Yes, folks, Paul McCartney still longs for “Yesterday.”
Indeed, Macca remains haunted by a regretful remark he made to his late mother Mary — a lament that lives on in a legendary line from The Beatles’ 1965 No. 1 single.
While “Yesterday” — which was ostensibly a McCartney solo song, with the singer strumming acoustic guitar over a sorrowful string arrangement — has always been considered a breakup ballad, the classic lyric “I said something wrong, now I long for yesterday” is actually a mea culpa to his mother.
It was inspired by “feeling very embarrassed because I’d embarrassed my mom,” the 81-year-old Beatle reveals in the latest episode of his songwriter podcast “McCartney: A Life in Lyrics.”
That embarrassment goes back to Macca’s mother having what he describes as a very “posh” accent.
“She was of Irish origin and she was a nurse, so she was above street level,” he explains about his mom, who died from breast-cancer complications in 1956 — when the Beatle was just 14. “So she had something sort of going for her, and she would talk what we thought was a little bit posh.”
One day while they were in the backyard, “I know that she said something like ‘Paul, will you ask him if he’s going … ’,” he recalls. “I went ‘Arsk! Arsk! It’s ask, mum.’ And she got a little bit embarrassed. I remember later thinking, ‘God, I wish I’d never said that.’ And it stuck with me. After she died I thought, ‘Oh f–k, I really wish … ’”
And when McCartney was writing “Yesterday” — which has spawned some 2,200 cover versions — that longing was immortalized in song.
“Sometimes it’s only in retrospect you can appreciate it,” he reflects about the line that would breathe a bittersweetness into the bridge of “Yesterday,” which went on to inspire the 2019 film of the same name.
But despite his mother providing some iconic inspiration as his lyrical muse, Sir Paul would take it all back if he could: “That would be better.”