Paul McCartney Album by Album Thread

And this should be the subject of a separate thread.

 

I think this is so interesting, to me like Ram, Band On The Run and Red Rose Speedway (double) being so similar, New and Egypt Station are like two sides to the same coin to me as well. You will notice all five make my top five, but each of you leave one of these off your list and I just don't get how you can think one of New or Egypt Station is an all time classic, but not the other? Thoughts?

On a side note, it continues to amaze me that MAF would probably make it so much higher on my list, maybe even above Chaos if it wasn't mastered so horribly!

 

Very interesting observation but for me, New and Egypt Station don't sound all too similar save for Paul's voice. There's this cohesion on Egypt Station I don't feel when I listen to New maybe due to the multiple producers.

 

Well, for me, Egypt Station is ninth overall on my list (Tug of War and Wings Over America being seventh and eighth, respectively) so while I don't consider it to be an "all time classic," it's still one of my favorites. In my opinion Paul's top 7 albums (New, Flowers, Chaos, Ram, BOTR, Flaming Pie, Tug of War) are as good as anything The Beatles ever did hide or any number of classic albums. I know it's not a popular opinion, but I genuinely consider each of those albums to be a genuine five star masterpiece.

 

They are similar in song style and quality to me just not in album format. To put it in Beatle terms New takes after the free form divergent styles of the White album and ES is of course Paul's most conscious effort to ape Sgt. Pepper.

 

Both New and Egypt Station seem to draw from all aspects of Paul's career, with New focusing slightly more on modern (say, mid 80s onward) Paul and Egypt Station on classic Paul.

 

New - divergent, creative, diverse.

Egypt Station - cohesive, creative, continuity, conceptual.

 

You put it in better words than I could have. That sums up my feelings too.

 

to me this is Paul's underrated/leftfield masterpiece

to make such an album at 55 = wow.

 

I actually CHOKED when coming upon this post just now. I had the pleasure of dining with Miss Wells in Woodstock, NY in the summer of '88 and had I known of this mag cover, I surely would have asked her about it. Bravo as always AG

 

Just spit out my beer AG. Thanks!

 

"If it ain't STIFF..."

 

Was Mary Wells living in Woodstock? Or was she performing in the area?

 

Looking for Flaming Pie information in the McCartney Sessions site, I came across this little blurb:

Mystery solved!

 

Sorry Arnold, I just saw this. It was some kind of kitchen sink day long concert that my radio station sponsored and I was sent as the emcee/host (I was all of 18 at the time). I can literally only remember two things about it and one was breaking bread with Mary Wells either before or after her set. There were other name acts on the bill but it's sadly lost to the annals of time. I don't recall ever hearing that she lived in Woodstock so I imagine she was just in town for the gig. An absolutely lovely lady

 

What's a wad? Is that like LOL (the only one I know what it means).

 

Well... I guess it's about time to add this one!

McCartney III

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Studio album by
Paul McCartney
Released 18 December 2020[1]
Recorded 2020[2][3]
Studio Hogg Hill Mill, Sussex, England
Genre Art rock · art pop
Length 44:48
Label Capitol
Producer Paul McCartney[4]

Singles from McCartney III

1. "Find My Way"
   Released: 18 December 2020

McCartney III is the 18th solo album by English musician Paul McCartney, released on 18 December 2020 by Capitol Records.[5] It serves as a continuation to his solo albums McCartney (1970) and McCartney II (1980). Like those albums, McCartney III features McCartney on all instruments. The album was met with widespread acclaim from music critics. The album became McCartney's first UK number-one solo album since Flowers in the Dirt in 1989.

