Paul McCartney Archive Collection - Tug Of War & Pipes Of Peace coming! (Part Two)

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by daveidmarx, Feb 16, 2015.

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  1. graystoke

    graystoke Forum Resident

    I agree but dabbling in art forms that aren't his strengths sets him up for a lot more criticism. I think Paul sees himself as an entertainer and as such gets involved in more forms of art than just pop music.
     
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  2. brettb33

    brettb33 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Seattle
    And that's fine. I'd rather artists take risks by venturing outside their comfort zone than simply stay in their lane for fear of criticism.
     
  3. Bemagnus

    Bemagnus Music is fun

    I read an interwiew a few years back with Elvis Costello. He said that parts of Pauls strenghts was that he was very brave in trying new things. Of course he opens himself up for criticism but I prefer that before artists who always play it safe,
     
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  4. christian42

    christian42 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Lund, Sweden
    It wasn't only the "Ram army", honestly. (Most of) The critics had already re-evaluated the album before the Deluxe was released.
     
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  5. Oh, I'd say it's rocking, no doubt about it. The guitar? The piano? Definitely. The bass line injects a little bit of funkiness to it, but otherwise it's a rock song.
     
  6. Rob Hughes

    Rob Hughes Forum Resident

    Yeah - I think it's true that not a lot of people saw Broad Street, so it didn't directly drag down Paul's public reputation.

    But, as you and others are also saying, there was a generational shift and a hostile media environment for older stars. The flop of Broad Street put out the word that it was open season on Paulie. These obstacles were not insuperable (c.f. Graceland and oldsters who became proper stars for the first time: So and Back in the High Life), but the head winds were tough.

    I feel sort of mixed here: on the one hand I want to defend these 80s albums, which I like very much and which I feel haven't gotten the love they deserve. On the other hand, I also think it's true that Paul was in some personal drift during that decade. So, he didn't have the energy to think carefully about how to present himself to this 80s generation. This is something he has done rather well, since Linda's death, considering all the constraints of his age and legacy.
     
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  7. Rob Hughes

    Rob Hughes Forum Resident

    I usually defend Broad Street, but that... that was a regrettable moment. Immortalized on the soundtrack, too, iirc....
     
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  8. theMess

    theMess Forum Resident

    Location:
    Kent, UK
    I am glad to see that it is popular on this forum; IMO it is one of his most beautiful solo ballads, and the best song on the POP album.
     
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  9. theMess

    theMess Forum Resident

    Location:
    Kent, UK
    I fully agree; Paul's greatest strength is his adaptability and willingness to experiment. His never ending well of melodies allows him to try his hand in many different areas of music, normally with some degree of success, which has allowed him to build up one of the most diverse and popular catalogues in music, if not the most diverse and popular.

    I will be happy with Paul as long as he continues to experiment. I am really hoping that we get a follow up to Electric Arguments and a McCartney 3.
     
  10. AndyNicks

    AndyNicks Forum Resident

    Location:
    NJ
    Ditto. My favourite on the LP
     
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  11. mrjinks

    mrjinks Optimistically Challenged

    Location:
    Boise, ID.
    There's too much love going to Through Our Love right now. I need to give the universe some balance... :p
     
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  12. Paul H

    Paul H The fool on the hill

    Location:
    Nottingham, UK
    I think any artist that finds themselves outside of a popular genre has two choices: either carry on working the you always have and face criticism for being a dinosaur, or attempt a move into that genre and face criticism for pandering to popular fad.

    McCartney was somewhat unfortunate in that he didn't decide to ride the 80s wave early enough, so he wasn't being cutting edge. By the time he decided to join in (1986) it was seen as a desperate attempt at a cash in. And, of course, he's been unfortunate subsequently, in the sense that 80s production values quickly fell out of favour and have never returned as far as the critical press is concerned.

    Perhaps the brave thing to do was to stick to making records the way he'd done before and hope to ride it out. Certainly, his 80s work might be more well-liked by those who grew up with his earlier work but at the time it would have been hard to accept a fall from grace, especially given that - without a crystal ball - he couldn't know his time would come again.

    And besides, all of this ignores the point made earlier: that McCartney just likes to try different things. In fact - and I've suggested this before - I'm not convinced that Press To Play, for example, was that much "different" for McCartney. It was a record that leaned heavily on production and in that sense I think it's little different to Sgt. Pepper (although, of course, the latter album caught the Zeitgeist perfectly and had the songs to go with it).
     
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  13. Rob Hughes

    Rob Hughes Forum Resident

    Oh my. I'm quoting myself here. But really, I'm continuing a thought interrupted by a meeting.

    So, my thought was considering the mix of what I think are generally successful and interesting musical explorations combined with (speculative) personal turmoil. There are several odd things here: (1) my assumption that Paul was in a difficult period between, oh, 1980 and 1995 is sort of speculation: even if Paul were in some turmoil in those years, it's not like he would speak much of these things in public, maybe especially since the last few years with Linda seem to have been good ones and (2) the usual understanding of music + personal turmoil is that one then goes and produces a turmoil-theme album, which I'm not sure Paul did either (did he?).

