Sept. 13 is the date of the new release of Chaos And Creation In The Backyard
Just because it says Paul McCartney on the cover though, I can't give it an automatic A+ pass. From my music fan POV, reputation gains you respect, it doesn't make me buy your new album. In fact, personally speaking, you can have all the musician's chops in the world and still do something not all together entertaining.
No fear here. At least with the listen of the first track "Fine Line", it appears we have something special with Paul McCartney's 20th release since The Beatles.
I challenge you to name Paul McCartney's last CD release; and unless you're a true fan (or over 55) I'll bet you can't name any solo album of his in the last 25 years. Radio has a lot of power and it doesn't play solo Paul McCartney. So fuck corporate radio (Again? Yes again.) and give a new track a listen.
Real One Player (56k, 100k) or Windows Media Player (56k, 100k)
"Fine Line" like most every recent Paul McCartney starts with a whiff of the cliché. But rather than a lingering odor, it's more the aroma that pleasantly catches as you walk past an unfamiliar restaurant - and one that draws you in. "Fine Line" is undeniably delicious, with a piano pungency that stays long after you stop looking at the window menu and decide to go inside.
To me this is Paul McCartney's pep song - to himself; I can picture him in his dressing room, getting up looking his reflection in the mirror dead in the eye and telling himself, "This is why I keep on going."
There is a fine line between recklessness and courage
It's about time, you understood which road to take
It's a fine line when your decision makes a difference.
Get it wrong, you'll be making a big mistake.
Come on brother all is forgiven
We all cried when you were driven away
Come on brother everything is better
Everything is better when you come on the stage
Whatever's more important to you
You've got to choose what you want to do
Whatever's more important to be
That's the view that you've got to see
It's a long way between Chaos And Creation
... etc.
The full track listing of the album:
1 Fine Line
2 How Kind Of You
3 Jenny Wren
4 At The Mercy
5 Friends To Go
6 English Tea
7 Too Much Rain
8 A Certain Softness
9 Riding To Vanity Fair
10 Follow Me
11 Promise To You Girl
12 This Never Happened Before
13 Anyway
It remains to be seen whether Paul McCartney releases this to iTunes, where the Beatles are absent. Currently the only McCartney you can get is a 2002 NPR interview with him.
Take a gander at the “Chaos And Creation In The Backyard” preview page
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Eric Olsen
thanks T!
2 - Rocco
The songs I have heard are fantastic.
Jenny Wren is beautiful and too much rain may rank amongst his best.
By the way, I am 35 and I can name every single Macca solo album. Rock on!
3 - Michael J. West
I'm 26, I can name most Macca solo albums, and if we were grading albums based on his reputation as a solo artist, almost all of them would probably get C's. :-)
That said, this sounds great! I'm going to Amazon right now!
4 - Demi
yawn.... zzzzzzzzzz
5 - Temple Stark
I hope you listened before yawning correct? Because normally I'd agree with you but this song is pretty damn good.
6 - Hen
'fine line' is mint!!!
7 - macca
I can name all paul's albums also. The thing is he is underrated.I think on every lp he still comes up with different types of songs with a wide range plus he is a great singer I have only heard 3 songs on lp so far and they are great the song about womens struggles "jenny wren" has a beautiful melody and good words "fine line" and "promise to you girl" are also great
8 - LennonFan
Well I think Macca is very underrated as a solo artist, we know that most of his Wings stuff was crap, but just listen to albums like McCartney, Ram and Flaming Pie and you can easily find songs that are just as good as his beatles material.
9 - Randy
I'm 47 years old, I was and still am a Beatles fan, but more importantly, I've been a huge Paul fan as a Beatle, as the leader of Wings, as a solo artist, and with his current band. I think everyone else musically pales in comparison to him. He is the greatest artist in our history...a tremendous songwriter, a fantastic singer with tremendous range, a fabulous musician who sounds awesome on bass, piano, drums, lead guitar, and acoustic guitar. It's amazing that this man is going to be 64 years old next June, and is still producing songs like "Fine Line." I saw his "Back in the U.S." concert two different times, and I thought it was as good of a concert that I've ever seen. Elvis may be referred to as "The King of Rock 'n Roll," and MJ as "The King of Pop,", but Paul is the GREATEST OF ALL TIME!!! And, I totally disagree with a previous posting that said most of his Wings material was crap. He had several #1 songs with Wings, including a "Song of the Year" with Listen To What The Man Said.
