Who is Paul McCartney? He is an English singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and composer. He gained worldwide fame as a member of the Beatles, one of the most popular and influential bands of all time. His songwriting partnership with John Lennon was the most successful of the 20th century. After the Beatles disbanded in 1970, he pursued a solo career and formed the band Wings with his first wife, Linda Eastman.
Sir Paul McCartney is one of the most popular solo performers of all time, with sales of more than 100 million albums and 60 gold discs. He has written or co-written 32 songs that have reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, and as of 2009, he has had 91 UK number-one singles, more than any other artist in UK history.
Table of Contents:
1. Early Life
2. The Beatles
3. McCartney’s Post-Beatles Work
4. Personal Life
5. Solo Career
6. Band of Wings
7. Later Career
8. Awards and Honours
9. Music Legacy
10. Paul McCartney’s Top Quotes
Early Life:
Paul McCartney was born on 18 June 1942 in Walton Hospital, Liverpool, England, where his mother, Mary Paterson, had qualified to practice as a nurse. His father, James McCartney, was absent from his son’s birth due to his work as a volunteer firefighter during World War II. McCartney has one younger brother, Michael, born seven years after him.
The Beatles:
McCartney became interested in music at an early age. His father, who was a trumpet player and pianist, introduced him to music and encouraged his interest. When he was 14, his father bought him a trumpet, but he was more interested in the guitar. He took guitar lessons from a man named Ivan Vaughan, and soon after, he began to write his own songs.
In 1957, he met John Lennon, a fellow student at Quarry Bank High School, and the two soon became friends. They started a skiffle group called the Quarrymen, which evolved into the Beatles in 1960. McCartney played bass guitar and sang backing vocals. He also wrote or co-wrote many of the group’s hits, including “Yesterday”, “Let It Be”, and “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”.
McCartney’s Post-Beatles Work:
After the Beatles disbanded in 1970, McCartney pursued a solo career and released his first album, McCartney, in 1970. He continued to work with Lennon on various projects, including the albums John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band (1970) and Imagine (1971). He also formed the band Wings with his first wife, Linda Eastman.
McCartney achieved success with his second solo album, Ram (1971), which reached the top of the charts in the UK and the US. He also had success with his third album, Band on the Run (1973), which was nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards.
Personal Life:
McCartney married Linda Eastman in 1969. The couple had three children: Mary, Stella, and James. Linda died of cancer in 1998. McCartney married Heather Mills in 2002, and the couple had one child, Beatrice. They divorced in 2008. McCartney married Nancy Shevell in 2011.
Solo Career:
McCartney has released 18 solo studio albums, including McCartney (1970), Ram (1971), Band on the Run (1973), Tug of War (1982), and Egypt Station (2018). He has also released five live albums, four compilations, and three classical albums.
Band of Wings:
McCartney formed the band Wings with his first wife, Linda Eastman, in 1971. The band released eight studio albums, including Band on the Run (1973), which was nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards. Wings disbanded in 1981.
Later Career:
McCartney has continued to tour and release new music in the 21st century. He has collaborated with artists such as Kanye West, Rihanna, and Lady Gaga. In 2018, he released his eighteenth solo album, Egypt Station.
Awards and Honours:
McCartney has won numerous awards and honours, including 18 Grammy Awards, an Academy Award, and a British Academy Film Award. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Beatles in 1988 and as a solo artist in 1999. In 1997, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for his services to music.
Music Legacy:
McCartney is considered one of the greatest songwriters of all time. He has been praised for his melodic songwriting, inventive bass playing, and vocal harmony arrangements. His songs have been covered by artists such as Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley, and Michael Jackson.
Paul McCartney’s Top Quotes:
”I’m really glad that most of our songs were about love, peace, and understanding.”
”It’s hard to follow my own act. But the only answer to that would be to give up after The Beatles. I only had two alternatives. Give up or carry on.”
”I like the idea that people hear my stuff, and if it’s commercially successful, that’s a good sign that it’s being heard.”
”Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I’m sixty-four?”
”Lyricists play with words.”
”I’m not religious, but I’m very spiritual.”
”There’s nothing as glamorous as a record store to me.”
”If children are studying the 20th century, I’m in their textbooks.”
”Take a sad song and make it better.”
”Having a beard is natural. When you think about it, shaving it off is quite weird.”
”Music is like a psychiatrist. You can tell your guitar things that you can’t tell people. And it will answer you with things people can’t tell you.”
”I feel like I’m running in a figure of eight, don’t know if I’m coming or going, early or late.”
”But with writers, there’s nothing wrong with melancholy. It’s an important color in writing.”
