Paul Is Live (Album sampler)

Track list

Side 1

1. Magical Mystery Tour

   Written by Lennon - McCartney

   Studio version

2. Biker Like An Icon

   Written by Paul McCartney

   Studio version

3. My Love

   Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney

   Studio version

4. Paperback Writer

   Written by Lennon - McCartney

   Studio version

5. Live And Let Die

   Written by Paul McCartney, Linda Eastman / McCartney

   Studio version

This 5-track album sampler CD was issued in Europe and immediately withdrawn, in part because of the error on the front cover artwork. The background was the ’93 version instead of the ’69 version, (which appeared correctly on the commercial album and CD releases).

From the liner notes:

Dear DJ

This sampler, which is exclusively sitting in your little hot and sweaty, is just a hint of tracks to come from the new album PAUL IS LIVE.

The album title and sleeve shot (when you see it — this isn’t it) is a light-hearted parody on the famed Abbey Road crossing picture and the wild ‘Paul is Dead’ rumour that sparked at the time. For the shot, Paul stepped back onto the crossing this summer and then was stepping back in time when the ‘93 Paul (as shown here) was superimposed by computer wizardry into the original Abbey Road shot of ’69.

“Back in the Sixties,” says Paul, “the wild rumour was that I was dead because of certain alleged ‘clues’ on the Abbey Road sleeve. Because I was barefoot, it being a scorching summer’s day, it was taken as a bizarre Mafia sign of death. Then they said that because part of the numberplate of the Volkswagen parked behind read 28IF, it meant I being 27 at the time – would have been 28 IF I’d lived.“

“So we’re having a little parody of that on the sleeve of PAUL IS LIVE. This time I’ve got my boots on (veggie Doc Martens, by the way, so they’re not dead either). The original Volkswagen is still there. This time the number plate reads 51 IS.“

All 24 tracks on PAUL IS LIVE were recorded during the New World Tour in either Australia or the USA by former Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick, who worked with Paul on Sgt. Pepper, Abbey Road, Band On The Run and Unplugged and who said of this new album: “What captured was the energy that comes to the stage. With this album you really get the sense of being there, because we’ve kept the realness.“

Not only does PAUL IS LIVE contain a wealth of tracks never heard live before, there’s a unique improv section at the end, featuring new songs made up by Paul and the Band at their soundchecks.

The photographer for PAUL IS LIVE was Iain Macmillan, the lens-man to whom Paul first conveyed his original Abbey Road album shot back in ‘69. And Savile Row tailor Edward Sexton, who made Paul’s suit for Abbey Road (mistakenly thought at the time to be the ‘funeral suit’), returned to make Paul’s new suit for the ’93 crossing shot.

“It was weird,” Paul says, “strange to go back to the Abbey Road crossing all these years later. It was a summer’s day again, the cars held up in the traffic again, the crowd of surprised onlookers gaped again. But the only difference, instead of The Beatles, it was one man and his dog — but, please, don’t start reading anything into that!“

Geoff Baker