Paul McCartney: 'McCartney' & 'McCartney II' Reissues

Paul McCartney Reissue Series
McCartney (1970) / McCartney II (1980)
Reissue Review
By Anthony Kuzminski

Recorded nearly a decade apart McCartney and McCartney II represent initial stages in each of the chapters in Paul McCartney’s solo career. Each feature McCartney performing all the instruments and going it alone after nearly a decade with two of the rock eras biggest bands; The Beatles and Wings. Both albums recently were reissued through Hear Music in wonderful two-disc editions and more elaborate box sets for the pious fans. McCartney was initially shadowed by the cloud of the Beatles break-up whereas McCartney II was a big success and helped urge McCartney to go it alone which is how it’s been ever since. Decades later, each album has taken on a new life. McCartney has proven itself to be charming entrance into the world of solo records whereas McCartney II while a success initially is an exploratory and entertaining but in the end a record with astounding highs and equally astounding lows.

McCartney, released in April 1970, is fundamentally an elaborate home demo with McCartney performing virtually all instruments and vocals. While parts can be self-indulgent in places it is mostly a brilliant journal of self discovery and the first step into an astonishingly successful post-Beatles career. “The Lovely Linda” is a tiny ditty of love lasting less than a minute but is the ideal starting point for solo McCartney. He would dive deep on themes of love throughout his career and what better place to start than with his wife? “That Would Be Something” features bare instrumentation and even verbal beats by McCartney. As spare as it may be, when you hear the academic drumming, it feels more like a heartbeat than a rhythm and as the curling bass in laid on top, you can’t help but be captured by the plainness of it all. “Valentine Day” is an instrumental throwback to the music of the fifties and wouldn’t have been out of place on a record by a Sun Records recording artist. “Every Night” one of the album’s most enduring songs, is also one of its more fleshed out. This wouldn’t have been out of place on the next Beatles record with dueling acoustic guitars are a flush in this lovable melody. “Junk” is an amazingly endearing track with McCartney hushing along to a solemn guitar sweep. “Momma Miss America” is an instrumental (featured in Jerry Maguire) with a heavy beat backing by hammering piano and drums and later in the song by a wailing vintage electric guitar sound. “Teddy Boy” was recorded during what eventually Let It Be became but didn’t make the final cut. A quarter century later it would see release on Anthology 3 but its first public airing occurred as a result of McCartney. It is more at home here than it would have been on any of the latter day Beatles records. “Singalong Junk” may be one of the most sensuous tracks he’s ever written. The stripped instrumental puts its focus on the piano, drums and an acoustic guitar creating a song that wrangles inside your stomach forcefully and to think it elicits such a strong reaction without any lyrics is a coup. Cameron Crowe used this to beautifully in Jerry Maguire during a moment off affection between Tom Cruise and Renee Zellweger. Without ever uttering a word, the lullaby pulls at heart strings. It’s moments like these on McCartney that are underrated and amongst McCartney’s finest.

“Maybe I’m Amazed” is the album’s most accomplished track and perhaps one of the greatest love songs ever composed. It’s delivered with a hearty vocal where McCartney expunges his soul on this classic. His booming voice makes you want to love someone as much as he does and over the years despite what has been written about his love songs, this may stand as his best just for the utter passion of the performance and delivery. That is the utmost compliment I can give him, a man who is responsible for “Yesterday” and “Let It Be” no less. Despite having recorded more than a dozen records with the Beatles there is an air of innocence to these songs. McCartney takes you inside not so much his mind but where his heart was at the moment. His marriage to Linda McCartney settled him. Despite the often acrimonious relationship he had with his Beatle band mates, none of that tension is present on this album this is an exercise of survival and renewal. As his Beatle mates began to find their way through their own relationships and families, the themes on McCartney would seep their way into their own solo works. While they often ridiculed McCartney in the press over the soft nature of these songs they eventually followed suit once they became more settled in their lives.

