Everyone BUT Paul is Dead

During the most recent "Paul is dead" thread, philllll noted that if the clues were merely the result of coincidence, one would expect that there would be about as many death clues for the other three Beatles as there are for Paul. Hoping to prove that just such a situation exists, I checked my CDs and stumbled across evidence of a much bigger conspiracy: all the Beatles except Paul died and were replaced by doubles. More specifically, in 1963 Ringo died and was replaced; George died and was replaced in 1964; John died and was replaced in 1965; and RIngo's replacement died in a car crash in November of 1966 and was re-replaced. Of course, the clues about the '66 car crash of "Ringo2" were what produced the Paul is dead rumors.

The Evidence

1963:
On the front cover of With the Beatles, Ringo's face is not in line with those of the other Fabs. Clearly a clue that the "Ringo" on this album is different form the others: obviously, he had died between the first two albums and been replaced.

1964:
On the cover of A Hard Day's Night, George is the only Beatles with his back to the camera in any of the photos, and he's the only one with a cigarette ("a coffin nail"). These are the signals that George had died.

On the Long Tall Sally EP, George wears a different style of coat than the other three, again indicating that he's different, having been replaced. (Technically, George and Ringo both should be shown as different, but presumably whoever is in charge of planting the clues [Paul? John? EMI? Spiritual entities?] decided that having George and Ringo in one style of coat and Paul and John in a second style would make it difficult to figure out just which pair of Beatles is supposed to be gone. Therefore, for these two records they concnetrated on announcing the most recent death).

On the Beatles for Sale LP, the Beatles all wear black, and the record includes the song "Baby's in Black." Black of course is a traditional color of mourning--just the state you'd expect Paul and John to be in after the deaths of two of their comrades.

1965:
On the cover of the Nowhere Man EP, Ringo is sitting on a stone monument, obviously meant to symbolize his tombstone. (Apparently the 'forces' deciding what clues to drop decided to give Ringo a new clue so he'd be even with George).

On the cover of the Help! album, the Beatles are holding their hands in semaphore positions. However, instead of spelling out "help" as one would rightly expect, they spell out "NUJV." This is an abbreviation for "New unknown John vocalist," indicating that John had died and been replaced. And since the odds of the Beatles just 'coincidentally' picking four letters that match that phrase must be millions to one, this MUST be a planned clue. On this album, the Beatles (what's left of them, that is) stopped indicating a member's death by showing him as different than the others. Indeed, since Paul was now the only non-replacement in the band, *he* was shown as the different one (ie, with his back to the camera on the back cover of Sgt Pepper) to indicate that he was alive. That this would later be interpreted as evidence of Paul's demise must have been a crushing irony to the one remaining original Beatle.

In "I'm Looking through You," (from Rubber Soul), Paul sings "You don't look different, but you have changed"--a reference to the three replacements he had to surround himself with.

1966:
On Revolver, John#2 sings the song "I'm Only Sleeping." Sleep is, of course, a metaphor for death (cf Hamlet's "Too sleep, perchance to dream" soliloquy).

Also from Revolver, in "She Said She Said" John#2 sings "I know what it's like to be dead," which the original John did indeed know by now. In "Eleanor Rigby," Paul sings "Father McKenzie/ wiping the dirt from his hands as he walks from the grave/No one was saved." 'Father McKenzie' is obviously a metaphorical reference to Paul McCartney (after all, what are the odds that Paul would by mere coincidence come up with a character whose last name begins with 'Mc' just like his own?!), who had far too often walked from the graves of his fellow band members. And indeed none of the other Beatles had been 'saved' from death.

More clues will follow in Part 2 (a separate article)

Chris "Who'd have thunk they'd could have pulled this conspiracy off?" Fishel

Everyone BUT Paul is Dead (Part 2)

This is the second half of an article providing the evidence that all the Beatles except Paul died and were replaced by look-alikes.

1967:
In "Strawberry Fields," John#2 says "I buried Paul." At first, this may suggest that Paul had joined the other three Bealtes in dying. However, earlier John#2 sings "Nothing is real," which shows that his latter comment is not a 'real' clue, but rather a red herring to throw the unwary off of the real trail.

