Kisses On Bottom - Paul Mccartney Digital Booklet

p & c 2012 MPL Communications Inc. under exclusive license to StarCon, LLC d/b/a Hear MusicTM, 100 N. Crescent
Dr., Beverly Hills, CA 90210. Hear MusicTM is a licensed trademark of Starbucks US Brands, LLC in the US and
Starbucks Corporation outside the US. All rights reserved. Unauthorized duplication is a violation of applicable laws.
HRM-33600-25
www.paulmccartney.com

The album offerssome classic vintage songs and a few Paul McCartney originals.
How did the general idea come about?
For years I’ve been wanting to do some of the old songs that my parents’ generation
used to sing at New Year. What would happen is us kids would arrive at the ‘do’, the
carpets would get rolled back, all the women would sit around with their little drinks
of rum-and-black, gin-and-it,Babycham; someone would play the piano and it was
normally my Dad. They would sing these old songs all night: When The Red Red
Robin, Carolina Moon. And I took all of that in.
Eventually I just said “I really ought to do this, or I’ll go off the idea, and I’ll kick
myself.” So I talked to a lady in our New York Office called Nancy Jeffries who knows
all about all the publishing side of the business,and I said, “If I was gonna do it, who
might I work with? Who might produce? What songs do you think I might do? I’ve got
my own selection, what do you think?” And she said, “I think Tommy LiPuma would
be great, you should meet him, and I’ll think of some songs to suggest.”
So I met with Tommy (LiPuma), and we just hung out, talking about the songs, the old
sing-songs, and we found we had alot in common. But we tried to work out a slightly
different approach, and used a selection of songs that wouldn’t be the absolute
obvious ones, like The Way You Look Tonight, songs that everyone tends to cover.
We looked for songs that were a little more unusual, that sometimes people might
never have heard. So that’s what happened. We found a bunch of things. It’s a good
idea to go slightlyoff-piste. Even to the extent where I didn’t know some of them.
And he suggested Diana Krall, who he knew very well. We ran through a couple of my
selections, a couple of Tommy’s, a couple of Diana’s, and we just threw a lot of songs
into a pool, and eventually I’d say, “I like that one, I’m not too keen on that one…” So
we had a bunch of things and we were ready to record.
Your own songsapart, the selections are all American, I think?
The thing is, from that era, we just chose what we thought were good songs, so the
nationality of the song didn’t matter. It just happened that there was a lot of good
American music coming out of the States at that time, it was a very rich period. We
didn’t choose on songwriters, we chose on whether we fancied the song or not, at
that moment. Sothere wasn’t any great head-banging or heavy breathing went into
the choices. It was more, “This feels right, let’s do this one.” So we just did it, a bit in
the manner of the sing-song: “Let’s do this one! Yeah!”
Were songs like these among the first you ever learned to play?
No, I never learned how to play them. All I ever did was sing them, at the family
sing-songs. They’re quitecomplicated, the chords and things. I’d have a bash, and I
did eventually become the sort of family piano player, at New Year, as my Dad got a

bit older and I got a bit more capable. But I was always busking it; he knew the real
chords, and I had to busk my way around. But it was good enough for the family singsong. A lot of these songs, like Bye Bye Blackbird, were ones that I’d sung along with.There’s a track called Home that I remember from my Dad’s era. It’s funny, when I
suggested that one, Diana said, “Oh my gosh, I though I was the only person on earth
who knew that song.” I actually used to do an instrumental version of it, before The
Beatles. I liked the chords, so I used to play a little guitar instrumental when me and
John were just getting it together. So I had nice...