The first volume of a new book series
on the career of Paul McCartney by three distinguished Beatles
authors and researchers will hit the shelves in 2017, we
can announce here for the first time. “The McCartney Legacy,” as
it will be called, will be written by Chip Madinger, Allan Kozinn and
Adrian Sinclair, and published by Madinger's Open Your Books imprint
that's also handling his “Lennonology” series on John Lennon. The book has also
just started a website.
Madinger, of
course, is known for his excellent Beatles books
“Eight
Arms to Hold You” and the “Lennonology” series of
which
one volume is available.
Allan Kozinn, has written for the New York Times, the Wall Street
Journal and other newspapers, is the author of two Beatles books,
“The Beatles - From the Cavern to
the Rooftop” and
“Got That
Something - How The Beatles’ ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’ Changed
Everything,” one of the co-hosts (with yours truly) of the
radio show “Things We Said Today,” contributing editor to
Beatlefan magazine and author of
several
other music-based books. Sinclair, a Beatles researcher for over
20 years, is also an award-winning documentary editor in the UK.
They reveal first details of the project for this interview. Madinger
(and Kozinn) also discuss the book in the new Things We Said Today
show
#207
premiering soon on
Podbean,
iTunes
and
YouTube.
Q: When will the first book come
out?
Adrian Sinclair: “The book should, be
out at the end of next year on the Open Your Books label together
with the next installment of (Madinger's) 'Lennonology.'”
Allan Kozinn: “‘McCartney Legacy’
will be a multi-volume set, rolled out over several years and
published by Chip Madinger’s ‘Open Your Books’ imprint, which
is also publishing “Lennonology.” I’m not sure how many volumes
the set will be – probably five, maybe more. One reason it’s
changing is because of the amount of material we’ve turned up. The
first volume, as we originally envisioned it, was going to cover the
whole of Wings through 1979 or 1980. But we have so much
documentation, and so many fresh interviews, for the first version of
Wings, which fell apart in 1973, just as the group was about to leave
for Lagos, Nigeria, to record ‘Band on the Run,’ that we decided
to make the first volume a look at McCartney’s work from 1969 to
1973 -- we’re talking about the ‘McCartney’ album through the
rehearsals for ‘Band on the Run’ – as well as his first actual
solo project, the score for ‘The Family Way.’ It should be out in
the autumn of 2017.”
Sinclair: “Volume One (there will
likely be five in total) will cover Paul’s solo career 1966-73.
Closing when the ‘Band on the Run’ rehearsals ended on 13 August
1973 (you can have one date we found!).”
Q: How did it come together?
Kozinn: “Like a lot of us, I think
Adrian was hoping for an update to "Eight Arms to Hold You,"
but knew that Chip was fully engaged in writing "Lennonology,"
so began to collect information on his own. He asked me if I wanted
to get involved, and while I thought it would be daunting, I liked
the challenge. But I also knew that Chip had collected a good deal of
info since "Eight Arms" was published, so I persuaded both
Chip and Adrian that it made sense to make common cause.
Sinclair: “Much like the Beatles
finding one another, we somehow did the same. I had started a project
myself and spoke to Allan about helping me out. I’d been gathering
information, and needed someone to help me translate that into book
form - Allan seemed the perfect fit. After a few weeks Allan had a
conversation with Chip who told him that he’d been compiling info
for 15 years for an update to 'Eight Arms,' so it felt like a natural
thing for us all to join forces.”
Chip Madinger: “After the release
of ‘Eight Arms To Hold You,’ in 2000, I began to gather data for
potential update, which as I've said before, was the genesis of
Strange Days Indeed. Now it would have been irresponsible of me to
not stockpile any McCartney data that I discovered during the
production of ‘LENNONOLOGY,’ and there was some very exciting
information that I came across, which I proceeded to file away with
no particular project in mind. So, around a year to 18 months ago, I
was speaking with Allan Kozinn and he told me of a project that he
was working on with the British researcher Adrian Sinclair. After a
few more conversations, it seemed natural for me to join the team and
pass along the session information and interviews that I had
collected-especially as I was busy working on volume two of the
‘LENNONOLOGY’ series. The combination of contemporary studio
documentation paired with an extensive series of key interviews –
including some that I conducted over the years with members of Wings
and session players who are no longer with us – will result in the
definitive history of Paul McCartney as a solo artist-both on his own
and with Wings. And It only seems natural that ‘McCartney Legacy’
will be presented in a format similar to the future volumes of
‘LENNONOLOGY.’”
Q: What is the goal of the book?
Kozinn: “Our feeling was that
although there are, at this point, a number of McCartney biographies
on the market, there really isn't a work that deals comprehensively
with his creative work - an extraordinary, varied collection of
albums and rock, classical and experimental projects that continues
to grow. Chip's "Eight Arms To Hold You" charted that
territory to a great extent, but it is now 16 years old, and a good
deal more information has emerged since he published it, and we
wanted to sharpen the focus. So we will have a detailed write up for
each song, including session dates, quotes from both the interviews
we've done our selves and from contemporary sources. And each album
will be introduced by a biographical overview that will look at what
was going on in McCartney's life at the time of each set of sessions,
as a way of providing context for the information about the
recordings.”
Sinclair: “The initial goal was
fairly simple, to update the amazing work done in 'Eight Arms.' But
the project snowballed within a matter of months when we realized how
much new information we actually had. My own personal aim was to try
and speak to everyone (still alive) who worked with McCartney between
1969-73, to tell the story in the voices of those who lived it. So we
tracked down most of the key players and Allan and I interviewed
them. Lucky for us Chip had already spoken to Henry McCullough before
he passed, as well as many other big names from this era. His input
in the project cannot be overstated. Through band interviews we
struck up several key relationships, through which we’ve been able
to piece together an extraordinary timeline of events for 1970-73.
This means that we can report accurately on things such as recording
sessions, filming, band rehearsals, dinners, holidays, and more
importantly, when members joined and quit - down to the very day.
“At the same time, being that I’m
in the UK, I spend a lot of time in the British Library, reading all
the music newspapers printed between 1969-73 (more than 1000 in
total) to get every detail, press interview, report, photo, rumour,
you name it from contemporary reports. Contemporary band interviews
are as key to volume as new ones, they were of the time, fresh,
honest, and at times incredibly revealing.
“We have also done a lot of
historical digging, and accumulated as much historical information as
possible to tie in with Wings’ work in the studio, on TV and on the
road to bring this period to life for readers. At the heart of the
volume there will be a full discography and sessionography, this will
include a detailed description of the recording process for each and
every song, from conception to studio session (sample song coming
next week hopefully.) We really hope to offer a definitive, detailed,
and most importantly accurate account of Wings first flight.”