”You can judge a man’s true character by the way he treats his fellow animals.”
”We probably seem to be anti-religious… none of us believe in God.”
”The trouble with fame and riches is that you have more than one guitar.”
”There will be an answer. Let it be.”
”None of us wanted to be the bass player. In our minds, he was the fat guy who always played at the back.”
”I don’t work at being ordinary.”
”I thought the only lonely place was on the moon.”
”I hate the idea of success robbing you of your private life.”
”I have no problem with bootlegs, although every time I say that, my lawyer says, ‘Oh yes you do.’”
”I love the past. There are parts of the past I hate, of course.”
”I don’t ever try to make a serious social comment.”
”Microphones are just like people. They get scared if you shout at them.”
”It’s also not unusual for writers to look backward as that’s your pool of resources.”
”I don’t care too much for money, money can’t buy me love.”
”It gets dangerous when you start believing your own legacy. That’s why I’ve not gone back.”
”To this day, if I ever meet grownups who play ukulele, I love ’em.”
”A hundred years from now, people will listen to the music of The Beatles the same way we listen to Mozart.”
”I found out that love was more than just holding hands.”
”The rumors of my death have been exaggerated greatly.”
”I’m always trying to do better music. I don’t know if I’ve written my best song yet. That’s the big question. It doesn’t stop you from trying.”
”Be cool and you’ll be alright. That’s rock & roll religion.”
”I think that, particularly in the old days, the spirit of The Beatles seemed to suggest something very hopeful and youthful.”
”Fight for the right to live in freedom!”
”She loves you and you know that can’t be bad.”
”I had this song called ‘Helter Skelter’, which is just a ridiculous song. So we did it like that, ‘cuz I like noise.”
”Listen to the color of your dreams.”
”One of my biggest thrills still is sitting down with a guitar or a piano and just out of nowhere trying to make a song happen.”
”There are only four people who knew what The Beatles were about anyway.”
”Hamburg totally wrecked us. I remember getting home to England and my dad thought I was half-dead. I looked like a skeleton, I hadn’t noticed the change, I’d been having such a ball!”
”At the end of The Beatles, I really was done in for the first time in my life.”
”I realized marveling at nature was a deep pleasure of mine.”
”And I loved Fats Waller. I love his instrumental abilities, his vocal abilities, and his sense of humor.”
”Songs have some kind of structure that connects with people’s hearts.”
”I don’t take me seriously. If we get some giggles, I don’t mind.”
”Think globally, act locally.”
”We knew it was coming, but we tried to pretend we didn’t know it was coming.”
”Buy, buy, says the sign in the shop window; Why, why, says the junk in the yard.”
”All the lonely people. Where do they all belong?”
”I think the pop industry is still a young man’s game.”
”For you know that it’s a fool who plays it cool, by making his world a little colder.”
”In the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.”
”Lady Madonna lying on the bed listen to the music playing in your head.”
”I’ve got to admit it’s getting better. It’s a little better all the time.”
”Putting two songs together, I’ve always loved that trick when it works.”
”The thing is, we’re all really the same person. We’re just four parts of the one.”
”It was Elvis who really got me hooked on beat music. When I heard ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ I thought, this is it.”
”There’s nothing you can do that can’t be done.”
”We can work it out. Life is very short, and there’s no time for fussing and fighting, my friend.”
”Love is all you need.”
”And what’s the point of changing when I’m happy as I am?”
”We live in hope of deliverance from the darkness that surrounds us.”
”It’s a powerful thing when you are hearing your friend on a very beautiful song.”
”I saw that Meryl Streep said, ‘I just want to do my job well.’ And really, that’s all I’m ever trying to do.”
”Meditation is a lifelong gift. It’s something you can call on at any time.”
”Sadness isn’t sadness. It’s happiness in a black jacket.”
”Criticism didn’t really stop us and it shouldn’t ever stop anyone, because critics are only the people who can’t get a record deal themselves.”
”She’s lovely, great. She was very friendly. She was just like a mum to us.”
”Nothing pleases me more than to go into a room and come out with a piece of music.”
”If you can play your stuff in a pub, then you’re a good band.”
Somewhere down the line, everyone must pay for their misdeeds.”
”I’d like to be able to go on holiday and not to have to hold my belly in for two whole weeks.”
”The best thing I ever saw was a man who loved his wife.”
”I don’t have any desire to learn. I feel it’s like a voodoo, that it would spoil things if I actually learnt how things are done.”
”If you love your life, everybody will love you too.”
”I used to think anyone doing anything weird was weird. Now I know that it is the people that call others weird that are weird.”
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