It took me back to the last time I actively pursued a new Ringo Starr album. It was the summer of 1998, and I was a mere 15-year-old kid who had little interest in anything the “new” musicians of the day were putting out. Bands like Fastball, Matchbox 20, and Dave Matthews Band made no impact whatsoever to me, and I preferred the old guard – musicians who had been there and done that and were still putting out quality music. For whatever reason, Ringo Starr was a big deal to me, and when I found out that he was releasing Vertical Man, I was overjoyed. FINALLY! A new Ringo Starr album! His last one had been in 1992, the forgotten Time Takes Time, so this was a big deal to me. I got the album for my birthday and loved it – often listening to it while playing Banjo-Kazooie on Nintendo 64.

Since then, I’ve come to my senses. Not that I’ll begrudge anyone for enjoying a Ringo Starr album – his eponymous 1973 album is his best, and I’ve even got a soft spot for Stop And Smell The Roses – but as my musical tastes have matured, I find that I don’t really need a new Ringo Starr album in my collection.

The question is, does the world really need a new Ringo Starr album? Granted, he’s not taking up valuable real estate in independent record stores, and, for what it’s worth, latter-day Starr albums like Ringorama and Choose Love were strong, if flawed, but Ringo 2012 has a lot of problems with it, the biggest being its running length. Nine songs are presented across 28 minutes, with two being re-recordings (‘Wings’, from his 1977 album Ringo the 4th, and ‘Step Lightly’, from Ringo) and one being a previously released cover (‘Think It Over’, from the Buddy Holly tribute album Listen To Me).

What perplexes me about Ringo 2012 is that it’s so average. Even Starr sounds utterly bored on album opener ‘Anthem’, in which he intones, “This is an anthem / About peace and love”. There’s some scorching guitar work from Joe Walsh, but at its 5 minute running length, it overstays its welcome. ‘Wings’ isn’t much better, though its a lively reworking, with some clattering drum work (Starr admitted to listening to a lot of reggae before and during the recording of the album, and it’s pretty obvious here), but the synthesized horn blasts date it horribly to the late 1980s. The solution to Starr’s lifeless vocals is found with a chorus of backing vocalists, who beef up the sound and make the song sound more fibrous than it actually is.

‘Think It Over’ is perhaps the best tune here, with Starr actually trying to sing – and sounding a lot like he did on ‘Honey Don’t’ – but those damn synthesized steel drums ruin what could have been a cute track. ‘Samba’ also finds some life infused in it, even though it’s not the kind of song anyone would actually try to dance to. There’s some interesting flamenco guitar accents littered throughout, but it’s not enough to make it more than a curio. Starr’s handling of the traditional ‘Rock Island Line’, a song he’s probably played in rehearsals a million times already, is lively and joyous, and, along with ‘Think It Over’, is the highlight of the album. But the quality drops with ‘Step Lightly’, a pointless reworking of an already inconsequential song from the 1973 Ringo. Was anyone really clamoring for a reggae remake of this song? Of course not – but as Ringo’s first sole composition since ‘Early 1970′, the original has a certain affable charm that is completely demolished on this limp remake.

‘Wonderful’ is anything but, and is bathed in guitar and synthesizer atmospherics, with Starr striking a poignant chord in what is obviously an ode to his wife, Barbara Bach. This uninspired tune drags on for nearly four minutes, and it was at this point that I discovered there was an undeniable sameness to the seven songs (thus far). Though there were accents that differentiated one from the other, Starr’s voice and drumming are so painfully similar throughout that even though I was a little over 20 minutes through, it felt like the album had been going on for at least twice that length. ‘In Liverpool’ is at least a little better, a nostalgic ode to Starr’s Beatles-era life, though the lyrics are cringe-inducing: “Me and the boys, me and the gang / Living out fantasies / Breaking the rules, acting like fools / That’s how it was for me – how was it for you?” This touching autobiographical tune nevertheless is a highlight of the original material.

