10 Rock Songs That Were Written As An Apology

As Paul McCartney found himself without one of the biggest bands in the world at the turn of the '70s, he was never really keen to make it as a solo star at first. He had always thrived off of working with other musicians, and the beginnings of Wings were formed as a way for Macca to gel with other contemporaries of his time, drafting in Denny Seiwell behind the drums and Denny Laine from the Moody Blues. The Beatles may have been in the past, but a few of those old wounds tended to linger on a bit.

In the wake of the Fab Four's breakup, Paul and John Lennon had gotten pretty nasty with each other, from Paul criticizing Lennon's protesting to John firing right back with the diss song How Do You Sleep, which dragged his writing partner through the mud. Even with all of those raw wounds, Paul knew that he and John still loved each other, and Dear Friend was his attempt to build bridges between the two.

While this isn't the massive reconciliation that many of us wanted, the tone of Dear Friend is a lot more peaceful coming from Macca, wishing John well and understanding the fact that these former best friends are now just leading separate lives with the people they love. This wasn't the long awaited Beatles reunion that many had pictured in their minds, but it's a song like this that planted the seeds for Paul writing his tribute track for John Here Today a few years down the line.