Keith Richards and Mick Jagger had even upped the ante on songwriting. If the melody for “Scrambled Eggs” came to Paul in a dream, “I wrote ‘Satisfaction’ in my sleep,” Richards says. “I pushed rewind”—on the cassette player he kept next to his bed—“and there was ‘Satisfaction.’”

*  *  *

John lies on the king-size bed inside his mansion. Five hours later, he’s still empty of ideas, until suddenly:

…a Nowhere Man…

He writes the song in minutes.

Paul remembers polishing up the chorus. “He’d say, ‘Nowhere land,’ and I’d say, ‘For nobody.’ It was a two-way thing.”

In one week, the Beatles come up with seven songs.

George Martin is always with them in the studio, listening and watching, giving advice, perplexed as ever that “John couldn’t be bothered even to tune his guitar. He was a completely impractical man.”

One night, when they’re recording late, the control room intercom switches on, and John hears Brian’s voice. He snaps into focus.

“Something doesn’t sound quite right,” Brian says.

An uncomfortable silence follows. Brian is clearly drunk. Just as clear is the fact that he’s trying to impress his male companion.

Not for the first time, John reminds Brian who does what. “You just take care of your percentage and leave us to worry about the music.”

Four weeks later, on November 12, the album is finished.

Now it needs a title. John says, “We should call it the Pot Album.”

They share a laugh about all the times they’ve “shared a laugh” during this recording.

Paul mentions something an old blues guy said of the Rolling Stones: “Mick Jagger, man. Well, you know they’re good—but it’s plastic soul.”

John likes the wordplay of Rubber Soul. Rubber soles are very popular in Britain. The cobbler glues them to the bottom of people’s shoes to fight the damp.

But when a dark piece of John’s past resurfaces, it’s not as easy to repair.

Chapter 28

Chapter 28

Turn off your mind relax and float downstream.

—“Tomorrow Never Knows”

There’s been an unexpected development on the home front.

Alfred (called “Alf” or “Freddie”) Lennon, John’s long-absent father, has emerged and told his life story to Tit-Bits, a weekly magazine that features scantily clad girls on the cover and eye-grabbing headlines such as HOW WOMEN TURN MEN INTO POOR LOVERS.

Alf, it seems, has ambitions to become a recording artist, just like his son. His single, “That’s My Life (My Love and My Home),” is released at the same time as Rubber Soul.

“Rubber Soul broke everything open,” Steve Winwood, then frontman of the Spencer Davis Group, says. “It crossed music into a whole new dimension and was responsible for kicking off the sixties rock era as we know it.”