Sorry again, JR. I promise, no more rubber-leg jokes.
But let's face the facts, the more mediocre music McCartney puts out the more he builds the case that maybe he wasn't the genius of the Beatles after all. And frankly, Mr Shankly, I think that's sad.
But age should have nothing to do with creativity.
Did they say about Beethoven--that 9th symphony, boy, he's sure getting on . . . and deaf to boot . . . not near as good as the 1st and 3rd and 5th!
Plenty of bluesmen recorded some of their best stuff in their 60s. Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf.
Yeats wrote his greatest poems after 60. Thomas Hardy did into his 80s.
Paul shouldn't get a walk just because he was a beatle and we feel nostalgia. His stuff now is just plain mediocre. There's no core, no vision.
I find that disturbing. Especially for one you say who changed the world.
I think that's the real problem with pop culture--we invest these people with mythic, almost religious status--we call them icons--when they really don't have the depth or vision or transcendence to deserve such status.
As Graham Parker put it, "It's a strange religion, without any God!"
So people feel obliged to pay homage to the ghost of Beatle Paul (1965-68) by expecting that same sense of wonder and transcendence we felt with those classic songs.
But he's just not writing them anymore. Hasn't been for a long time. So don't tell me I don't have a right to criticize when he has the right to foist this stuff upon the public and let loose the publicity machines and let us all know he's "back."
He's not coming back. He's lost the gift. And it just plain sad.
And, JR, I don't mind being called "ignorant" and a "f***", but "pompous"--that really hurts.