The Beatles' Solo Careers Poll - Voting and General Discussion Thread

I started to listen through your list yikes Mumbo is like a shitty Beach Boys outtake (sans vocals, but that hammering 8th note piano style is total Brian Wilson)

ringo's double-tracked vocal on "bye bye blackbird" is pretty winning

hahahaha yeah I made the post-smile beach boys/macca comparison a bit back and it makes more and more sense to me as i think about it.

Big Barn Bed is pretty good but god I find this creepy for some reason
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQzVJlLpriY

70s BW and Macca are p interesting compliments of each other - at opposite ends of the success/functionality scale and yet their approaches to their musical output are kind of similar: stoned, slapdash, occasionally brilliant, often mind-numbingly stupid, casually unpredictable, largely shadows of their former selves. But tbh I prefer BW's output more just because he is so much farther *out* than Macca, and there is a real emotional core to a lot of his stuff (the "tragic figure" arc of his life def figures into this) that Macca rarely dips into. Even when BW is writing stupid throwaways about Johnny Carson, they still contribute to this peak into what feels like an actual, lived in life. Macca is usually more opaque, it's all just goofy smoke and mirrors and platitudes about how much he loves Linda or whatever.

His vocal on "No Other Baby" is I guess what boomer critics had in mind when they longed for a Paul McCartney who used the gifts displayed in the Beatles.

I like this song that I'd never heard before today.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSS2ABconDg

shakey, that's a solid summary and I don't disagree with any of it. and yet I have always liked paul's stuff more! maybe i'm just more oriented to his melodic/arranging sensibility or the sense of variety and polish - stuff always sounds more *finished* and i do think there's a greater range of musical territory (all within the pop/rock megagenre obv). i also grew up with more of paul's stuff so that probably shaped my taste as much as my taste informs which i'd rather listen to most days.

meanwhile on ringo-watch: Beaucoups of Blues is another very pleasant listen so far! Nashville Skyline is the inevitable comparison but this feels less idiosyncratic/unique than that - Ringo's voice and the material he ginned up with the band fit very, very comfortably into the early 70s country/AM-gold interzone. he's obviously way more at home dolefully explaining that someone gave him the fastest growing heartache in the West than he is doing "night and day" or even than he is belting out a rocker like "back off boogaloo." i kinda wish that after that initial wave of early hits he'd just decided to be a country artist, but maybe these listens will change my mind...

if Nashville Skyline is an homage to Lefty Frizzell (which is how I hear it) who is Beaucoups of Blues an homage to...? Buck Owens? (I've never listened to it tbc)

Morse Moose and the Grey Goose maybe the most "Paul McCartney album track" song title ever. all the theatrics and drama of a "Live and Let Die,"

ahh, the dramatic build was used in the Twin Freaks version of Coming Up! tyvm for this pointer, Doc Casino.

BOB is solid, and, yeah, Conway Twitty should have worked with Ringo.

Oh man that's an inspired pairing

Missouri Loves Company

*massive eye roll at Ringo*

Single Pigeon = man this also reminds me of post-Smile Brian Wilson, a pretty but fairly simple piano progression with dumb lyrics about a bird outside his window. at least until the horns briefly come in, which have a very Beatle-y arrangement.

not bad, but slight

RRS is a lousy album though.

when I said upthread that I can listen to McCartney albums and enjoy them while they're on and then not be able to remember a single thing about them as soon as they stop playing, RRS is what I had in mind. Totally forgettable.

I wrote this about "My Love." I love Rob Sheffield's theory that Paul wrote it out of envy for George's "Something."

er, this.

Morse Moose and the Grey Goose = omg the Animal Collective buzzing high-pitched synth running through this whole thing is so fucking irritating, what a horrible sound.

Paul could be actively irritating in a way the other Beatles' solo works never were (at their worst, they were boring and flaccid).

But this just makes me want to stab something, it's a sonic crime.

Temporary Secretary also quickly goes from cute novelty to actively irritating, although there it's the chirping refrain that really grates.

re: ringo's homage - i'd trust anybody itt's judgment more than mine as to what styles or performers ringo is going for on this record - i own a few classic country LPs but i don't really know the genre!

loving these classically shakey-esque track reviews. can't believe i got you to listen to "morse moose and the grey goose."

giving a thumbs up to beaucoups of blues. will keep these first two ringo albums in rotation and recommend any particular standout tracks if they come to me. moving on now to his "rock" albums which have always looked worrisomely "i had me own albums to do, peace and love" to me, but i could easily believe they have some gems. ringo opens with the lennon-penned "i'm the greatest," the silliness of which i've always appreciated, but it's like 10 BPM too slow or something, just kind of plodding. what happened to his instincts as a drummer (the thing he's actually the greatest at)? my fear has always been that these next few LPs are mostly like that, but we'll see....

i had me own albums to do, peace and love

lol this is probably a little too on the nose...

Put It There = this is pretty good, it's a sturdy melody and actually reminds me a bit of XTC (yes I know that's backwards) but that may be the late 80s production sheen of chorused guitars more than anything then else. I don't love the sound of it but with a slightly different arrangement/production style I can see it being quite affecting. Of course the song is then promptly ruined by the Hello/Goodbye callback coda.

I don't know! The song is way too brief to criticize (Paul produced it himself btw); I don't rate it.

No "Cut Me Some Slack" for Paul McCartney?

critics have been doing it since 1970

"Cut Me Some Slack" was (I believe) only performed live, that once? So I left it off, as I'm excluding live stuff.

if a studio version was released somewhere, feel free to vote for it.