Background
McCartney III was recorded in early 2020 at McCartney's studio in Sussex, England while in lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic.[6][7] McCartney began by recording the instrument he wrote the song on, then added further layers. He said: "It was a lot of fun. It was about making music for yourself rather than making music that has to do a job. So, I just did stuff I fancied doing. I had no idea this would end up as an album."[8]

Like previous McCartney albums, McCartney performed all the instrumentals himself.[2] He had also performed most of the instruments on his 2005 album Chaos and Creation in the Backyard (described at the time by journalist David Hajdu as being "essentially McCartney III"[9]) and on his 2007 album Memory Almost Full. McCartney also played all the instruments on Rushes (1998) and Electric Arguments (2008) under the name the Fireman.[10]

The album's cover art and typography was designed by artist Ed Ruscha,[11] an acquaintance of the McCartney family.[12]

Promotion
The domain name mccartneyiii.com was registered on 28 August 2020 by CSC Corporate Domains, the company that previously registered paulmccartney.com and flaming-pie.com (for the reissue of Flaming Pie, McCartney's 1997 studio album). Its landing page originally appeared with a 303 error notice, instead of the usual 404 error notice.[13]

On 16 October, teasers for the album started appearing on the streaming service Spotify with animations over the artwork for McCartney and McCartney II showing a dice with three pips facing upwards. The following week, McCartney's Twitter account started posting photos at 33 minutes past the hour with a recurring motif of three.[5] On 21 October, McCartney's social media channels officially announced the forthcoming release of the album on 11 December.[14] On 19 November, it was announced that due to unforeseeable production delays, the album release date had to be moved back one week to 18 December.[1]

Starting from 4 December 2020, McCartney sent via his Facebook page the first post of a series of 12 daily posts unveiling the titles of each of the 11 new tracks from his new album through murals painted in 12 different cities all over the world.[nb 1] Each mural is showing the title of a new track, an excerpt from its music score and its author (Paul McCartney) along with the album title and its release date.[15] McCartney also asked all musicians to post their video covers of his 11 new songs through his special website #12DaysOfPaul.[16]

During his appearance on The Howard Stern Show on 15 December 2020, McCartney revealed that American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift originally decided to postpone the release of her album Evermore by one week to respect the original 11 December release date of his album. Upon learning this, McCartney decided to release his album on 18 December instead so that Swift could move forward with the rollout of Evermore as initially planned.[17]

On 17 December, a day before the album release, two live appearances were confirmed for that day: one on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and a YouTube Released special featuring Chris Rock, alongside the release date for the lead single "Find My Way", which was released at the same time as the album.[18]

Release
McCartney III was released on 18 December 2020 on CD, vinyl, cassette and digital formats. The vinyl editions include a variety of colours: standard black, Third Man Records exclusive yellow-with-black-dots limited to 333 copies,[19] Third Man Records exclusive red limited to 3,000 copies,[20] #SpotifyFansFirst 130g Coke-bottle clear vinyl limited to 3,000 copies worldwide,[21] 130g yellow limited to 3,000 copies worldwide,[22] 130g violet limited to 3,000 copies worldwide,[23] Newbury Comics exclusive pink limited to 1,500 copies,[24] Target exclusive green,[19] uDiscover exclusive orange,[25] selected retailers exclusive blue,[26][27] other record stores exclusive white.[19]

Commercial performance
McCartney III performed strongly across a number of international charts. The album debuted at number one on the UK Albums Chart on 25 December 2020, marking his first number one solo album in his home country in thirty-one years (since 1989's Flowers In The Dirt). The album reached the top spot by selling 33,079 album-equivalent units.[28] The album also reached the top 10 of many other European markets.

In the US the album debuted at number 2 of the Billboard 200 with 107,000 equivalent album units – of which 104,000 were album sales behind Taylor Swift’s Evermore .[29] The placement earned McCartney the feat of being the first artist to have a new album in the top two chart positions in each of the last six decades.[29] McCartney III was also the top-selling album in its debut week in the US, outselling Taylor Swift's Evermore and Eminem's Music to Be Murdered By – Side B in pure sales (not including equivalent album units).[30] The album also recorded the third largest US vinyl sales week since Nielsen SoundScan tracking era began in 1991.[30]

Critical reception

McCartney III received critical acclaim. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from professional publications, the album has an average score of 81, based on 21 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".[32] Aggregator AnyDecentMusic? gave it 7.6 out of 10, based on their assessment of the critical consensus.[31]

Track listing
All tracks are written by Paul McCartney.

