Review – The McCartney Years

I read a number of reviews before I could afford to order my copy of Paul’s 3-disk videos and concerts and, despite knowing that rarely does a reviewer cut him any slack, I was a little afraid I’d be disappointed. Well, I wasn’t. Sure, I don’t doubt that some of the video isn’t absolutely tops in every single video and no doubt they were right that the sound quality here and there isn’t perfect – I’ll never know since I don’t have an expensive “home theatre” attached to my inexpensive and far from new TV. (My computer speakers, however, are top notch just in case you’re interested.)

Sure, one or two of the videos appear dated in a way that isn’t fun and I don’t love absolutely every song but all in all, there’s a lot of enjoyment to be had from the collection.  Some are just plain fun, some are thought provoking, some wonderfully illustrate the song and some are utterly off the wall – If I’d thought about what I wanted them to be, those are the words I’d have used. Most of them look like they were fun (as well as hard work) to do and many of them go to very odd and unusual places, mostly places in Paul’s head. It helps that I’ve always enjoyed surrealism.

I’d end up with a rather long list if I named my favorites but I can mention a few: Fine Line, computer “reduced” and animated in … fine lines; Push, with lovely relaxed ride on the underground, Brown-Eyed Handsome Man with the most inventive collection of line dancers ever conceived; Hope of Deliverance with the torches in the dark and of course Coming Up with Paul and Linda taking all the roles. Not to mention that it’s fascinating to watch the years go by – Paul’s years and the changing band but my own years as well.

So maybe there are imperfections; frankly I’ve found perfection to be more then merely rare in this world. My personal opinion is that if you can’t find something to be entertained by on these disks, you’re working awfully hard at being a party-pooper! Don’t miss the “easter eggs” at the beginning and end of each menu choice!! I think that they are repeats on the credits but there’s a lot of film and music lurking on those disks. For instance, Calico Skies plays on the Setup menu of disk 2 with Paul sititng by a fire in the woods with an acoustic guitar. Not, perhaps, a formal video but an enjoyable illustration of one of my favorite songs.

The concert footage I enjoy as well although I notice that by the time they filmed Rockshow, Paul was tired and perhaps worried; strain is very obvious in his face. He must have been tired as well for the performance at Glastonbury but there’s far less strain apparant. The Unplugged footage is completely different with neither wear and tear or worry burdening Paul’s expression. Watching the videos of the original Wings I do feel that Paul was really pushing to bring the band to real success — I’m not going to examine his reasons as they are pretty obvious — and my research indicates that he succeeded quite well. The videos helped me realize that Wings really was a very different band from the Beatles and I can’t help feeling a good bit of respect that Paul could manage to do it without coming across as something synthetic.