anonymous October 1st, 2006 10:14AM  
Blackbird is a song inspired by the black civil rights movement in america

anonymous November 19th, 2006 08:06PM  
Not only could this song be interpreted as a comment on the civil rights movement of the time, but also on the rising anti-vietnam sentiment of the time..."Blackbird" is also another name for the american helicopters that were being used in Vietnam.

anonymous December 19th, 2006 01:29AM  
Initially I thought 'Blackbird' was a song for the blacks in the sixties. Then I read a book about the Beatles' songs called 'A Hard Day's Write' by rock music journalist Steve Turner.

The book pointed out that the problem with the story about 'Blackbird' being written about the racial tension in America and using the blackbird taking its broken wings to fly as a metaphor of racial minorities getting stronger was that the death of Martin Luther King Jr., which provoked riots in April 1968, didn't take place until Paul had returned from the States with the song already written.

The book also says that Paul often cites 'Blackbird' as evidence that the best of his songs come spontaneously, just like 'Yesterday'.

~M

anonymous July 23rd, 2008 01:51PM  
Since it's already been established earlier that Blackbird was deliberately used so that it could apply to everyone, my interpretation would be how it applied to me. Maybe it's how other people might see it too. The first time I heard the song I didn't really get it but then it felt like the song was talking to the youth.

feeling like you're an outcast, teen angst, being insecure, this is how I saw the blackbird.

Singing in the dead of night, because none of us really want to show our pain. We're all so very happy and loud when we're with other people, but then when we are in our room trying to fall asleep with what we've become, it's hard. It's like I feel that whatever I have to say about my pain would just come out as whining.

I have this scenario in my head of a young lady/man looking out into the moon beside a window. I don't know if anybody else does.

It's hard trying to be so sure when you really don't know much about the world. It gets depressing thinking about the future you don't know about. You're scared about whether or not you're doing the right thing or if you're even on the right path. You want to be all that you have to be and can be, but in the back of your mind, you can't.

But you have to face it. You have to learn to fly and all your life you were waiting for that moment when you can actually be yourself already, when you know your dreams can come true and there's no more feeling of hopelessness.

It's like the song's saying the time is now for you to get over it and that you can do it.

I also saw it as something that can be applicable to the state of the youth in the 60s when the ideals started depleting. If you lost that much hope for something you really believed in (like paradise maybe), you might benefit from listening to this song.

P.S. I agree with the whole American Civil Rights Movement interpretation. I'm just saying that the music translates through the ages.

meliac October 2nd, 2008 10:30PM  
Blackbird singing in the dead of night-means someone is seeping but no one's listening.
Take these broken wings and learn to fly- takes you experience and learn from it
Take these sunken eyes and learn to see- from all the bad things try to see the best
Blackbird fly Blackbird fly- say what you have to be free
Into the light of the dark black night.- make people listen to you

Well that's what I think

Waiting November 20th, 2008 04:07PM  
It can be interpreted to be death. I song it to my mother on her deathbed, and it all became clear.

anonymous January 31st, 2009 03:06AM  
Whenever i listening to this song there are certain emotions i feel. Mainly there is a calming feeling that just flows over me. It's great, i have no idea what this song was meant to represent. Here's what i think though. Paul wanted everyone to feel calm and hopeful after the amount of death and despair that the recent years (that being the late 1960's) had been going through. Of course what I think is only an opinion out of thousands. Isn't that the best part of being a song writer though hearing your songs being interpreted by the fans of the song. ^_^ great song.

anonymous April 16th, 2009 10:51PM  
I was just reading Geoff Emerick's (One of the Beatle's Sound Engineers) autobiography, and he claims that the song is about the African-American Civil Rights movement in America. Seeing as he was there when the song was written and recorded, I figure that if I'm going to trust anyone it'll be him. And it makes sense.

anonymous April 19th, 2009 08:41PM  
Paul McCartney performed this song at Coachella Music Festival on Friday 4/17 and introduced it as a song about the civil rights movement in the 60s. He even used President Obama as context for the song.

Debate is over in my opinion

talltale May 5th, 2009 08:17PM  
Yeah, but did he mention the Vietnam helicopters? Just askin.

anonymous June 11th, 2009 06:01PM  
This song is definitelly about the civil rights movement, no contest about it. But you can also relate it to anyone, like things are worth fighting for if you believe in them and dont give up fighting because it will pay off if you truely believe you can change something.

anonymous July 18th, 2009 07:44PM  
I belive it is about someone who is very shy becoming more confident.

anonymous August 8th, 2009 01:20AM  
I recently went to a paul mccartney concert and he indeed did say that blackbird was about african americans during the civil rights music.

sargam September 4th, 2009 04:06PM  
To a westerner who who was involved with Eastern Religion as the Beatles (& I) were, then a very simple explanation is that the song is about enlightenment.

CrackerJackLee September 9th, 2009 10:35PM  
Paul McCartney's genius is truly understated...

MLK was black
black symbolizes death
someone has died
blackbirds do sing at night - in the dead of night
the night is the veil of tyranny - but MLK speaks out in the night - the blackbird
broken wings (angels/church) and sunken eyes - someone great has died
destiny - MLK called - all your life (past tense) you were only waiting for this moment to arise (turn one's back on slavery)
death is a freedom - only waiting for this moment to be free - end of slavery.
death's journey - into the light of the dark black night.
MLK freed black Americans from tyranny by showing that they could walk out of it - but for him there was a price - his life.

anonymous January 9th, 2010 12:51AM  
This song is one more about the same person most of the other songs are about. Blackbird, Jude, Fool on the hill, Sexy Sadie, JoJo, "old Flattop", all about 1 person.

anonymous January 31st, 2010 01:34PM  
Argh... I can't stand all the terrible things people are writing here. Before you write/rate another interpretation please remember IT WAS WRITTEN ABOUT A BLACK WOMEN DURING THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT! Not about helicopters in Vietnam or some of the other crap people have here.

It's about black people being oppressed and fighting for freedom even though society has tried to break them (broken wings) and the bird singing is most likely a reference to slave songs.

Blackbirrd1 February 10th, 2010 12:21PM  
Paul McCartney concert at the Portland, OR Rose Garden, Back in the USA tour: Song- Blackbird is about the civil rights movement AND its beginnings with the Underground Railroad during the Civil War era.

It's not about Vietnam BUT the fact that someone can interpret his songs to fit their beliefs and/or circumstances is a testimony to Paul and the Beatles' universal appeal. They wrote from the heart, they wrote together and individually, and their songs touched us all.

anonymous February 23rd, 2010 11:55PM  
Do you think maybe it could not mean anything?

It could just be randomly meaning helicopters or civil rights or death.

Does it really have to mean things?

anonymous March 11th, 2010 04:48AM  
I was at a Paul McCartney concert last year in DC, before he played this song he said in different and better words; "it was written about a black girl he saw sitting on a park bench, and that it was about the civil rights movement."