Thursday night (April 16), Paul McCartney gave a magical, mystery tour through his new solo album, The Boys of Dungeon Lane, for 30 fans.
Hosted at producer Andrew Watt’s newly christened Diamond Dust studio in Sherman Oaks, McCartney and Watt described the making of the album track by track before playing each song. In between, an animated McCartney regaled the audience with stories about his fellow Beatles, before playing a handful of deeply nostalgic songs.
Overall, the album, which comes out May 29 on Capitol Records, is delightfully Beatle-esque in parts in terms of melodies, instrumentation, bold tempo and stylistic changes and, of course, McCartney’s vocals, which sound by turns sturdy and robust and then delicate and vulnerable. Watt stressed that for the most part (other than the strings and orchestration), McCartney played all the instruments on the album, including drums…though he got a very able assist from Ringo Starr on one track: “I said [to Watt], ‘Are you going to get Chad [Smith]?’ And he said, ‘Why don’t you have a go?’ And I did!”
“No one else can do that,” Watt said of McCartney’s multi-instrument prowess. A modest McCartney replied, “A few people can do it,” before taking a beat and cutely tilting his head and adding, “but not many.”
The superfans were shuttled from the Capitol Records Tower to the studio, and while McCartney’s presence hadn’t been promised, when the fans (and three journalists) entered the small room and saw two burgundy velvet chairs with three acoustic guitars lined up behind them, flanked by two large speaker stacks, anticipation rose that McCartney would definitely make an appearance.
Shortly before 7 p.m. PT., Watt, McCartney and McCartney’s wife, Nancy Shevell, entered the room, with McCartney miming playing the guitar. “We’re going to play the album and we’re going to explain how we made it,” McCartney said, adding, “Welcome my missus, Nancy.”
And that’s exactly what happened. For close to 90 minutes, a delightfully loquacious McCartney dived into the making of the album, starting with how he met the 35-year old Grammy-Award winning Watt, who has become the go-to producer for legendary artists, including the Rolling Stones, Elton John and the late Ozzy Osbourne, after producing such acts as Justin Bieber, Post Malone and Miley Cyrus.
McCartney met Watt for a “cup of tea,” but they immediately began noodling around and trading licks and “I’m like, ‘okay, we’re going to work together,” McCartney said. “Sometimes, I like to find a crazy chord and [find] maybe that will inspire me,” he said, grabbing an acoustic guitar from behind him to replicate the chord. The small audience burst into applause, leading McCartney to joke, “it wasn’t that good.” From there, they came up with the opening track and began working on the album, which was recorded in Los Angeles and England.
“When I first met Andrew, I thought, ‘He’s a bit pushy,’” McCartney said. “And he is, but that’s what you want in a producer. You don’t want a shrinking violet.”
Below are the songs on the album, McCartney’s first solo set since 2020, with some of his comments on each. As every tune played, McCartney mouthed almost every word or would sometimes play air drums, and Watt, who smartly ceded the floor to McCartney, would often play air guitar.
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“As You Lie There”
The song that came from that first tea meeting was inspired by McCartney’s childhood in Liverpool, England and a neighbor girl. “I really fancied named Jasmine,” McCartney said, looking at his wife and adding, “Sorry, Nancy.” The tune starts as a spoken word track, before going into a sweet, then rocking melody, that changes tempo and shape shift throughout. “Do I ever cross your mind as you lie there?” he asks. “As you lie across the bed, am I there inside your head?”
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“Lost Horizon”
The late Eddie Klein, who worked with the Beatles at Abbey Road and then with McCartney at his studio in Sussex, England, found the track that McCartney said he didn’t remember writing or recording. In England, “we produced it exactly like the cassette,” McCartney said, and then brought it to Los Angeles to add guitar parts. The chugging, mid-tempo track is a nostalgic look back, with lyrical reminders that “time makes every moment count” and “you gotta live for now.”