McCartney III – Standard edition
No. Title Length
1. "Long Tailed Winter Bird" 5:16
2. "Find My Way" 3:54
3. "Pretty Boys" 3:00
4. "Women and Wives" 2:52
5. "Lavatory Lil" 2:22
6. "Deep Deep Feeling" 8:25
7. "Slidin'" 3:23
8. "The Kiss of Venus" 3:06
9. "Seize the Day" 3:20
10. "Deep Down" 5:52
11. "Winter Bird / When Winter Comes" 3:12
Total length: 44:48
McCartney III – Japanese and Deluxe digital editions
No. Title Length
12. "Women and Wives" (Studio Outtake) 3:15
13. "Lavatory Lil" (Studio Outtake) 2:06
14. "The Kiss of Venus" (Phone Demo) 2:10
15. "Slidin'" (Düsseldorf Jam) 4:58
Total length: 57:17
McCartney III – Vinyl edition

Side A
No. Title Length
1. "Long Tailed Winter Bird" 5:16
2. "Find My Way" 3:54
3. "Pretty Boys" 3:00
4. "Women and Wives" 2:52
5. "Lavatory Lil" 2:22
6. "Slidin'" 3:23
Total length: 20:47
Side B
No. Title Length
1. "Deep Deep Feeling" 8:25
2. "The Kiss of Venus" 3:06
3. "Seize the Day" 3:20
4. "Deep Down" 5:52
5. "Winter Bird / When Winter Comes" 3:12
Total length: 23:55

Personnel
Sources[2][43]
Musicians

• Paul McCartney – vocals, electric and acoustic guitars, bass, double bass, piano, harpsichord, mellotron, harmonium, Fender Rhodes, synthesizer, Wurlitzer electric piano, drums, percussion, recorder, producer
• Rusty Anderson – electric guitar (track 7)[44]
• Abe Laboriel Jr. – drums (track 7)[44]

Production

• Steve Orchard – engineer
• Greg Kurstin – co-producer (track 7)
• Keith Smith – assistant engineer at Hogg Hill Mill
• Alex Pasco – engineer (track 7)
• George Martin – co-producer (track 11)
• Bob Kraushaar – engineer (track 11)
• Randy Merrill – mastering at Sterling Sound

Artwork

• Ed Ruscha – cover art and typography
• Mary McCartney – cover portrait, photography
• Sonny McCartney – photography
• Nick Steinhardt – art direction and design
• Brian Clarke – stained glass

Charts

Chart performance of McCartney III
Chart (2020) Peak
position
Australian Albums (ARIA)[45] 6
Belgian Albums (Ultratop Flanders)[46] 5
Belgian Albums (Ultratop Wallonia)[47] 8
Canadian Albums (Billboard)[48] 7
Czech Albums (ČNS IFPI)[49] 11
Danish Albums (Hitlisten)[50] 9
Dutch Albums (Album Top 100)[51] 1
Finnish Albums (Suomen virallinen lista)[52] 4
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)[53] 1
Hungarian Albums (MAHASZ)[54] 26
Irish Albums (OCC)[55] 14
Japanese Albums (Oricon)[56] 5
New Zealand Albums (RMNZ)[57] 28
Norwegian Albums (VG-lista)[58] 6
Scottish Albums (OCC)[59] 1
Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan)[60] 2
Swiss Albums (Schweizer Hitparade)[61] 2
UK Albums (OCC)[62] 1
US Billboard 200[63] 2
Spanish Albums (PROMUSICAE)[64] 15
US Top Album Sales (Billboard)[65] 1
US Top Rock Albums (Billboard)[66] 1

 

Didn't realize McCartney III reached #1 on a half dozen charts from all over the world.

 

Wait... so... Find My Way is a single, but Nothing For Free (remix) is not..???

Exactly what are the criteria being used here to define what is a single??

Wikipedia, you confound me!

No, I will not let this go until it gets corrected!

 

All the countries that don't know Taylor Swift.. .