Paul McCartney — Mr. Nice Guy
Hello again, it’s me IG Agent 19, still writing some more about this listicle article
Or as I like to call it the gift that keeps on giving (lazy editor: please insert venereal disease joke here).
Since I found the ideas behind the article somewhat irritating, (such as the idea that one can sequentially rank the value of every artist in the rock and roll hall of fame! ) I decided to write my own rankings.
Some people in the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame may need talking about more than one can adequately do in a big article ranking lots of people, so I have decided to special outtake articles on those people.
Paul McCartney
Today I am going to talk about Paul McCartney — an enigma wrapped inside a really nice guy.
Anyway — the original article went real in-depth on the idea that when you were inducted into the hall solo even though you have previously been inducted as part of a band that means you should only be ranked on whatever you have done outside the band, which ok and also that’s bullshit and you know it don’t work like that. But ok, like we said, we can always write about The Beatles later.
But this article is not about his ranking, because we’ve already talked about that, but rather a more in depth look at Paul McCartney — specifically his niceness.
Now I know you’re thinking — why would you want to write about that? Everybody and their uncle has written about that! What could you possibly have to add. Well, taking into account ambition, hubris and if I am totally truthful a clear estimation of my own abilities contra all the hacks out there: probably a lot.
So what does Wyman say about McCartney in the original article?
Free of the Beatles, McCartney’s first solo album was a dandelion wisp of nothingness; in its own way it was sort of a punk-rock thing to do. He then became an awesome hit-making machine and was probably the best-selling artist of the ’70s. Band on the Run remains a strong album. I find McCartney refreshingly one-dimensional and dependable, save for this one thing: He is both industrious and lazy. There are great songs strewn throughout his albums from this period, and slighter, highly enjoyable ones, too, but way too many throwaways. But, as with so many other things in McCartney’s life, it just doesn’t matter. One day when he had nothing better to do he recorded a single called “Mull of Kintyre,” which became the biggest-selling single ever in Britain to that point. That’s the way his life goes. You don’t have to like him. He still likes you.
I’ve already noted in one of the other articles the hypocrisy of docking people for bad behavior without giving credit for being good (although really the band that got docked the most seems to be Queen and the bad behavior was doing dumb/not especially moral stuff for money instead of the rapists, murderers, wife beaters and whatever else you get in rock and roll who did not seem to get docket any points) but actually it’s worse than that because it is really clear here that Wyman is downgrading McCartney for not being an asshole.
I mean he doesn’t actually say let’s dock McCartney points for being so darn nice but that’s what it means which to be fair — basically everyone does this.
There is something very rock and roll about being an asshole.
Anecdotes abound of Rock Stars being assholes, and let’s be honest — if you were to live in a world for any length of time with Beatles level of fame you would probably be an asshole — I sure know I would. Hey, if I lived with Aerosmith levels of fame I would probably be an asshole.
There is a story that McCartney evidently told Jane Asher at their breakup that he was no good and a bastard (or asshole, I can’t recall) which it makes sense he would be.
But everyone agrees that he isn’t an asshole, the established narrative is that McCartney is a nice and considerate human being. And for which he is often attacked with snide little remarks like the ones Wyman deploys above.
The only conclusion is that McCartney was an asshole, and then he changed! He knew he was an asshole, he told Jane Asher he was, and he changed. He decided he didn’t want to be an asshole, which to be fair most people don’t want to be but their solution when they are is to craft narratives where they aren’t an asshole — because that is the easy way.
Paul McCartney decided to take the hard way and make himself not an asshole.
Think about that for a minute. How do you do that, it is something that is more of a strain than quitting smoking. It involves changing your personality, about you react to things as they happen. And he did it. He went from being a guy whom the world revolved around to being someone people say “You don’t have to like him. He still likes you.” about. That’s impressive. Even if I didn’t like any of his music I would still consider him an important person for rock and roll because of that.
It may be very rock and roll to be an asshole, but there are very few people who actually want to be assholes. People who want to be rock and roll assholes actually want to be rock and roll stars, and aren’t thinking clearly enough to see that the star-like qualities they admire are burning on pure asshole-fuel.
McCartney is the star for smart people who don’t want to be an asshole and are clear-eyed enough to see how most people in the business end up assholes.
He is probably also an inspiration for every decent singer-songwriter or person who got into the business not to be big crazy stars but just because they had musical talent and wanted to provide for their family with that talent. Sensible people who are nice.
