[HN Gopher] Paul McCartney's Freakish Memory
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Paul McCartney's Freakish Memory
Author : tintinnabula
Score : 117 points
Date : 2022-10-03 17:49 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (ianleslie.substack.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (ianleslie.substack.com)
| lacrosse_tannin wrote:
| Does he drink?
| jjulius wrote:
| >The idea that he coincidentally landed on the name 'Eleanor
| Rigby' - for a song about a woman who "died in the church and was
| buried along with her name" - is wildly implausible.
|
| ... _is it_ , though?
| notahacker wrote:
| An exceptionally unusual line about names and burials and a
| fairly unusual name associated with a burial in one of the only
| churches the Beatles are likely to have spent much time hanging
| around?
|
| (Throw in the fact that Lennon claimed to have written a lot of
| the song, which meant McCartney who disagreed with that claim
| had a lot of reason to make up an alternative story if he
| couldn't remember where the name or line came from...)
|
| I passed a narrowboat called Eleanor with the location it's
| based in (Rugby) painted below the name (it's from the Aintree
| Beetle range too... ) a month or two back. If the owner told me
| he'd named his boat Eleanor because of a film star, and
| coincidentally decided to moor it at Rugby some time later, I
| wouldn't believe him :)
| vlunkr wrote:
| In my opinion it's not that impressive either way.
|
| If he did remember it: Seems like it's very common for
| artists to take mental or physical notes of interesting
| things they see. He saw the name, associated it with the
| cemetery, then forgot that it was a real name and place.
|
| If it's a coincidence: Tons of people are buried at churches,
| that's not unusual. There's a chance there's more than one
| Eleanor Rigby buried at a church.
| jjtheblunt wrote:
| where is freakish memory evident? (and i did read it)
| w0mbat wrote:
| That's a weird article. The anecdote at the beginning has a big
| buildup then goes absolutely nowhere and the pattern keeps
| repeating.
| nathias wrote:
| rhyme and rhythm are linguistic information compression
| mechanisms
| alexpotato wrote:
| I actually had a Ask HN question that went nowhere about how
| senior folks in tech with bad memories got to their positions:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18309597
|
| I ask b/c it seems that most (if not all) of the senior folks
| I've worked with in the past somehow managed to have incredibly
| detailed memories around:
|
| - the tech stack
|
| - the people that worked for them etc
|
| If they didn't, they did the "if you are a fighter pilot with bad
| vision, get a wingman with good vision" and hired a number 2 or
| team lead who did.
| zaat wrote:
| An IT manager in a company that is my client have extremely
| terrible memory. He is well aware of his shortcoming, ask
| people to remind him stuff they ask for and is important to
| them, and himself writes down in notebooks everything he need
| to follow through.
|
| The guy is doing awesome job, pushing his department forward,
| he is very precise and meticulous and have years of experience
| in leading people and projects. He developed sharp instincts
| that enable him to make smart decisions regarding complex
| issues very fast, nevertheless he is very thoughtful and open
| listener and doesn't act as if he knows better than everyone
| else.
| throwaway5752 wrote:
| Writing things down. It's the ultimate hack.
|
| Good memory doesn't scale at all organizationally, so a good
| memory is actually a liability, in a sense.
| takoid wrote:
| Reminds me of the old Chinese proverb that says "the faintest
| ink is more powerful than the strongest memory."
| sibeliuss wrote:
| This is def me. Interestingly, I have a terrible memory when it
| comes to facts and names and things I read in books and so on
| and so forth. But I have a way-above-average situational
| memory. Interactions with people (or code), conversations and
| reasons why decisions were made tend to stick forever. It's
| bizarre. Granted I'm not Paul McCartney interacting with
| innumerable people across time and space over a whole lifetime,
| but this story felt familiar because I can imagine something
| like this happening to me.
