I remember hearing this growing up, and assuming it was about a homeless person or tramp or some such – but I recently read that it was probably about John Lennon himself, and the emptiness that he was feeling – sobering stuff.
When I came out to write with him the next day, he was kipping on the couch, very bleary-eyed. It was really an anti-John song. He told me later, he didn’t tell me then, he said he’d written it about himself, feeling like he wasn’t going anywhere. I think it was actually about the state of his marriage. It was in a period where he was a bit dissatisfied with what was going on; however, it led to a very good song. He treated it as a third-person song, but he was clever enough to say, ‘Isn’t he a bit like you and me?’ – ‘Me’ being the final word.
Paul McCartney
Many Years From Now, Barry Miles
Anyhow, it’s a cracker of a song if you have a penchant for melancholic pop (like me)…
You’ll need three major chords (G, C and D), and three minor chords (Am, Bm and Cm) – and the Bm and Cm chords could be a stretch if you’ve not encountered them before – but be adventurous! You can also change the C’s to Cadd9 and the D’s to Dadd4 for a little extra sparkle…