The bonus disc houses a series of outtakes and live cuts previously unreleased or hard to find. An outtake entitled “Suicide” fades in and features McCartney alone on a piano. The live cuts include “Maybe, I’m Amazed” and “Every Night” taken from a Glasgow show in 1979. While these are nice to have, after listening to the newly remastered cuts of the originals, you can’t help but feel they are lacking urgency. Despite an extra charge of oomph on the live full band cuts, the intimacy and solemn nature of the studio records appears to be lost. “Don’t Cry Baby” is another instrumental rendering appearing here and closing out the bonus materials is a demo of the song “Women Kind” which like “Suicide” features McCartney solo on piano. While these bonus tracks are most welcomed, I can’t help but feel McCartney has better archived material in the vault. I may be wrong about this, but it may have been interesting to see what his latest touring band might have done with re-recording these songs or cutting them live. Regardless, McCartney is a delightfully dear album deserving of its deluxe packaging and hopefully it will be given a second life as a result of the top tier mastering, packaging and bonus materials. Both of these reissues were overseen by the same team at Abbey Road who did the Beatles remasters a few years back. They are warm without being distorted. The acoustic guitars welcome you and the drums snap, but never causing distortion even in MP3 form.

Ultimately McCartney is a quickly put together album with numerous songs that feel like unfinished demos and with only four songs that surpass the three-minute mark it’s partially true. However, there is splendor in the sparse production and performances. McCartney’s lyrics and candid vocals take center stage and four decades later, it sounds better than ever.

Taking a 180-degree turn in focus with McCartney II in 1979, the songs are more experimental, less organic and feature scores of keyboards and synthesizers. As a result, while it’s an altogether pleasant listen, it doesn’t warrant return visits. Like its predecessor, it was made during a time of change and once again, done almost entirely by McCartney alone. However, the eccentric and timbre sounds from McCartney give way to walls of noise and arcade sonics. “Coming Up” was a number-one hit and rightfully so, with its infectious grooves paired with a chorus that will install itself in your head whether you like it or not. It’s still a concert staple to this day and features McCartney delivering his easy-on-the-ear melodies while musically pushing the envelope. “Temporary Secretary” is where things get painful. While one has to admire McCartney for not churning out the same songs on every album, this should have been where a producer pulled him aside and forced him to cut the track from the record. It’s dated and at best, sounds like a Styx outtake. “On the Way” is refreshing with a bluesy lead guitar that isn’t that far removed from what one would hear on a recent Black Keys record. This is an illustration of the massive talent McCartney has, despite being known for monster radio hits, its gems like these that tend to be lost or forgotten. As I’ve previously mentioned, this is one of the great things about well done reissues; it sheds new light on a forgotten album and more importantly the individual songs. McCartney’s vocal comes through the left speaker amidst some bluesy guitar dipped in the Chicago River. “Waterfalls” features McCartney’s voice up front and center echoing under an ever so slight sound of a barely noticeable keyboard. While it may feel unfinished, you can’t help but believe the breaking vocal like of “I need love”. Many may dismiss it as saccharine but it once again showcases his charismatic voice which never appears to grow old. Multiple generations have grown up with it, so there is something madly romantic and nostalgic that emanates from it. “Waterfalls” may not be his most known or even his best song, but you can’t help but fall in love with McCartney all over again upon hearing it. “Nobody Knows” is a boogie stomping glee of a track with an energetic rhythm section. The album’s fourth track is insanely great and it makes me wonder why I’ve never paid attention to it before. It sounds like a lost blues number dusted off of someone’s 78 in an attic full of dust. It’s also a stark contrast to the heavy experimentation of the albums first two tracks. It’s almost as if his good side was creating this while his evil twin was fiddling with the synthesizer on the other half of the record.

Side two kicks off with “Front Parlour” and I’m not sure if McCartney was attempting to get in on the music publishing for Pac-Man, but that is what it feels like. As painful as I find the track to listen to, one must admire McCartney because for many artists they’re all too happy to remain complacent in their artistic endeavors and you can never criticize McCartney for not trying something new. “Summer’s Day Song” had the potential to be performed with a choir or orchestra. Regardless, it feels like a rough home demo and its elegiac with music based around what I believe is a flute and keyboard. Once again, its minimalism brings the lyrics to the forefront as it ventures more towards hymn status than schmaltz. “Frozen Jap” has a lining of elation in the performance even if it falls prey to the technology on the recording. This would be a song he should consider reworking one day with an actual drum kit. “Bogey Music” houses a thumping bass beat but it comes off as more of a castoff with McCartney hamming it up. It feels like a fragmentary thought and if he had attacked it the same way he had “Nobody Knows”, the results may have been significantly improved. “One of These Days” ends the album on a high point once again due to the rich vocals.