The album ends, mercifully, with ‘Slow Down’ – no, not a cover of the Larry Williams rocker that the Beatles themselves covered in 1964 – a slight rocker that features Starr hollering the inconsequential lyric, backed up by a quivering organ line. It’s a middling conclusion to an inconsequential Starr album, and its titular allusion to Ringo would give the impression that this was a star-studded affair – and with Joe Walsh, Dave Stewart, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Benmont Tench, Edgar Winter, and Van Dyke Parks the biggest names here, whether this constitues a “star-studded affair” is up to the listeners’ interpretations. But while Starr famously lost himself among drugs and drink in the ’70s, and was able to sober up and rejuvenate his career in the ’90s, Ringo 2012 is a huge step backward toward anonymity. It’s bland, inessential, and simpering – at least his output from the ’00s felt like he cared. One can’t help but escape the nagging thought that Ringo 2012 was designed to simply shift product – any product – before another lucrative All-Starr Band tour. It’d be interesting to see if any of the material from this album features in the repertoire.

Essential listening: meh

Anyway, take one part Queen, one part David Bowie, one part The Darkness, and one part Meat Loaf, and you get Foxy Shazam. Obviously this appeals to me but I was so blown away by vocalist Eric Sean Nally’s powerful vocals and natural showmanship that it led me, for the first time ever, to agree with – and like – a comment on YouTube: “I don’t care how gay Freddie was, somehow this man is his child.”

Word is that their live performances are especially astounding. If they come to Philadelphia anytime soon, I’ll certainly check them out.

News today broke that Roxy will be releasing an all-encompassing box set of their eight studio albums, with 31 bonus tracks, 12 of them previously unreleased on compact disc. A further four DVDs of high-resolution audio versions will also be included.

Below is the press release from Roxyrama:

Roxy Music: The Complete Studio Recordings 1972-1982

Roxy Music will release a deluxe box-set entitled Roxy Music: The Complete Studio Recordings 1972-1982 on Monday 2 April, celebrating 40 years since the release of the band’s eponymous debut album in 1972. The release is the first of a major reissue campaign with Virgin Records.
Roxy Music: The Complete Studio Recordings 1972-1982, an 8 CD + 4 DVD deluxe box set will feature all eight Roxy Music studio albums – Roxy Music, For Your Pleasure, Stranded, Country Life, Siren, Manifesto, Flesh And Blood, Avalon. In addition, a selection of non-album singles, B-sides and remixes, some of which are available on CD for the first time ever will also be included. Each album will be represented on DVD format as high-resolution audio, transferred digitally from the original analogue masters, making this release an absolute ‘must have’ for Roxy Music fans and collectors.

Roxy Music – Bryan Ferry, Brian Eno, Andy Mackay, Phil Manzanera, Paul Thompson and Graham Simpson – landed in 1971, seemingly from far beyond Planet Earth, to part bewilderment part rapture. an intoxicating cocktail of fashion, romance, nostalgia and futurism with songs that were almost cinematic, set to soundscapes that stunned and perplexed.

Roxy Music’s debut album, the self titled Roxy Music, was released in 1972 to critical acclaim and exemplified the band’s penchant for glamour, both in the lyrics and with the album cover of model Kari-Ann Muller, kickstarting a tradition of iconic album covers featuring female models. Single ‘Virginia Plain’ – not featured on the original album release – reached No.4 in the UK singles chart. For Your Pleasure, released the following March and including the classic Roxy tracks ‘Do The Strand’, ‘In Every Dream A Heartache’ and ‘Editions Of You’, was the last album to feature Brian Eno in the recording line up, and displayed a more elaborate production treatment with a variety of fade ins / outs and tape loops. Non-album single ‘Pyjamarama’ is included on The Complete Studio Recordings, as the original Island label remix and a 1977 remix, plus its B-Side ‘The Pride and the Pain’.

November 1973 saw the release of Stranded, which reached No. 1 in the UK Album Chart, producing the Top Ten single ‘Street Life’, and featuring 1973 Playmate of the Year (and Bryan Ferry’s then girlfriend) Marilyn Cole on the cover. A year later, Roxy Music released Country Life, this time featuring two models on the album cover (Constanze Karoli and Eveline Grunwald) and producing the single ‘All I Want Is You’.

