Punky Paulie

Paul McCartney may seem an unlikely influence for the punk movement and yet it was from the, always most visible, Beatle that The Ramones got their name - Paul Ramone being a short lived stage name for McCartney when the Beatles were themselves punkish kids. Today The Sunday Mail gives away a quite unique CD - a recording of the live concert Paul gave in The Amoeba Record Store in California.

The artwork on the CD was designed by McCartney himself and this is no cheap newspaper give-away - the sound quality is of the highest standard and the performance, well, it's done by a man with over forty years experience who seems to be getting younger with each gallon of hair dye. True, these days McCartney may look like Angela Lansbury from mid-period, Murder she Wrote, but he can still rock with the best of them.

12 tracks on the CD and the newspaper also carries Dylan Jones' interview with the one time mop top.

McCartney, whilst always guarded, reveals some interesting insights into what it must be like to be rock royalty. But even now, after all these years, McCartney can still make mistakes - just when the image of middle of the road crooner seems to be fading, and a post Glastonbury revaluation occurring, he goes and appears on that most un-hip of shows,the squarest of the square screen, the Cowell cash machine, The Karaoke Factor.

"The X-Factor polarised a lot of people. Lots of my friends told me not to do it. But Beyonce was on it and if it's good enough for her then it's good enough for me."

Yes. All very amusing, Paul but can anyone imagine the cool Beatles, John or George, doing the show? True, Ringo would do it in a flash, turning up at the studio on Thomas the Tank Engine, no doubt. But then that's Ringo for you - I'm not giving any-more autographs, mind!

That's okay, big nose. Don't want one.

Come to think of it - that Sir, thingie is a load of bollocks too. Would it have ever been Sir Working Class Hero? Hmm, I wonder. But I digress - that's a gripe for another time, but if it was up to me I'd make it illegal for ageing rock stars to go all establishment.

Give Ireland back to the Irish, might have never been recorded.




Though there is something quite delicious in the fact that this man - a self confessed drug user, a man who once spent time slammed up in the Japanese slammer for carrying a lump of pot the size of a small island through customs, should be honoured in a way that many years ago, was reserved for people who killed people. And don't get me started on Mick Jagger.


Still - McCartney's always been the media darling of the Beatles, something that hasn't always worked in his favour. Indeed it is this appalling lack of judgement that has given him the image of, rich old fart, with the Lennon loving youth the world over. But we can forgive this particular fool on the hill - after all, in recent years he's given us some stunning albums, Chaos and Creation and Electric Arguments to name but two as well as dominating Glastonbury. And that's not to mention the fact that he kept the readers of Hello Magazine enthralled, with his short lived marriage to old Long John Heather Silver.


Ahh well, don't stop and rock on. The free CD is excellent so thanks for that Mr Ramone.

A splendid time is guaranteed for all.