Paul McCartney is in the studio working on an album of standards plus two brand new songs with Diana Krall and her band.
Paul McCartney Standards album mixing at the Capitol Studios
McCartney says the album will feature songs he first heard as a child performed by his father at home on the piano.
The yet-to-be titled album also features guest appearances from Eric Clapton and Stevie Wonder on the original compositions ‘My Valentine’ and ‘Only Our Hearts’.
Sir Paul agrees this record is the last thing fans will expect. “In the end it was ‘Look, if I don’t do it now, I’ll never do it,” he says. “The songs me and John based quite a few of our things on will receive the recognition they deserve”.
“When I kind of got into songwriting, I realised how well structured these songs were and I think I took a lot of my lessons from them,” Paul explains. “I always thought artists like Fred Astaire were very cool. Writers like Harold Arlen, Cole Porter, all of those guys – I just thought the songs were magical. And then, as I got to be a songwriter I thought it’s beautiful, the way they made those song’.”
Paul has tried another first when recording this album. This will be the first time you will ever hear him in a studio without an instrument. Previously he has always played guitar, bass or piano when he was singing but for this record the vocals were done voice only.
“It was very spontaneous, kind of organic, which then reminded me of the way we’d work with The Beatles. We’d bring a song in, kick it around, when we found a way to do it we’d say ‘Okay, let’s do a take now’ and by the time everyone kind of had an idea of what they were doing, we’d learnt the song. So that’s what we did, we did the take live in the studio.”
“It was important for me to keep away from the more obvious song choices so, many of the classic standards will be unfamiliar to some people. I hope they are in for a pleasant surprise.”
The album was recorded at Capitol Studio on LA as well as in New York and London.
The album will be released on February 6, 2012.