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“Days We Left Behind”
The first single, released a few weeks ago, is a gentle sentimental nod to his past. “It’s my memories of Liverpool,” McCartney said. “Dungeon Lane was near where I lived, me and George [Harrison]. I would get the bus and the next stop, he’d get on. We’d talk about guitars and rock ‘n’ roll. It was all coming in. It was all arriving.” McCartney also talked about going down to the Mersey shore. “I was a big bird watcher,” he said, drawing a laugh as the audience assumed he meant girl watcher, using the British slang. “No,” McCartney said, indicated he really meant the winged variety.
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“Ripples In a Pond”
A very upbeat song with McCartney’s vocals pushed front and center and with a bouncy pop production before delving into a spacy, inventive bridge. Written for and about Shevell, McCartney changed the song from third person, “she” to second person, “you,” to personalize it more for his wife. During the playback, McCartney even looked straight at his wife of 15 years as he mouthed lyrics including, “I love you more than I ever did before.” McCartney recorded the song in England and then sent it Watt to make it bouncier and dancier.
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“Mountaintop”
Produced with tape loops, the spacy song is from the perspective of a young girl tripping out with her friends at a music festival. McCartney’s voice is almost unrecognizable in the dreamy song that sounds like a cousin to “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.” After singing about how everyone’s tripping, McCartney adds, “everyone’s flipping/need to get a grip and get away, or do you want to stay.” The adventurous tune, which bursts into psychedelic warp speed at one point with pounding guitars and drums, would sound even more experimental if it weren’t created by the person who, with his friends 70 years ago, completely invented a new language for rock ‘n’ roll.
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“Down South”
Perhaps the most nostalgic song on the album prompted a revealing story about how McCartney used to hitchhike with both Harrison and John Lennon, often by grabbing a ride with a lorry (truck) driver and heading to Wales or southern England around Exeter. He recalled how once he and Harrison were in Wales and had hopped a ride “in a milk truck. George in the middle. He was sitting right on the battery. George jumped up,” McCartney said, acting it out. “He had jeans with a zip on the back and it connected with the battery! [Later] he showed me the zip mark [burned onto his body].”
McCartney also took the time to poke fun at Lennon pretending to be poorer than he was. “John always used to say — bless him — that he was a working-class hero,” before he added the Lennon actually had some very “posh” relatives. “Ringo really was working class. George and I were kind of working class,” McCartney said, recalling the time he and Lennon hitchhiked to Paris and one of Lennon’s relatives gave him £100, which they spent very quickly.
The charming song, rooted in an acoustic guitar, is the literal story on McCartney and Harrison meeting on the bus and growing into hitchhiking friends. “It was a good way to get to know you before we learned ‘Twist & Shout,’” he sings.
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“We Two”
The album contains many inventive twists and turns, but perhaps none more endearing than the creation of this stripped-down tune. As McCartney explained, when EMI got purchased by Thorn Electrical in 1979, the buyer wanted to purge all the equipment from Abbey Road (which EMI owned at the time).
McCartney got a lot of the old studio equipment, including a Studer four-track tape machine that the Beatles recorded many of their classics on, the harmonium played on “We Can Work It Out” and the spinet used on “Because.”
Because the Studer could only record four tracks, the Beatles employed a technique called “bouncing down,” which would quickly mix two tracks down to one to free up tracks. McCartney said “I and Ringo would be on bass and drums, which would take up two tracks and then we’d bounce it down to one track. You had to get it right because you couldn’t get it back.” In England, Watt and McCartney wrote the sweet love song, “We Two,” to record on the Studer and bounced down the tracks. “We’re particularly proud of the snare drum” on the record, McCartney said, of the song that ends with the sound of the track playing backwards.
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“Come Inside”
One of the album’s pure rock tunes had the audience clapping along with McCartney giving little explanation. “It’s basically a rocker. Not a lot I can say about it. Just play it,” he said to Watt, who was calling up the songs on his laptop. The driving tune includes the message, “Open up your mind/open up your heart/nothing else is keeping us apart.”
“That sounds nice,” McCartney said, concurring with the audience.
