George and Paul’s relationship improved after John Lennon died in 1980.At a 1984 press conference, George revealed that he’d been in touch with Paul and was complimentary of his work. (Cheatsheet)
George revealed that his relationship with Paul was going well and that he liked Paul’s latest hit, “No More Lonely Nights.”
“I have recently been very much in touch with Paul and musically-see all the pens are coming out for this one, I love it-I think ‘No More Lonely Nights’ is a lovely song,” George told the press, sitting beside Taylor, who was once The Beatles’ long-time press officer. “I like it a lot.”
In 1984, Paul released his film, Give My Regards to Broad Street, and an album of the same name. While the film was a failure, the album did OK. In the U.S., it peaked at No. 21 on the Billboard 200. “No More Lonely Nights” reached No. 6 in the U.S. and No. 2 in the U.K. (per Beatles Bible).
Out of the 15 tracks on Give My Regards to Broad Street, Paul chose to cover six Beatles songs: “Good Day Sunshine,” “Yesterday,” “Here There And Everywhere,” “For No One,” “Eleanor Rigby,” and “The Long And Winding Road.” George told the press that he thought that was strange.
“I haven’t seen his movie so I can’t comment…,” George said before someone asked him about the Beatles songs in the film. “I’ve not really heard it all, I’ve heard ‘Eleanor Rigby’ and ‘For No One,’ I think. It’s OK, it’s OK. I can’t understand why he did it. Makes me think it must be because he got the publishing of it or something.”
One press member asked George if he thought Paul’s covers were sacrilege. “No, he wrote the songs,” George replied. “It’s like he says, I mean, if I wanted to sing ‘Here Comes the Sun,’ is that sacrilege? I mean, I wrote it. It’s the same, Paul wrote those songs, and good on him, he can do them.
“I think he would have been better off to have not done so many of them and had more new tunes. But he’s not doing so bad.”