    What was the nature of Paul's turmoil in these years? Gosh I don't know. I speculate: marital issues, middle-age issues, career drift and the difficulty of inventing the middle-aged rock star as a non-oxymoron. Or maybe, as I now appreciate all too keenly, the mid-40s are just sort of a lame period in life, notwithstanding the perks of having an income and having learned a bit of how the world works. How did he get out of it? Gosh I don't know. I speculate: the rush of touring, giving up on chart relevance, new explorations in music (Daumier's Law, Liverpool Oratorio, eventually The Fireman), the advent of Linda's cancer giving a new context for their relationship... I seriously don't know.

    But, supposing any of this is true, it is striking that Paul was making these more-or-less thumbs-alofty public presentations and these not-notably depressed albums (are they?). Although here's a data point: so Tug of War was a great album of my mid-adolescence, but my friend Sean, who liked Paul too, could never get along with that album, which he said was too depressing (Sean could handle other depressing albums, why not ToW?).

    Comments?
     
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  14. theMess

    theMess Forum Resident

    Location:
    Kent, UK

    It is interesting to think about what would have happened if Paul had continued down the line he took with McCartney 2. He would certainly have been more 'current' at the time had he continued to experiment with synthesisers.

    It is ironic that the critics at the time attacked McCartney 2, and then praised the more Beatlesque Tug Of War, whereas the critics today say that he should have continued down the McCartney 2 path. In 1980, Danny Baker said in the NME review: "McCartney II isn't worth the plastic it's printed on. Neither is Paul, but he'll go on doodling and fooling his public because they're too frightened to ditch him and his past and he's too rich to be stopped."
    Some of the recent critical consensus states that the album is : ''weightless and gorgeous, perhaps the furthest out McCartney ever got; a blueprint for another Eighties, one he chose to disregard.''

    What this proves IMO is that Paul should always disregard the critics, and do what he wants.
     
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  15. Bobby Morrow

    Bobby Morrow Senior Member

    I never liked Danny Baker!
     
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  16. theMess

    theMess Forum Resident

    Location:
    Kent, UK
    I can see why. :D
     
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  17. theMess

    theMess Forum Resident

    Location:
    Kent, UK
    In a way Paul's problem was that he was too early to ride the 80's wave; recording McCartney 2 in 1979 made him too cutting edge for some, especially most critics. It is a shame that he didn't follow it up in 1981 or 82, either before or after TOW, but I understand that with John's death his plans changed, and he instead spent a long period of time working on and perfecting TOW.
     
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  18. AudiophilePhil

    AudiophilePhil Senior Member

    Location:
    San Diego, CA
    One of my favourite McCartney albums is "Tug of War".
    I'll surely buy this reissue on CD and vinyl.
     
    Last edited: Feb 27, 2015
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  19. theMess

    theMess Forum Resident

    Location:
    Kent, UK
    I agree that lyrically the song does not exactly do much, and that the lyrics could have been worked on more by Paul, but they don't impact on my enjoyment of the song at all. I find that they manage to convey his love to Linda, with the help of the music, so it doesn't really matter if they 'work on paper' as such.
     
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  20. Bobby Morrow

    Bobby Morrow Senior Member

    I don't actually own any reviews of McCartney II from it's release. Were they all as vicious as that? I used to have Record Mirror but I can't remember what they said about it...
     
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  21. Bobby Morrow

    Bobby Morrow Senior Member

    In TOW, he made an album Lennon would surely have approved of.
     
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  22. theMess

    theMess Forum Resident

    Location:
    Kent, UK
    Most were negative, but as far as I know Baker's review was the most harsh, in a way the equivalent of the Rolling Stone article which called Ram the nadir of Western pop music.

    It is amazing to see how both Ram and McCartney 2 have been positively re-evaluated.
     
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  23. Bobby Morrow

    Bobby Morrow Senior Member

    True, but it would have been nice if they had been supported in their day. Imagine the records we might have gotten afterwards if Paul had felt encouraged by these albums reception upon release...
     
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  24. OobuJoobu

    OobuJoobu Forum Resident

    Location:
    Yorkshire, UK
    I'm surprised at Danny Baker there, he is very open about the fact that he considers The Beatles to be untouchable as the greatest thing ever in music, with everything else battling for 3rd place (The Stones have his number 2 place sown up).

    He must also be one of the few people to have found fame after 1980, who met all 4 Beatles.
     
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  25. OobuJoobu

    OobuJoobu Forum Resident

    Location:
    Yorkshire, UK
    Did we ever hear again from whoever it was who "leaked" info about the POP and TOW Deluxe releases for June 2015?

    I hope I'm not doing whoever it was a disservice, but hoping it wasn't just an elaborate hoax.
     
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