McCartney, Cash, and Starr

I doubt than an iconic English musician needs a push from me. But here it is anyway.

Paul McCartney's latest single, Days We Left Behind, may be his best song in decades. Sentimental without being cloying, it's an intimate reflection on his personal history yet with feelings with which we can all relate. His weak, tired voice adds depth, giving the song a bit of an ethereal, other worldly sound. It's not unlike Johnny Cash's voice fatigue in Ain't No Grave. Wistful, yet powerful.

He and fellow Beatle Ringo Starr release a duet this Friday, Home to Us. Although they've sung and performed together frequently since the Fab Four split, it's their first full on duet. I'm looking forward to it.

Ringo by the way has had some good stuff lately too. Here's Look Up from 2025 if you're interested.

The All Starrs

Well, he doesn't bill them as an All Starr band for nothing. Along with Ringo this past Saturday were:

Steve Lukather and Warren Ham from Toto. They performed Roseanna, Africa, and, one of my all time favorite rockers, Hold the Line.

Colin Hay from Men at Work. The band did Overkill, Who Can it be Now?, and Down Under.

Hamish Stuart from the Average White Band, who led everyone in Pick Up the Pieces and Cut the Cake.

Edgar Winter. I thought I liked alliteration; he killed his intros to everyone on stage with it! Of course, the band played Winter's Frankenstein, which may just have the coolest guitar intro ever. If interested, have a listen: Frankenstein It rocked the Masonic.

Ringo Starr and his All Starr Band. Great, great show.

Ringo Sings

Ringo Starr and his All Starr Band put on an excellent show this past Saturday in Detroit. It opened with Ringo doing a cover of Carl Perkins' rockabilly classic Matchbox. He had done the song as a Beatle and I've always loved it. It really got the crowd going, which I guess was the point, eh?

Ringo did several of his standards from both his Beatle and solo days, all of which you would expect. Octopus's Garden, Boys (the crowd, including yours truly, got well into the bop-shu-wop, bop-bop-shu-whop) Act Naturally, A Little Help From My Friends (in part directed as a thank you towards his All Starrs), and, of course, Yellow Submarine, which had great audience participation. He also sang What Goes On from the Beatles. It's the only Beatles song credited to Lennon-McCartney-Starkey, he pointed out to the crowd, and a pretty good B-side to the Nowhere Man single.

From his solo days came It Don't Come Easy, Back Off Boogaloo, I'm the Greatest (written by John Lennon, who thought Ringo would bring the right attitude to a self effacing tune) and Photograph. A lot of people sang along with these standards; it added great enjoyment to the concert air.

Ringo clearly picked things to please the crowd. And you know what? He did. 

All right, I haven't been to many concerts at all. But this was absolutely the best.

Sir Richard

I don't have a bucket list, but that doesn't mean there aren't things I like to do. One of those happened last night. I saw Beatle drummer Ringo Starr perform.

The Beatles have always been my favorite band. Since they had broke up when I was 10 there was never an opportunity to see them as an act. Yet even seeing one of them live was not something I ever imagined.

Well, me son and daughter in law solved that. I can't thank Charlie and Tarina enough for the tickets. It was a great show - more on that later; any decent blog writer knows it's advantageous to stretch his material - and a greater treat than I would have expected to actually see a music legend perform in concert.

Sir Richard Starkey, Ringo's real name and title (he's been knighted, you know) did some standards and played drums on several others. Again, more on that in due time. But, man, I saw a Beatle live. That was pretty cool.

Post Beatles

My favorite John Lennon post Beatles song is Instant Karma! 

George Harrison? I would go with his cover Got my Mind Set on You.

Band on the Run for Sir Paul.

And with Ringo Starr, it would be Oh My My.

I just thought I'd share that with you this morning. I know you've been curious.