Lennon–McCartney
Songwriting partnership between John Lennon and Paul McCartney
Lennon–McCartney is the songwriting partnership between the English musicians John Lennon (1940–1980) and Paul McCartney (born 1942) of the Beatles. It is widely considered one of the greatest, best known and most successful musical collaborations ever by records sold, with the Beatles selling over 600 million records worldwide as of 2004[ [update]]. Between 5 October 1962 and 8 May 1970, the partnership published approximately 180 jointly credited songs, of which the vast majority were recorded by the Beatles, forming the bulk of their catalogue.
Unlike many songwriting partnerships that comprise a separate lyricist and composer, such as George and Ira Gershwin, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, Kander & Ebb or Elton John and Bernie Taupin, both Lennon and McCartney wrote lyrics and music. Sometimes, especially early on, they would collaborate extensively when writing songs, working "eyeball to eyeball" as Lennon phrased it. During the latter half of their partnership, it became more common for either of them to write most of a song on their own with minimal input from the other, and sometimes none at all. By an agreement made before the Beatles became famous, Lennon and McCartney were credited equally with songs that either one of them wrote while their partnership lasted.
Lennon–McCartney compositions have been the subject of numerous cover versions. According to "Guinness World Records", "Yesterday" has been recorded by more musicians than any other song.
Meeting.
Although McCartney had previously seen and noticed Lennon in the local area without knowing who he was, the pair first met on 6 July 1957, at a local church fête, where 16-year-old Lennon was playing with his skiffle group the Quarrymen. The 15-year-old McCartney, brought along by a mutual friend, Ivan Vaughan, impressed Lennon with his ability on the guitar and his version of Eddie Cochran's "Twenty Flight Rock". Soon afterwards, Lennon asked McCartney if he would join the Quarrymen; McCartney accepted. The duo's first musical idols were the Everly Brothers, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, and Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, and they learned many of their songs and imitated their sound. Their first compositions were written at McCartney's home (20 Forthlin Road), at Lennon's aunt Mimi's house (251 Menlove Avenue), or at the Liverpool Institute. They often invited friends—including George Harrison, Nigel Walley, Barbara Baker, and Lennon's art school colleagues—to listen to performances of their new songs. The first song that Lennon and McCartney wrote together, according to Mark Lewisohn, was titled "Too Bad About Sorrows".
Writing chemistry.
Lennon said the main intention of the Beatles' music was to communicate, and that, to this effect, he and McCartney had a shared purpose. Author David Rowley points out that at least half of all Lennon–McCartney lyrics have the words "you" and/or "your" in the first line. In Lennon's 1980 "Playboy" interview, he said of the partnership:
<templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />[Paul] provided a lightness, an optimism, while I would always go for the sadness, the discords, the bluesy notes. There was a period when I thought I didn't write melodies, that Paul wrote those and I just wrote straight, shouting rock 'n' roll. But, of course, when I think of some of my own songs—"In My Life", or some of the early stuff, "This Boy"—I was writing melody with the best of them.
Historian Todd Compton has noted that there is some truth to Lennon's statement regarding McCartney's optimism. However, it does not tell the whole story, as some of McCartney's most characteristic songs are tragic, or express themes of isolation, such as "Yesterday", "She's Leaving Home", "Eleanor Rigby" or "For No One".
Although Lennon and McCartney often wrote independently—and many Beatles songs are primarily the work of one or the other—it was rare that a song would be completed without some input from both writers. In many instances, one writer would sketch an idea or a song fragment and take it to the other to finish or improve; in some cases, two incomplete songs or song ideas that each had worked on individually would be combined into a complete song. Often one of the pair would add a middle eight or bridge section to the other's verse and chorus. George Martin attributed the high quality of their songwriting to the friendly rivalry between the two.
As time went on, the songs increasingly became the work of one writer or the other, often with the partner offering up only a few words or an alternative chord. "A Day in the Life" is a well-known example of a later Beatles song that includes substantial contributions by both Lennon and McCartney, where a separate song fragment by McCartney ("Woke up, fell out of bed, dragged a comb across my head ...") was used to flesh out the middle of Lennon's composition ("I read the news today, oh boy ..."). "Hey Jude" is another example of a later McCartney song that had input from Lennon: while auditioning the song for Lennon, when McCartney came to the lyric "the movement you need is on your shoulder", McCartney assured Lennon that he would change the line—which McCartney felt was nonsensical—as soon as he could come up with a better lyric. Lennon advised McCartney to leave that line alone, saying it was one of the strongest in the song.
Though Lennon and McCartney's collaborative efforts decreased in later years, they continued to influence one another. As Lennon stated in 1969, "We write how we write now because of each other. Paul was there for five or ten years, and I wouldn't write like I write now if it weren't for Paul, and he wouldn't write like he does if it weren't for me."
Credit variations and disputes.
Joint credit.
When McCartney and Lennon met as teenagers and began writing songs together, they agreed that all songs written by them (whether individually or jointly) should be credited to both of them. The precise date of the agreement is unknown; however, Lennon spoke in 1980 of an informal agreement between him and McCartney made "when we were fifteen or sixteen". Two songs written (primarily by Lennon) in 1957, "Hello Little Girl" and "One After 909", were credited to the partnership when published in the following decade. The earliest Beatles recording credited to Lennon–McCartney to be officially released is "You'll Be Mine", recorded at home in 1960 and included on "Anthology 1" 35 years later.
Some other songs from the band's early years are not credited to the partnership. "In Spite of All the Danger", a 1958 song that the band (then the Quarrymen) paid to record to disc, is attributed to McCartney and George Harrison. "Cayenne", recorded at the same time as "You'll Be Mine", is a solo McCartney song. "Cry for a Shadow", an instrumental recorded during the Beatles' sessions with Tony Sheridan in June 1961 (one of the only full instrumentals the group recorded), was written by Harrison and Lennon.
By 1962, the joint credit agreement was in effect. From the time of the Beatles' A&R Decca audition in January that year, until Lennon's announcement in September 1969 that he was leaving the band, virtually all songs by McCartney or Lennon were published with joint credit, although, on a few of their first releases, the order was reversed (see below). The only other exceptions were a handful of the McCartney songs released by other musicians (viz. "Woman" by Peter and Gordon in 1966 (McCartney using Bernard Webb as a pseudonym), "Cat Call" by Chris Barber in 1967, and "Penina" by Carlos Mendes in 1969). Lennon kept the joint credit for "Give Peace a Chance", his first single with the Plastic Ono Band.
After the partnership had ended, Lennon and McCartney each gave various accounts of their individual contribution to each jointly credited song, and sometimes claimed full authorship. Often their memories of collaboration differed, and often their own early and late interviews are in conflict. In 1972, Lennon offered "Hit Parader" a list of Beatles songs with comments regarding his and McCartney's contributions to each song. In his response to the article at the time, McCartney disputed only one of Lennon's entries.
 Lennon described the song as co-written in 1965 interviews. In late interviews, he claimed full authorship. McCartney's stated help was on the "countermelody", estimating the song as "70–30" to Lennon. In 1984, McCartney said "John and I wrote it at his house in Weybridge for the film."
