10 Paul McCartney deep cuts only die hard fans would know
Paul McCartney has been making hits longer than most people on this planet have been alive. Throughout his work with The Beatles and into his solo career, Macca could create a beautiful tune as naturally as making a cup of tea in the morning. However, some of his diamonds have flown past the attention of the mainstream.
Although McCartney has more hit records than he knows what to do with, each of these songs remained in the shadows throughout his career. Excluding his work with The Beatles, both Wings and his solo band have created some of the most beautiful music of the past century, yet all of these songs got stuck either as album tracks or fizzled out when they were brought to the radio.
Granted, McCartney not playing these songs live comes down to practicality more often than not. When you’ve written songs like ‘Hey Jude’ and ‘Band on the Run’, even the most remarkable tracks tend to get left on the cutting room floor. When you dissect each of these on the surface, any other band would have killed to have any of these songs as the best thing they had ever written.
The hits keep coming as well, with songs from his early solo career straight through to his Wings material and into the pop music elder statesman he is today. Paul McCartney doesn’t need another hit record to sustain himself, and these songs result from his love of the music around him.
10 Paul McCartney deep cuts:
‘You Gave Me the Answer’
Throughout Paul McCartney’s career, he’s always been whimsical. As far back as his Beatle days, his love of music-hall songs entertained fans and drove the rest of the band crazy. Whereas the Fab Four had songs like ‘Honey Pie’ in their canon, Venus and Mars transported listeners back to the 1920s with ‘You Gave Me the Answer’.
After a few sounds that feel like a vinyl record starting, McCartney brings out a honky-tonk style piano to deliver this love song. Although Macca is known for this breed of songs, this bumbling ode to domestic bliss is equal parts touching and hilarious, as he invites his wife, Linda, to dance with him and says, “We should do this more often,” in the bridge. Despite the album being about a rock and roll show in outer space, this jaunty number feels like something that McCartney could have performed had he been famous in 1922 instead of 1972.
‘I’m Carrying’
Towards the end of the ’70s, the musical landscape was flooded with yacht rock bands. Seemingly, every artist was trying to emulate Steely Dan and Duran Duran by trying to make something mellow that you could lounge in your deck chair while listening to. McCartney was no different, and what better way to make yacht rock than to make the album on a yacht?
Throughout the production of London Town, most of the songs were constructed when the band travelled on a yacht in the Virgin Islands. Though the easygoing vibes run throughout every song, ‘I’m Carrying’ is the purest McCartney ever got. With just one acoustic guitar, McCartney makes a beautiful song about carrying a load for someone else without changing chords often. Despite being one of the record’s highlights, the track is criminally short and only hangs around for two minutes before stopping and moving on to another interlude on the album.
‘Happy With You’
The Paul McCartney of 2018 was a lot different than the one we met back in the day. After years of living the rock and roll lifestyle, McCartney became the sensible elder statesman figure, working with younger acts like the Foo Fighters and making the rounds on the festival circuit. However, just because the hair starts getting grey doesn’t mean the hits must stop.
His album Egypt Station boasts ‘Happy With You’ which is one of the most honest creations of McCartney’s career. Taking inventory of his life, a lot of this song talks about McCartney owning up to being stoned all day in the ‘70s and lying to his doctor about the problems he was secretly facing.
Macca might be a lot more candid in song, but none of those past sins matters anymore now that he’s happy with his wife, Nancy, and settled down away from the spotlight. It may have taken a long time for McCartney to step out of the rock and roll circus, but he’s finally at peace.
‘Ballroom Dancing’
For the cagey Paul McCartney fans, Tug of War could technically be categorised as the musician’s third solo album. Since he made his masterpiece RAM with his wife, Linda and spent the rest of the ‘70s making material with Wings, this was his first flying solo in years. Punctuated by the shadow of John Lennon’s death, McCartney brought out some of his most pop-friendly songs in a long time.
Although Beatles purists fondly remember this album for McCartney’s tribute song to Lennon ‘Here Today’, ‘Ballroom Dancing’ is another highlight. The track is one of the most energetic songs that Macca has ever released. There is an old-fashioned sense of swagger to it, with McCartney going for broke behind the piano, and letting loose with his vocals like Little Richard. While the rest of the ‘80s weren’t nearly as kind to McCartney as a pop star, this song is a high-point from his MTV.
‘Jenny Wren’
After years of making solo albums with his backing band, McCartney wanted a change of pace for Chaos and Creation in the Backyard. He liked what he’d heard on the last Radiohead albums, and recruited their producer Nigel Godrich, only for him to kick out most of his backing band to get to the root of his music. The final product from the experiment was one of McCartney’s sturdiest latter-day releases, with a spotless ballad on the front half.
