PAUL McCARTNEY
All music and lyrics by Paul McCartney except
"Save Us," "Queenie Eye" and "Road" music and lyrics by Paul McCartney and Paul Epworth Executive Producers: Paul McCartney and Giles Martin
Released October 15, 2013
"We don't work music. We play it!"
Indeed!!
Those words can be found at the conclusion of Paul McCartney's self-penned liner notes inside of his terrific new album, the appropriately titled "New," and they also represent a pitch perfect assessment of the material that all listeners can find within. "New" is a jaunty speed-ball of an album that illustrates not only that McCartney, now at the age of 71, is still working at the peak of his legendary powers but it is also a testament to the art and artistry of the song, a topic that I have been exploring throughout this month on Synesthesia. "New" is not an album about a concept or a theme or one that contains dark explorations of our human existence or anything of the sort. This is an album designed to get you up onto your feet, rapturously captivated and swept away by the melodicism and musicianship that can only come from Paul McCartney. I highly recommend that you purchase the Deluxe Edition which rewards you with two more selections bumping up the track list to 15 (this includes the hidden track "Scared"), because if you are going to hear new music from Paul McCartney, you should hear ALL of it!!
As I think about the trajectory of Paul McCartney's life in music, it truly astounds me how his songwriting skills have not dulled a bit.over the years and how especially over the last decade or so, McCartney has simply been on a creative high, almost defiantly refusing to lazily coast upon his massive legend as he seems to always be seeking for new ways to write that perfect song. With that, and with each subsequent album, we are allowed to have as much fun listening to the results as McCartney obviously had during the creation period. Still having Paul McCartney in the world and for him still willing to share his creation with us is the purest of blessings to me as well as giving us all more chances to witness the MASTER at play.
While the albums "Flaming Pie" (released May 5, 1997) and "Driving Rain" (released November 12, 2001) were both deeply satisfying efforts that illustrated McCartney's superior songwriting gifts and ability to still surprise us, I think the true wonderments arrived after the elegant, sophisticated yet gray toned muted qualities of "Chaos And Creation In The Backyard" (released September 12, 2005). Beginning with the excellent "Memory Almost Full" (released June 4, 2007) and continuing with the extraordinary free flowing psychedelic whirlwind of "Electric Arguments" (released November 24, 2008), McCartney's collaboration with the producer Youth under their joint pseudonym as "The Fireman," Paul McCartney opened up his musical paintbox to an even wider degree, exposing and displaying more colors and shadings than could have been expected for an artist of his longevity.
As per most of his past solo catalog, McCartney handles the lion's share of the instrumentation, but he is also aided valiantly on several tracks by his ace backing/touring band since 2001 which includes Brian Ray and Rusty Anderson (guitars and backing vocals), Paul "Wix" Wickens (keyboards) and the mighty Abe Laboriel Jr. (drums and backing vocals). Also providing even more collaborative juice to the proceedings is McCartney bold decision to work with four different and highly notable producers over a variety of album sessions: Ethan Johns (son of the legendary producer Glyn Johns and who has worked extensively with Ryan Adams, Kings Of Leon, and Rufus Wainwright among others), Mark Ronson (most known for his work with the late Amy Winehouse), Paul Epworth (most know for his award winning work with Adele) and Giles Martin (son of "fifth Beatle," the inimitable producer George Martin).
While this laundry list of collaborators may appear to be too many cooks in the proverbial kitchen, the final results are as clean, clear headed, focused and so unmistakably, uniquely...Paul. Even with all of these creative hands at work, every song contains its own story and sonic palatte, all of the pieces congeal beautifully, and you are easily able to hear that "New" fully and joyously represents McCartney's singular artistic vision. With "New," from the blazing opening track "Save Us" all the way through to that aforementioned hidden track "Scared," McCartney gives us even more colors, with deeper hues and sublime vibrancy, and the whole album just left me spellbound! The MASTER has opened up his musical paintbox once again but instead of paintings we have songs...but truthfully, and with further thought, with Paul McCartney, what else are his songs but musical paintings? Even if you are not as happily afflicted with synesthesia as I am, I can guarantee that you will hear every color of the rainbow on these wonderful new songs.
