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Jan 06, 2003, 02:05 PM
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0301040208jan04,1,300974.story
Getting better all the time
January 4, 2003
As the Beatles go, Paul McCartney was always known as the cute one. But maybe we've been selling him short all these years. Maybe he's also the wise one.
McCartney's been on a concert tour of the United States and now, at age 60, he's figured out some important things.
"I should be jaded at my age, I should be blase, I should hate the whole thing and have retired years ago," he told The New York Times. "But it's the opposite. I do two and a half hours onstage . . . and this is so satisfying. It's kind of amazing. You get people and their children. You get tears. I saw on our DVD an older gentleman, probably my age, deeply moved by `All My Loving.'"
There's something satisfying about that, and it's more than nostalgia. After all these years as a larger than life rock icon, McCartney's moved into more human-sized territory. He's growing old gracefully--not an easy thing for a rock star.
In recent years, he's had his share of loss. In 1998 his wife Linda died of cancer, the disease that claimed George Harrison last year. Of course, John Lennon has been gone since a crazed fan shot him in 1980. Now Paul's Beatle-cut is modified somewhat, and it's suspiciously dark, but the face is unmistakable. Funny thing: When he's just talking, he looks his age. But on stage, singing, he looks at least a decade younger.
McCartney and Lennon had a bitter, public feud over the breakup of the band and for years McCartney made a point of not singing Beatles songs. Now he's singing them in concert, because, he tells an interviewer, "these songs are my babies."
At his age, McCartney could be doing absolutely nothing. He's got tons of money, a lovely new wife, and nothing left to prove. Instead, he's continued to write and sing, even when the reviews of some of his efforts over the past two decades were caustic.
But now it's a different McCartney. He's more at ease. He's not trying too hard. Unlike another rocker of his generation, Mick Jagger, he's not trying to prove he's still 18.
Now, onstage, McCartney connects with the past. He strums a ukulele and sings a tune as a tribute to Harrison. And more tellingly, after years of resisting public tributes to Lennon, he wrote a song called "Here Today," a ballad mourning the loss of Lennon. "I still remember how it was before," the song goes. "And I am holding back the tears no more . . . I love you."
He admitted to a National Public Radio interviewer that sometimes as he is singing the song, he chokes up. "I'm no longer ashamed of being emotional," he said. "When I was 18, that was like the biggest crime a guy could commit. `You cried?' Well, now it's like, `Yeah and why not?' That's pretty sad stuff, you know, losing a friend like John or losing Linda after all those years, or George. So I'm comfortable with that."
When McCartney compares the Beatles to every other rock band of that era, you can hear the echoes of Lennon's famous comment about the Beatles being more popular than Christ.
"Is it conceited to say we were better than all the other groups? Maybe it is. But listen to songs like Eleanor Rigby and Penny Lane. We were better."
And in many ways, McCartney's getting better all the time.
Copyright © 2003, Chicago Tribune
Getting better all the time
January 4, 2003
As the Beatles go, Paul McCartney was always known as the cute one. But maybe we've been selling him short all these years. Maybe he's also the wise one.
McCartney's been on a concert tour of the United States and now, at age 60, he's figured out some important things.
"I should be jaded at my age, I should be blase, I should hate the whole thing and have retired years ago," he told The New York Times. "But it's the opposite. I do two and a half hours onstage . . . and this is so satisfying. It's kind of amazing. You get people and their children. You get tears. I saw on our DVD an older gentleman, probably my age, deeply moved by `All My Loving.'"
There's something satisfying about that, and it's more than nostalgia. After all these years as a larger than life rock icon, McCartney's moved into more human-sized territory. He's growing old gracefully--not an easy thing for a rock star.
In recent years, he's had his share of loss. In 1998 his wife Linda died of cancer, the disease that claimed George Harrison last year. Of course, John Lennon has been gone since a crazed fan shot him in 1980. Now Paul's Beatle-cut is modified somewhat, and it's suspiciously dark, but the face is unmistakable. Funny thing: When he's just talking, he looks his age. But on stage, singing, he looks at least a decade younger.
McCartney and Lennon had a bitter, public feud over the breakup of the band and for years McCartney made a point of not singing Beatles songs. Now he's singing them in concert, because, he tells an interviewer, "these songs are my babies."
At his age, McCartney could be doing absolutely nothing. He's got tons of money, a lovely new wife, and nothing left to prove. Instead, he's continued to write and sing, even when the reviews of some of his efforts over the past two decades were caustic.
But now it's a different McCartney. He's more at ease. He's not trying too hard. Unlike another rocker of his generation, Mick Jagger, he's not trying to prove he's still 18.
Now, onstage, McCartney connects with the past. He strums a ukulele and sings a tune as a tribute to Harrison. And more tellingly, after years of resisting public tributes to Lennon, he wrote a song called "Here Today," a ballad mourning the loss of Lennon. "I still remember how it was before," the song goes. "And I am holding back the tears no more . . . I love you."
He admitted to a National Public Radio interviewer that sometimes as he is singing the song, he chokes up. "I'm no longer ashamed of being emotional," he said. "When I was 18, that was like the biggest crime a guy could commit. `You cried?' Well, now it's like, `Yeah and why not?' That's pretty sad stuff, you know, losing a friend like John or losing Linda after all those years, or George. So I'm comfortable with that."
When McCartney compares the Beatles to every other rock band of that era, you can hear the echoes of Lennon's famous comment about the Beatles being more popular than Christ.
"Is it conceited to say we were better than all the other groups? Maybe it is. But listen to songs like Eleanor Rigby and Penny Lane. We were better."
And in many ways, McCartney's getting better all the time.
Copyright © 2003, Chicago Tribune