 In 1965, Lennon claimed that the song was "three-quarters mine and Paul changed it a bit. He said let's alter the tune." However, in 1980, Lennon said that McCartney's contribution was limited to "the way Ringo [Starr] played the drums". In "Many Years from Now", McCartney said "we sat down and wrote it together ... give him 60 percent of it."
 Lennon's entry for "In My Life" was the only one that McCartney disputed in his response to the "Hit Parader" article. Lennon said that McCartney helped only with "the middle eight" of the song. McCartney said that he wrote the entire melody, taking inspiration from Smokey Robinson songs.
 In the 1997 biography "Many Years from Now", McCartney recalled writing the music to "Eleanor Rigby" on a piano at Jane Asher's family home in Wimpole Street, and then playing it to Donovan, who supported that the song lacked any serious lyrics at that point. In 1972, Lennon said that he wrote 70 percent of the lyrics, but Pete Shotton, Lennon's childhood friend, remembered Lennon's contribution as being "absolutely nil". In 1985, McCartney said that Lennon had contributed "about half a line" to the song, but elsewhere (including a 1966 interview) he describes finishing the song with more substantial collaboration with Lennon. Harrison also contributed to this song. According to journalist Hunter Davies, the last verse was finished with all the Beatles giving suggestions in the studio.
 McCartney claimed to have helped on the lyric, estimating the song as "80–20" to Lennon. In "Hit Parader", Lennon did not acknowledge any contributions from McCartney.
 In "Hit Parader", Lennon said he authored the song and took the words from a circus poster. He did not acknowledge McCartney as a contributor. In 2013, McCartney recalled spending an afternoon with Lennon writing the song based on the poster: "I read, occasionally, people say, 'Oh, John wrote that one.' I say, 'Wait a minute, what was that afternoon I spent with him, then, looking at this poster?'"
Lennon–McCartney vs McCartney–Lennon.
In October 1962, the Beatles released their first single in the UK, "Love Me Do", credited to "Lennon–McCartney". However, on their next three releases the following year (the single "Please Please Me", the "Please Please Me" LP, and the single "From Me to You"), the credit was given as "McCartney–Lennon". According to McCartney, the decision to consistently order the credit with Lennon first was made at an April 1963 band meeting. With the "She Loves You" single, released in August 1963, the credit reverted to "Lennon–McCartney", and all subsequent official Beatles singles and albums list "Lennon–McCartney" (UK) or "John Lennon-Paul McCartney" (US) as the author of songs written by the two.
In 1976, McCartney's band Wings released their live album "Wings over America" with songwriting credits for five Beatles songs reversed to place McCartney's name first. Neither Lennon nor his wife Yoko Ono publicly objected to the flipped credits at the time.
Many years after Lennon's death however, in the late 1990s, McCartney and Ono became involved in a dispute over the credit order. McCartney's 2002 live album, "Back in the U.S.", also used the credit "Paul McCartney and John Lennon" for all of the Beatles songs. When Ono objected to McCartney's request for the reversed credit to be used for the 1965 song "Yesterday", McCartney said that he and Lennon had agreed in the past that the credits could be reversed, if either of them wanted to, on any future releases. In 2003, he relented, saying, "I'm happy with the way it is and always has been. Lennon and McCartney is still the rock 'n' roll trademark I'm proud to be a part of – in the order it has always been."
An in-depth analysis of the legal issues was the subject of a 66-page article in the "Pepperdine Law Review" in 2006.
Subsequent Paul McCartney live albums "Good Evening New York City" (2009) and "Amoeba Gig" (2019) featured original credit to Lennon-McCartney songs. The new Paul McCartney and Wings live-in-the-studio album "One Hand Clapping" (2024) featured reverted credits to the Beatles songs.
Lennon–McCartney and others.
A number of songs written primarily by the duo and recorded by the Beatles were credited as follows:
The German-language versions of "I Want to Hold Your Hand" and "She Loves You" were also credited to additional songwriters for assisting with the translation. "Komm, gib mir deine Hand" was credited to Lennon–McCartney–Nicolas–Hellmer, and "Sie liebt dich" was credited to Lennon–McCartney–Nicolas–Montague.
Legacy.
Cultural impact.
Lennon–McCartney, as well as other British Invasion songwriters, inspired changes to the music industry because they were bands that wrote and performed their own music. This trend threatened the professional songwriters that dominated the American music industry. Ellie Greenwich, a Brill Building songwriter, said, "When the Beatles and the entire British Invasion came in, we were all ready to say, 'Look, it's been nice, there's no more room for us… It's now the self-contained group- makes, certain type of material. What do we do?" In 1963, "The Sunday Times" called Lennon and McCartney the greatest composers since Ludwig van Beethoven.
The Lennon–McCartney brand would prove to be a model for several other songwriting teams in the rock genre, including, according to Lennon, the Rolling Stones' Jagger–Richards partnership. Subsequent Beatlesque songwriting teams attracted comparisons in the media to Lennon–McCartney. The new wave band Squeeze's partnership of Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook was dubbed the "new Lennon–McCartney" by music writers. Difford and Tilbrook expressed ambivalence about the comparison: Tilbrook felt that they "got a bit pompous" as a result, while Difford noted that, although the tag was "very useful" to Squeeze for getting the attention of radio programmers, the label "might have been a burden" on Tilbrook "because he had to live up to the challenge of [the Beatles'] kind of songwriting, which he didn't need to do because he's such an incredible songwriter in his own right." "Record Mirror" pondered in 1980 whether Andy McCluskey and Paul Humphreys, the founding duo of electronic band Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, were emerging as "the Lennon and McCartney of the electronic world"; music journalists subsequently began to describe the pair as "the Lennon–McCartney of synth-pop".
When McCartney teamed up with Elvis Costello in 1989, Costello's acerbic style earned him comparisons to Lennon in his role as McCartney's collaborator. McCartney, despite conceding that Costello has "got a bit of Lennon in him", characterized the pairing as "a new thing".
Beatles catalogue.
The Lennon–McCartney songwriting partnership makes up the majority of the Beatles' catalogue. The first two UK studio albums included 12 cover tunes and 15 Lennon–McCartney songs, with one track ("Don't Bother Me") credited to George Harrison. Their third UK album, "A Hard Day's Night" (1964), is the only Beatles album made up entirely of Lennon–McCartney compositions. The next album released, "Beatles for Sale" (1964), included six covers and eight Lennon–McCartney originals. The subsequent release, "Help!" (1965), had two covers and two Harrison compositions along with ten Lennon–McCartney tracks; it was the last Beatles album to feature a non-original composition until "Let It Be", which included an arrangement of the traditional Liverpool folk song "Maggie Mae". Among the songs in this post-"Help!" output, Harrison contributed between one and four songs per album, and Ringo Starr wrote two songs in total and received a joint credit with Lennon and McCartney for a third ("What Goes On"). In addition, "Flying" and "Dig It" were credited to all four Beatles. The rest of the catalogue came from Lennon and McCartney.
Lennon and McCartney gave songs to Starr to sing, and to Harrison before he started writing his own material. As for the songs they kept for themselves, each partner mostly sang his own composition, often with the other providing harmonies, or they shared lead vocal. If each contributed a fragment to make a whole song, he might sing his portion, as in the case of "I've Got a Feeling" and "A Day in the Life". "Every Little Thing" is a rare example of a Lennon–McCartney song in which one member of the partnership was primary composer (McCartney) but the other sang lead vocal (Lennon). McCartney sings in unison with Lennon on the verses, but Lennon's vocal is more prominent. McCartney sings the high harmony on the chorus.