The album's title track, also released as the first single, it a blast of the most golden musical sunshine. The harpsichord laden "Penny Lane" bounce will undoubtedly plaster a smile across your face from the opening seconds and leave you grinning from ear to ear over the course of the track's two minutes and fifty six seconds. This very quality sits at the heart of then entirety of the full "New" album as you can hear with each and every track how Paul McCartney's songwriting skills have been honed to an even sharper point, filling all of the songs, most of them which last for a duration of under four minutes, with as much music as possible. Frankly, do not let the unfamiliarity of the songs sway you for I promise you, these are the types of songs that you will find yourself singing along with instantly.
"New, "Save Us," the speedy Wings-ish "Turned Out" from the Deluxe Edition and the rousing "Everybody Out There" are just tailor made for the stadium shows and would easily fit with all of the classics we know and love. The propulsive Mellotron augmented "Queenie Eye" dares you to not get up and jump around and I guarantee that its childhood playground chant of "Queenie eye, Queenie Eye, who's got the ball?/I haven't got it. It isn't in my pocket/O-U-T spells OUT/That's OUT!" will be riveted into your brains! The life lessons contained within "Appreciate" are fully augmented with a subtle hip-hop beat merged with DEEP bass, sticky sticky bubblegum harmonics and a dirty/swampy guitar solo outro.
Paul gives us a sense of his friskier and even lustier side with "Alligator," a song that actually sports the passage, "I want someone to save me/When I come home from the zoo/I need somebody who's a sweet communicator/I can give my alligator to." The track "Looking At Her" provides the same effect but mostly through the music where the bulk of the song, in which our narrator cannot help but to stop and stare at his lovely lady, is conducted with an almost sneaky, shyly covert lust. But when he expresses to us, "I'm losing my mind," the music explodes in a dissonance that we can all instantly understand.
The album's more emotional highpoints arrive in a collection of more rustic, acoustic selections including the bluesy and humorous "Get Me Out Of Here" from the Deluxe Edition. "Hosanna," featuring a dreamy, hazy, slightly woozy psychedelia envelops like a slow moving and trance inducing fog while "Early Days," finds McCartney in a reflective mood as he recounts the days between himself and John Lennon, long before Beatlemania, when they were just kids beginning to find their musical footsteps. "On My Way To Work" is a stunning selection of pitch perfect audio/musical storytelling as we find our narrator, the morning traveler, riding along sharing his sights, daily habits, inner fears, lusty daydreams, and future hopes and eternal musings with all of us, fully mirroring what I feel each and every one of us experience every day.
Within the liner notes, McCartney speaks of the sheer volume of songs recorded for this project and the process of choosing the best songs that would fit together in the most effective and artistic way. As for the discarded tunes, "They will, no doubt, show up somewhere sooner or later," McCartney explains. Well...if you just head on over to You Tube, you can hear yet another track selected for the Japanese Edition of "New" entitled "Struggle," a song in more of an avant garde style that includes what sounds like sequenced bells, an insistent drum beat that may encourage you to get up and dance until you hear the lyric, "I'm your glass of poison and I'm actin' up on you!" If this is just a hint of the wider diversity of material McCartney recorded and had to select from for "New," then, I hope the bulk of material surfaces MUCH sooner rather than later!
2013 has been an especially wonderful year for music especially when it has come to our veteran artists. To think that we had all had the opportunity to hear new works from likes of David Bowie, Todd Rundgren, Prince, Elvis Costello, Elton John, Sting and others...artists who truly have absolutely nothing left to prove anymore but have each continued to release creative and vital pieces of music. Paul McCartney sits at the top of this mountain, for if any artist has nothing left to prove, it is him. And yet, McCartney soldiers on, working...ahem...I mean, playing with music, always searching and seeking for that next collective of notes, words and instruments and through some sort of magical surge of alchemy, forming them together to make yet another piece of solid musical gold.
I would gather that Paul McCartney expresses the fullest of his intentions to us during the album in the grooving "I Can Bet," in which he states proudly, "What I'm going to do next I leave entirely to your imagination. Don't wait for me to be steady. I've got no plan, but I'm your man and I'll be there when you're ready."
With Paul McCartney, I can imagine forever. But whatever he is imagining next, I am ALWAYS ready for it!
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