Performed on acoustic guitar, ‘Jenny Wren’ is the kind of story song that McCartney has always loved writing, echoing the same values that he made in ‘Lady Madonna’ and ‘Another Day’. As the track documents a woman making her way through a rough childhood, McCartney’s voice is a warm hug to any fan looking for the classic sounds of ‘Blackbird’ and ‘Michelle’.
Even in his later age, McCartney is still innovating, with the solo being played on a duduk, an Armenian woodwind instrument that gives the song an exotic vibe. McCartney could have easily stepped into dad-rock territory for the back half of his career, but there was still a lot more music to explore.
‘My Brave Face’
The idea of Paul McCartney and Elvis Costello might have seemed a strange combination on paper. The Liverpudlian pair both had their fair share of classics under their belt, but came from different ends of the musical spectrum. While they may have had different aesthetics, everything fell into place when they hit on the common language: melody.
When working on Flowers in the Dirt, McCartney remarked how the collaboration with Costello was in the vein of his partnership with John Lennon. Though the version of ‘My Brave Face’ that we got on the album was swallowed up by ‘80s production, the song’s demo is where the real magic was captured.
Performed just on acoustic guitars, McCartney and Costello sing this as a duet, as they talk about finding that romantic bliss that everyone longs for at some point in their lives. Though the names might have changed, this is the kind of chemistry The Beatles had always talked about having in their glory days. The Lennon/McCartney partnership might be gone forever, but hearing them harmonise has electricity behind it.
‘Only Mama Knows’
After years out of the spotlight, McCartney almost seemed to lose his spark in the 2000s. Although his gift for melody never failed him, the number of syrupy ballads he spat out made people question whether he still had it. Though Memory Almost Full stays in pop territory throughout its runtime, ‘Only Mama Knows’ has all the bombast you would expect from an early Wings song.
Opening with sighing strings, McCartney’s vocals are much grittier than you would expect for his age, strapping on an electric guitar and getting down to business. Although there isn’t a mind-bending solo that you would expect from a Wings song, McCartney is trying to evoke that spirit, breaking out the pipes that he had kept under wraps for so long.
While this is nowhere near the heights that we had seen on ‘Live and Let Die’ or ‘Junior’s Farm’, McCartney’s full steam ahead attitude on this song is the best he has ever pulled off since his arena rock era. Many artists might like to settle down a little bit as the years go by, but McCartney wanted to let his fans know why he kicked ass back in his glory days.
‘Waterfalls’
The early ‘80s started off with controversy for McCartney. After going on what would become Wings’ final tour, his incarceration due to cannabis possession led him to return home and work in the studio. Although the goal wasn’t for Wings to break up, McCartney II was a better way for McCartney to express himself than with his bandmates.
Working with a tape recorder at home, most of these songs were homemade, as McCartney tried out different songwriting techniques from home, never fine-tuning anything. Although the electronic textures of ‘Temporary Secretary’ might have been primitive for the time, ‘Waterfalls’ is beautifully simplistic. McCartney sounds distraught on this song, bringing in synthesiser strings for most of the track, calling out to his lover to be careful out in the wild and his need for love in her absence.
Though McCartney did have some second thoughts on this song later in his career, this is as openhearted as he could have made under his circumstances. While it might be abstract in some places, the arrangement is simple enough to work into your heart.
‘Calico Skies’
McCartney’s best work always comes when he has an acoustic guitar in his hand. As far back as his work with The Beatles, his acoustic songs always held a certain weight, whether it was the melancholy of ‘Yesterday’ or the intricate run-up scales on ‘Blackbird’. Once McCartney reached the ‘90s, he felt comfortable writing a quasi-sequel to his greatest works on ‘Calico Skies’.
Recorded on solo guitar, this is one of the best love songs that McCartney ever wrote outside of The Beatles. After penning it during a power shortage at his house, he details his love for Linda as clearly as he can, talking about how he always knew she was the one with almost a childlike innocence to it.
Despite the fantastic performance, ‘Calico Skies’ also has a melancholy feel surrounding it, as Linda would sadly only live a few more years before passing away from breast cancer. No words can describe the bond of soulmates, but ‘Calico Skies’ might be the best way to express those feelings to your other half.
‘Monkberry Moon Delight’
Of all four Beatles’ solo careers, Paul McCartney’s RAM is undoubtedly the weirdest. Although the public and his bandmates didn’t understand what he was going for, this was a precursor to the sort of indie rock that would dominate the next era of music. While this album has some great hits like ‘Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey’, it doesn’t get wilder than ‘Monkberry Moon Delight’.
Having a western feel from the start, McCartney’s delivery is some of the most ferocious of his career, banging away on the piano and reciting borderline gibberish into the microphone. Despite the album sleeve saying the song was made by both Paul and Linda, this is firmly one of McCartney’s demented masterstrokes, as he stretches the track out and creates a wall of sound coming out you from all angles. McCartney may have been known as the most lighthearted out of The Beatles, but this is practically pulled out of a fever dream.