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“Never Know”
“I was out in California. I’ve always loved that Laurel Canyon vibe of the ‘70s. I was playing guitar trying to get that vibe. This is me trying to do that,” McCartney said of the dense, heavy tune that then veers into a clarinet and then turns heavy again, with McCartney sounding a little like Lennon vocally.
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“Home To Us”
Beatle fans will go nuts for this nostalgic track that features Ringo Starr on drums and Starr and McCartney trading vocals line by line as they sing about growing up. But it didn’t come together without some confusion, McCartney explained.
“I saw Ringo and said I worked with this guy Andrew. Ringo came over to Andrew’s studio and played a little bit of drums,” he explained, but then things went slightly off the rails with misunderstandings. Starr thought he’d given Watt enough to create a song, but was “a bit pissed,” McCartney says when it wasn’t enough. McCartney really liked Starr’s contribution and created a song around growing up in Liverpool. “Even though where we lived was a little rough, it was home to us,” McCartney said.
McCartney sent the demo to Starr and asked him to sing on it and, misunderstanding, Starr only sang on the chorus, leading McCartney to think Starr didn’t like the song. Eventually, they talked through everything, and Starr came back, added more drums and the two turned the song into true collaboration.
“Ringo’s never done a duet with one of the Beatles,” McCartney said with a laugh. Not surprising, it’s probably the most Beatle-esque track on the album, with tempo shifts, key changes and layered vocals with assists from the Pretenders’ Chrissie Hynde and Texas’ Sharleen Spiteri.
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“Life Can Be Hard”
A sweet love song written during the COVID lockdown which McCartney and Shevell spent with Shevell’s niece, her husband and their new baby. “It was very nice. Every day, [Nancy] would ask if she could wake the baby,” McCartney said, once again grabbing an acoustic guitar. As the crowd cheered, he laughed and said, “I haven’t done anything! Let me try again.” The audience again cheered, leading McCartney to very good-naturedly mutter, “pathetic.”
He demonstrated how he created a gentle melody and then would let the baby strum the strings, leading Shevell’s niece and husband to declare that “it’s our song.” The genial, simple song is meant to inspire hope for the future. “I like that tune,” he said after it played. “It has very good memories.”
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“Star”
McCartney was touring in Costa Rica and had a day off, which he planned to spend lathered up with sunscreen poolside. But it was pouring rain most of the day. So, McCartney decided to write a song instead and came up with “Star,” another uplifting song. “The first star on the night is always special when you see it,” he said. “It always gives me a little hope.” The sweet, melodic acoustic tune stresses “I know my little world is still alright,” upon seeing the first star pop out each night.
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“Salesman Saint”
Another song that is extremely autobiographical features McCartney writing about his father, James, the “salesman” in the story, and his mother Mary, the titular “saint” and a nurse/midwife. The couple met during WWII and McCartney’s dad was also a fireman who would put out fires caused from Germany’s bombing raids.
“We moved outside of Liverpool with our parents making sure me and my brother, Mike, did ok,” McCartney said, praising the resilience that his parents’ generation exuded during tough times. The track opens with a trumpet and builds from there into a heavy tune with time signature shifts and the message in the lyrics of “They couldn’t take anymore, but they had to carry on.”
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“Momma Gets By”
The closing track starts as a lush, dramatic piano ballad that expand to strings and an orchestra. “Sometimes, writing a song, you don’t draw on memory, you’re making it up,” McCartney said, referencing writing “Lady Madonna.” Same with “Momma Gets By,” which includes the opening lines, “Momma gets by, while papa gets high.” But even though papa is a wastrel, Momma loves him with “all her heart and soul,” as they struggle to put food on the table. McCartney sings from the perspective of their young son, though he stressed again this was not about his parents.
Following the conclusion, McCartney noted how no one theme dominates the album (though nostalgia is a pretty recurring them), and that he worried about lack of cohesion. “Then you remember the Beatles albums. We didn’t worry about that,” he said with a little smile.