Siren, released in 1975 and featuring Jerry Hall as the cover girl, includes arguably Roxy Music’s best-known song ‘Love Is The Drug’, which charted at No. 2 upon release, and a second single ‘Both Ends Burning’. A four year gap preceded the release of Manifesto in March 1979, which reached No. 7 in the UK charts and featured an eye catching album cover of mannequins conceptualised by Bryan Ferry and long time designer and Roxy Music collaborator Antony Price, this time producing three singles including the No. 2 hit ‘Dance Away’ and ‘Angel Eyes’.

The No. 1 album Flesh And Blood was released in 1980, Roxy Music at this point was Ferry, Mackay and Manzanera due to the departure of drummer Thompson. Roxy Music’s cover of the John Lennon song ‘Jealous Guy’, was released as a single in 1981 and included the B-Side ‘To Turn You On’. The most commercially successful Roxy Music album, Avalon, was released in 1982, charting at No. 1, and staying in the UK album charts for over a year, with three single releases including the Top 5 song ‘More Than This’.

Roxy Music: The Complete Studio Recordings 1972-1982 brings together all of Roxy Music’s albums with a plethora of tracks previously never released before on CD, including the USA 7” mixes of ‘Do The Strand’ ‘Love Is The Drug’ and ‘Take A Chance With Me’, two edits of Country Life opening track ‘The Thrill Of It All’, plus its B-Side ‘Your Application’s Failed’ (the only track to date written by Thompson), 7” and the 7” single versions of ‘Oh Yeah’ (from Flesh And Blood) and ‘Avalon’.

Further reissues are planned for 2012 with details to be announced at a later date.

TRACKLISTING
CD1: Roxy Music
1. Re-make/Re-model
2. Ladytron
3. If There Is Something
4. 2HB
5. The Bob (Medley)
6. Chance Meeting
7. Would You Believe?
8. Sea Breezes
9. Bitters End

Bonus Tracks:
10. Virginia Plain
11. The Numberer

CD2: For Your Pleasure
1. Do The Strand
2. Beauty Queen
3. Strictly Confidential
4. Editions Of You
5. In Every Dream Home A Heartache
6. The Bogus Man
7. Grey Lagoons
8. For Your Pleasure

Bonus Tracks:
9. Pyjamarama (Island mix)
10. Pyjamarama (Polydor mix)
11. The Pride And The Pain
12. Do The Strand (USA 7” mix – previously unreleased on CD)

CD3: Stranded
1. Street Life
2. Just Like You
3. Amazona
4. Psalm
5. Serenade
6. A Song For Europe
7. Mother Of Pearl
8. Sunset

Bonus Track:
9. Hula Kula

CD4: Country Life
1. The Thrill Of It All
2. Three And Nine
3. All I Want Is You
4. Out Of The Blue
5. If It Takes All Night
6. Bitter Sweet
7. Triptych
8. Casanova
9. A Really Good Time
10. Prairie Rose

Bonus Tracks:
11. The Thrill Of It All (1977 Greatest Hits edit – previously unreleased on CD)
12. Your Application’s Failed
13. The Thrill Of It All (USA 7” mix – previously unreleased on CD)

CD5: Siren
1. Love Is The Drug
2. End Of The Line
3. Sentimental Fool
4. Whirlwind
5. She Sells
6. Could It Happen To Me?
7. Both Ends Burning
8. Nightingale
9. Just Another High

Bonus Tracks:
10. Love Is The Drug (USA 7” mix – previously unreleased on CD)
11. Sultanesque
12. Both Ends Burning (7” mix – previously unreleased on CD)
13. For Your Pleasure (live – previously unreleased on CD)

CD6: Manifesto
1. Manifesto
2. Trash
3. Angel Eyes (rock version)
4. Still Falls The Rain
5. Stronger Through The Years
6. Ain’t That So
7. My Little Girl
8. Dance Away (ballad version)
9. Cry, Cry, Cry
10. Spin Me Round

Bonus Tracks:
11. Trash 2
12. Dance Away (single version)
13. Dance Away (Canadian extended 12” mix)
14. Angel Eyes (single version)
15. Angel Eyes (12” single version)

