Getting Closer

Reading The Unknown Paul McCartney by Ian Peel (Coming Soon to a Blogpost Near You) has been a lot of fun. Reading it on Kindle is ideal, because when Mr. Peel mentions a song (which, as you might guess, he does on a regular basis), I can highlight the song title, hit Web Search, and give it a listen courtesy of the You Tub. And I've done that frequently, hearing many things for the first time, most of which I'd never even heard of before. (For instance, the last recording Paul did with John Lennon, a thing called (I shit thee not) A Toot and a Snore in '74. I can't say that it is worth your time (28:46), as it mostly consists of a seriously stoned John Lennon bitching about this and that, but I'm still glad that I have it under my belt. 

Reading the aforementioned book has also made me want to go back and listen to McCartney albums that I haven't listened to in years. Which was a bit of a problem. My love for McCartney has never waned, but my album collection--which once had every Paul McCartney release from McCartney to Pipes of Peace--has, as during some lean years I sold off a couple hundred of my precious vinyls. So when Ian Peel started talking about some of the outré aspects of the Back to the Egg album, I couldn't pull out my vinyl copy of the album and give it a spin. But I could go online and hear it in its entirety. Slightly more than its entirety, as it turns out, since the version I landed on included the extra tracks "Daytime Nighttime Suffering" (which I hadn't even realized was a non-album single, though I did know that it wasn't on the original Back to the Egg), "Wonderful Christmastime, " and "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reggae." (I also found a thing called Back to the Egg Sessions which is 2:33:43 long and includes various different takes on songs, extended versions of songs, and songs which weren't put onto the album...quite a treasure trove. I haven't worked all the way through it yet, but I believe that I shall do that in the near future.) And not only was I impressed with the things that Ian Peel had pointed out, I also re-discovered how much I liked this album. Before being re-introduced to it, my only memory was that I really liked "Rockestra." On giving the album (+) a spin this time, I remembered that I loved every track. And I was especially fond of "Getting Closer."

Paul McCartney sometimes writes stupid or banal lyrics. (And yes, I think that has gotten worse on the later albums.) But he is sometimes just completely out of left field brilliant in my humble, and that is one of the reasons that I love "Getting Closer." Check this out: 

Keeping Ahead Of The Rain On The Road,
Watching My Windscreen Wipers.

Radio Play Me A Danceable Ode,
Cattle Beware Of Snipers.

I mean...WHAT? And then after a round of the chorus--in which he refers to The Object of His Desire as "My Salamander," by the way-- he goes here:

Hitting The Chisel And Making A Joint,
Glueing My Fingers Together.
Radio Play Me A Song With A Point,
Sailor Beware Of Weather.

Yeah...that's how you do it, man. The high point for me will always be "Cattle Beware Of Snipers," but I love all of it. And on top of that, this is a really snappy little song...with a pretty decently hard rockin' edge to it.

Here, give it a listen and see what you think:

 

Mmm-hmm? 

Thank you, You Tub. Sure wish I still had that album, though. It's like Holden Caulfield said, "Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody." Except with albums.