| olddustytrail wrote:
| I'm the opposite. I can remember all sorts of weird facts and
| numbers. I can remember the IP address of the DNS servers of
| a job I worked 20 years ago. And lyrics to songs I learned as
| a child.
|
| But I will forget someone's name minutes after meeting them
| even if I try all the tricks of repeating it 3 times or
| associating it with a particular action.
|
| As a side note, after I got COVID, for a few weeks I couldn't
| retain anything. I'd read some documentation and afterwards
| couldn't remember a single thing. I remember discussing it
| with my sister and her response was "welcome to the world of
| ordinary people!" It has made me more patient with people not
| getting what I've explained on the first hearing, so at least
| I've learned from my experience.
| sibeliuss wrote:
| How interesting -- and then after COVID resolved your
| memory gradually improved? I've heard anecdotal evidence
| about this. How frustrating! And sorry you had to
| experience it!
| notshift wrote:
| Is that a broken link or is my browser broken? That opens to an
| empty Hacker News page for me.
| lowercased wrote:
| In 2007, he told us his memory was almost full.... Yet in 2022,
| here we are, it's still seemingly got room for a bit more.
| stevage wrote:
| Boy the evidence in this article is pretty thin.
| nicoburns wrote:
| > In 1999, McCartney recorded a haunting cover version of an
| obscure song called No Other Baby. He'd had the song in his head
| for years without knowing who recorded it or who it was written
| by. Whenever he sang it to people, nobody knew it. Only after
| recording it did he discover that the song, or at least the
| version of it, was by a skiffle group called The Vipers, who
| released it as a single in 1958, the year after John met Paul (as
| it turns out, the record was, rather remarkably, produced by
| George Martin). Paul said he never owned the record, which means
| he would have heard it on the radio, or in a record store
| listening booth, what - once, twice? Yet forty years later, he
| remembered all the verses, as well as the refrain, which goes, I
| don't want no other baby but you....I don't want no other baby
| but you...
|
| This kind of memory is certainly possible. And from what I've
| seen of McCartney - he has a _vast_ repertoire of songs he knows
| (not just his own) - it seems almost certain that he has this
| talent. I suspect it 's actually a relatively common ability
| though. I have family members who can remember both the tune and
| the lyrics of songs after 1 or 2 listens through. This just isn't
| so noticeable because they're not musicians.
|
| In general, I find what people find easy to remember a
| fascinating topic. my personal ability to remember song lyrics
| (and in general auditory information) is awful - I actually can't
| remember the entire lyrics to single song. I'm sure I could
| memorise some if I really tried, but it would take me hours of
| conscious. effort. On the other hand I often recall visual or
| written information from a single glance, and am very good at
| book learning and retaining an understanding of system and
| concepts.
| coliveira wrote:
| Yes, this is not so surprising. I remember songs I heard in my
| infancy and never again. I also didn't have a record. I guess
| people find this surprising because they live in an era where
| you can find any song you want (the already common thought of
| "how people did this before smart phones...").
| j7ake wrote:
| An analogous scenario would be that Magnus Carlsen can look at
| a chess board where pieces are well advanced and know when that
| historic event happened.
|
| Steph curry can tell you the dates and plays and sequences from
| one still image of a video highlight.
|
| Cristiano Ronaldo can head the ball into the goal with his eyes
| closed.
| fsckboy wrote:
| > _Paul said he never owned the record, which means he would
| have heard it on the radio, or in a record store listening
| booth_
|
| or in a discotheque, or in George Martin's living room, or
| other people had the record and he heard it at parties. People
| used to get together to play records. I'm not doubting he has a
| good memory, and especially for music, but he could have heard
| the song many times.
| asciimov wrote:
| In high school I got rather adept at memorizing our marching
| band music. By my senior year I could play a song once or
| twice, and not have to look at it again for the rest of the
| semester.
|
| While this kind of skill is nice to have, there is a curse to
| this kind of musical ability. I often find myself humming songs
| or fragments that I cannot place. Worse you cant just hum or
| whistle the tune into some app and have it tell you the song.
