“New” artwork discussion

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Stuart Bell, Paul McCartney’s publicist, gave details about a working session to discuss the artwork of the upcoming “New” album.

From paulmccartney.com, September 17, 2013:

It’s a rainy Friday afternoon in Soho. The first Friday of September and the glorious long summer feels like a distant memory. This week has very much felt like it’s been back to school for everyone with people returning from the summer breaks and getting back into the swing of things.

Today we are meeting up with Paul at his London HQ to discuss artwork for the NEW album. […]

Back to where I started – Paul’s London HQ. On the 4th floor of Paul’s Soho office a team of 12 people have assembled with Paul to discuss the album artwork. Paul wants to make sure people get value for money in terms of what gets included. It’s not for me to give it away but there are some cool touches and the design, which as I write is days away from being revealed, looks great too.

Paul told us a story about how once Japan didn’t want to stock one of his albums because they didn’t include lyrics in the sleeve notes!

The meeting is a fun session with lots of great ideas, in contrast to the rain outside. At one point Paul’s manager brings the meeting back to order as Paul was having a laugh with the team and going off on a tangent. ‘Well that’s us told’, he said. ‘I feel like a naughty schoolboy mucking about in class!”

It’s a very fruitful afternoon and the album is really coming alive in every sense now. With just four weeks to go until launch Paul is going to be very busy getting out and playing some of the NEW album for people to hear. He’s currently with the band rehearsing up the new stuff. I had an email exchange with Abe last night in which he said how well it’s all going and how ‘awesome’ the new stuff sounds.

Stuart Bell, Paul McCartney’s publicist

It seems that, despite all the efforts, there were some hiccups in the making of the packaging of “New“, as Paul McCartney felt obliged to publish the following article, soon after the release of the album.

From paulmccartney.com, October 13, 2013:

Paul really wants you to enjoy his ‘NEW’ album and has asked us to pass on the following piece of advice:

“If you buy ‘NEW’ on CD, please be careful when removing the booklet and take it out through the front cover gap, rather than the inside gap; If you do it could rip the cover. I only know this because I did it three times before I realised the booklet had to come out of the front gap!
 
“I hope you enjoy the music!! And please pass this message on.”

Last updated on February 7, 2021