In January 2017, McCartney filed a suit in United States district court against Sony/ATV Music Publishing seeking to reclaim ownership of his share of the Lennon–McCartney song catalogue beginning in 2018. Under US copyright law, for works published before 1978 the author can reclaim copyrights assigned to a publisher after 56 years. McCartney and Sony agreed to a confidential settlement in June 2017.
Non-Beatles songs.
Several songs credited to Lennon–McCartney were originally released by bands other than the Beatles, especially those managed by Brian Epstein. Recording a Lennon–McCartney song helped launch new performing-artists' careers. Many of the recordings below were included on the 1979 compilation album "The Songs Lennon and McCartney Gave Away". Beatles versions of some of these were recorded; some were not released until after their split, on compilations such as "Live at the BBC" (1994) and "The Beatles Anthology" (1995–96).
In April 2024, the surviving Beatles sons James McCartney and Sean Ono Lennon worked together on the song "Primrose Hill" for McCartney's upcoming album.
Four songs and a soundtrack album were released during this period but credited solely to Paul McCartney:
Unreleased songs.
The following compositions are believed to have been written by Lennon and McCartney, but never officially released by the Beatles or any other artist except as noted below. Many have appeared on Beatles bootlegs, an exception being "Carnival of Light". The list of unreleased songs includes some of the earliest Lennon–McCartney joint works dating back to the Quarrymen, the group that evolved into the Beatles. Several of these songs were revisited during the "Get Back" sessions of early 1969.
References.
Citations.
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Bibliography.
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How Do You Sleep? (John Lennon song)
"How Do You Sleep?" is a song by English rock musician John Lennon from his 1971 album "Imagine".
The song makes scathing personal attacks aimed at his former Beatles bandmate and songwriting partner, Paul McCartney. Lennon wrote the song in response to what he perceived as personal slights by McCartney on the latter's "Ram" album, particularly on the song "Too Many People".
The track includes a slide guitar solo played by George Harrison, and was co-produced by Lennon, Phil Spector and Yoko Ono.
Composition and lyrics.
Lennon wrote "How Do You Sleep?" in the aftermath of Paul McCartney's successful lawsuit in the London High Court to dissolve the Beatles as a legal partnership. This ruling was caused by the publication of Lennon's remarks about the Beatles in a December 1970 interview with "Rolling Stone" magazine, and McCartney and his wife taking full-page advertisements in the music press, in which, as an act of mockery towards Lennon and Yoko Ono, they were shown wearing clown costumes and wrapped up in blankets, which some perceive as being a reference to bagism. Following the release of McCartney's album "Ram" in May 1971, Lennon felt attacked by McCartney, who later admitted that lines in the song "Too Many People" were intended as digs at Lennon. Lennon thought that other songs on the album, such as "3 Legs", contained similar attacks, although McCartney denied the claim.
The lyrics of "How Do You Sleep?" refer to the "Paul is dead" conspiracy theory ("Those freaks was right when they said you was dead"). The song begins with the line "So Sgt. Pepper took you by surprise", referring to the Beatles' landmark 1967 album. Preceding this first line are ambient sounds evocative of those heard at the beginning of the "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" album.
The lyrics "The only thing you done was yesterday / And since you've gone you're just another day" are directed at McCartney, referencing the Beatles' 1965 song "Yesterday" and McCartney's single "Another Day", released in February 1971. Lennon initially penned the lyrics "You probably pinched that bitch anyway", as a reference to McCartney's claims that he was not sure if he had plagiarized "Yesterday", having asked Lennon, Harrison, George Martin and others if they had heard that melody before. Although Lennon received the sole writing credit for "How Do You Sleep?", a contemporary account by Felix Dennis of "Oz" magazine indicates that Yoko Ono, as well as Allen Klein, Lennon's manager, also contributed lyrics.
Recordings.
Lennon recorded "How Do You Sleep?" on 26 May 1971 at Ascot Sound Studios, during the sessions for his "Imagine" album. String overdubs took place on 4 July 1971 at the Record Plant, in New York City. The song features a slide guitar part played by George Harrison. Aside from Lennon on rhythm guitar and vocals, the track also includes Klaus Voormann on bass, Alan White on drums, acoustic guitar played by Ted Turner, Rod Linton and Andy Davis, as well as additional piano parts by Nicky Hopkins and John Tout. Although he had been united with Lennon, Ringo Starr and Klein, against McCartney, in the recent lawsuit, Harrison recalled that the period was one of "very strange, intense feelings" among all the former Beatles, and he was initially wary of Lennon's invitation to play on the new album. Given this, Harrison added, he was relieved that Lennon was "openly pleased I came".
As with all the tracks on "Imagine", several outtakes of "How Do You Sleep?" became available on bootleg albums and in documentary films about Lennon. A run-through of the song in the 2000 film "Gimme Some Truth" includes what authors Chip Madinger and Mark Easter describe as "John's query to Paul", as Lennon faces the camera and sings: "How do you sleep, ya cunt?" Starr visited the studio during the recording of the song and was reportedly upset, saying: "That's enough, John." The final mix version as released on the album is in mono rather than stereo, unlike all the other tracks. In 2018, two versions of the original recording sessions were released in 5.1 surround sound as part of the "Imagine" box set.
Critical reception.
In a contemporary review of "Imagine", Ben Gerson of "Rolling Stone" highlighted "How Do You Sleep?" among the album's three "really worthy, musically effective numbers" but found it "horrifying and indefensible" as a song that "lay waste to Paul's character, family and career". Gerson concluded: "The motives for 'Sleep' are baffling. Partly it is the traditional bohemian contempt for the bourgeois; partly it is the souring of John's long-standing competitive relationship with Paul." Writing in the "NME", Alan Smith said of the track: "Musically, it's tremendous – open, big, powerful, thundering, dramatic – but this is a song which will be remembered for its lyrics …" As its ultimate putdown of McCartney, Smith identified the couplet "The sound you make is muzak to my ears / You must've learned something in all those years." In "Melody Maker", Roy Hollingworth lauded "Imagine" as the best work that Lennon had ever done and described "How Do You Sleep?" as "the unnerving slash at McCartney … a slow funk with Commanche or maybe Sioux flavoured strings".
Thomas MacFarlane wrote about the song:
<templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />The space created for "How Do You Sleep?" seems to be a photo negative of the one created for "Imagine". ... Here, it seems as if a storm is brewing, and its awesome power will not be denied.
Aftermath.
A few months after "Imagine" was released, Lennon stated that the song "was an answer to "Ram"" but added: <templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />There's really no feud between me and Paul. It's all good, clean fun. No doubt there will be an answer to 'Sleep' on his next album, but I don't feel that way about him at all. It works as a complete song with no relation to Paul. It works as a piece of music. I started writing it in 1969, and the line 'So Sergeant Pepper Took You By Surprise ...' was written about two years before anything happened. There was always a musical difference between me and Paul – it didn't just happen last year. But we've always had a lot in common, and we still do. The thing that made The Beatles what they were was the fact that I could do my rock 'n roll, and Paul could do the pretty stuff ... But hardly a week goes by when I don't see, and/or hear from one of them."
