. Sir Paul welcomed the PR opportunity of a happy snap with Yoko - it made the front pages of the nationals the next day - but he didn’t want pictures of himself with Beatrice, who was being minded by Mike McCartney a few rows back, a pretty little girl dressed head to foot in pink.

When John Hammel had shooed the snappers away, Bea stood on her chair and loudly asked Daddy for an ice cream. Sir Paul turned, acknowledged Bea’s presence with an affectionate, fatherly expression, upon which she ran to him, climbed into his lap and chattered away for a few minutes before going back to sit with Uncle Mike for the start of the show.

Stella McCartney strode onto the stage - a perky, ginger-haired woman of 36 - to acknowledge her family links to Liverpool. ‘I’ve got about 50,000 relatives in this city,’ she said, upon which Sir Paul shouted: ‘Three cheers for Stella!’ The audience did as it was told. During the ensuring catwalk parade, Paul and his son sat with fuzzy looks on their faces watching the leggy beauties model Stella’s latest creations, Paul taking the occasional picture on his mobile phone as if lining up dates for later. Bea returned with a balloon, scrambled into Daddy’s lap, then fell asleep with her thumb in her mouth. ‘I thought, fantastic, he’s got a great relationship with her,’ notes Mark Featherstone-Witty.

Liverpool was overcast that evening as 36,000 people streamed towards Anfield for the concert, most of the ticketholders local people, though others had come from around the world to see Sir Paul play his home town. The fact he was playing at Anfield was special: the McCartneys had lived briefly round the corner at 10 Sunbury Road, and a home town show always has that bit of extra emotion. After the support acts, the Kaiser Chiefs and Zutons, two of whose members had attended LIPA, the comedian Peter Kay appeared on stage to a warm reception. ‘It’s my job to introduce the star turn tonight, ladies and gentlemen,’ said Kay, who is hugely popular in the north.

He’s a local lad who’s done very well for himself in the old music game. He’s played with some amazing people over the years: Stevie Wonder, Rupert the Bear [big laugh] and the Beatles! [huge cheer] … In conjunction with Liverpool County Council [boos and hisses], BBC Radio Merseyside [cheers] and Heatwave Sun Bed Centre, Norris Green [laughs], it is my duty to reveal Britain has got talent, ladies and gentleman, and his name is Sir Paul Mildred McCARTNEEEEEY!

Strolling on stage in a silver suit, Paul opened with ‘Hippy Hippy Shake’, taking his audience back to the Cavern. Next came ‘Jet’, the audience punching the air with the repeated exclamations of ‘Jet!’, singing along to the verses in the style of a football crowd at a home fixture. ‘Liverpool! I love ya!’ exclaimed Paul at the end of the number, and who would doubt him? In recent years he’d spent more time in the city than at any stage since the early Sixties, becoming almost a familiar figure in the streets again. Stories of the star strolling about town - popping into Lewis’s to buy a tie one day - were legion. ‘I was born just down the road from here, Walton Hospital, Rice Lane,’ he reminded his audience, ‘and I lived in Sunbury Road.’ Sitting in the Lower Centenary Stand, Brenda Rothwell turned to the person sitting beside her and said excitedly: ‘I live next door!’ After ‘Got to Get You into My Life’ Paul held up his Höfner bass and cried: ‘OK, let’s hear it for Speke! For Garston! …’ Local people cheered their suburb.

Paul sang ‘My Love’ for Linda, whose picture appeared on the huge screens (all images of Heather excised). The audience applauded everything the star said, his every joke and story, and sang along heartily to almost every song, the ukulele tribute to George Harrison raising the crowd to a collective roar when Paul sang his friend’s sweetly questioning lyric, meant originally for George’s first wife, Pattie Boyd, but having a universal resonance: ‘You’re asking me will my love grow/I don’t know, I don’t know’. The words echoed around the stadium as a football chant, tears pricking the eyes of performer and fans. Olivia was watching. Yoko was beside her. She appeared to approve Paul’s performance of ‘Give Peace a Chance’, as a tribute to her late husband. Paul signed off with ‘I Saw Her Standing There’, setting middle-aged Liverpudlians jiving in the aisles, round ladies of pensionable age recreating the dance steps of their youth, touching their ample bosoms and sending out their love with the palms of their hands as Paul sang of his heart going
boom
.