New McCartney song a ballad & in upcoming film

I wouldn't say his vocal abilities have diminished. Rather, I would say that ballads are no longer his strong suit. Paul still sounds great when he is belting out the rockers--much, much better than he did circa-1990 during the Flowers in the Dirt/Tripping the Live Fantastic tour. His midrange ballad voice does have a bit of a quiver to it, however. Pretty good pipes for a dude close to 70!

 

Anyone have any Idea if and when this track maybe released as an "official" single?
I'd love to try and get it some airplay at the station I'm with.

 

I read somewhere that they want to push it to Adult Alternative (or was it AAA?) in early November...

 

Wonderful! That will do just fine, it meets our criteria if that's the case.

 

I agree. When I hear a new McCartney song, I am always careful to not expect a "New Beatles Song." I just listen to it and decide if I like it as A SONG. And this one is pretty good, imo. Nice.

I wonder if the movie is any good and where this song fits in it. He did the title song for Vanilla Sky and the song only played over the end credits. Good movie though.

 

Does somebody or some company still promote this kind of music?

 

Electric Arguments was a great example of an elder artist taking their "aged" voice and adapting it to suit the music. I'll never forget hearing "Nothing Too Much Just Outta Sight" and thinking I had accidentally cued up a Tom Waits track by mistake. I would compare EA to Dylan's Time Out of Mind in the respect that they both debuted a more worn voice than fans were used to, but used their new limitations to great effect for those particular sets of songs. The new Paul song is indeed great, but yes his voice does seem out of place for this kind of material now, especially after doing such a 180 with EA. Still glad to have it though!

 

I'm not wild about it. He used to have melodies that made the song seem so familiar on the first listen. Now it takes a few listens before you can get into it. Anyway, it's much better than Vanilla Sky.

 

I much prefer Vanilla Sky!

 

It's always weird with Paul, the first time you hear it you go hmm weird chord change there, why does he do that? And you feel a little but unexcited about it. But once you play it two more times or so, you start loving it and it's like it always been there!

 

I hear Melodyne (other pitch correction software) 'artifacts' on his voice, just like on some "Memory Almost Full" songs. If you edit the 'modulation' with that software, it's sounds a little bit like the artifacts of 'time stretching'.

But if you don't hear it: Let it stay that way, it can ruin the enjoying experience of this lovely new McCartney song .

 

Per David Kahne, Meldoyne was only used on one song on Memory Almost Full, Feet in the Clouds, to create the "vocoder" effect in the middle of the song. He said that he did not want to use it on McCartney's voice anywhere else on the album. He did use it on the *instruments* in places, however!

My ear are very sensitive to the sound of pitch correction and I do not hear it here.

 

In another era, this song would have been given to Ringo.

It's a bit repetitive and could use something else in the middle to break it up - a little monotonous for McCartney. I'm betting this sucker lives on the credits.

 

Hm, interesting. But songs like ""See Your Sunshine" are definitely having that 'time stretching' sound like I described. And the vocals on that track are sounding like he's singing in a sock anyway.

Btw, I don't hear any of that on "Electric Arguments", not even on the multi-tracks on the bonus DVD, and he sings fantastic on that album.

 

I quite liked it.

 

It's a really good song.

 

The more I listen, the more it grows on me.

 

I agree.

There are some interesting similarities between the current work of Paul McCartney, and his pal/peer..Brian Wilson, IMO. I'll use "Midnight's Another Day" as my example of a Brian Wilson ballad here.

Both of these ballad style songs don't have the tight, instantly compelling hooks and style of their earlier work. Both songs melodies are more linear, for lack of a better word on my part. What I'm trying to express is..the melodies follow a longer, straighter path and take longer to develop than their earlier "catchier" work. Whether this is a natural development of their styles, or a weakening of melodic sense after writing so many songs and getting patted on the back for forty plus years is hard to say.

It takes me more listens to grasp the "hooks" these days, and some people probably don't give the music that time for the songs to grow on them. I can understand that. There is a beauty in both kinds of writing though.

Also, both of them sound pretty far removed from their "Sixties" voices at this point. I am a huge fan of BOTH of them and their work though. I would rather hear either of them with their "current" voices than 99% of the other singers in the world. Again, maybe that's just me. Some others may not care for the songs or vocal styles at this point.

 

I love it! I love the string work!! Awesome chord changes!!

 

Very nice.

Well they're in step with the times really. Attention has generally shifted from the melody more or less defining the song towards words, the beat, words, sometimes chord changes and words. A melody is more apt to be used in service to the lyrics and beat than to have a tightly structured melody that defines the time and to which words are set. Kind of two ways of putting it but I'm still not sure it's making sense. You won't find new songs like 'Unforgettable' or 'She's Leaving Home' anymore but you wouldn't have heard these then. Definitely trade-offs as there are strengths and weaknesses to either approach. One can often find excellent, interesting lyrics but many songs tend to ramble on melodically, frankly, and can be hard to recall without recalling the lyric. Paul happens to be strongly oriented to melody so it offsets some of it, but it's not surprising that the lyrics are more memorable than the melody, that's been a broad "trend" for a generation or two now.

 

This song is a b-side...if it's lucky. Come on folks, this is a stinker.

 

Love the song. Its fabulous we get this kind of music from Paul at his age.

His voice doesn't bother me except in the very beginning where it sounds a bit shaky.

I think that his film songs are always very good and interesting...

 

Sorry to be a kill joy, but Macca's voice is so frail and fragile on this Randy Newman type movie ballad.

 

haha, reminds me of that twitter site that was going around, "S*** my dad says," which had the line, "who is this? Kate Beckinsale? Well you can tell Kate Beckinsale she sucks".

 

has anyone worked out the chord changes