CD7: Flesh And Blood
1. The Midnight Hour
2. Oh Yeah
3. Same Old Scene
4. Flesh And Blood
5. My Only Love
6. Over You
7. Eight Miles High
8. Rain Rain Rain
9. No Strange Delight
10. Running Wild

Bonus Tracks:
11. Oh Yeah (7” version – previously unreleased on CD)
12. Manifesto (remake)
13. South Downs
14. Lover
15. Jealous Guy
16. To Turn On You (1981 B-side version – previously unreleased on CD)

CD8: Avalon
1. More Than This
2. The Space Between
3. Avalon
4. India
5. While My Heart Is Still Beating
6. The Main Thing
7. Take A Chance With Me
8. To Turn You On
9. True To Life
10. Tara

Bonus Tracks:
11. Avalon (7” single version – previously unreleased on CD)
12. Always Unknowing
13. Take A Chance With Me (7” single version – previously unreleased on CD)
14. Take A Chance With Me (USA 7” mix – previously unreleased on CD)
15. The Main Thing (12” single version)
16. The Main Thing (remix – previously unreleased on CD)

As my interest in Roxy Music has increased since I first got Avalon in the late 1990s, this box set is insanely tempting. I might have to part with some hard-earned cash and indulge myself in this come April 2nd. (Also, I’m a sucker for box sets.)

To show my appreciation for this release, here’s what I consider to be one of Roxy Music’s finest-ever songs.

With the runaway successes of The Game and its two blockbuster singles, ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ and ‘Another One Bites The Dust’, all North American #1s, Queen’s reputation in the US was at an all-time high. The slight misstep of billing Flash Gordon as a proper Queen album instead of as a soundtrack album only did minor Stateside damage, but the rot began to show with the modest success of ‘Under Pressure’, which was a UK #1 but struggled to #29 in the US. Rejuvenated by the recording process of The Game, the band took ‘Another One Bites The Dust’ as their boilerplate and developed an entire album based on the funkier side of things. The problem is, Queen wasn’t a funk/disco band; they were primarily a rock band who dabbled in eccentricities from time to time.

Their biggest mistake was front-loading the album with the dance songs, instead of leading in the listener with something more traditionally Queen-sounding. ‘Staying Power’ is an abysmal song about lead vocalist Freddie Mercury’s, ahem, prowess, and while it would take on a new life in the live setting, on record it’s limp and flaccid, bogged down by drum machines, synthesizers, and “hot and spacey” (read: cheesy) horns from noted producer Arif Mardin. Things aren’t much better with Brian May’s ‘Dancer’, a livelier funk/rock amalgam that hints at the guitarist’s awkwardness with his band’s experimentation:

I’m not invited to the party
Been sitting here all night
I’m all alone at the party
I don’t feel all right

Unfortunately for May, his song too is mired in synthesizers and drum machines, whereas his earlier funk/rock song, ‘Dragon Attack’, featured a blistering live drum performance from Roger Taylor. (At least his homemade guitar makes a few appearances, delivering several scorching solos that were lacking from many of the other songs.) ‘Back Chat’ is John Deacon’s attempt to rewrite ‘Another One Bites The Dust’, and it’s the best track on the album of the funk/disco variety, but it’s not necessarily the bassist’s best work. Written about a fiery argument between two unnamed parties, the song features a lively vocal performance from Mercury and a screamer of a guitar solo, but those damned synths and drum machines…!

It’s on ‘Body Language’ where the band hit not only the nadir of the album, but of their entire catalog. Penned – and, apart from some guitar at the end, almost entirely performed – by Mercury and once again extolling his qualities in the sack, ‘Body Language’ isn’t just Queen’s worst song ever, it’s also their most offensive. As Mercury moans and groans about his mate’s long legs and great thighs, the listener is left cringing in embarrassment – and it matters not whether Mercury was singing this about a man or a woman; there’s none of the tongue-in-cheek playfulness of ‘Fat Bottomed Girls’ or the over-the-top carnal longing of ‘Get Down, Make Love’. All Mercury wants is sex, and by God, he’s going to get it, whether he can control himself or not.