| And it's maddening when you know you don't have it quite right.
|
| For example, for years I had a reoccurring little tune stuck in
| my head. I had nothing to go on other than a couple of bars of
| the song that repeated. One day I finally(!) figured it out
| when I got out an old copy of NES Mega Man, and selected
| Cutmans stage. The cutman theme had been stuck in my head for
| years, and it was quite the relief to know what the song was.
| pulvinar wrote:
| >Worse you cant just hum or whistle the tune into some app
| and have it tell you the song.
|
| I've had reasonable luck with folktunefinder, not for
| humming, but for tapping in a snippet as notes or a rhythm.
| nicoburns wrote:
| The article says McCartney had a similar problem with a song,
| and only found out which song it was when he recorded and
| released his own version!
| dualboot wrote:
| Same, but it started in middle school for me. I could only
| read a piece of music once.
| mstade wrote:
| > I suspect it's actually a relatively common ability though. I
| have family members who can remember both the tune and the
| lyrics of songs after 1 or 2 listens through. This just isn't
| so noticeable because they're not musicians.
|
| I'm like this, more or less, and I'm no musician or singer. If
| I hear a song, I can't _not_ hear the lyrics, and I 'll
| remember them and the melody after a listen or two. It's great
| for music quizzes where you have to figure out the name of a
| song or artist, because if they only play a short bit I can
| usually fill in, to help my team mates figure out the answer.
|
| I also tend to recall numbers quite easily. Faces too, but tell
| me your name however and I'll forget it in about 7 seconds.
| forgotmypw17 wrote:
| I think what contributes to this ability is already knowing a
| number of songs, and being able to remember them as "systems"
| rather than individual notes and words.
|
| Similarly, it is easier for someone who plays often to remember
| a chess game.
| svachalek wrote:
| Yeah I'm always impressed when someone is like, the dance is
| like this and this and this and then it seems the whole room
| got it except me. But for most of my life (as I'm aging I'm
| losing it somewhat) I pretty much only had to read something
| once to remember it forever. Never understood the process of
| "studying".
|
| Lebron James has been remarked upon for his ability to remember
| practically any play of any game he's ever been in (and many
| that he hasn't) in precise detail. And actress Marilu Henner
| can basically remember every detail of her entire life, a
| condition called hyperthermesia. I think superior memory is an
| underestimated driver of successful people.
| colordrops wrote:
| I had what was probably hyperthymesia until I got into
| college. Lots of drinking, drugs, experiences, illnesses and
| whatnot and now I'm almost 50 and can't remember much of what
| happened a couple hours ago. It's like Flowers for Algernon
| but in slow motion so not as painful.
| cardiffspaceman wrote:
| The power of ad jingles is often attributed to songs being easy
| to memorize. According to legend that was the core idea for
| Sesame Street teaching things with songs and music. But I am
| sure I don't remember nearly as many songs as musicians do,
| never mind McCartney
| smm11 wrote:
| I often come up with numerical sequences also involving letters.
| Like RLT237-b, something like that. Sometimes I'll track down
| what those mean, and very frequently turn up a toy I had when I
| was 4, or a window code in the back of an International
| Harvester. Stuff is down there for all of us, it's just a matter
| of how to summon it.
| yuan43 wrote:
| > I find this fascinating. The exact sequence of his writing
| process for the song [Eleanor Rigby] is probably irrecoverable
| now but I'd love to know precisely when he decided on the song's
| theme of loneliness, death, and worship, and when the name
| 'Eleanor Rigby' bubbled up into his conscious mind [from a
| gravestone in a graveyard he and John used to walk through]. It's
| almost as if his unconscious mind had been giving him prompts,
| first 'Eleanor', then 'Rigby' (hey, check that sign out!), like a
| stage magician guiding their mark towards a card while creating
| the illusion of a free choice.
