Paul McCartney turns 80 without thinking about retirement, offering concerts and releasing new albums

Think about this, imagine it for a moment: you are 27 years old and you are part of the most famous rock band in the world, for which you play bass, sing and write songs. You integrate a fruitful and successful creative tandem with the first guitarist of your group. But you’re fed up. You just got married, you feel harassed and overwhelmed, the climate between the four members is dense and oppressive. You leave the city, you take refuge in the mountains, in your marriage, in whiskey and marijuana, until your wife tells you “Enough”. One day you pick up the guitar, another day you write a song and so, little by little, your crisis ends and the joy of music returns. It’s the story of how Paul MCCARTNEY he knew how to declare his creative independence outside the lap of the Beatles, producing one of the first indie albums in history, McCartney, in which he played all the instruments and only had the help of Linda Eastman, his wife, on the choirs.

READ ALSO: Charlie Watts died at the age of 80: Paul McCartney and his farewell to the Rolling Stones drummer

At the age when many great rock stars, such as Janis, Brian Jones, Hendrix or Jim Morrison, had already left this world, Paul laid the foundations for the new stage of his life, already far from the Fab Four, which it also meant away from the direct influence of John Lennon. This, although officially the group continued together for a few more months, until April 1970. That self-managed album –with jewels like Maybe I’m Amazed- was one of the most important steps for the future of his artistic career.

“We were four against the world. We constantly got into very strange situations and we only had each other to try to deal with them as best we could.”, McCartney said in 2021 about his former partners, already far from any of the resentments that made them separate.

A long and winding road

The nearly 10 years he spent with them were enough to make him one of the most influential musicians in rock history. Songs like Yesterday, Hey Jude, Let it Be or All My Loving corroborate this. And his work with Wings, Band on the Run, Mull of Kintyre or Live and Let Die included, reaffirms him as a versatile composer, capable of amalgamating pop, rock or even reggae, disco or new wave to turn his lyrics and melodies into songs. diaphanous, powerful or playful, medals capable of shining in the solitude of a room or on the radios of the entire planet, as confirmed by their eighties hits with Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder, Say, Say, Say and Ebony & Ivory, as well as Hope of Deliverance, a solo song from the 90s, among many others. At the end of 2020 he released McCartney III and 2021 McCartney III Imagined -same songs in the hands of other artists, such as Damon Albarn or Beck-, whose single was the surprising Find My Way, which he recorded together with the latter and in whose video he was you can see playing, as in his first album from 1970, all the instruments. Almost 3.5 million views show, in the same way that when talking about him and always mentioning John, George and Ringo, that he honors the anthem of his hometown team, Liverpool, to which they sing You Never Walk Alone. At 80 years old, Paul McCartney proves that he will never walk alone. As long as rock continues to rock hair and light up parties, that’s how it will be.

Think about this, imagine it for a moment: you are 80 years old and you will always continue to be part of the most famous band in the world –excuse the Stones-.

At the close of this article, Bon Jovi had just sang Happy Birthday to him live at a concert on his Get Back tour, in New Jersey, before 50,000 people. Today, Saturday, the whole world sings it. As in that song from the White Album, they will tell him: You say it’s your birthday/ It’s my birthday too, yeah.