CC00012: Paul McCartney
Submitted by lbangs on Tue, 02/20/2001 - 10:24
Tags:
- Band on the Run (8.5)
- All the Best [US] (8.5)
- McCartney (7.5)
- Flaming Pie (7.5)
- Ram (7)
- Wings Greatest (6.5)
- Venus & Mars (6)
- Flowers in the Dirt (6)
- Choba B CCCP (5)
- Red Rose Speedway (5)
- Wings Over America [live] (5)
- McCartney II (5)
- Standing Stone (4.5)
- Wild Life (4)
- London Town (4)
- Back to the Egg (4)
- Pipes of Peace (3.5)
- Tripping the Live Fantastic (3.5)
- Off the Ground (3.5)
- Paul Is Live (3.5)
- Wings at the Speed of Sound (3)
- Give My Regards to Broad Street (2.5)
Author Comments:
This is the twelfth in a continuing series I call Critical Consensus. I am averaging the opinions of several excellent music critics to produce a list of each artist's albums. The albums will each have a rating between 1 and 10. The albums will be listed in a recommended purchasing order, so new fans will have an idea of where the best place to start buying an artist's work is. These are not my opinions, although, since I have chosen the critics used (and I'm using many), my taste will perhaps seep through a bit.
Terribly nerdy, I know, but maybe this will help people only now beginning to dabble into certain artists' bodies of work.
Interesting. Significantly lower average score for Sir Paul than for John and George, and Ringo has yet to get a look in. Back in their heyday, the generally agreed order of popularity was John, closely followed by Paul, then George, then Ringo.
I also found these results very interesting. Paul and George's best albums actually score rather closely, with the exception of Harrison's All Things Must Pass. From what I could tell, ATMP would have scored a ten if it wasn't for the endless jams that comprise the final third or so of the album. Most critics hated these, and it is a testament to the remaining songs that the album still pulled a nine. Without that one album, however, I think Paul's finest work has the upper-hand over George's on these lists. Paul does have quite a few albums scoring in the middle of the range, but then Paul has continued making many more albums than George, and I find it a bit heartening that one of Paul's recent works, Flaming Pie, was actually one of his highest ranking works. The guy's got some juice left in him.
Obviously, the critical masses have swung quite a bit in favor of John over the other Beatles, although I was a bit surprised most of John's solo work, excepting Plastic Ono, Imagine, and the compilation, didn't fare better. I haven't CCed Ringo yet, but I seriously doubt his solo work will fare as well as John's. In fact, I'm willing to bet he will score quite a bit lower than the other three.
None of which, of course, should take away one bit from the fantastic work all four accomplished in the Beatles. I seriously doubt any other rock band will surpass them on these CC lists, where their scores are simply amazing.
Ringo's list will follow before long.
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs