By the time they got together to record Abbey Road in 1969, The Beatles were at their creative peak. But personally, their relationships were more strained than ever. At the beginning of that year, they had attempted to record what would later become their last album, Let It Be, and the sessions, made worse by the constant presence of cameras filming their process for a TV show, were incredibly tense. At one point, George Harrison even quit the band.
A couple of months later, they managed to patch things up somewhat, but instead of releasing what were at the time called "The Get Back sessions," they decided to turn over a new leaf and start again. However, while making the new album, one of the most tense moments was the recording of this Paul McCartney track. “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” took a long time to record, as McCartney, ever the perfectionist, had a very clear idea of what he wanted the song to sound like. He really enjoyed this song, but his former bandmates all hated it.
1969 was the last year The Beatles were an active band. While they officially broke up in 1970, it was the year before that they wrapped up their projects. They made the Let It Be album and film (you can watch the sessions in Peter Jackson's documentary, The Beatles: Get Back), and the band almost didn't survive the tensions. Yoko Ono's presence in the studio was allegedly making things difficult, and George Harrison was struggling to make his voice heard.
Based on your personality, energy, and taste, the classic rock band that matches your soul is…
You are pure, undiluted rock energy. You don't need tricks, trends, or theatrical gimmicks — you have something more powerful: a riff that hits like a thunderbolt and an attitude that never wavers. Like AC/DC, you understand that simplicity executed with absolute conviction is its own form of genius. You're the person in the room who doesn't overthink it, doesn't pretend, and never turns the volume down. The highway to hell is a state of mind — and you've been on it since day one.
You've got swagger that can't be taught. Rooted in the blues and soaked in street-level attitude, you move through life with a loose, dangerous elegance that draws people in without ever trying too hard. Like the Stones, you've seen it all, done most of it, and somehow look better for it. You're not chasing perfection — you're chasing truth, groove, and that electric moment when everything clicks. Can't always get what you want? You tend to get it anyway.
You go hard or you go home — and you almost always go hard. Intense, dedicated, and fiercely loyal to what you believe in, you don't do anything halfway. Like Metallica, your passion runs deeper than most people's will ever go, and when you care about something, it shows in every detail. You're drawn to darkness not because you're cynical, but because you're honest — and honest people know the world isn't always pretty. Enter Sandman. Nothing else matters. That's your philosophy.
You are magnificent, and you know it — not from arrogance, but from an unshakeable sense of self that has never needed anyone's permission. Like Queen, you defy every category people try to place you in. You blend the epic with the intimate, the operatic with the anthemic, the serious with the playful. You live boldly, love fiercely, and perform every aspect of your life as though the whole world is watching. Because sometimes it is. We are the champions — and so are you.
You have the rarest of gifts: the ability to make something that feels both deeply personal and universally human. Like The Beatles, you're a natural connector — someone whose warmth, curiosity, and creative instincts draw people together across every divide. You believe in melody, in craftsmanship, and in the quiet power of a song that says exactly what someone needed to hear. You've changed the people around you just by being who you are. All you need is love — and you give it generously.
By late January, they had finished their sessions, but instead of releasing the album, they decided they wanted to start a new project. They called their long-time producer, George Martin, who agreed to produce their album on the condition that they did it "like we used to," since the inclusion of cameras and new technologies in the making of Let It Be had overcomplicated things.
For a while, it seemed things were clicking. John Lennon and Paul McCartney seemed to get close again while they were making the single "The Ballad of John and Yoko," a song they recorded just the two of them, as both Harrison and Ringo Starr were out of town at the moment. But soon, the tensions that had gotten in the way before reappeared. Especially when Paul McCartney insisted they work on a song none of the others liked.
The song that could have broken up the band.
"Maxwell's Silver Hammer" was one of the songs that caused the most discord in the history of the band. It was a track that Paul McCartney started working on long before the Abbey Road sessions started. A few rehearsals of the song can be heard in the Get Back documentary. But while the track was eventually included on the album, the process of putting it together was painstaking, and by the time it was done, none of McCartney's bandmates had good things to say about the song.
"The worst session ever was ‘Maxwell’s Silver Hammer. It was the worst track we ever had to record," Ringo Starr said in 2008. It's not often that an affable drummer has something negative to say, especially not about his band, but in this case, he couldn't hold back. "It went on for f****** weeks. I thought it was mad," he went on to explain.
This song about Lennon's childhood is still one of the best songs ever written.
He wasn't the only one who thought this. The other Beatles seemed to agree that they had spent too much time working on a track simply due to McCartney's perfectionism. “That’s Paul’s, I hate it," John Lennon said. Considering that he and McCartney spent half of the 1970s feuding, fans might think this was simply a dig at his former partner, but Lennon hated the track for the same reason his bandmates did. "He made us do [the song] a hundred million times," he complained. "He did everything to make it into a single, and it was never, and it never could’ve been... We spent more money on that song than any of them on the whole album."
Harrison, for his part, wasn't just angry about having had to do the track so many times. He never liked the song in the first place and hated that it was included at all. “Sometimes Paul would make us do these really fruity songs,” the guitarist said. “I mean, my God, ‘Maxwell’s Silver Hammer’ was so fruity.” It's understandable, considering how Harrison had spent years trying to get them to include more of his songs on their albums, yet he was forced to work on a song he didn't care for.
Paul McCartney is an undeniable genius, but even the most talented people get it wrong sometimes. "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" is a confusing song, featuring a cheery, upbeat melody but dark lyrics. It follows the story of Maxwell Edison, a student who murders people with a hammer. It's an interesting theme, but it never quite became a fan favorite. And judging by what all the band members said about it, maybe it shouldn't have earned a spot on Abbey Road.