|
| It's not uncommon for writers to put things into their novels
| even they don't see. Readers and editors note what's there, and
| the writers can be surprised that it happened.
|
| Sean Coyne talks about this several times on the Story Grid
| podcast, and it's on display in several of the episodes in which
| a writer's draft is examined.
|
| Maybe the real story here is how the process of creating art taps
| into a part of the mind that it keeps hidden from itself, or at
| least doesn't expose without persuasion.
| borski wrote:
| So much of what is described matches perfectly my experience with
| having ADHD. It's less about having an insanely good memory and
| more about being able to find connections where others don't
| normally see them, completely subconsciously.
|
| Plus the "homework while doing TV and remembering both
| perfectly," etc.
|
| I would bet many dollars Paul McCartney has ADHD. :)
| schnevets wrote:
| Observe a trivia night focused on a specific TV Show (like
| Simpsons or Seinfeld trivia) and you'll see this phenomena en
| masse. People make connections based on plotlines, celebrity
| guest stars, or even head writers on episodes and then can
| drill down to a precise line of dialogue or gag.
|
| The same thing happens with die-hard sports fans. You ask "Who
| was the rookie points leader on the 05-06 Toronto Maple Leafs?"
| and a sports nut can start piecing together how the team did
| that year, who was on their roster, and finally derive an
| educated guess.
| borski wrote:
| For sure! One of the hallmarks in how ADHD often presents is
| also hyperfocus on things they're particularly interested in,
| which also exists in non-ADHD folks sometimes of course. Paul
| was clearly curious about _everything_ , and hyperfocused on
| a few things (music). Get Back is a great thing to watch to
| see this in action; his brain flies from idea to idea, until
| he lands on one he is imminently curious about and then
| that's all he talks or thinks about for hours.
| joe_the_user wrote:
| That the Beatles were astoundingly, uniquely talented actually
| became fodder for right wing conspiracy theories [1]. I remember
| a relative in 1974 asking rhetorically how four uneducated
| working class men could produce music of musical genius. The
| actual story is the Beatles had a remarkable series of musical
| opportunities, from the background described here to studying
| with some of the Greatest American Rock and Rolls to endless
| performance in their first gigs.
|
| [1] https://publicseminar.org/essays/was-theodor-adorno-the-
| fift...
| kaiwen1 wrote:
| In counterpoint, a recent 60 Minutes piece on Paul MacCartney
| showed him playing an impromptu concert in his local pub. While
| playing one of his old hits - I can't recall which one - he
| suddenly started to stumble and couldn't remember the lyrics.
| Fortunately the audience was signing along and knew every word.
| macshome wrote:
| I saw him on tour in 1990 and he got lost in a Beatles song on
| stage and had a laugh about it. That's said, everything I've
| read or seen about him points to him having an encyclopedic
| memory of songs.
| lowercased wrote:
| He's done this multiple times - We Can Work It Out from
| Unplugged, for example. I think in some cases, it's semi-
| rehearsed. But not in all cases, certainly, and he can just
| roll with it apparently.
| 2-718-281-828 wrote:
| Those slips - I'd assume - tend to occur with people who have
| very high trust in memory. Sometimes something gets messed
| up. Doesn't even have to be due to forgetting something but
| rather overmemorizing versions of a song getting entangled
| upon accessing them. People who don't trust their memory will
| rehearse more thoroughly.
| arinlen wrote:
| > _In counterpoint, a recent 60 Minutes piece on Paul
| MacCartney showed him playing an impromptu concert in his local
| pub. While playing one of his old hits - I can 't recall which
| one - he suddenly started to stumble and couldn't remember the
| lyrics. Fortunately the audience was signing along and knew
| every word._
|
| I'm sure that the 80-year old Paul McCartney deserves a free
| pass when he misses a line or two from an impromptu song.
