Paul McCartney got candid about the final days of The Beatles and the “hurtful” song written by John Lennon.

In an interview with British GQ, the legendary songwriter said, “I suppose that when The Beatles broke up, perhaps there was a misconception that we all sort of hated each other.”

He added, “What I realize now is that, because it was a family, because it was a gang, families argue. And families have disputes.”

Paul goes on to blame the band’s manager Allan Klein, who was drafted in by John, Ringo Starr and George Harrison to handle The Beatles’ business affairs in January 1969.

Following the band’s split, Paul said he became increasingly wary of the manager’s motives, which ultimately led to him file a lawsuit against his three bandmates in December 1970.

It was, he tells GQ, “The only way for me to save The Beatles and Apple… If I hadn’t done that, [the music] would have all belonged to Allan Klein. The only way I was given to get us out of that was to do what I did. I said, ‘Well, I’ll sue Allan Klein,’ and I was told I couldn’t because he wasn’t party to it. ‘You’ve got to sue The Beatles.'”

The lawsuit took more than four years to resolve and ended with The Beatles legally splitting in January 1975.

“I remember reading an article, an interview with Yoko [Ono], who, okay, she was a big John supporter, I get that, but in this article she goes, ‘Paul did nothing. All he ever did was book studio,'” he told GQ. “And I’m going, ‘Err? No…’ And then John does this famous song, ‘How Do You Sleep?’ and he’s going, ‘All you ever did was ‘Yesterday’…’ And I’m going, ‘No, man.'”

“But then you hear the stories from various angles and apparently people who were in the room when John was writing that, he was getting suggestions for the lyrics off Allan Klein. So, you see the atmosphere of ‘Let’s get Paul. Let’s nail him in a song…’ And those things were pretty hurtful.”

Wow. Read the rest of the revealing interview at British GQ.