Shortly before his death in 1980, Lennon stated in an interview with "Playboy": "I used my resentment against Paul … to create a song … not a terrible vicious horrible vendetta … I used my resentment and withdrawing from Paul and The Beatles, and the relationship with Paul, to write 'How Do You Sleep'. I don't really go 'round with those thoughts in my head all the time".
References.
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McCartney (album)
McCartney is the debut solo studio album by the English rock musician Paul McCartney, released on 17 April 1970 by Apple Records. McCartney recorded it in secrecy, mostly using basic home-recording equipment at his house in St John's Wood. Mixing and some recording took place at professional London studios. In its loosely arranged performances, "McCartney" eschewed the polish of the Beatles' past records in favour of a lo-fi style. Apart from occasional contributions by his wife, Linda, McCartney performed the entire album alone by overdubbing on four-track tape.
McCartney recorded the album during a period of depression and confusion, following John Lennon's private departure from the Beatles in September 1969. Conflicts over the release of McCartney's album further estranged him from his bandmates, as he refused to delay the album's release to allow for Apple's previously scheduled titles, notably the Beatles' album "Let It Be". A press release in the form of a self-interview supplied with UK promotional copies of "McCartney" led to the Beatles' break-up.
"McCartney" received mostly negative reviews, while McCartney himself was vilified for seemingly ending the Beatles. The record was widely criticised for being under-produced and for its unfinished songs, although the ballad "Maybe I'm Amazed" was consistently singled out for praise. Commercially, "McCartney" benefited from the publicity surrounding the break-up; it held the number 1 position for three weeks on the US "Billboard" Top LPs before yielding that position to "Let It Be". It peaked at number 2 in Britain.
In later years, the album was credited for influencing DIY musicians and lo-fi music styles. McCartney also recorded two successor albums: "McCartney II" (1980) and "McCartney III" (2020). In 2011, the first "McCartney" record was reissued with bonus tracks as part of the "Paul McCartney Archive Collection".
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Background.
After John Lennon requested a "divorce" from the Beatles in a band meeting on 20 September 1969, Paul McCartney withdrew to his farm in Campbeltown, Scotland. Author Robert Rodriguez describes his frame of mind as "brokenhearted, shocked, and dispirited at the loss of the only job he had ever known". While Lennon's departure was not made official, partly for business reasons, McCartney's period in seclusion with his family coincided with widespread rumours in America that he had died – an escalation of the three-year-old "Paul Is Dead" rumour. The rumour was dispelled by journalists from BBC Radio and "Life" magazine, who tracked him down at his farm, High Park.
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I nearly had a breakdown. I suppose the hurt of it all, and the disappointment, and the sorrow of losing this great band, these great friends ... I was going crazy.
 – McCartney to daughter Mary, 2001
McCartney's two months in Scotland created an estrangement between him and his bandmates, further to the division caused by their appointment of Allen Klein as business manager in May that year. McCartney later cited Klein's appointment as the first "irreconcilable difference" within the Beatles, since he continued to favour New York lawyers Lee Eastman and John Eastman – father and brother, respectively, of his wife Linda. For McCartney, the period following Lennon's departure was also marked by a bout of severe depression, during which, in his own estimation, he came close to suffering a nervous breakdown.
In his book "Fab: An Intimate Life of Paul McCartney", Howard Sounes writes of the McCartneys' exile at High Park: "This was grim for Linda. She had a seven-year-old and a baby to look after, with a husband who was depressed and drunk. She later told friends it was one of the most difficult times in her life, while Paul reflected that he might have become a rock 'n' roll casualty at this point in his career." With Linda's encouragement, McCartney began to consider a future outside the Beatles, by writing or finishing songs for his first solo album, "McCartney".
Content and recording.
Studer home recordings, December 1969 – January 1970.
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I was like a professor in his laboratory. Very simple [set-up], as basic as you can get ... Even now that album has an interesting sound. Very analogue, very direct.<ref name="Du Noyer/Mojo p 60"></ref>
– McCartney, 2001
McCartney and his family returned to London shortly before Christmas 1969, and he started work on the album at his home in Cavendish Avenue, St John's Wood. The recordings were carried out on a recently delivered Studer four-track tape recorder, without a mixing desk, and therefore without VU displays as a guide for recording levels. McCartney described his home-recording set-up as "Studer, one mic, and nerve". He played all the musical instruments on the album – from acoustic and electric guitars and bass to keyboards, drums and various percussion instruments – with Linda supplying backing vocals on some songs.
The album's recordings eschewed the musical sophistication that distinguished the Beatles' work with producer George Martin, particularly the band's 1969 release "Abbey Road". According to "The New Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll", "McCartney" is "a one-man-studio-band LP" with "a pronounced homemade quality; it was spare and sounded almost unfinished". Rodriguez writes that in his avoidance of the "Abbey Road" studio aesthetic, "In his own way, [McCartney] was fulfilling the 'as-nature-intended' theme of the aborted 'Get Back' sessions, albeit as a one-and-a-half man band."
McCartney first taped a 45-second portion of a song he wrote in Campbeltown, "The Lovely Linda". As with much of the album, McCartney sang the composition accompanied by acoustic guitar before filling the remaining tracks on the Studer with a second guitar part, bass and percussive accompaniment. Although this performance of "The Lovely Linda" was only intended as a test of the new equipment, it would be included on the official release, as the opening track, complete with the sound of McCartney giggling at the end of the recording. Reflected in the sequencing of the album, the second and third songs McCartney taped were "That Would Be Something", also written in Scotland, and the instrumental "Valentine Day". The latter was one of three selections on "McCartney" that its creator "ad-libbed on the spot", he later claimed, along with the similarly rock-oriented "Momma Miss America" and "Oo You".
On 3 January 1970, he interrupted work on "McCartney" to participate in the Beatles' final recording session, when he, George Harrison and Ringo Starr recorded the Harrison composition "I Me Mine" at EMI Studios (now Abbey Road Studios). The next day, the three musicians revisited McCartney's "Let It Be", a song recorded by the band in January 1969 for their forthcoming "Get Back" film project.
Morgan Studios, February 1970.
On 12 February, McCartney took his Studer tapes to Morgan Studios, in the north-west London suburb of Willesden, in order to copy all the four-track recordings onto eight-track tape, to allow for further overdubbing. To maintain the project's secrecy, McCartney worked at Morgan under the pseudonym "Billy Martin". By this point, he had also taped "Junk" and "Teddy Boy" at Cavendish Avenue, two songs he began writing during the Beatles' 1968 visit to India and had rehearsed with the band in January 1969. The other recordings transferred to eight-track included "Glasses" – a sound effects piece featuring "wineglasses played at random", in McCartney's description – and "Singalong Junk", an instrumental version of "Junk" to which he now added a strings part played on a Mellotron. Among other overdubs on these eight-track mixes, McCartney supplied a vocal to the previously instrumental "Oo You".