Having hit rock bottom, Hot Space gets far, far better, with Taylor’s funky, New Wave-ish ‘Action This Day’ leaving a far better taste in the mouth. It’s here that the dance overtones wash away, and they blend a little more successfully with Queen’s pompous pop sensibilities. May’s ‘Put Out The Fire’, meanwhile, brings the band firmly back to their rock roots, but, as with most socio-political message songs the band occasionally dabbled in, the moral of the story – guns are bad, okay? – is ham-handed and a little embarrassing – especially with the line, “Y’know a gun never killed nobody/You can ask anyone/People get shot by people/People – with – guns!” You don’t say.

‘Life Is Real (Song For Lennon)’, written as a tribute to the slain former Beatle, is a well-intentioned nod to Lennon’s oblique lyrical imagery (specifically structured like ‘Mother’ or ‘Mind Games’), but Mercury stumbles and falters; at least the piano-based backing is lovely, with a tender acoustic guitar solo from May. The album’s strongest songs follow, with Taylor’s ‘Calling All Girls’, a lively New Wave rocker preaching peace and love in a turbulent world, and May’s ‘Las Palabras De Amor (The Words Of Love)’, a gorgeous power ballad sung partly in Spanish and inspired by the band’s 1981 tour of South America. The dreaded synthesizer makes a return here, but instead of whooping and blasting needlessly, it twirls and sparkles, adding a poignant and human touch that had been lacking on the other songs.

The album’s penultimate song is ‘Cool Cat’, a refreshing chaser to its heavier predecessor, and was written – and performed entirely – by Mercury and Deacon. The former slips into a decadent falsetto while the latter lays down a funky groove on bass, then overdubs some cracking Telecaster guitar. (Either one of them could have pressed “play” on the drum machine.) While I give the first half of Hot Space a lot of grief for being bloated and misguided in its funk/disco attempts, ‘Cool Cat’ is a lovely, lovely track. If only the rest of the album could have been this good.

The six month old ‘Under Pressure’ is tacked on as the album closer, presumably to attract more sales, and while it’s a classic collaboration with David Bowie, it sits a bit at odds with the rest of the album. It’s nice to have ‘Under Pressure’ on an album, despite its calculated attempt at name recognition, but one can’t help but wonder if maybe there was something a bit more appropriate that could have taken its place. (The argument to that, of course, is that if ‘Body Language’ and ‘Staying Power’ were the best of what the band could offer, then imagine what didn’t make the cut.)

All told, Hot Space was a transitional album for Queen, and, for the first time in years, they found themselves having to work hard at reassuring fans that they hadn’t lost their edge. Disco was a dirty word by 1982, but by the following year, Michael Jackson made it cool again with Thriller. (Not that four white British guys were going to ever make funk or disco cool.) So Hot Space was a victim of poor timing; if it had been released in 1978 or 1979, it might have been a bit more successful. As it is, Hot Space was a watershed album for the band: with all of the energy they expended in experimenting with new sounds and technology, their efforts were rewarded with poor sales and terrible reviews. As a result, the band were scared straight, and their follow-up, The Works, was a Queen-loaf: all the best bits of what makes Queen Queen, without sticking their necks on the line. It worked, but the willingness to try new things was gone, and the band floated throughout the rest of the 1980s in a fog of smash pop singles and weak albums. Hot Space, despite its flaws, at least saw the band trying something new and unexpected – and, for that reason alone, it remains to me Queen’s last great album for nearly a decade.

Essential listening: Back Chat, Action This Day, Calling All Girls, Las Palabras De Amor (The Words Of Love), Cool Cat, Under Pressure

Late last year I got on something of a supergroup kick when I discovered Tired Pony, a country band formed by Snow Patrol frontman Gary Lightbody and featuring such luminaries as Richard Colburn (from Belle & Sebastian), Jacknife Lee, Iain Archer, some guy named Peter Buck, and everyone’s favorite twee punching bag, Zooey Deschanel, on a few tracks. The Place We Ran From is an interesting take on country; it’s not traditional country, but a twisted, warped, indie/alt-folk/country amalgam, and it was a regular in my car’s CD player for several weeks, much to the chagrin of my girlfriend.

