On The Beatles, Papa, and grief
I rewatch James Corden’s carpool karaoke episode with Paul McCartney, and it brings out a mix of joy and melancholy.
The first time I watched this years ago, I sat next to Papa and noticed tears well up in his eyes, sometime around the scene when Paul played the piano and sang, “When I get older, losing my hair many years from now . . . Will you still need me? Will you still feed me when I’m 64?” in his childhood home on Forthlin Road.
Papa was 65 years old at that point, sitting in a wheelchair and frail from bi-weekly dialysis appointments. I wondered what was running through his mind while watching an aged Paul sing the songs of his youth. I could only guess.
Paul casually singing classics like Penny Lane, Let It Be, and — my parents’ theme song — When I’m Sixty-Four made my heart smile. But seeing the wrinkles and sagging eyes on Paul’s face was jarring compared to his youthful black-and-white photos alongside the rest of The Beatles in their glory days.
I suppose Paul’s old age was a reminder of the lost youth of my own dad who was a little boy during the peak of The Beatles’ careers. Papa was a big fan of the English band, imitating their haircuts as a teenager and belting out to Obladi Obladah on the radio when he was already our Papa.
There’s something poignant about seeing a larger-than-life personality sing in mundane setups like inside a car or in front of a piano in a small apartment he once called home.
It was a reminder that despite the huge impact The Beatles made on the world, they’re just like us. Humans who dream, fulfil their dreams, and then get old and look back on the good old days.
Will you still need me? Will you still feed me when I’m sixty-four? the song goes. True to their couple song, my parents continued to care for each other and love each other up until Papa was 64 years old and beyond. But two years later, he passed away.
The video gets to a part where Paul performs a surprise concert in The Philharmonic pub. Diners’ eyes and mouths widen as the curtain reveals Paul, guitar in hand and singing the opening lyrics of A Hard Day’s Night.
Soon, both old and young people from the street swarm into the bar. I see people in their 20s and 30s sing and dance along to Love Me Do. One girl raises her thumb at the camera and shows off a Beatles tattoo on her forearm. Another girl cries as the live band performs Hey Jude.
The Beatles had broken up many years before some of these people were born, and yet the band’s songs seem to have a special place in their hearts. I marvel at how The Beatles transcended generations. And I also wonder why these young people, my age or even younger, have come to be great fans of The Beatles.
As for me, it’s the nostalgia–not for an era I didn’t experience, but for the good memories of my dad.
In the video, a man from the crowd comes up to Paul and tells him they played Beatles songs at his father’s funeral. This hits home. At Papa’s funeral, Let It Be, Blackbird, and In My Life played as the monitor flashed pictures of Papa’s life, from his teenage years with my mom, to his days as an actor, to the last days when we smiled and held his hand while he lay in the ICU.
In times when I especially miss Papa, I put on a Beatles song. We cling on to tangible and intangible things that remain when we miss our loved ones whom we’ve lost.
Papa may not be around anymore physically, but his presence feels very real whenever I play a Beatles song that he loved.
As the lyrics go, “Take a sad song and make it better.”