While at Morgan, he also taped "Hot as Sun", a "Polynesian-influenced" instrumental dating from the late 1950s, according to author Bruce Spizer, and "Kreen-Akrore", which Sounes describes as an "experimental percussion track". Recorded on 15 February, "Kreen-Akrore" was McCartney's attempt to describe sonically a hunt by the Kreen-Akrore tribespeople of the Brazilian Amazon, after he had watched an ATV documentary on their way of life. Amid musical interludes featuring electric guitar, organ and piano, McCartney used a bow and arrow he purchased at the Knightsbridge department store Harrods, according to engineer Robin Black. The latter was among the few people who knew that McCartney was making a solo album. Linda contributed the breathing and animal-like sounds, with McCartney, on "Kreen-Akrore".
EMI Studios, February–March 1970.
On 21 February 1970, McCartney moved to the more familiar EMI Studios, with the booking again under the name of Billy Martin. There, he carried out further mixing on the previously recorded material, as well as taping new selections. On 22 February, McCartney recorded "Every Night" – another composition rehearsed during the "Get Back" sessions, and a song that authors Chip Madinger and Mark Easter note as the "first


I Wanna Talk About Me
"I Wanna Talk About Me" is a song written by Bobby Braddock and recorded by American country music artist Toby Keith. The single was released on August 20, 2001 as the second single from Keith's 2001 album "Pull My Chain". The song was his seventh number one single on the US "Billboard" Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart.
Background.
Braddock ("He Stopped Loving Her Today") initially intended the song for Blake Shelton's debut album, which Braddock produced. When audience testing of the song yielded negative results, Shelton's record label decided against including it on the album. Recalling the spoken-word verses of Keith's 1998 single "Getcha Some", Braddock then decided to pitch it to him.
Keith told "Billboard" magazine that he knew he would get "banged a little" for cutting the song. "They're going to call it a rap, [although] there ain't nobody doing rap who would call it a rap."
Content.
Similar to Keith's 1998 single "Getcha Some", "I Wanna Talk About Me" is cited as an example of country-rap, due to the use of a strong beat and rhythmically spoken lyrics. "I Wanna Talk About Me" tells of a male's frustration in his inability to converse with his partner, who wants to talk about herself. In the chorus, the singer states "I like talking about you, you, you, you, usually / But occasionally / I wanna talk about me". A musical strength of the song is its use of a I-V-vi-IV arpeggio played in a punchy rhythm.
Critical reception.
Ray Waddell, of "Billboard" magazine said that men could relate to the song, "which Keith manages to sell through sheer force of personality." For "The Washington Post", Paul Farhi called the song "a good-natured ditty" whose chorus "is either a justified demand for equal time or the response of an egotistical jerk." In contrast, Stephen Thomas Erlewine of All Music Guide called the song a "mocking macho white-rap" and the "weakest track" on "Pull My Chain".
Reviewing the music video, Edward Morris of Country Music Television called the video a "comic gem and all the proof...that Keith can handle any acting chore."
Music video.
The music video was directed by Michael Salomon and shows Keith in many different situations, including a man shopping with his girlfriend or wife, a police officer, a pimp, a motorcycle rider, and a surgeon. It premiered on CMT on August 28, 2001.
Chart performance.
"I Wanna Talk About Me" debuted at number 51 on the U.S. "Billboard" Hot Country Singles & Tracks for the week of August 25, 2001.
References.
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Talk a Good Game
Talk a Good Game is the fourth studio album by the American singer Kelly Rowland. Formerly titled "Year of the Woman", the album was released on June 18, 2013, by Universal Republic and its affiliated record labels. Incorporating a base core of R&B and pop music, "Talk a Good Game" was influenced by the likes of Whitney Houston, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder among Rowland's other idols. She wanted the album to be a celebration of womanhood and referred to the record as her most personal album to date. On the album, she co-wrote all but one song, "Freak", a cover version of the 2010 song by the entertainer Jamie Foxx from his fourth studio album "Best Night of My Life". A deluxe edition, and a Target-exclusive edition of the album with bonus tracks, were released simultaneously with the twelve-track standard edition.
"Talk a Good Game" was promoted with live versions of the album's songs during the Lights Out Tour, a co-headline concert tour between Rowland and The-Dream. The album was also preceded by the release of the lead single, a Mike Will Made It and Marz production called "Kisses Down Low", which peaked in the top-thirty of the US "Billboard" Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart. A second single, The-Dream-produced "Dirty Laundry", was released a month before the album. The song talks about the domestic abuse that Rowland suffered during a previous relationship.
On its release, music critics commended the album's cohesive sound and themes throughout, often noting Rowland's most personal and vulnerable lyrics as well as the strength of her vocals. "Talk a Good Game" entered the US "Billboard" 200 at number four, selling 68,000 copies in its opening week, and was Rowland's third top ten album. The album also entered the US R&B/Hip-Hop Albums Chart at number four. In 2014, Rowland left her label, wanting a new start elsewhere and signalling the end of the "Talk a Good Game" era. The album was her only release under Republic Records.
Background.
Work on Rowland's fourth studio album reportedly began in 2011, after the release of her third studio album, "Here I Am". In March 2012, Lonny Bereal told Kempire Radio that for the album Rowland would be returning to her R&B roots. "She's going in so hard with the R&B. Of course, she is going to give the Pop crowd what they're looking for. But, she really is returning to R&B on this album. Her delivery is real confident now. It's definitely a new Kelly Rowland. She wouldn't even let me put autotune on her voice this time round. She was like 'No, I want people to really get me'." The following month, Rowland told "MTV News" that the album would have a theme and that she had been documenting the recording process of the album for her fans to see. During an interview with "Vegas" magazine in June 2012, she described the album as a dedication to "my ladies". She explained, "I want to tell women how incredible we are, how our intuition is so spot-on. Sometimes we don't listen to it, but it is the thing that can actually make us happier." She cited Whitney Houston, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder as the album's inspirations.
In August 2011, the producer Rico Love told "Rap-Up" magazine, "While she's on tour, I'm gonna be writing records for her new album. We can kinda roll that out and drop her new single in late spring. Excited about that." H also said that he wanted to continue developing an R&B sound with Rowland, following the US chart success of her single "Motivation" (2011), which he co-wrote and co-produced. "I believe in R&B and I believe that if we make new age records and don't make dated records and keep it classic, I think we'll be fine." Rowland also worked with Amber "Se7en" Streeter, Da Internz, Eric Bellinger, Eric Hudson, Kevin Cossom, Lonny Bereal, Nikeshia Briscoe, Redd Stylez, Rock City, T-Minus, Rodney "Darkchild" Jerkins, The Runners and Beau Vallis. On March 23, 2012, Rowland confirmed via Twitter that she was working with rapper T-Pain. Sean Garrett revealed in an interview with "Rap-Up" on May 9, 2012 that he also contributed to the album. He stated, "Her swag is dope and I'm just so happy to see her get her shot. I'ma do what I can to make sure Kelly right." In August 2012, the Grammy-winning songwriter Diane Warren mentioned her involvement, saying that she had been working with Rowland "because Beyoncé was telling her to get together with me".
