Lennon/McCartney

[martin]

I went to see Paul McCartney last night at an outdoor arena here in Oslo. I was very impressed with the show. He played for two and a half hours and a lot of Beatles material was included in the programme. His band is also excellent including drummer Abe Laboriel jr, whose father has played on several Herb recordings;"Rise" and "Fandango" to mention a couple.
As one of the opening songs were "All my loving" I started thinking about the impact that the Lennon/McCartney songs have had even on Herb and the TJB repertoire. McCartney himself seemed very youthful and energetic. He had even taken the trouble of learning some sentences in Norwegian and was able to introduce all the band members in quite passable Norwegian. A gesture that I have hardly ever seen with a big international star before. They usually settle for "Tusen takk" (thank you very much). A quiz question here at the end: How many Lennon/McCarney songs were recorded by the TJB?

-greetings from the north-

Martin

 

[Captaindave]

I can think of the following four:

1. All My Loving
2. ObLaDi ObLaDa
3. With A Little Help From My Friends
4. I'll Be Back

Any time I have ever seen Paul McCartney - and that even goes back to the Beatles first appearances on the Ed Sullivan show in 1964, I have always felt that he was a natural born entertainer/showman.

He was always the one who seemed the most cheerful, energetic, gregarious, and at ease in front of an audience, camera, or microphone. He seemed to be at home on the stage and in the public eye, so to speak. He was the one who wanted to try to keep the Beatles going after the rest of them had pretty much given up and wanted to quit.

Of the Beatles, I think Paul was by far the best musician and songwriter. Think of all the songs that have become "standards" over the past forty years that were actually written by McCartney, even though they bear the Lennon-McCartney name.

IMO, McCartney is probably among the most influential persons in the entertainment and music world of the last forty years. I think that he was the main driving force behind the Beatles - not meaning to minimize Lennon - but without McCartney, I don't think the Beatles, even with Lennon, would have become what they did. Their influence and contribution to music and entertainment history would have, IMO, been far less significant and far reaching...

 

[jfiedler17]

Of the Beatles, I think Paul was by far the best musician and songwriter ... without McCartney, I don't think the Beatles, even with Lennon, would have become what they did. Their influence and contribution to music and entertainment history would have, IMO, been far less significant and far reaching...

Wholeheartedly agree! It's mostly McCartney's material that keeps me being able to listen to the later (RUBBER SOUL and after) Beatles albums; their later stuff can be really depressing or just too bizarre to listen to, and it's McCartney that usually keeps the albums from being completely inaccesible. The WHITE ALBUM, for one, would be just flat-out HORRIBLE were it not for Paul's contributions, like "Birthday" or "Ob-La-Di ..." or "Martha My Dear" or "I Will." That is one seriously messed-up album once you strip away Paul's stuff. [Although I won't even ATTEMPT to defend "Why Don't We Do It in the Road?" ]
Unfortunately, since the Beatles split, most music critics have seen fit to use McCartney's solo work as a punching bag (but then these same critics also are continually putting "JOHN LENNON/PLASTIC ONO BAND," one of the most blatantly inaccesible and uncommercial albums I've ever heard in my life, on their "greatest albums of all-time" lists, so ...) It's bad enough Paul gets short-changed by critics all the time, but he gets short-changed by radio - the man's had 37 Top 40 hits as a solo artist - that's only three less than all the other three Beatles' solo careers COMBINED - and yet how many of those do you ever hear anymore???
Not that Lennon, too, wasn't also a great songwriter, but, personally, his writing just became too serious (and, quite often, too political) after a while to be that much fun to listen to in long sittings. He just started taking himself waaaaaay too seriously. I love his early Beatles songs (and some choice cuts from the Apple years, like "Revolution," which, despite its overtly political lyrics, is still a really, really fun rocker), but if I had the choice between listening to John's solo stuff or JULIAN Lennon's stuff ... I'd definitely have to go with Julian's. I truly think that VALOTTE is better than about 80% of his dad's solo stuff. John still had his moments, though ... "Nobody Told Me" is easily my favorite of 'em. The most relaxed and jubilant he ever sounded on record after the Beatles split. Just a really fun one to listen to.

Jeff F.
NP: Paul "Press" and John "Nobody Told Me"

 

[Steven J. Gross]

"Martha My Dear"" is another L&M song- from the TJB album: "Summertime".

 

[alpertfan]

Lennon once described the album JOHN LENNON/PLASTIC ONO BAND as the one in which he dealt with his own pain, and I'm quite ready to believe that. He had a lot of baggage. His mother was killed crossing the street (by a drunk, off-duty cop) when he was 15. His uncle George Smith, who was like a father to him, passed away when he was 7 or 8. His good friend from the Liverpool Art School, Stuart Sutcliffe succumbed to a brain hemorrhage. The Beatles' manager, Brian Epstein killed himself with a lethal dose of drugs. He was another father figure to Lennon. These things caused him to have a chip on his shoulder. If that wasn't bad enough, McCartney was bashing his relationship with Yoko Ono when he had a wife who couldn't sing to save her life! (And actually, if you read some interviews, she had little to no respect for John Lennon or the other Beatles). I think they're both great songwriters and I can't imagine one without the other. But so much went down in the Beatles' story that's just very sad. That's the best word I could come up with to describe it. I don't think, conversely, that Lennon's songs are too political. Do they say anything new? No. But many of them are right on the button as far as I'm concerned, such as: "Imagine no possessions-I wonder if you can. No need for greed or hunger-a brotherhood of man". I couple those with some of the late, great George Harrison's words such as, "By chanting the names of the Lord, you'll be free. The Lord is awaiting on you all to awaken and see". Anywho...that's just my opinion.

 

[alpertfan]

By the way, one of my solo Lennon favorites is, "Watching The Wheels" from DOUBLE FANTASY.

 

[PJ]

Saw Paul M.....last year at his open air homecoming concert at Liverpool's King's Dock ......unbelievable atmosphere and performances ....one of my personal all time great concerts

Over 20 Beatles / Wings classics plus some good recent solo songs ....over 2 and a half hours of wonderful music ....what more could you ask for ....( except being time travelled back to key Beatles events ) ....

Peter