Charlie O. wrote:Open question: If you were going to interview McCartney, what are some questions you'd like to ask him?
His work is always the thing.
In reviewing 55+ years of recordings, does he believe any special tracks were sort of unduly overlooked and undiscovered?
Does
he feel like anything was lost when the more charmingly rough hewn areas of his early career (Beatles AND solo/Wings) were eventually sanded away pretty thoroughly in the 1980s/90s, as he and the rest of his peers moved towards a certain polish and perfection that, whatever its virtues, obfuscated a lot of the crucial character in his work? Did he ever make a conscious move to reverse that process?
Did it ever trouble him in any way that the actual once in a lifetime chemistry and magic of his first band was ultimately an unrepeatable experience? Was this an easy enough reality to shrug off and just make the most of?
Regarding musicians like Joe English or Denny Laine - were there aspects to their playing (or specific performances/ideas) that he can still recall as valuable or essential to the quality of the records?
Might he have opted/preferred to continue working with Laine had the latter not departed during the Tug of War sessions?
What does he remember about the specific character of the track "With a Little Luck" - a rather soothing and narcotic sound, all soft edges and round low end (no guitars, pianos, or anything else to provide jagged edges)? How deliberate a choice, how much chance does he feel played into the final outcome? Ditto "Let Em' In", "Arrow Through Me" and "Silly Love Songs" - relative to the trad. arr. rock band instrumentation, there's a nice understated sense of sonic space - mostly due to the complete and total absence of guitars.
His sense of scale - somewhere in the mid 1970s, his songs developed a surprising number of repetitions and expansive lengths (the three songs mentioned above, "Monkberry Moon Delight", "Goodnight Tonight", "Wonderful Christmastime", "Mull of Kintyre", "Coming Up", etc,) - did he ever notice his own work breaking away from a more concise model ("I'll Follow the Sun", "Good Day Sunshine", "Penny Lane", "Live and Let Die")? Was it the pot? Was there something completely subconscious about the instinct to go the bridge a third time, or sing a fifth verse?
"Arrow Through Me"? What do you remember about both the composition and the track?
To those, like me, who consider 2005's
Chaos and Creation... something of a unique and special record...in some way wamer, more intimate-seeming, present and engaged, perhaps more unguarded or revealing than some other records - to what do you attribute these qualities? Is there a character that gets untapped when you do all of your own stunts (drums, guitars, bass, piano, etc.)? Did Nigel Godrich enable you to create things you mightn't have otherwise created? Is the record's character mostly just the product of a specific moment in time?
You've produced some great music largely unassisted in the area of production (
McCartney, RAM, BOTR, many Wings records) - was there anything specifically that eventually drove you to work with producers as the years went on? Anything you believed you were missing? Is there anything you miss about working alone?
Glyn Johns was there at the beginning of
Red Rose Speedway. He was not there a few weeks later. What happened?
Are you high right now?