Paul McCartney and George Harrison meet to dissolve The Beatles’ partnership

A meeting was arranged for John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison on 19 December 1974, to sign documents that would dissolve The Beatles’ legal partnership and allow the official receiver to divide up and distribute royalties which had been frozen since early 1971.

The meeting took place at New York’s Plaza Hotel. Harrison’s 1974 North American tour called at Madison Square Garden that evening, and Lennon was due to appear on stage.

I was a bit nervous about going on stage, but I agreed because it would have been mean of me not to go on with George after I’d gone on with Elton.

Ringo Starr had signed the documents in advance. Lennon, however, failed to attend the meeting, saying that “the numbers weren’t right, the planets weren’t right.”

We had all arrived for the big dissolution meeting in the Plaza Hotel in New York. There were green-baize tables… like the Geneva Conference it was… with millions of documents laid out for us to sign. George had just come off tour, I’d flown in specially from England, Ringo had flown in specially, too, I think, and John wouldn’t show up! He wouldn’t come from across the park! George got on the phone, yelled, ‘Take those f*****g shades off and come over here, you!’ John still wouldn’t come over. He had a balloon delivered with a sign saying, LISTEN TO THIS BALLOON. It was all quite far out.

Harrison, angered by Lennon’s intransigence, informed Lennon that he was not welcome at that evening’s concert. Lennon’s son Julian attended in his place.

George was furious at the time because I hadn’t signed it when I was supposed to, and somehow or other I was informed that I needn’t bother to go to George’s show. I was quite relieved in the end because there wasn’t any time for rehearsal, and I didn’t want it to be a case of just John jumping up and playing a few chords.

According to Lennon’s partner May Pang, he was uneasy about the tax implications of the dissolution agreement.

John didn’t want to be the one to suffer with all the taxes, since he was the only one living in the States… so he said, ‘Wait a minute, hold on, I don’t like this.’ That was one of the parts, and I’m sure there were a lot of other emotional ones as well. He locked me out of the room for a second, ’cause he was like freaking out because he knew he had to sign that night. Yoko called, and I said, ‘John doesn’t want to sign the contract.’ So she calls back a few minutes and tells him not to sign it because ‘the stars weren’t right’. Harold Seider called again and asked, ‘When are you coming?’ I said, ‘He isn’t coming.’ When he hung up the phone, there’s George going, ‘You’re the one who told him!’ George is waving his fist, ‘You’re the one who told him not to sign! We know it, we know it! Poor Harold had to take everything. At the end of the day I remember George calling up, and I said, ‘Hi George. Do you want to speak to John yourself?’ He says, NO! GIVE HIM THIS MESSAGE!’ He’s screaming through the phone, he’s screaming, ‘Tell him I started this tour alone and I’ll end it the same way!’

Lennon eventually signed the documents on 29 December 1974 at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida.

The numbers weren’t right, the planets weren’t right, and John wasn’t coming. Well! And it’s never happened since. It’s never happened. He said he was not coming and that was it. Had we known there was some guy flipping cards on his bed to help him make his decision, we would have all gone over there. George blew his top, but it didn’t change anything. It’s beyond words. It’s mind-boggling.