In November 2012, Rowland revealed she had been working with production duo Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. Speaking of their collaboration to "Billboard"'s Keith Caulfield, she said "Let me tell you something, they are a part of the foundation of who I am ... Because their sound was one of the first things I remember about R&B. Being in the studio with them, I wanted to pinch myself." However, it was later revealed that the songs she recorded with Jam and Lewis did not make the album. In February 2013, Rowland revealed that she had over fifty songs recorded for the album that she was continuously working on to put together the final collection. Rowland also worked with The-Dream, Pharrell Williams and Boi-1da. According to "USA Today" in April 2013,the rapper Pusha T was to make an appearance on the album. In April 2013, Rowland revealed she had more than 70 songs to choose from, among a feature vocal from Lil Wayne, the album features Wiz Khalifa and a duet with Pharrell Williams. Rowland reunited with her former Destiny's Child bandmates Beyoncé and Michelle Williams for a song on the album, Rowland stressed that it was not a Destiny's Child reunion but rather a song by herself featuring Beyoncé and Williams.
Musical style, writing and composition.
"Talk a Good Game" was inspired by R&B artists New Edition, Pebbles, and Babyface, Rowland spoke on the album's musical direction saying "[It] feels like everything I wanted to make as far as music and R&B, I wanted to make sure my roots were really pronounced on this album." Rowland cited Whitney Houston, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder as the album's inspirations.
The album opens with "Freak", an electro-R&B song that was originally recorded by American entertainer Jamie Foxx for his album "Best Night of My Life" (2010) It references Michael Jackson's "Thriller" as well as including a spoken bridge towards the end. Then comes "Kisses Down Low", an R&B and electronic track written by Marquel Middlebrooks, Timothy and Theron Thomas, Rowland, Mike Will Made It, with the latter producing the song. "Rap-Up" described the song as a "bedroom banger", whilst "Billboard"'s Andrew Hampp described the song as an "unofficial" sequel to Rowland's most successful and sexually explicit single, 2010's "Motivation" (featuring Lil Wayne). Third in the album, is the adult contemporary-influenced "Gone", which features the hip-hop rapper Wiz Khalifa. Harmony Samuels produced the "base-heavy" and radio friendly "snapping" beat which features a prominent sample of "Big Yellow Taxi", a 1970 single by Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell. It lyrically speaks about a "man who played with her heart" and how "she's done putting up with his games". Lyrics from Rowland include "There's a million ways that I could tell you / But I think I would rather show you that it's over / And I won't be back no more", whilst Khalifa raps "I been here before / And you know Kelly never lied / So you can get your stuff / And get to going / I'll get back to getting high".
The album is named after track four, "Talk a Good Game" which features Kevin Cossom. Over a "snaky but sweet" production from T-Minus Rowland sings "I don't think I can take another broken promise / Why do things the hard way when you can just be honest". Hampp stated that Cossom's rap gave the song a "street edge". It takes the listener on an emotional journey according to "The Honesty Hour". The next song, "Down on Love", is a mid-tempo production featuring another classic sample, this time the 1987 song "Rock Steady" by R&B group The Whispers. Using her mezzo-soprano vocals, Rowland takes on a downtrodden romantic situation, "We want two different things at two different times / You know how the story go / Easy come easy go". "Dirty Laundry" was co-written by Rowland, Carlos McKinney and The Dream, and is an R&B "confessional" ballad, containing "R&B jam spools" and a piano-led melody. It details a "frank and often poignant commentary" on Rowland's life. The song is a "brutal" chronicle of the last ten years of Rowland's life, covering her envy of Beyoncé's solo success and the end of an abusive relationship. Amongst the lyrics, Rowland sings "Kinda lucky I was in her shadow / Phone call from my sister what's the matter / She said, 'Oh no / You gotta leave' / I'm on the kitchen floor / He took the keys."
This moves onto another track called "You Changed" that features her former Destiny's Child bandmates Beyoncé and Michelle Williams. Lyrically the song talks about a relationship that has gone "awry". Rowland takes prominence on the track, though Beyoncé and Williams each get their "own cathartic verse to go off on a clueless ex". The "Honesty Hour" compared "You Changed" to the 2004 Destiny's Child single "Girl". Production on the album then moves on to a light mid-tempo dance track on "I Remember", which was produced by The Runners. Atop a "tinkling piano and propulsive dance beat", Rowland's "characteristically soulful vocals" can be heard. Hampp said that the song incorporated tribal music and a vibe that "consciously stops short of being a full-on four-on-the-floor banger." According to the "Honesty Hour", "I Remember" remains firmly a ballad, but incorporates elements of techno and EDM. Rowland dabbles in some 80's funk pop on the Boi-1da and Matthew Burnett-produced "Red Wine". The song features dreamy synths and a soaring chorus, in a vintage throwback. It was compared to songs by Brandy Norwood. The pace continues on the romantic "This is Love" which focuses on a guy that "got [Rowland] goin' on cloud 9". Over the light production, Rowland sings "I'm waiting and anticipating for you to give it to me / Boy I'm trying to hold it inside / Heart racing, my body shaking / 'Cause when you give it to me, boy you are the truth, I can't lie." According to the "Honesty Hour", "This is Love" had crossover appear for both R&B and pop radio.
"Street Life" sees Rowland opt for a "no BS" attitude. She sings about how "chasing fast money takes precedence over self-improvement" atop a mid-2000s pop music production, built around layers of hand drums and horn stabs. It was produced by Pharrell Williams and opens with Rowland saying "Ooh 'dere go my baby daddy!". The lyrics then continue on to speak about the current problems society is facing, "the recession ate me alive / Tryin' to get where the breeze is nice / So I can breathe." She then goes on to speak about social issues and the breakdown of society on lyrics like "coming from the street life we know it's letting go / We like to go to school for education / But the street life we know don't write no notes / It's like parole with the time we're facing." Pusha T appears in the song's middle 8 where he raps about honor and US president Barack Obama, "this is for my niggas with them four baby mamas...this Presidential Rollie don't make me Obama / so don't judge me by my jewelry, please your honor". The "Huffington Post" described "Street Life" as a departure from Rowland's previous "softer sound". The standard edition of the album finishes with "Stand in Front of Me", a 1950s' doo-wop inspired "ode to love". The simple production and lyrics include the lines "You just do it / Mean it / Prove it"; Hampp of "Billboard" wrote that one could expect to hear the song at weddings.
Release and promotion.
On October 10, 2012, Rowland announced on her official website that the album would be called "Year of the Woman", and wrote that it "is one of my greatest pieces of work and I cannot wait to share it with you guys!". During an interview with "Billboard" magazine in November 2012, Rowland spoke about the type of songs she had been recording for the album, saying "With the things that I'm talking about, I think that it's probably the most vulnerable I've been on a record. And I wanted to just touch a woman's hand, talk to her, you know what I mean? Like, this is my sister and I think that's one of the things that I wanted to really pronounce on this album, is a celebration of a woman." During a back stage interview at the 55th Annual Grammy Awards, Rowland revealed that working with so many producers inspired her to rename the album "Talk a Good Game". The album was originally due for release from June 3, 2013, but, during an interview with "The Madd Hatta Morning Show" on 97.9 Box FM, Rowland revealed that the album had been pushed back to June 18, 2013. The album was made available to pre-order on May 21, 2013, ahead of its June 18, 2013 US release. In August 2013, vocal producer Lonny Bereal said that Rowland was working on new music, including songs produced by Bereal, for a re-release of "Talk a Good Game". In March 2014, Rowland confirmed that she had left Republic Records in search of a "fresh start" and that she had already begun work on her next studio album, signalling the end of the "Talk a Good Game" era.