10 - Gerry Parker
McCartney's biggest problem over the years since the Beatles split has been the lack of Quality Control. His ability as a song-writer is surely beyond question, but the problem is that he doesn't know himself what constitutes good music. My own opinion is that he now opts for the comfort zone too often, and pushes the automatic "ballad-mode", "rock-mode" buttons and so on.
The problem here is that he so often sounds formulaic, and as a result much of his post-Beatles output has been easily dismissed. Far too much McCartney material is "(un)easy listnening" when he should/could have continued to push back the boundaries as he did in his first band and even up until Ram.
My main gripe, though, is that he should have been one of the world's most celebrated rockers/acoustic musicians by now, but the reality is that when McCartney has "rocked" in the last 20 years, it's been a horrible clean over-produced noise that he's produced. (Having heard bootlegs of McCartney playing acoustic compositions towards the end of the Beatles, I can't believe he hasn't exploited his unique style much more.)
However, the good news is that I can't see Nigel Godrich letting McCartney get away with laziness. He'll have pushed McCartney to try things he normally wouldn't, and I'm especially glad that McCartney has handled all the instrumentation himself. This has paid dividends in the past, but on this occasion with Godrich overseeing McCartney's output, I am hopeful that we will indeed hear something genuinely special. Just when I'd given up thinking we would ever hear anything worthy from McCartney again.
11 - Temple Stark
Gerry, that about captions my ideas on Paul MC.
12 - Temple Stark
"captures" too. Talk about photo captions in newsroom. Sorry.
13 - jgkojak
Paul is very underrated as a solo artist. On every record he comes up with at least SOMETHING that makes your ears prick up and say "ahhhh... that's why he was a Beatle."
I have heard 4 songs from Chaos and they are all spectacular:
A FINE LINE-- The single, which after you listen to it a few times really grows on you.
JENNY WREN-- Utterly beautiful and music ally accomplished accoustic track.
PROMISE TO YOU GIRL-- Notable mainly for the Sun King/Because harmonies.
FRIENDS TO GO-- A great rock 'n roll number, about "waiting on the other side for your friends to go"-- Wilbury worthy.
14 - kyle whisenant
Born in 1988 was I.
McCartney II, Tug of War, Pipes of Peace, Flowers In The Dirt, Give My Regards To Broadstreet, Run Devil Run, Flaming Pie, Driving Rain, Off The Ground, Press To Play.
I consider myself a McCartney addict and I'm thrilled about the new album, after listening to "Fine Line", I'm excited about the album and I think it will be great.
15 - Wouter Demuyt
33 years old and I know Macca's albums, though I don't like all of them. I thought Flowers In The Dirt, Flaming Pie and Run Devil Run were actually good albums.
Fine Line isn't his best song, but it's interesting to say the least. Jenny Wren sounds delicious.
Promise To You Girl is okay.
Growing Up Falling Down is very atmospheric.
Comfort Of Love has some nice details.
...So, it should be a good album coming up.
16 - regis hair
I don't think anyone can seriously deny that Macca doesn't rank among the greatest entertainers or musical geniuses of the half century rock & roll era. It's amazing he still has the impact he does today with fans flocking to see him put on the best rock concert by anybody and to take in interest in his releases of new material.
This is 40+ years since the Beatles first conquered the world. It'd be like Al Jolson or Hoagy Carmichael actively performing and releasing great new songs in the 1960s (40 years after their chart topping prime) while the Beatles were on Ed Sullivan.
As to Macca's current relevance on today's musical charts or scene, that's all relative. Times change, tastes change. I can't even hum or name a Billboard #1 song in the past 10 years. Oh maybe that Titanic song. Besides that, though. I do know my McCartney stuff. Yeah, I've bought all his albums from the essential classics to the not-so-essential stuff. That's the music for me. I've worn out vinyl copies of Back to the Egg and Tug of War, chewed through cassettes of Ram and Red Rose Speedway, and scratched up CDs of Flowers in the Dirt and Flaming Pie.
I know there are tons of folks out there like me. It's over 20 years later, and we'll still catch ourselves suddenly singing that insipid song "The Other Me" with that stupid "dustbin lid" lyric from that crappy "Pipes of Peace" album. Plus, dozens of other "horrible" Macca songs from "horrible" solo albums. Why? Because McCartney drivel and crap is still better than most of the "Greatest Hits" compilations that flood the bins each year.
17 - Temple Stark
>>I don't think anyone can seriously deny that Macca doesn't rank among
Let's see. Carry the second negative over, multiply the superlative by the third negative. Find the differential of the declarative first negative and ....
