More about: Paul McCartney

From The Beatles, Wings, The Fireman and solo efforts, the legendary Paul McCartney has had a mammoth career spanning almost 60 years. 

To celebrate the release of McCartney III this week - a lockdown album written, recorded and produced entirely by Paul himself - we look back at the Beatles legend’s lengthy career and appreciate the hidden gems from over the years - in chronological order. 

The Beatles – 'I Will'

The Beatles and the word “underrated” are two things that just don't go together, but as the iconic band released over 200 songs in their 8 years together – some are very easily overlooked. The vast 1968 double-LP The White Album is a standout in the fab-four’s career, containing a plethora of iconic songs such as ‘Back In The U.S.S.R’, ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’, ‘Blackbird’ and ‘Helter Skelter’ to name a few. In a way, it could be argued that many of Paul’s songs on this album could count as solo-efforts, since it was recorded as the band’s relationship started to decline. Paul would regularly get tired of the band constantly bickering in the studio, so he’d go to another room and record his own song’s entirely himself.

'I Will' is the penultimate track on the album’s first LP, a short but sweet one coming in at just 1 minute and 46 seconds. It’s a beautiful acoustic love-letter from McCartney, filled with a cool guitar hook inbetween verses that adds atmosphere to the melodic and succinct track. 

Paul McCartney – 'Every Night'

Clearly Paul is the expert at simple, acoustic-based love songs because here’s another one. Taken from his first solo effort after The Beatles split, McCartney was an album made entirely alone. It contains some very interesting experimental tracks, and the listener can quite clearly hear Paul embracing his new artistic freedom without the other Beatles' involvement.

Apart from the iconic ‘Maybe I’m Amazed’, ‘Every Night’ is undoubtedly one of the standout tracks on the record. Another song with very basic acoustic instrumentation but done perfectly and combined with beautiful lyrical sentiment – simply falling in love. It’s a track that demonstrates the powerful attachment of being in love with someone and beginning a new chapter of life with them. What makes every track on McCartney so awe-inspiring is the fact the entire album was built by Paul alone.

Paul McCartney – 'The Back Seat Of My Car'

Upon release, Ram was a rather poorly received album critically, despite reaching the top of the UK charts. Over the years, the appreciation for the record has increased dramatically and rightly so, it’s also subsequently been recognised as an early indie pop album. The album’s closing track ‘The Back Seat Of My Car’ is a gorgeous outpouring of emotion, despite it really just being about shagging in the back of a car – he still makes it seem so romantic! The song contains a vast array of instrumental tracks layered together to create a gorgeous orchestral sound layered with rock and roll guitars that perfectly reflect the youthful optimism of the young generation at the time, and not forgetting McCartney’s divine vocal fills throughout the track.

Wings – 'Mumbo'

Many agree that Paul’s chart-topping 70s band Wings joined the scene with a very lacklustre debut album, full of overlong and frankly dull tracks. An exception however is the opening track ‘Mumbo’, a very nostalgic but meaningless rock and roll song. Half of the lyrics aren’t even understandable, but it’s an undeniable bit of fun, filled with extremely cool guitar licks and amazing instrumental performances throughout. Before you start arguing about the nonsensical lyrics, I’m sure you love ‘I Am The Walrus’…

Wings – 'Junior’s Farm'

By 1974, Wings had become well established hit-makers with three albums to their name, including the legendary classic Band On The Run the previous year. The fact ‘Junior’s Farm’ was released as a single such a short time after that probably means that the album overshadowed it. Like ‘Mumbo’, ‘Junior’s Farm’ is simply a quintessential rock and roll track, again containing nonsensical but also rather controversial lyrics at the time. Paul’s thumping bassline is also a standout within this single. The track was generously placed on the 1978 compilation ‘Wings Greatest’ - and rightly so. 