| BitwiseFool wrote:
| There's also the possibility that he's mixing up lyrics from
| earlier drafts/renditions of the song. But I think the key is
| understanding that a freakish memory does not mean that the
| person has insanely good recall regardless of the situation.
| heleninboodler wrote:
| ... or that it doesn't start to falter in your 80's
| spoonjim wrote:
| Almost everyone "smart" has a really good memory. Turns out it's
| a lot easier to think of things when you have everything in RAM
| instead of tape storage.
| karaterobot wrote:
| > Of course he got it from the cemetery. The idea that he
| coincidentally landed on the name 'Eleanor Rigby' - for a song
| about a woman who "died in the church and was buried along with
| her name" - is wildly implausible.
|
| ...
|
| > (Note that the gravestone in question isn't even for Eleanor
| Rigby herself but her grandfather; her name is further down, a
| detail).
|
| So, in any case he didn't name the character after someone who
| died in the church, or was even buried there, but someone whose
| name appears there. Essentially, the connection is that the name
| Eleanor Rigby is engraved in a place where Paul McCartney has
| been before. The fact that he met Lennon there does not mean that
| the place is seared in _his_ memory, it just means it 's of
| historic importance to Beatles fans, which may be making this
| coincidence seem like something else.
| wingspar wrote:
| I do not now the custom of that area or era, but I took that
| grave marker to be basically a family marker and they were all
| buried there.
| cryptonector wrote:
| That is clearly the case. It's almost certainly like the plot
| behind it and to the right -- not covered by dirt, but more
| like a buried mausoleum which is opened to add urns with the
| ashes of recently passed family members.
| cryptonector wrote:
| The names listed on the stone are the names of people buried
| there. Multiple people are buried in the same plot. Eleanor
| Rigby was buried there. The coincidence or non-coincidence is
| indeed of really low importance in the grand scheme of things,
| and says nothing about McCartney's "freakish memory".
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| If you examine anybody's life, you will probably come up with
| 'coincidences' like that. Because we all have associations we're
| not aware of, or at least not aware where they came from.
| sceptically wrote:
| I don't get it. Please explain. Is it the weird dollar sign on
| the stone?
| behaveEc0n00 wrote:
| Tao3300 wrote:
| That's an IHS with the letters imposed on one another. It's
| short for 'ihsous', Greek for Jesus.
| ahazred8ta wrote:
| The superimposed IHS: https://www.istockphoto.com/vector/ihs-
| ancient-medieval-chri...
|
| And actually the dollar sign started out as two pillars with
| ribbon banners wrapped around them in an S shape, not as a
| P-S.
| wheels wrote:
| Fun fact: the actual "dollar" sign is actually a P and an S
| superimposed, as it's actually a symbol for "peso".
| mywittyname wrote:
| Given the context, I think that says "IHS". There are a variety
| of IHS symbols, some can be confused as a dollar sign.
|
| https://cemeteries.wordpress.com/2006/08/23/ihs/
| madrox wrote:
| I enjoyed reading this, but what a strange article that's
| projecting a lot onto McCartney. Every anecdote has some
| plausible, other reason for these situations, but the article
| seems insistent on putting McCartney's memory on a pedestal. Paul
| himself never acknowledges these anecdotes are due to memory, and
| he's never mentioned his memory is particularly noteworthy. If I
| got anything out of this article, it's the mystique of celebrity
| when they don't answer your every question.
| seneca wrote:
| Yeah, exactly this. This is an unwitting article about how
| people are desperate to deify celebrities. I've always been a
| bit bewildered by the phenomenon. It almost seems like
| internalized marketing.
| meowface wrote:
| Yes, I found this one of the oddest articles I've read in a
| while. It's just the author projecting all of these things onto
| McCartney, without ever having any clear evidence of what
| really happened in any of these cases or evidence that he has a
| particularly good memory.
| kazinator wrote:
| Random hypothesis: Paul did in fact know Fran, and is the real
| father of those two boys.
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