I don't deny that I should not agree.
How sick is this anyway? I'm jonesing to listen to some old Paul, other than Ebony and Ivory and The Girl is Mine - and the Nth live version of Hey Jude.
18 - Muzik23
Huge Beatle / McCartney fan since I was 8 (I'm 34 now). McCartney is a legend, but he hasn't put a decent album out there since Flowers in the Dirt. Single-wise, World Tonight was pretty catchy, but these last few albums are fairly shallow and hoaky. I guess it is hard to be original and fresh after 40 years, but please Paul, enough with the formulaic writing.
19 - Arouet
Jenny Wren is very good, but I'm afraid we will get only that one good song on the album, which is disappointing given his potential talent. "Fine Line" is forgettable and "Promise to you Girl" is almost awful. It's hard to believe this man was once a Beatle. He has squandered his talent since the break-up of the Beatles, and it doesn't make much sense since Lennon and he wrote so much great stuff separately. Paul McCartney continues to be modern music's greatest mystery.
20 - JohnJ
I'm familiar with all McCartney's solo albums. As much as I wish he hadn't, I think he's lost most of his talent. The songs are lacking that creative, magical touch in the melodic department. His last really good melodies, although a bit cheesy, were from Off The Ground ('93), 'Off the Ground' "Hope of Deliverance" and "Mistress and Maid". Flaming Pie was too fomulaic, and dropped a gear in melody. "Young boy" is reasonably catchy, "Flaming Pie" too, and "Heaven on a Sunday" gets better with listens, but they're a step down from previous endeavors. "What it is", one of the McCartney penned tracks on Run Devil Run is pretty good, and with that we conclude his talented output. Since then it's just been an 'effort'. The Vanilla Sky song was utter rubbish. Driving rain was another 'effort'. I've listened to 3 tracks so far from this new album. Jenny Wren is Ok. On an earlier album it would be classed as a nice 'filler'. Fine Line is writing by numbers. He's losing his natural rythm, his vocal agility is slowing down. I don't know whether it's his choice of lyrics but it seems the musical pace of the song is racing ahead of him. And face it, it's not a good melody. Promise to you girl, is a thowaway aswell. He tries to recapture the wings sound here. It's like he's trying to re-trace his steps to find that creative spark again, without success. His voice has really deteriorated in the last few years aswell. In concert he forces his voice too much where he should sing softly, fucusing on the musicality of his voice and singing the right notes, and he should leave the PA to look after the volume.
So, from listening to those 3 songs, I don't expect much from this album. There will be a lot of hype and good reviews , like there were for the last few albums, but like them, it'll be forgotten about fairly quickly. If he came out with 'Off the Ground' now instead, even though it's pretty mediocre compared to his early solo albums, the critics would be falling over themselves praising it.
But let's keep it up, let's all pretend it's a really good album, and we might will it into being one.
21 - Hart
I love Paul too. Band on the Run still stands the test of time. I would of liked to see more White Album Paul, Helter Skelter-Birthday-Why don't we do it in the road- The End- type of tunes.
My theory is that Paul's hard side faded when he became a vegetarian. Yes, meat eating Paul was much more interesting than Plant eating Paul......
22 - Al Barger
Double up on that, Hart. The vegetarian stuff is probably good for his cholesterol, but a couple of good bacon double cheeseburgers might put a bit more aggressive and competitive spirit back into the mix.
As to Mac solo, let me drop in a quick vote for Venus and Mars as his very bestest.
23 - marcie bouley
okay, enough... I am 32 years old and a Mccartney fan since 10. I agree with "regis hair" about the lowest form of Macca being WAY better than the best of these artists nowadays, who make it absolutely impossible to listen to anything current. "I know I was a crazy fool".... 'The other Me' wins my vote,too. Rock on, Pipes of Peace fans!!
Mccartney is the greatest artist of our time, if not the greatest ever. For those of you who want to pick his work apart or criticize his lack of meat intake need to just admit you are not, and never were, a true fan. sad.
24 - liamgallagher
McCartney is probably rock's most gifted songwriter when it comes to melody. That being said, his solo stuff isn't near as good as his Beatles stuff. Duh.
25 - lanceloz
I am sad to agree with JohnJ. I loved Paul very much but all his latest work is a huge and painful "effort" to try to find his former beautiful style. The last three songs I heard raise some pity. No voice, no rythm, no melody. Jenny Wren is fine now but it would probably not have been put on a beatles album at the time.
I think that nobody can write songs as good as Paul McCartney, even Paul McCartney himself.