POLL: How do you rate Paul McCartney's "Driving Rain" album?

When ranking our "favorite to least favorite" albums by an artist, something inevitably must be on the very bottom. For me it is DRIVING RAIN (or rather, "Thriving Pain", as I tend to call it). Just a gray and gloomy nothing of an album for me, with non-catchy tunes and atrocious lyrics - even for Paul. I have a complete collection of solo works by all four ex-Beatles, and DR is the only album by any of them where I don't even truly enjoy ONE single song. That even includes Ringo's solo catalogue... I am a huge Ringo Fan, and I don't mean any disrespect by this comparison... but I always like at least one to three songs off even the least of Ringo's albums.

 

The problems with this record is that it is too long.
I rated the album as "not bad". I like several tracks very much (Driving Rain, From a Lover, I do, Heather, Riding to Jaipur, About You), but the record would have benefited from some editing -- namely, leaving off the two long tracks (Spinning... and Rinse...) and, of course, Freedom too.

 

I really find that hard to believe. I heard the Cold Cuts outtakes' compilation and, even though I enjoyed it, I think there is only one really "essential" track (Waterspout). My guess is he may shelved it because of plagiarism concerns -- it sounds very much like something you heard before. Otherwise, its exclusion from London Town or (especially) Back to the Egg is hard to understand.

There are several fun and/or nice tracks but nothing that's really missed. The kind of tracks which may or may not be included in a record.

Probably, those four songs leftover tracks would fall into the may/may not category.

 

A disappointment when it came out and I still don't enjoy it, though this thread has inspired me to pull out my vinyl copy and give it a spin. Perhaps my expectations were too high after Flaming Pie (easily in my Top 5 McCartney albums).

Overall this is what Paul McCartney is when his sense of melody and harmony desert him. Oh and he forgets how to sing. In all seriousness, I have no idea what he was going for on this album. There are interesting bits but ultimately nothing adds up.

Sonically, there are some really unique things going on here. His bass playing is top notch and he makes his little Hofner groan and howl like I've never heard. Though he may have used his Rick as well, does anyone know? That's not the problem of course, it's great to hear someone in this phase of his career reach for new sounds.

No, the problem is this (and he's repeated it to much better results, but I don't know why he keeps trying) - he wanted to have spontaneous, unrehearsed vocals, "like we used to do in The Beatles." Well, that falls apart because a) you were 20, and b) you had quality control in the form of four other talented people. The vocals suffer here and it mostly sounds like lack of preparation. The album is also oddly void of harmonies again pointing to lack of planning.

The best of the bunch:

I Do - This one actually has a nice melody - could almost be a Wings leftover, but he gets screechy in places.

Your Way - A nice country-folk song with some picked guitar. He sings this well, uses his falsetto well without getting screechy and sounds pretty polished. McCartney shows off his gift for simple melody here with some nice harmonies. I'd say this is probably one of my favorite McCartney songs in addition to the best on the album.

About You - Great chugging rocker. This one sounds very polished and complete. The harmonies are well thought out and the arrangement has some nice touches that are typical of McCartney's better work. It's just the right length - it doesn't have a chance to get old. I'd have liked to have heard him do this one during the Driving USA tour.

Heather - Well let's just ignore the title. He's got a great melody here and this works surprisingly well as an half-instrumental with a bit of "oohing" and "ahhing" plus the verse at the end. Paul like to use weird words in his songs and he gives us another one in this song: runcible.

Back in the Sunshine Again - Strong track. In common with the others this one sounds well thought out and rehearsed especially his vocal performance. This sounds like it could be an outtake from the Flowers in the Dirt era. The lyrics are great here - you get the feeling after all he went through, he's really trying to convince himself what he's singing is true.

Your Loving Fame - The classic McCartney ballad we've come to expect on every album. He delivers here, with a great, slightly melancholy piano riff. Again the main problem is the vocal. It sounds unrehearsed or incomplete. My other issues with this song are the fact that he only seems to have written one verse (so it gets old real fast) and it goes on forever and ever with that one verse. When he debuted this on Parkinson, I took to it immediately and was anxious to hear what he'd do with this on the album. Unfortunately he didn't take it beyond that first performance.

Rinse the Raindrops - A fun throwaway. He's good at these.