Yeah there's not much I'd salvage from Ringo's s/t. Despite the inclusion of a song called "Step Lightly" and a bunch of great musicians, it mostly all sounds like they're on downers and out of ideas. Stunning to read that Rolling Stone found it the best solo Beatle record released by November 1973, and that only Goodbye Yellow Brick Road kept it from #1 in the US. "Photograph"'s status as a big hit has always sort of mystified me - it's again, doughy and sluggish, but if I imagine it a little faster, the boringness of the melody just looms larger. I mean it's okay but it's really the same thing the whole way through, four or five notes, dah dah dah dah DAH dah duh... say what you will about Paul but he would quit or fall asleep halfway through if you tried to get him to sing this. "It Don't Come Easy" at least has some big, ear-grabbing hooks and real Ringo-y drum fills but I think it'd be better without the horns piled all over it - doesn't really make you sound like a scrappy hard-time dues-payer when you're beaming it out from a Vegas stage. Rounding out the singles, "Oh My My" at least feels a good fit for Ringo's persona, but that's all I can really say about it.

"Early 1970" is the real keeper imo - limber, sincere, stripped down to the country-western sound that worked so well last time, and evidently Ringo is the kind of guy who writes better tunes and lyrics when there are things he's actually feeling and wants to get on record. I could put that on a ballot. "Sunshine Life For Me" has a momentary flash of interest when George's vocal line comes in towards the end. "You're Sixteen," though an icky choice of material, is what the whole album should have been - brighter, more uptempo, with Ringo singing at the top end of his register rather than the wooden bottom... he's done a standards album, a country album, okay, do the album of American Graffiti soundtrack covers. "Devil Woman" has a flash of a grittier, Stonesier energy or something but it's buried under the same good-time boogie horns as everything else.

the album version of Cut Me Some Slack was live-in-studio, no? so as valid as lots of early Beatles songs, and probably loads of '70s stuff

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_City:_Real_to_Reel

"Put It There" does not have a "Hello Goodbye" coda!!! That's the stupid music video version which I explicitly cautioned everyone not to listen to!

>:|

oh I love "Photograph" because of that melody (George's melody). I would've preferred a Harrison production to Perry's, but Ringo wanted commercial. I don't give a shit for "You're Sixteen" but "Oh My My" is fine.

It's amazing to think how many consecutive top tens he enjoyed through 1974 -- more than the other three!

hahaha oops sorry

xp

Some of the best tracks on the last McCartney album, New, are toward the end. "I Can Bet," "Road," "Get Me Out of Here," and the hidden track ("Scared").

"I Can Bet" is good! I could tell in seconds that he was drumming.

"Put it There" (about Paul's father) randomly came on Spotify a few weeks after my dad passed away and cut me to the bone.

By the way, has anyone listened to the original demos of McCartney & Costello from the Flowers in the Dirt reissue? Worth checking out if just to hear how Paul melds his background vocals to EC's. There's points where I can't tell him & Costello apart at all. Also, the lack of 80s production on the raw rehearsals does wonders for the material.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocgZO-Vm-3A

Here's some more underrated McCartney gems in addition to Doc Casino's excellent list:

Little Lamb Dragonfly
Mama's Little Girl
Beware My Love
Daytime Nighttime Suffering
So Glad To See You Here
One Of These Days
The Pound Is Sinking
Good Times Coming/Feel The Sun
Back On My Feet
All of the McCartney/McManus demos-
Golden Earth Girl
From A Lover To A Friend
All of Chaos and Creation
Mr. Bellamy

Jet (Band on the Run)
Take It Away (Tug of War)
Arrow Through Me (Back to the Egg)
Eat at Home (Ram)
No More Lonely Nights (Give My Regards to Broad Street)
Every Night (McCartney)
Say Say Say (Pipes of Peace)
Press (Press to Play)
We Got Married (Flowers in the Dirt)
Sally G (B-side of “Junior’s Farm”)
Letting Go (Venus and Mars)
Figure of Eight (Flowers in the Dirt)
Heart of the Country (Ram)
Mrs. Vanderbilt (Band on the Run)
Ever Present Past (Memory Almost Full)
Listen to What the Man Said (Venus and Mars)
My Brave Face (Flowers in the Dirt)
Another Day (single)
Secret Friend (McCartney II, Special Edition)
This One (Flowers in the Dirt)
Wanderlust (Tug of War)
Hi Hi Hi (single)
Goodnight Tonight/Daytime Nighttime Suffering (single)
No Other Baby (Run Devil Run)
Country Dreamer (B-side of “Helen Wheels”)
One of These Days (McCartney II)

I expect no one to love this scrappy non-hit rocker, but I always have:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVA7qFurE7I

Here's another demo w/Costello I need to rep for:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNJl2IdW7Vc

This curio has not yet been accounted for (and I may vote for it). Bonus track from recent Pipes of Peace reissue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDoaZdoWwjA

i listened to Band on the Run today, loved "Jet" but "Bluebird" was hard to stomach.

"Jet" is so fucking great. SUF FUR RUH GETTE! JET!

"Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five," tho

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yrop_GZsp-U

OTM

Alfred's list is closest to the type of list that I'd put together. There's one or two that I'd remove, and a lot more that I'd include, but it's a far better representation of what McCartney is good at compared to the likes of 'Mumbo' and 'Morse Moose' etc.

I'd rank Red Rose Speedway as easily one of the weaker albums in the McCartney discography. The best three Wings albums are Band on the Run, Venus and Mars and Back to the Egg.

'Bluebird' is a great song - one of my favourites, that.

Lovers That Never Were is lovely! Paul often better when tempered by some opposing force/with someone to impress.

I like the McManus demos but some of the lyrics (or even, like, the title "the lovers that never were") are too Costello-y for me. Paul, of course, is terrific on them - he's great at working with pompous windbags