On the Sgt. Pepper album, the Beatles introduce Billy Shears to replace Ringo#2 (that is the original Ringo's replacement) who is the real victim of the November 1966 car crash that figures so prominently in the "Paul Is Dead" theory. How anyone ever thought that Billy Shears was Paul's replacement is hard to fathom. After all, the next song following the "Let me introduce to you the one and only Billy Shears" bit is sung by 'Ringo'. And 'Ringo' would provide further confirmation in 1973's "I'm the Greatest" when he admits "My name is Billy Shears/It has been for so many years." In the face of this evidence, the thought that Billy Shears could be Paul's replacement seems faintly ridiculous.

Furthermore, it's well known that "A Day in the Life" describes the famed November 1966 car crash. However, everyone seems to have overlooked an obvious clue as to the victim of the car crash planted within "A Day in the Life": the ringing alarm clock!! Why would the Beatles include something that was 'ring'-ing unless it was to show that the song is about 'Ring'-o?!?

A similar identity-clue hidden within a death-clue appears on the front cover of the Magical Mystery Tour album. When the album is held upside down, the word 'Beatles' spells out the phone number of a London mortuary. However, the word 'Bealtes' is spelled out in stars--as in Ringo STARR! If the Beatles had really meant to indicate where Paul's body had been (as the "Paul is dead" theory insists), why would they use the one common symbol that was also a band memeber's last name? Obviously, this couldn't be a mere coincidence.

Also, one more clue from Sgt. Pepper needs to be discussed. On the front cover, someone holds a hand over Paul's head. This clearly mimics the actions of a priest in blessing the living--and Paul could certainly consider himself as blessed, as he was the only Beatle fate had spared.

The front cover of the Magical Mystery Tour album features one other clue. The titles of "Magical Mystery Tour", "The Fool on the Hill" and "Your Mother Should Know" are arranged as follows:

  Magical...
     ...On The...
       ...Should...
  

As for songs: John#2 sings "I Am the Walrus." Walruses are death symbols to Scandinavians. (Or maybe that was Eskimos. Or perhaps Falkland Islanders. I can't quite remember.) And in 'Hello, Goodbye", Paul sings "I don't know why you say goodbye, I say hello," a reference to the original Beatles (and one replacement) dying (Saying "Goodbye") and Paul surviving to say "hello" to their replacements.

1968:
In "Glass Onion," John#2 sings "Here's another clue for you all/The walrus was Paul." However, in this song, as in "Strawberry Fields," John#2 also sings "Nothing is real," thus tipping off the alert listener to the fact that this 'clue' is a mere red herring. In "I'm So Tired," John#2 sings about cigarettes ("coffin nails").

Furthermore, at the end of "I'm So Tired," John#2 says several nonsense syllables which, when played backwards, become "Paul, I'm dead." However, due to the poor sound quality, many insist mistakenly that it's "Paul is dead." (Much like the people who mistakenly insist on claiming that the words at the end of "Strawberry Fields" are 'cranberry sauce') In "Yer Blues," John#2 sings "If I ain't dead already" in ironic reference to John (that is the real John) indeed being dead already.

1969:
On the cover of Abbey Road, a VW has the license plate "281F," which can, of course be read, as '28IF' and denotes that John (born in Oct, 1940) would have been 28 when Abbey Road was released (Sept. 1969) IF he had lived. Also, the use of the "281F" plate is really a clever clue-within-a-clue, since the substitution of '1' for 'I' must have been inspired by the fact that Abbey Road was released only *1* month before John's birthday. Possibly the poignancy of that juxtaposition was what inspired the decision to mention John's age (had he lived) on the cover rather than George's or Ringo's (presumably the decision to not refer to all their ages was motivated by the difficulty in parking three cars so one could read all their license plates).

John#2's song "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" is abruptly cut off, clearly as a metaphor for the real John's life being abruptly cut short back in 1965. In "Come Together," the line "come together, over me" refers to a burial (where, of course, the mourners 'come together' over the grave). Later in this song, the line "one and one and one is three" indicates that three original Beatles were buried. Why isn't it "1+1+1+1 is four"? Because... The "I'd like to be under the sea" lines in "Octopus's Garden" indicate that Ringo#2 (that is, the replacement who was replaced by Billy Shears) was buried at sea. Thus, there was no gravesite for others to 'Come Together' over. Therefre, its "1+1+1 is three." QED.

Of course, all of this is still only the preliminary work. I don't own a version of Magical Mystery Tour with the original booklet in it, I don't have the resources necessary to listen to every single song backwards, etc. I beseach the dedicated investigators that must be out there among the RMB'ers to help unearth more important clues.

Chris "Yes, it's finally over" Fishel