In June 2012, it was announced that the Sean Garrett-penned song "Ice", which features rapper Lil Wayne, would serve as the album's first single. "Ice" is the third collaboration between Rowland and Wayne, following the Destiny's Child collaboration "Soldier" (2004), and her solo single "Motivation". It was sent to urban radio in the United States on August 14, 2012, and was released via iTunes Stores from August 24, 2012. "Ice" reached number 24 on the US Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, number 88 on the US "Billboard" Hot 100 chart, and number 25 on the South Korea Gaon International Chart. Upon unveiling the track listing it was revealed that "Ice" would not feature on the album.
Rowland performed in support of "Talk a Good Game" at the RiverFest 2013, on May 25, 2013 in Little Rock, Arkansas. Here, Rowland performed "Dirty Laundry" live for the first time. Rowland performed "Dirty Laundry" live for the second time on May 26, 2013, during the opening date of her co-headline tour with The-Dream, the Lights Out Tour. On May 28, 2013, Rowland visited "The Raheem DaVaughn Show" on BLIS.fm, where she premiered "You Changed", her collaboration with Beyoncé and Michelle Williams, as well as "Gone" featuring Wiz Khalifa and "Talk a Good Game" featuring Kevin Cossom.
On April 30, 2013, it was confirmed that Rowland would be co-headlining a US concert tour with The-Dream, who produced two songs on "Talk a Good Game". Speaking about the tour, Rowland said: "To be able to work with [The-Dream] in this capacity and have the opportunity to showcase our new music to our fans live and in person is going to be extremely rewarding! I can't wait.". The Lights Out Tour was originally scheduled to have twenty-two shows, but this was later changed to five, after Rowland was forced to cancel many of the shows because she signed on to become a judge on "The X Factor US". The tour kicked off on May 26, 2013 in Washington, D.C. and ended on June 2, 2013 in Mashantucket.
Singles.
The album's first single, "Kisses Down Low", made its worldwide premiere on January 18, 2013, and was released via iTunes Stores on February 1, 2013. The single impacted US urban radio on February 5, 2013, and US rhythmic radio on March 26, 2013. In the United States "Kisses Down Low" debuted at number 96 on the "Billboard" Hot 100 for the issue dated March 10, 2013. On its third week the song peaked at number 72.
On May 9, 2013, Rowland released a teaser for the album's The-Dream-penned second single "Dirty Laundry". The minute-long clip featured a scene from a laundromat. The song premiered on May 15, 2013 and was released for digital download on May 21, 2013. The track begins during a "rough period" of time after the release of her debut album "Simply Deep" (2002). In the lyrics, Rowland confronts a mixture of emotions that she experienced over former bandmate Beyoncé's post-Destiny's Child success; emotions including resentment and job. The second half of the song discusses an abusive past relationship. It was officially sent to US urban radio on May 15, 2013, and to US rhythmic radio on July 30, 2013. On August 7, 2013, Rowland announced that "Gone" featuring Wiz Khalifa would be released as the album's third single. However, in March 2014, it was confirmed that Rowland had left Republic Records for a new start and already started work on her fifth album, signalling the end of the "Talk a Good Game" era.
Critical reception.
Upon release, "Talk a Good Game" has received mostly positive reviews. According to Metacritic, where they assign a weighted average score out of 100 to ratings and reviews from selected mainstream critics, the album received an average of 65, based on 12 reviews. Kyle Kramer from the Chicago's "RedEye" entertainment newspaper called "Talk a Good Game" a "fantastically bold re-introduction for those who haven't checked in on Rowland in a decade." He noted that although at times Rowland experiments with adult contemporary music (on "Gone" featuring Wiz Khalifa) the majority of albums sits "between post-Drake R&B and "high energy highlights". Kramer concluded by calling "Talk a Good Game" a risk-taking project, which "as a result, [is] the right [move]". For VH1, Felicia Dennis and Samantha Friedman wrote that, on hearing the album, every song could have been a single. For "AllMusic", Andy Kellman wrote that "Talk a Good Game" was a similar make-up of pop and R&B music to Rowland's releases. He described the album as full of "satisfying, if mostly unexciting, material", comparing it to "Here I Am" (2011) except for the lack of dance-pop songs on the new album.
Jim Farber from "The New York Daily News" thought that the "90s-style R&B might keep [Rowland] from receiving the mainstream appeal of her peers". Apart from "Dirty Laundry", which Farber called "a tad desperate" as the message gets lost in the melody, he thought the album "has a focused sound, based on the slow grind. As on many of Rowland's most effective songs of the past, her latest keep the center of gravity low. The songs let her slippery voice slide over loping, bass-driven beats." "The Boston Globe"'s Sarah Rodman agreed that when people looked beyond "Dirty Laundry", the album "reflects a better balance of sound and sentiment". Writing for "Slant Magazine", Annie Galvin awarded the album three out of five stars. Commenting that "Rowland is still grappling with how to create an authentic artistic identity", Galvin concluded that ""Talk a Good Game"'s standout tracks prove that she's closer to carving a niche for herself than she has been on prior efforts that suppressed rather than addressed that difficulty".
"Spin"'s Julianne Shepherd wrote that "Talk a Good Game" was "a slive above "Here I Am"". In the review, she wrote, "Rowland is good at anything, it's being bona fide through and through. She's an extremely likable figure in pop music, more relatable than her goddess-sis Beyoncé, more down-to-earth lyrically than many of her R&B peers. "Talk a Good Game" is her realness in full flower, an album that balances world-weariness about relationships with infectious dollops of sexual agency, tackling the vagaries of love almost exclusively and offering anthems for experiences that every woman has had (or will have) at some point." Andrew Hampp from "Billboard" agreed in his track-by-track review. He wrote, "Kelly Rowland finally comes into her own on 'Talk a Good Game' her most focused, consistent and honest album to date. Picking up where 2011's 'Here I Am' left off, the singer's new album has an additional layer of honesty and openness courtesy ... the album is still a refreshing hyper-focus on contemporary R&B." "Vibe"'s Kathy Iandoli also agreed, saying that ""Talk a Good Game" sets her far apart from the status quo of mass-produced R&B... Kelly finally knows who she is and how she'd like to sound." "Rowland finally hits her stride," is what Robert Copsey wrote in his review for "Digital Spy", where he also called the album "a collection of classy and sophisticated R&B".
Commercial performance.
On June 23, 2013, "Talk a Good Game" opened on the UK R&B Albums Chart at number seven, besting previous album "Here I Am" (2011) by one chart position. However, on the UK Albums Chart, "Talk a Good Game" failed to match "Here I Am"'s peak position of forty-three, only managing to debut at number eighty. As a result, it became Rowland's lowest charting album in the UK to date. In the US, "Talk a Good Game" debuted on the "Billboard" 200 chart at number four, having sold 68,000 copies; it became Rowland's third top-ten album, though sold 9,000 copies fewer than "Here I Am". "Talk a Good Game" also debuted at number four on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums, failing to match "Here I Am"'s peak of number one. In its second week, the album dropped to number 11. As of December 2013, "Talk a Good Game" has sold 215,000 copies worldwide.