My vinyl copy sounds great. Dead quiet, nice range of tone. The bass is deep and rich and the mid-range acoustics sound very warm and overall well-balanced. Beats my CD copy hands down.

 

Lower-tier McCartney - only a couple songs worth revisiting .

I'm not overly fond of the Paul McCartney / David Kahne partnership. This album being the best example of why I dislike the union.

 

An album that is worthy of a critical reappraisal in the future.

 

I've said this before about Driving Rain, but what a delicious tone Paul had on this one.

 

So many different flavors on one album. This should've been the album cover.


Or maybe a food menu. Lol

 

Completely agree, and I'm a huge McCartney fan. Haven't listened to it in years and the only song I really liked was the (unfortunately titled) "Heather", a showcase for Paul's gift for melody. Coming between 2 masterpieces, "Flaming Pie" and "Chaos", didn't help.

 

Sorry for the duplicate posts above, my tablet was still asleep I guess.
As much as I love this album, I suppose it could have been boiled down to a great, great 40 minute disc. Then again, Driving Rain flows like the traditional, sprawling double albums that I'm so fond of. I think it works better than Springsteen's The Rising, released months later and also took on the double album on one CD role.
Driving Rain is a snapshot of Macca's life as he is nearly sixty years old and is the last album before the Old Man Paul era that kicks off with Chaos and Creation in the Backyard.

It will be an important release in the Archive series.

 

Driving Rain isn't my most played McCartney album, but I always enjoy it when I do. It's nothing like the McCartney II album, but similar to the latter, there's nothing quite like DR in his catalogue.

 

It is a bit of a downpour to be honest.

 

Still does't do much for me. None of the songs inhabit my brain like songs on most other McCartney albums.

 

I voted for a pretty solid effort, which I feel it is. I may be biased as this was the first new album Paul released since I had become a fan, but I enjoyed it then and enjoy it now. From the opening "Lonely Road", with the great bass intro, nice ballads like "Magic" and "From A Lover To A Friend", and even silly songs like the title track the album has a bit of everything. I've always felt "She's Given Up Talking" is a great song, sort of a precursor to "Jenny Wren". Also have to mention "Rinse The Raindrops", which is just a great pyschedelic jam and might be my favorite track on the album.

All that said, I can see why many rate it as one of McCartney's weaker albums. The album has a real dark vibe to it IMO, not intentionally but Paul had gone through a lot, I think he was still missing Linda badly. Also the production is really murky, it really stands out in McCartney's discography for the muddy sound. The other thing that stands out is Paul is not in the best shape vocally, he sounds older on Driving Rain than he does on New. And I know his heart was in the right place but "Freedom" is just not for me.

So all and all, it is a flawed album and I always see it at the bottom on youtube when people rank Paul's albums, but I enjoy about 2/3 of the songs, and actually like the moody vibe. Really wish the production was better though. And as I said, maybe some of my enjoyment of the album is sentiment, but IMO it's a very solid effort.

 

Essential? Hahahaahahaahahaaha inho

 

I think this is a solid effort. I still revisit most tracks

 

I think Paul went way too far with the "one take" performances and ended up with some really crappy performances vocally.

To me that's the unforgivable sin of the album. The songs aren't bad, but the lack of harmonies and sloppy singing is egregious.

 

"Chaos" is the weak one of the three to me. Dirge after dirge after dirge with nothing memorable. Never understood the love.

 

I like:

Lonely Road
She's Given Up Talking
Tiny Bubble
Your Way
About You
Heather
Your Loving Flame
Riding to Jaipur

I hate hate HATE the fact that he added Freedom to the album. Should have been released as a SINGLE ONLY. It doesn't make any sense to be part of the album other than a way to boost album sales and that kind of
disgusts me in a way, seeing how it was for the people of New York after 9/11.

 

I voted Not Bad, if the album would have been:

1. Lonely Road
2. From A Lover To A Friend
   
3. She's Giving Up Talking
4. Always Be There*
5. I Do
6. Magic
7. If This Is Wrong*
8. Your Way
9. Heather
   
10. Washington*
11. Your Loving Flame
12. Rinse The Raindrops

I would have given it a solid effort. *indicates that the song is unheard from the sessions, but if they are good as people say they are, they would have had a nice home on my version of Driving Rain.

As this magnificent website says, in 2002 there was a full unreleased album given to Heather Mills as a gift. I would give my first born to hear that one. Driving Rain 2?