Flaming Pie

by

Paul McCartney

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Trite or not, cruel or not, James Paul McCartney creates better under stress and in emotional pain. Only months after this CD was released, the new Knight Bachelor lost the only woman he believed he'd ever love. Surely, even though the press was being assured Linda was "fine", she wasn't, the fact of her illness was informing his work.

Just as "McCartney" was created during the hazy period he was trying to define himself after the Beatles, and "McCartney II" surfaced after his jail experience in Japan, "Flaming Pie" shows a more vulnerable, less cheeky McCartney, and with good results.

Unlike a lot of Wings albums, or "Tug of War" or "Pipes of Peace", this album doesn't just yield one or two songs for the "It's got a beat AND you can dance to it!" crowd. Instead, the lyrics reign here, introspective, haunting at times.

Not that some of the songs don't rock! How could they not with Jeff Lynne and Steve Miller helping out? Even fellow Two-tle, Ringo, helps out with Beautiful Night. But since it's his voice in addition to drums, that's an element of sentiment, not one of quality.

The unusual production of some cuts, like the Victrola in "Souvenir", reminds one of the days the Beatles were experimenting with all kinds of sound at Abbey Road.

My one disappointment about this CD happened a couple years after its release. "Little Willow" shows up here, dedicated to a friend who'd died of cancer and her children. Only a bit of detective work would reveal that this friend was Maureen Starkey, Ringo's ex-wife, and the kids Lee and Zak. But after Princess Diana was killed and a memorial album put together for her, the song Paul "donated" in her memory was...."Little Willow." This was puzzling, maybe even disturbing.

Seeing beaming Sir Paul stroll in pictures with his new wife Heather and baby Beatrice, one can't help but feel happiness for him. But I must confess, sometimes I wonder if a bit, just a bit, of stress or hardship could come his way to promote that creativity; nothing major, just a stubbed toe or lost set of keys or something. Because he hasn't recorded anything as good as "Pie" since.

Oh, if you're wondering...Beatleoligists will remember that when John Lennon was asked to write in "Mersey Beat" how the Beatles got their name, and wrote, "A man in a flaming pie came and said, 'You shall be Beatles with an 'A'". So the name is a nod to John, and to the Beatles...of whom McCartney just may be the biggest fan.

Flaming Pie was very well received by fans and critics alike upon it's release, coming on the heels of The Beatles Anthology, Paul was definitely on the upswing.

I can understand why the praise for this album was so fullsome as it contains some textbook McCartney moments.

The first single 'Young Boy' is a nice bouncy pop song recorded in collaboration with Steve Miller. I've never really been a fan of Paul's collaborations with others (except the Elvis Costello one!) and this one really doesn't do much for me either. It's a very strong song but it doesn't really pull up any trees for me musically.

The rest of the album to me can be spilt into two sections. The very very good and the distinctly average.

The good far outweighs the bad though.

'The Songs We Were Singing' opens the album and is quite an epic production in the 'Tug Of War' mould, building up from a simple acoustic guitar backing to a climactic end with military style drumming. Excellent start.

'The World Tonight' follows this up and is a bit of a rocker that could fit nicely on any Wings album. Again a great song.

There are also an abundance of classic McCartney acoustic numbers in 'Somedays', 'Little Willow', 'Calico Skies' and 'Great Day' - all of which are gorgeous and are up there with some of the best things Paul has written.

'Heaven On A Sunday' is a very nice laid back ballad with some gorgeous backing vocals. Nice to listen to on a sunny English Summers day with an ice cream I would think!

The title track is a piano based rocker with some fun lyrics similar in feel to 'Fine Line' from the 'Chaos & Creation..' album.

'Souvenir' is another of Paul's gospel tinged ballads. An interesting production with a fantastic vocal performance. This would be nice to see live!

The album really climaxes with the big production number 'Beautiful Night' a melody right out of the top drawer which features all the bells and whistles (Ringo, George Martin score, extended singalong ending). It all works extremely well and really drives the album home ('Great Day' is a nice little way to return to earth and close the album).

Now, everything excellent up to that point. So why just the 3.5 stars??

I have always kind of had a problem with listening to this album as a whole. To me it is too long. There are songs on here that I feel really let the rest of the album down. 'Really Love You' and 'Used To Be Bad' are basically just jams that ended up on the album. Neither of them are bad but they really should have just been b-sides. They don't really fit the overall mood of the album and to me disrupt the flow. 'If You Wanna' is another mid paced track that I could live without. Nice enough but not of the same quality of the tracks around it.

And as much as I like Jeff Lynne I feel that some of the production here is a bit pedestrian and generic. Some of the songs could lend themselves to more interesting arrangements. It's a minor quibble - the quality of the majority of the tracks more than makes up for this.

So I'm probably in the minority of people that prefer 'Off The Ground' to 'Flaming Pie'. Sure, the songs on FP are generally of better quality than those on OTG, but I feel that OTG hangs together better as an album than FP.

That said though, there are some absolute classic McCartney moments here and it is an essential purchase for the collection.