After six years, we come to the end of an era. This is the last number one single from the Beatles. The four guys were not done, by any means, but on April 12, 1970, the Beatles officially broke up and “The Long and Winding Road” was their twentieth and last hit to reach the top of the charts.

“The Long and Winding Road” was recorded as part of the Let It Be album which was released on May 8, 1970. It was the twelfth and final studio album from the Beatles. The song was written by Paul McCartney and, of course, credited to Lennon-McCartney.

Regardless of what you might see in videos, there were only two Beatles present when this song was recorded. Paul was playing piano and singing and John was on guitar. Neither Ringo nor George were there. During post-production, producer Phil Spector added the orchestral and choral sounds that you hear in the record. He did this without clearing it with Paul first and this made Paul very angry. This is significant because when Paul appeared before the British High Court during the dissolution of the Beatles, he listed that as one of six reasons the group was breaking up.

Paul wrote the song after (or while) visiting High Park Farm near Campbeltown, Scotland, which he had purchased back in 1966. Even though he owned the property, he hadn’t visited it much during the last four years and when he did find the time to really look at the place, he noticed a road on the property that stretched up into the hills and was very beautiful to look at. That was the inspiration of the title of the song. He says the growing tension between the members of the group was another reason he wrote the song.

George Harrison wrote the flip of the record, “For You Blue.” He wrote it as a love song to his wife, Pattie Boyd. It was the second time a George Harrison written song had hit number one and it was the second time a double sided record from the Beatles had hit number one. George has spent some time at Woodstock, New York during the time of the famous Woodstock Festival in 1969. He had hung around with Bob Dylan for several weeks and says that it was Dylan’s influence that resulted in “For You Blue.”

This would be the end of the Beatles as a group. All four went on to successful solo careers and we will see much more of them as we progress through the Seventies and Eighties. Most people held on to the hope that the group would eventually see the error of their ways and reunite, but it was never to be. When John was killed in 1980, that ended any dream of a reunion.

“The Long and Winding Road”/”For You Blue” was not released in Britain, but here in the United States, it entered the pop charts on May 23, 1970 at number 35. It took three weeks to reach number one where it stayed for two weeks.