In our last article
I had this to say about McCartney, and of course Lennon for the two may never be completely separate.
I’m not going to talk much about McCartney here, as I intend to do a stronger focused article on him later, but I think the influence of McCartney and Lennon cast a long shadow over much of the 70s until punk arrived.
Lennon is the most easy to see, his life and his murder in 1980 making the most shocking death for a couple generations of Rock and Roll fans. McCartney stands in contrast to Lennon, Lennon stayed the vision of the artist as revolutionary, but McCartney became the artist as businessman. People don’t respect McCartney’s decision as much, but it certainly seems more levelheaded.
I think McCartney is probably a good model and strong influence on all those singer-songwriters of the 70s, and a march back to the professional musician of previous generations, still a rock star, but not one who needed to destroy himself. Which I guess for a lot of people equals sell out, but the dirty little secret of death is that most people would rather sell out if it meant self-preservation.
Some good points were made in that section about George Harrison too, and perhaps the somewhat dour-faced figure who organized the Concert for Bangladesh is the real nice guy, based on what theories of ethics and morality you follow.
But traditionally the Beatle to beat for niceness, from the beginning, was Ringo.
I have often considered — who would win in the niceness contest — Ringo or Paul? I think though it is Paul, he has had to fight for his niceness, it had to be earned, Ringo put under pressure might buckle not ever having been an asshole he might not realize when he was being pushed into becoming one until too late. McCartney, stronger than just about anyone I’ve ever met, strong enough to decide to stop being an asshole and do such a good job at it that he now has a reputation as just a nice guy that is so overwhelming his musical contributions get overlooked, is the one who can hold on through whatever life can throw at him and still be nice.
McCartney has battle-tested niceness.
All that said, here is a picture of a really nice guy as rock star and sort of a clever asshole as rock star — the kid is Julian Lennon. It’s hard not to read a lot into that picture.
The Music
There’s not much to say about the music that hasn’t been said, but maybe a small meta observation about the critical reception.
Again, Wyman wrote
One day when he had nothing better to do he recorded a single called “Mull of Kintyre,” which became the biggest-selling single ever in Britain to that point.
Ignoring what one would really want to say about the song — is it any good or not.
I have never actually encountered the song before, but one thing I have encountered is a dire and widespread hatred of it.
The song is pretty good, I can see why it became a best-seller, it digs deep into that desire for a Lake Isle of Innisfree, that freedom from the world capitalism has given us that you probably need to be rich to really have.
I wonder if Wyman didn’t say this song sucks in his description of it, could it be he secretly likes it or knows it is good but he couldn’t bring himself to defend it. What he wrote is dismissive, but it never definitely dismisses.
All that said, if the song was the biggest selling one and I heard it all the time, damn would I hate that song. It is really not to my taste, and probably not to taste of most Rock and Roll critics.
Of course the most egregious example of something McCartney made seemingly designed to draw critical ire — Silly Love Songs
I have never in my life met anyone who dared speak out loud in company their enjoyment of this song, despite it being quite a big hit. Even the concept is an attack on the mind, it is really a distillation of McCartney’s decision to be nice and yet in some ways calls into contestation that very niceness — would a really nice person have written something designed to offend so many people.
I don’t have time or the inclination to really deal adequately with this song, but will note that silliness is a trivializing emotion, and as such it trivializes love — the very thing that McCartney wants to valorize.
The fact is that McCartney has a broader palette of taste than almost any critic and probably most musicians as well. Most of the people who would have chosen to write Silly Love Songs could never have written Let Me Roll It or Yesterday, they would never have thought to write Eleanor Rigby or Helter Skelter, Jet or Band on The Run would probably have been abhorrent to them. McCartney has a taste palette that runs from Air Supply to Metallica. That’s weird, and I think a key ingredient in the success of the Beatles (well, lots of things contributed) but a decade or so ago a critic was given the task of writing a review of the Beatles Greatest Hits or the like and responded with (paraphrasing from memory here):
Half of the songs sound like Oasis, the other half sound like every other Rock and Roll band that has ever existed
That breadth of style owes a lot to McCartney’s breadth of taste.
This article was written by IG Agent 19.
Our previous re-rankings of the Rock and Roll hall of fame can be found in these articles:
The first article providing a close focus on a particular artist was this one
which of course mainly focused on his lyrics and compared his style to that of Dylan.
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