Only the most cynical would find something to complain about here, but for those of us who still really love the Beatles, what happened Saturday night was pretty exciting: Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr reunited at David Lynch's “Change Begins Within,” a benefit to bring transcendental meditation to troubled public schools. While they each had their own sets and only played three songs together at the show's end -- "With A Little Help From My Friends," Paul's 1968 ode to TM, "Cosmically Conscious," and "I Saw Her Standing There" -- it sounds like it was an amazing show.
Way back in 2001, Howard Stern conducted a great interview with Paul McCartney. Sir Paul dropped in again today promoting his kick-ass Fireman album. Listen to Howard and Paul talk about Paul's love life, the Beatles, the Fireman and more via the YouTube links below -- before the Internet Police make them disappear.
For those of you who appreciate some finely crafted pop, allow me to introduce you to Emitt Rhodes, a forgotten genius who made one amazing album in 1971, the self titled Emitt Rhodes, in which he sang, played all the instruments, arranged and produced the thing by himself. (As far as I know, the only other people really doing that at the time were Paul McCartney and Todd Rundgren.) Anyways, Rhodes' gift for songcraft (in an admittedly very McCartney-esque fashion) was incredible, as every song on his debut album is filled with hooks, but also some wonderful musicianship and thoughtful lyrics. It's a must-own.
The story for Rhodes after that album's release is actually kind of sad: contracted to deliver one album every 6 months, which he couldn't do since he made the records all by himself, Rhodes was sued by his label. After two more records that were rushed and not up to snuff, Rhodes quit the biz to become an engineer and producer. From the interviews I've read with him, he seems a little crazy, but he did give us one fantastic album.
Don't believe me? Some nice YouTuber compiled four songs from Emitt Rhodes in this one nifty video:
And here's a rare single of Emitt's, the killer "Birthday Lady":