 Wings – 'I’ve Had Enough'

Wings' penultimate album London Town had a long and tumultuous gestation for various reasons: Paul’s wife Linda falling pregnant with their third child, band members leaving Wings and so on. The album performed poorly commercially and critically compared to their previous albums, but it contains some solid gems. The guitar intro for ‘I’ve Had Enough’ is one of the coolest of all time, reminiscent of Brian May’s style of playing from Queen. This song is one of the many great overlooked tracks on London Town. Despite the instrumental not being as full as since the band were reduced to a trio, it still packs a punch.

Wings (Rockestra) – 'Rockestra Theme'

Despite being credited as a Wings song and sitting comfortably on Wing’s final album, ‘Rockestra Theme’ is practically by a gigantic supergroup called Rockestra that includes the entirety of Wings and also too many other names to mention. Some of the standout members include David Gilmour, Hank Marvin, Pete Townshend, John Bonham, John Paul Jones and many more. Keith Moon was also planned to be included, though he tragically passed away before the recording. 

The line-up of iconic rock and rollers on this track is nothing short of outstanding, yet it still somehow quietly sits under the radar. This instrumental track has an absolutely enormous sound thanks to the inclusion of various icons. 

Paul McCartney – 'Waterfalls'

The year after Wings split up, and 10 years after Paul’s first solo effort McCartney – he returned to the idea of creating an album completely alone from a decade earlier. McCartney II is a stylistically questionable album seeing Paul begin to favour electronic experimental styles by using synthesizers for most of the album. 

‘Temporary Secretary’ aside, McCartney II does have some very good tracks such as ‘Coming Up’, and not to mention that the iconic single ‘Wonderful Christmastime’ was born from the McCartney II sessions. ‘Waterfalls’ is the most underrated track on here: a beautiful ballad played only with an acoustic guitar, an electric keyboard and a synth. 

Paul McCartney – 'Calico Skies'

27 years after The Beatles split, Paul released the album Flaming Pie, arguably the most Beatle-esque album of his career. Flaming Pie had a deluxe edition re-release earlier this year, bringing Paul’s fantastic and underrated 1997 album back into the public consciousness. ‘Calico Skies’ is truly a standout and probably the track that could most easily be mistaken for a Beatles song. It sees Paul return to basic yet melodic acoustic guitar fingerpicking reminiscent of ‘Yesterday’ and ‘Blackbird’ and themes of falling in love: the key components of some of Paul’s most popular Beatles tracks. 

Paul McCartney – 'Too Much Rain'

Chaos And Creation In The Backyard was always considered as a faux McCartney III by fans until now: it follows the similar theme of his self-titled albums, in which Paul plays all the instruments himself. What doesn’t fit though, is that this album was produced by Nigel Godrich instead of McCartney himself. 'Too Much Rain' is a beautiful track on this record, with basic yet powerful instrumentals and an uplifting lyrical theme of hope in the face of adversary. The song was supposedly inspired by Paul’s second wife Heather Mills who suffered a lot of tough times in her life. 

The gorgeous instrumentals of a piano and an acoustic guitar layered together demonstrate McCartney’s lifelong musical talent for melody, and considering Paul was 63 at this point, his voice still sounds as amazing as it always did.

Paul McCartney – 'My Valentine'

Despite the very strange album title, Kisses On The Bottom is one of the most interesting and stylistically different albums in Paul’s discography. Apart from this track and one other, the rest of the tracks on this album are covers from the era of traditional pop music and jazz. Being one of the only original tracks on this record, 'My Valentine' is definitely the best on there. Despite being an original track, it’s still full of traditional pop and jazz elements that make it sound so stylistically interesting. It contains classical guitar, light jazz-style drumming, and a gorgeous orchestral accompaniment.

Not to mention that the classical guitar on the track is played by Eric Clapton, a lifelong collaborator with various Beatles members ever since George Harrison’s White Album track ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ in 1968. 

McCartney III arrives 18 December via Capitol Records.

More about: Paul McCartney