I’m not sure if McCartney has any other album in his catalog with such staggering highs and astounding lows as McCartney II. It ranges from in-your-face technology to basic arrangements that would make any classical composer proud. The album was recorded in July of 1979 at his farm in Scotland. It was his first proper solo record since 1971’s Ram, it wasn’t planned to be but after his drug bust in Japan in early 1980, Wings was put to the side and these recordings were rush issued. Whether this album would have come out so close after the bust remains a question. It’s possible these were mere demos which McCartney may have re-recorded at a later date, but still, as muddled and maddening portions of the record can be, it’s can’t easily be dismissed because it still houses a handful of classic cuts and even the other half can be credited to experimentation.

McCartney II is given a deluxe edition with a bonus disc (and an expanded set with a third disc). “Blue Sway” has lush orchestration but the saxophone fills don’t add anything and ultimately, the song goes nowhere. “Coming Up” live from Glasgow in 1979 is included as a bonus track and this is the version that ascended to number-one on the US charts. It would have been nice to possibly pair both albums together with their respective outtakes and b-sides at the end of each album and then the entire Glasgow show as a bonus feature. “Check My Machine” is unrecognizable and there’s nothing on a blind listen that would make you think this is McCartney. The first song recorded for the album, it was more or less a test to see what the possibilities were with his new toys. “Secret Friend” is released in its entire ten-plus minutes. While definitely not essential, it’s an added edition to this special edition even if it’s unlikely to be listened to more than a handful of times (and that is for the most devout McCartney followers). “Mr. H Atom / You Know I’ll Get You Baby” sounds like an outtake from an early 80’s videogame. Decades before auto tune, you can hear how artists used to disguise their voice. “Wonderful Christmastime” an often disregarded song is rather delightful here. Sure it’s dated but I dare you to not sing along with it. The 3:48 edit appears on disc two with the unedited version on the third disc of the deluxe edition. “All You Horse Riders / Blue Sway” completes the second disc with ten minutes of further experimentation. The third disc which is only available in the deluxe package houses “complete versions” of many tracks on the first two discs. While this may seem like a hoax to buy the more expensive set, it isn’t. While these versions warrant being released, it’s unlikely anyone, even the most fervent McCartney fans will revisit these more than a few times. If you’re on the fence I think the two disc edition will cover most people’s needs.

Listening to these two records back-to-back is an absorbing experience. You hear McCartney’s strengths which usually are when his arrangements are at their most spare which is why McCartney still sounds incredibly fresh four decades later. I can’t say McCartney II is in the same league as McCartney but they both are integral to his career and represent turning points in not just his career but life as well. While listening to these two records over the last few weeks it’s staggering to witness the talent of McCartney as not just a songwriter but a performer as well. Even when I have disliked many of the left field stylings on McCartney II there is something to be said for not settling. More importantly, when McCartney worked alone (as he did on these two records) he birthed some music that isn’t just fun or memorable but appears to be extensions of his life at that moment in time. He’s a man rich in musical talent and these two records represent how he is ready at any given point to deliver a song that will knock you out. While I prefer the less-is-more approach of McCartney, McCartney II in its new deluxe edition proves to be a fascinating listen and makes you appreciate it more than you most likely have before. Artists are defined by certain periods and albums and even though one record may be deemed more essential than the other, the top tier execution of both packages are hard to pass up, even if you consider yourself a casual fan. It’s hard to compete with yourself, especially when you were a member of the Beatles, but as McCartney and McCartney II prove, Paul McCartney always had and always will be an artist capable of writing great songs and these two albums serve as a reminder that even if a song wasn’t a radio hit, it may still be a treasure to be discovered.

Anthony Kuzminski is a Chicago based writer and Special Features Editor for the antiMusic Network. His daily writings can be read at The Screen Door. He can be contacted at thescreendoor AT gmail DOT com and can be followed on Twitter