‘Find My Way’: The song Paul McCartney used to get us through Covid-19
As much as 2020 has been framed as “the great equaliser” that everybody suffered from, it wasn’t exactly true, was it? For the rich, life went on precisely as normal, especially for the people making the laws that prevented regular people from seeing their loved ones when they needed them most. However, when a pandemic affects Sir Paul McCartney, then there may be some truth to the idea that we were actually all in it together.
However, unlike the rest of us, who had to be content with getting really into baking sourdough loaves and Zoom quizzes, Macca would spend the pandemic somewhat more productively. He set up shop in his home studio in Sussex with his family and got to work doing what he does best, making music! In fact, the isolation from bandmates or producers meant that he could make a type of record he is uniquely known for, a genuine solo record.
Save for a single guest appearance from the drummer and lead guitarist of his live band, Abe Laboriel Jr and Rusty Anderson, respectively, McCartney ended up playing every single instrument on the record. Since he’d done that on record twice before with McCartney and McCartney II, there was only one option for what the record would be called.
McCartney III ended up being a colossal success by his solo standards. Widely regarded as one of the peaks of his solo career, which considering that’s a career that includes ‘Maybe I’m Amazed’, ‘Jet’ and, towering above all of them, The Frog Chorus, that’s saying a hell of a lot. Despite being recorded due to the pandemic, not a lot of the album actually reckons with it. With one notable exception.
Which Paul McCartney song reckoned with Covid-19?
On December 18th, 2020, the first single for the record dropped in the form of the driving rocker ‘Find My Way’. The song finds McCartney in typically heartwarming form. I can only imagine how many people at that time desperately needed to hear British music’s kindly grandfather coo, “You never used to be afraid of days like these / But now you’re overwhelmed by your anxieties / Let me help you out, let me be your guide / I can help you reach the love you feel inside” during that cursed Christmas season.
This wasn’t subtext either, as when McCartney was promoting the song, he explicitly talked about how it was a response to the times. In an interview with Uncut, he said, “It was a very scary time. Other scares we’ve had —SARS, avian flu—they seem to happen to other people. But this was happening to everyone, people you knew, everyone in the world. Some of my friends, some people I knew, were close to going under with it.”
Thus, this song wasn’t so much an attempt to stay sane on Macca’s part, but instead a message to those truly going through hardship at the time. A separate interview with The Sun made this clear, where he said: “In ‘Find My Way,’ the me character is singing about how he’s confident he won’t get lost at night, but he’s also talking to the person filled with anxieties. So I suppose, in a way, I’m trying to encourage them to keep their head up and get through this thing.”
Honestly, that was the best thing that people with resources could do during such a horrific time. There were some that swung and missed, but Paul McCartney rarely does, and he absolutely didn’t with one of the best songs he’s made this volatile century.