Track listing.
Notes and sample credits
Personnel.
Adapted from AllMusic and album liner.
Recording locations
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Technical
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Charts.
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Sing It with Me
"Sing It with Me" is a song by English singer-songwriter JP Cooper and Norwegian singer and songwriter Astrid S. It was released as a single on 3 May 2019 by Island Records.
Background.
When talking about the song, Cooper said, "I’m pretty sure that the reason most guys pick up a guitar and write a song for the first time, it's usually down to a girl. 'Sing It With Me' is a song about just that. It's the idea of writing a song for somebody that you didn't quite have the courage to simply say hi to. It's a romanticised version of that I guess, only this time the guy gets the girl (for me in reality I'd likely record it 50 times, only to decide it’s terrible and scrap it). I wanted to feature an artist with an incredibly sweet voice and Astrid S fit the bill perfectly. I was so excited to hear her on the track and she definitely delivered. I tried my best to write a chorus that was almost as infectious as 'Baby Shark' but very quickly realised that it was impossible. Overall, I think it turned out pretty well."
Music video.
A music video to accompany the release of "Sing It with Me" was first released onto YouTube on 30 May 2019. When talking about the music video, Cooper said, "I love 90's American indie films like Slacker, Rushmore and Napoleon Dynamite so the fact that it nods to that era… is great. We filmed it in Estonia with a brief for the location and the characters to all have a slight Wes Anderson feel, which I think the production company nailed. I’m usually quite nervous about making music videos. This is the first one of mine that I’ve watched back and smiled all the way through."
References.
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Marie Daulne
Belgian singer
Marie Daulne (born 20 October 1964) is a Belgian singer.
Daulne was born in Isiro, Haut-Uele District, Democratic Republic of the Congo to a Belgian who was killed that same year by Simba rebels, and to a local Congolese woman. Daulne and her mother and sisters were airlifted out to Kinshasa in an emergency evacuation by Belgian paratroopers and flown to Belgium because their father had been a Belgian citizen. Daulne was raised in Belgium and as of 2007 calls Brussels home, but lived in New York City for three years starting in 2000.
Daulne is the founder and lead singer of the music group Zap Mama whose second album, "Adventures in Afropea 1," "became 1993's best-selling world music album and established Zap Mama as an international concert sensation." With "over six albums and countless concerts, she continues to pay tribute to the family's saviors." Daulne insists that "one tune on each of her reggae-, soul-, funk- and hip-hop-infused albums be a traditional Pygmy song."
Daulne says her mission is to be a bridge between the European and the African and bring the two cultures together with her music. "What I would like to do is bring sounds from [Africa] and bring it to the Western world, because I know that through sound and through beats, that people discover a new culture, a new people, a new world." Daulne specializes in polyphonic, harmonic music with a mixture of heavily infused African instruments, R&B, and Hip-hop and emphasizes voice in all her music. "The voice is an instrument itself," says Daulne. "It's the original instrument. The primary instrument. The most soulful instrument, the human voice." Daulne calls her music afro-European.
Early life and musical origins.
Daulne was born in Isiro, Haut-Uele District, one of the largest cities in the northeast of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as the fourth child of a white civil servant, Cyrille Daulne, a Walloon (French-speaking Belgian) and Bernadette Aningi, a woman from Kisangani, formerly Stanleyville, the third largest city in Congo Kinshasa.
When Daulne was only a week old, her father was attacked and killed by Simba rebels, who were opposed to mixed-race relationships. "He did not have a chance to come with us because he was captured," Daulne says. "He said to my mother, 'Escape,' and we escaped into the forest, and the Pygmies hide us while we were waiting to see what happens," says Daulne. "He was a prisoner of the rebels for a while, then they killed him." Her mother was arrested by the rebels but was later set free because she spoke their language. Daulne pays tribute to those pygmies who rescued her family in the song "Gati" from "Supermoon". "They saved my family and many others during the Congolese rebellion," Daulne says, "and they deserve recognition for that." "My promise to them was I used your song to be known in the world and my goal is to talk about you," Daulne added.
After eight months in the interior of the country, Daulne and her mother, brother and sisters were eventually airlifted out to Isiro in an emergency evacuation by Belgian paratroopers and flown to Belgium because their father had been a Belgian citizen. "I think the experience of the political situation is more my mother, who had to survive. I was a baby, and I just was protected by my mother. What I know that I learned from my mother is to be strong and to stay positive in any kind of situation; that's the best weapon to survive. That's what I learned, and this is the main message I pass into my music," says Daulne. Everything was different when Daulne, her mother, five other sisters, and an aunt arrived in Belgium. "When we arrived, it was snowing, and my mother said, 'Look — the country of white people is white!'" says Daulne.
Growing up in Belgium was hard for Daulne. "It was hard as a kid, you want to look like everybody else, and there aren’t many black people in Belgium – compared to England, or America or France," says Daulne. "It became easier as I grew older. There were more black role models about – musicians and sports stars. At school I started to see my mixed heritage as a bonus – I could be part of both the African and Belgian communities."
Interest in European music.
Daulne listened to European music as she grew up. "We had the radio when I was growing up in Belgium, so we heard a lot of French music. And of course, American music was also very popular all over Europe. Since our mother did not want us to watch TV in our home, we entertained ourselves by creating our own music. We were very musical." Daulne was introduced to black music watching television. "When I was growing up, there weren't many black people in Europe -- my family was alone. Then I saw an American musical comedy with black people on TV. And I couldn't believe it. I said, "That's us!" My whole fantasy life was based on that movie." Daulne felt a special connection to blue songs like "Damn your eyes" by Etta James. "When I was a teenager I listened to a lot of American blues," says Daulne. "That song brought me happiness while I was going through the pain of a broken love. It helped me to open the door and see the life in front of me." Daulne said she sang that song as a teenager "alone in my room." "It’s a magic song, it transforms — when I sang that song I cried, and you need to cry to heal." "I sing it now and I hope, in my turn, that I can help another teenager to do the same if they are having pain from love."
When Daulne was 14 she went to England and first heard reggae. "I discovered Bob Marley -- my favorite album was "Kaya". I know that whole album by heart." Then Daulne became interested in the rap music of Run-DMC and the Beastie Boys. "I was into breakdancing at the time. I formed a gang, and we would beatbox like the Americans, like the Fat Boys."
Interest in African music.
"When I was growing up, I refused all this tradition," Daulne says. "It was boring . . . because it was not what we talked about at school, the bands of the moment. Nobody was talking about Pygmies and sounds from Africa. It was a little bit of shame to talk about the African roots." But although Daulne was encouraged to adopt the language and culture of Belgium, her mother kept Congolese music alive in the household. "In Africa, before you eat or do something, you sing to call the spirits of the peace, and my mother teach me that," Daulne says. "I discover that, with my two cultures, I have something very rich in me."
Although Daulne remembers that her mother sang some songs from Congo Kinshasa around the house, her mother did not teach them to the children, stressing mastery of French instead but after Daulne left home she remembered the African songs her mother sang to her as a child. "Our mother would make