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Writing a jealousy-driven song\u00a0rife with implied violence against women isn’t usually a great idea, and yet that is the point where the Beatles<\/a>‘ 1965 album Rubber Soul<\/em><\/a> concludes.<\/p>\n There is no denying that the writing in “Run for Your Life” has aged poorly, if it could have ever been considered agreeable in the first place. Threatening your partner with their very life should they ever decide to leave the relationship isn’t a good look now or then, though it’s worth remembering that domestic violence in the ’60s wasn’t\u00a0viewed through the same lens it is today. (The Beatles are, of course, not the only classic rock band\u00a0to have\u00a0landed in this situation over the years.)\u00a0It’s an unfortunately problematic end to an otherwise expressive and artistically challenging album.<\/p>\n Perhaps that’s part of the reason why John Lennon<\/a>, the song’s primary writer, eventually admitted his dislike for the track. Actually, one of its most regrettable lyrics didn’t even come from Lennon himself \u2014 it came from a 1955 Elvis Presley<\/a> song, written by Arthur Gunter.<\/p>\n “I never liked ‘Run For Your Life,’ because it was a song I just knocked off,” Lennon explained<\/a> to Rolling Stone<\/em> in 1970. “It was inspired from \u2013 this is a very vague connection \u2013 from ‘Baby, Let’s Play House.’ There was a line on it \u2013 I used to like specific lines from songs \u2013 ‘I’d rather see you dead, little girl, than to be with another man<\/em>‘ \u2013 so I wrote it around that but I didn’t think it was that important.”<\/p>\n Listen to Elvis Presley’s ‘Baby, Let’s Play House’<\/strong><\/p>\n A decade later in an interview\u00a0that took place shortly before his death<\/a>, Lennon went so far as to describe <\/a>“Run for Your Life” as a “favorite of George<\/a>‘s,” though for what reasons he didn’t elaborate. Even then, Lennon called it a “throwaway” song.<\/p>\n In that same interview \u2013 conducted jointly with Yoko Ono<\/a> \u2014Lennon spoke relatively openly about his history of violence against partners.<\/p>\n “I was a hitter,” he said. “I couldn’t express myself and I hit. I fought men and I hit women. That is why I am always on about peace, you see. It is the most violent people who go for love and peace. Everything’s the opposite. But I sincerely believe in love and peace. I am a violent man who has learned not to be violent and regrets his violence. I will have to be a lot older before I can face in public how I treated women as a youngster.”<\/p>\n Lennon may not have given much weight to “Run for Your Life” either at the time of its release or in the years after that, but Paul McCartney<\/a>\u00a0sensed there was something deeper going on.<\/p>\nWhy John Lennon Grew to Dislike ‘Run for Your Life’<\/h3>\n
Paul McCartney’s Opinion<\/h3>\n