The Macca files - Paul McCartney in Cavendish Avenue

 

'With Jane [Asher] no longer even nominally resident, Cavendish Avenue rapidly collapsed. In the living room a big jar of pot sat on the mantelpiece, books and records piled up all over the floor and the plywood model of the meditation dome became chipped and scarred with cigarette burns, tiny tangles of dog hair sprouting from the corners where Martha had pushed past.

I didn’t like asking for money because I thought it affected our friendship and I was also the one who approached him for help whenever International Times needed money to pay the staff; too many of the people he knew were hitting on him. However, he did say that I should never be scared to come to him if things were really bad. ‘Years from now,’ he said, ‘twenty years from now’, and it did look as if Indica Books would fold without an injection of cash, so I went begging once more. At least it was for the bookshop, not for me. 

I gave the secret three long rings on the doorbell, which all the girls gathered by the black metal gate knew anyway – they had eyes and ears – and was admitted. Paul’s house was set back from the road, with a front yard serving as a driveway. To the left of the house was the garage, concealing his Aston Martin DB5 and his wide-wheelbase black-glass Mini Cooper. The yard was lit by a Victorian street lamp, installed by Paul. Tea was served in his living-room, and we sat there like two English gentlemen. I asked for £3,000, to which he readily agreed and then quickly changed the subject, as if he were as embarrassed as I was at bringing it up.

Paul, having split up with Jane, was in what he later described as his ‘bachelor period’, and the house was full of semi-clad young women, one of whom looked in on us. Paul told her to go away; that we were talking business. She pulled a face and left. ‘It’s terrible,’ he said. ‘The birds are always quarrelling about something. There’s three living here at the moment.’ He laughed, because this was quite a new departure for him. Mostly I’d only ever visited the house when Jane Asher was there. ‘And there’s another one, an American groupie, flying in this evening. I’ve thrown her out once. I had to throw her suitcase over the wall. But it’s no good; she keeps coming back.’

Paul was clearly very pleased about something, and, business over, he leaped up and led the way upstairs to his music room. ‘Come and hear this,’ he said. He put on a white label acetate of ‘Back in the USSR’ that he had finished mixing the night before. ‘How do you think the cocky Americans will like that?’ he asked, and we both laughed.'

— Barry Miles, The Zapple Diaries. (2015)