Paul McCartney - The Boys Of Dungeon Lane

Paul McCartney’s solo material is a series of peaks and troughs, often serving as a recalibration of a true musical North when he’s called time on his groups. ‘McCartney I’ and ‘Ram’ emerged in the demise of The Beatles in the early ‘70s, and ‘McCartney II’ wriggled from the ashes of Wings in 1980. Since then, Macca’s solo career has gifted us with a strong album at a rate of roughly once, sometimes twice a decade.


Any patchiness that arises is often a result of misplaced taste or trend-chasing rather than lack of imagination; that’s something he incredibly appears seldom short of. Some of 2018’s ‘Egypt Station’ was dressed in pop tropes of the era, and while not a bad record, the chipmunked vocals that crept up on some tunes like ‘Fuh You’ came off a little goofy, a tag that has stalked McCartney multiple times in his career (just see those bright cardigans in the ’80s). And there’s proof he doesn’t disagree. There’s a great moment in an extended cut of ‘Man On The Run’ - a documentary looking back on his post-Beatles era - where he’s reunited with one of his daft creations, Robbie The Robot. All wires and copper, looking as if it had been nicked from a ’60s Doctor Who set, Robbie would emerge while Wings were onstage to kickstart ‘Goodnight Tonight’. After shuffling it around the room a couple of times as an 83 year old, he reflects, “maybe someone should have said: ‘You don’t need that’. We’ve had a few of those”.


It appears he’s listened to that instinct more so than ever now: ‘The Boys of Dungeon Lane’ is a definitive late-career high point. There’s no attempt to keep up with the tenor of the times: in fact, it remains focused on the past. The acoustic strum of ‘Down South’ retraces the hitchhikes he used to take with George Harrison in the ’50s, the stripped back instrumental aping the simple resources they likely had access to at the time: “It was a good way to get to know you,” he touchingly offers to his old bandmate. Cast a glance over the credits and you’ll see McCartney’s fingerprints all over the tunes, often tracking multiple instruments himself bar a few flourishes from session musicians or producer Andrew Watt, the go-to gun for hire for octogenarian rockstars, it seems (he also helms The Rolling Stones’ ‘Foreign Tongues’ due later this summer).


Many highlights prod through the tracklisting. Its opener immediately demonstrates McCartney’s melodic mind is operating at a seriously high level, somehow making a pretty tune out of the discordant, askew guitar patterns of ‘As You Lie There’ as it waltzes from spoken word to a heavy riff-littered chorus. The mournful ‘Days We Left Behind’ claws for a lost past, its descending chord sequence binding with the tenderness of McCartney’s aged vocal to summon a gorgeous melancholy. ‘Ripples In A Pond’ is a breezy slice of pop which sounds a little Smiths-y in its chord sequence and guitar tones; ‘Never Know’ is punctured by bubbling backing vocals that nicely lift the instrumental before a tapeloop whirls out of control.


All the strands of the songwriting styles that are weaved throughout his career are lovingly attended to and evolved on the record. ‘Life Can Be Hard’ is the latest addition to McCartney’s canon of old music hall tunes that began with ‘When I’m Sixty Four’. The closing statements of ‘Salesman Saint’ and ‘Momma Get By’ are the most emotionally resonant, pulling together another of his classic storytelling character portraits. Rather than the lonely elderly folks of ‘Eleanor Rigby’ or the girl who went to meet a man from the motortrade on ‘She’s Leaving Home’, it’s his own parents who are affectionately immortalised here. Stirring strings and clarinets circle the refrain of “she loves him with all her heart and soul”.


If it’s a wrap here, then ‘The Boys of Dungeon Lane’ is a fitting closing statement bringing the subjects and hallmarks of his songwriting full circle. Though for a man who can still do head stands and knock out a convincing Little Richard scream at 83, don’t count on this being curtains for McCartney. For the meantime, it’s a pleasure to bask in the effortless melodies that spring from his well.