Then, just last week by way of NPR, I was alerted to the existence of the Little Willies, which have mistakenly been called a supergroup by some ill-informed reviewers. Granted, Norah Jones is a pianist and vocalist in the group, but she’s the only megastar; in fact, had it not been for her breakthrough album Come Away With Me in 2002 (the Little Willies formed the following year), her presence as one-fifth of this group wouldn’t have warranted a mention in any review. That being said, while her success may have helped with much deserved recognition, she’s not the star of the show – this is a true band, with Jones and Richard Julian taking the lead on roughly half the songs each, and providing prominent backup on the other half on which they don’t sing lead.

The selection of songs is attractive, too: with their roots steeped in country, all but one of the covers (Elvis Presley’s ‘Love Me’) will be unfamiliar to anyone who doesn’t have an equal passion for country music, and if the listener isn’t willing to do some routine research, s/he could be fooled into believing the band actually wrote these tunes. ‘Roly Poly’ is a rollicking opener, taking a galloping shuffle with Julian and Jones gleefully poking gentle fun at an esurient equine, and a boozy cover of Hank Williams’ ‘I’ll Never Get Out Of This World Alive’ keeps the strident pace. ‘Love Me’ is sung sultrily by Jones, with the backing musicians punningly credited as the Ordinaires, and certainly gives the original a run for its money. The other big ballad is Townes Van Zandt’s ‘No Place To Fall’, sung primarily by Julian, with unobtrusive harmonies from Jones adding some delicate poignancy.

The tenderness is balanced by uproariousness joviality, with Kris Kristofferson’s ‘Best Of All Possible Worlds’ and Willie Nelson’s ‘Gotta Get Drunk’ both dealing with the bottle and its effects; in the former, Julian winds up in a local county jail after smacking into a cop for public inebriation, while the latter finds Jones being advised to give up drinking, but that “there’s more good drunks than doctors / So I guess I’d better have another round”. Nelson’s ‘Night Life’ is a more regretful ode to hard partying, performed by Jones as if it were the last song in the repertoire at a jazz lounge, the room filled with smoke and the last few lingering barflies being told last call.

The other three originals on the album are affectionate nods toward a contemporarily oft-derided and patently uncool genre, with Alexander’s twangy, countrified guitar well to the fore on ‘It’s Not You It’s Me’, a quaint if slight lament, while ‘Easy As The Rain’ is a touching ballad, sung superbly by Julian and Jones and it’d be easy to mistake them for Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris (incidentally, this song followed a jaunty performance of ‘Streets Of Baltimore’). But the pièce de résistance is album closer ‘Lou Reed’, a goofy and catchy scenario song where a weary group of travelers – who may or may not have been under the influence of West Texas’s finest grog – swear up and down that they witnessed the famed Velvet Underground frontman engaging in a game of cow tipping. It’s a boisterous performance, and one that even must have made the man it’s about crack an aged smile.

And that’s the whole point of this self-titled debut: making sure the listener is having a good time. (In fact, their follow-up album, due on Tuesday, January 10th, is titled For A Good Time, and is bound to be a corker.) The performances are relaxed and ragged, the production is casual and laid-back, and the mood is light and upbeat with a few moments of mournful regret. But, most importantly, its good-timey feel doesn’t wear off after repeated listens – I should know, as I’ve listened to it everyday this week to and from work and have yet to get tired of it.

Essential listening: Roly Poly, I’ll Never Get Out Of This World Alive, Love Me, Best Of All Possible Worlds, No Place To Fall, Roll On, Gotta Get Drunk, Easy As The Rain, Night Life, Lou Reed

(I should clarify that this wasn’t only to me, but that it was sent to a group of friends and family. It’s also semi-public, so long as you’re friends with Chelsea on Facebook.)

Here’s what Chelsea had to say about the recordings:

Season’s greetings to friends near and far, old and new. I hope each of you has been enjoying the holidays so far.

