McCartney leading rockers of ages
I’M going to see Jimmy Webb next week. That’s a sentence I didn’t expect to write ever in my life.
He’s not a musician I have been hanging out to see.
Lou Reed was one of those for me, Bruce Springsteen. These are performers that I had on my list of “must see before one of us dies”.
Webb is a songwriter more than a performer. He has authored classics like Galveston and Wichita Lineman.
He’s playing at the Melbourne Recital Centre in a couple of days and when I saw the advertisement I wondered, will this be the last chance to see Webb live?
None of us are getting any younger and it was this chirpy thought that drove me to book myself a single ticket to see this songwriter live on stage.
I immediately congratulated myself for acting on this dark premonition. Seeing Webb is going to be a master class in songwriting. An experience akin to visiting with Shakespeare and listening to the Bard about how he constructed his most famous works.
And then the very next day I read on the web that Paul McCartney is touring.
Paul McCartney? Internet. Are you serious? That guy is older than vinyl. He played stadium shows before they had Fold Back systems.
They stopped playing live because they couldn’t hear themselves over the screams of the young girls in the audience. Seeing the publicity for his One on One tour reminded me that age does not weary them.
McCartney is one of the first to shout, “Just wanna hear that rock and roll music”. Now, he is in the frame to be the first rock artist who might literally live to be 100 years old.
The art of being young is becoming a retiree’s dream.
Forget about the Whispering Jack Farewell phenomenon, this current bunch of old timers is mounting a constant string of tours and concerts and appearance opportunities.
Bob Dylan hasn’t stopped touring since the mid 1980s. He didn’t even pause to accept his Nobel prize.
Bruce Springsteen has been bashing the barns 300 nights a year for decades now. The Boss is fit and healthy and happy and most likely going to be the first voice of rock to reach 120.
Keith Richards is not dead yet. I repeat: Richards? Not dead. I know! Are they living longer because the food is healthier and their lifestyles have shifted through the eye of the needle of middle age?
Are they still on the perch because they’re not staying up until dawn? Is this why they are still on the road?
It’s kind of absurd when you think about the ones who didn’t make it. Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain — none of them made it into their thirties.
They must be sitting upstairs and wondering what the hell is goin’ on with the One on One?
Paul McCartney was always the fresh faced Beatle, but now he belongs to a very select group.
The longest survivors of the first people on earth who pledged to live fast and die young.
These are the guys who have literally outlived most of their target markets.
His back catalogue reads like a magical mystery tour of popular music. He is the Mozart of the 20th century.
That’s going to make for a pretty decent set list. Ross Mueller is a freelance writer and director.