BY MICHAEL S. JOHNSON  |  OCT 30, 2026

“Get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.”
–From the Beatles, Get Back, recorded in the UK in 1969. Lyrics by Paul McCartney

I was a reporter in Illinois in 1969. The state and the nation were recuperating from the Democratic National Convention in Chicago a year earlier where much of the national divisiveness boiled over violently on the streets. Vietnam had just taken down President Lyndon Johnson and launched divisive campaigns to replace him. Vice President Hubert Humphrey eventually won the nomination. But the turmoil in the country had already sealed his fate and gave us Richard Nixon.

It was in 1969 that the Beatles recorded a song entitled “Get Back, Get Back to Where You Once Belonged.”

It was recorded in a time when much of American society was adrift in a sea of confusion, disillusionment, and distrust of authority. Even the Beatles were struggling.

The title of that song just keeps ringing in my ears. I’m still in a fog as to what the other lyrics meant, or to whom they refer, but the title really harmonizes with the political and social climate back then and now. Continue reading →