Some of you may have gotten a recording of White Christmas that I did with my best friend and sister, Hannah, last year. This year, we wanted to expand a little and offer up a few more songs. So… we did. If you’re a fan of the festive, the unique, and the delightfully amateur, and if you’re maybe a little tired of hearing the same Christmas songs everywhere you’ve gone for the past two months, then this is the Christmas album for you. It was recorded at our homes, with new melodies and arrangements by the two of us, and all instruments played by us as well. (Plus a few Garage Band loops.) You can download the entire 4-track album, or listen to and download individual songs, using the following links:

Snowed In (entire album, 25 mb)

1. White Christmas
2. Jingle Bells
3. In The Bleak Midwinter
4. Silent Night

Album art, front and back.

I do hope you’ll enjoy our different takes on some traditional tunes. It was really a labor of love, done for our own enjoyment, and as something we could share with friends and family. We learned a lot and are already brewing ideas for next year.

Happy Christmas and lots of love!

Chelsea

Do yourself a favor and listen to these wonderful recordings.

I hope your holiday celebrations, whatever you celebrate, were lovely and full of family, friends, and good times. I know mine was.

See you in 2012!

Anyway, McCartney is finally releasing a follow-up to Electric Arguments (or Memory Almost Full, depending on your view), and it’s about as far and away in sound as could be: My Valentine, due out February 7th (just in time for some holiday), is more in line with Run Devil Run than the ambient electronica of the former, or the pure, unadulterated pop of the latter. As on Run Devil Run, McCartney has returned to his roots, but this time instead of the early, glory days of rock ‘n’ roll, it’s the easy listening standards that have elevated Rod Stewart to the level of rooster-haired, gold lamé suit-wearing crooner:

Paul McCartney will release “an old-fashioned” collection of love songs – My Valentine – on February 7 via Concord/Hear Music. The album was produced by noted studio veteran Tommy Lipuma – best known for his work with jazz greats – and features a guest appearance from Diana Krall. The album is said to be a mix of classic standards along with McCartney songs. The involvement of Hear Music insures that the project will be a big push item at Starbucks coffee retail outlets.

“This will sound like the years between 1920-1940, the time when my father was 20. These are songs I heard. My family, my uncles, everybody sang. And there will be pieces I wrote, but in this style,” McCartney told a French radio station recently. “I worked with Diana Krall, and great jazz musicians like John Clayton. This is an album very tender, very intimate. This is an album you listen to at home after work, with a glass of wine or a cup of tea.”

1. I’m Gonna Sit Right Down And Write Myself a Letter
2. Home (When Shadows Fall)
3. It’s Only A Paper Moon
4. More I Cannot Wish You
5. The Glory Of Love
6. We Three (My Echo, My Shadow And Me)
7. Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate The Positive
8. My Valentine (hear the song here)
9. Always
10. My Very Good Friend The Milkman
11. Bye Bye Blackbird
12. Get Yourself Another Fool
13. The Inch Worm
14. Only Our Hearts

The title track, available to hear above, is pretty good, if a little unusual for McCartney. Then again, as someone who’s interested in his “granny shit” (as John Lennon called it), I’m looking forward to it, though I’m more interested in McCartney’s assertion that he’s planning on doing a garage rock album with Dave Grohl.

UPDATE, 1/12/12: The album has now been retitled from My Valentine to Kisses On The Bottom. I know it’s a line from ‘I’m Gonna Sit Right Down And Write Myself A Letter’, but the filthy-minded teenager in me can’t help but read waaaaay too much into that.

Their Satanic Majesties Request is an album that has gotten a lot of shit over the years, a good deal of it from the band members themselves. Compared against Sgt. Pepper, it’s obvious that the Beatles were going to win that one, but Satanic Majesties is a good, if overcooked, experiment in drugged-out psychedelia. I have a soft spot for the album, because it was one of the first Stones albums I listened to after becoming a fan in high school, and a lot of the songs still hold up well all these years later. ‘She’s A Rainbow’ is my favorite on the album, because it captures a childlike innocence of falling in love for the first time without the wink-and-a-nod attitude that most Stones songs have, nor does it have the treacly, super-saturated saccharine of love songs like ‘Angie’ or ‘Fool To Cry’. It’s a perfect counterpart to ‘Ruby Tuesday’, but ‘She’s A Rainbow’ is lovely in its naivety, and it’s impossible to believe that the Stones were on the cusp of some of their raunchiest material when listening to this little gem.