"McCartney II" sessions #1 (session) • The Paul McCartney Project

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Album Songs recorded during this session officially appear on the McCartney II Official album.

Studio:: Home Studio, Peasmarsh, Sussex, UK

Studio:: Spirit Of Ranachan Studio, Kintyre, Scotland, UK

Timeline

Previous session May 08, 1979 • Lympne Castle Jam Session

Article May 20, 1979 • Paul McCartney signs new deal with Columbia

Album May 24, 1979 • "Back To The Egg" by Wings released in the US

Session June - July 1979 • "McCartney II" sessions #1

Interview 1979 • A Life In The Day Of Linda McCartney

Single Jun 01, 1979 • "Old Siam, Sir / Spin It On" by Paul McCartney released in the UK

Next session September - October 1979 • "McCartney II" sessions #2

Master release

McCartney II

By Paul McCartney

Some songs from this session appear on:

McCartney II

By Paul McCartney

B-Sides Complete Vol. 2

By Paul McCartney

B-Sides Complete Vol. 5

By Paul McCartney

MoMac's Hidden Tracks Vol.13

By Paul McCartney

MoMac's Hidden Tracks Vol.14

By Paul McCartney

The Lost McCartney Album

By Paul McCartney

All The Best! (UK version)

By Paul McCartney

Wingspan Hits And History

By Wings

McCartney II - Archive Collection

By Paul McCartney

UK Singles Collection - Volume 02

By Paul McCartney

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About

In June / July 1979, Paul McCartney recorded a series of synth-based experimentations, which would later be released as his second album, “McCartney II” in 1980. To put things into perspective, in Summer 1979, Wings was still existing – soon to be on the road – for its final UK autumn tour, and the planned but cancelled Japan tour early 1980.

Those recordings were done in two of his properties – in Sussex then Scotland – and temporarily transformed into home studios by Eddie Klein:

One day I received a call asking me to meet up with Paul to discuss a recording project he had in mind. Paul explained to me that he wanted to do some recordings in the same way he’d done with the McCartney album almost ten years previously. This entailed simply plugging the microphones into the tape machine inputs and completely bypassing the recording console. […] He wouldn’t need a recording engineer standing by, and would therefore be able to record whenever the mood took him.
I don’t know of anyone else who has recorded in this way, it seems so basic and pioneering but the very idea appealed to me. […] I set up the equipment in the old farmhouse in Sussex where Paul had chosen to record and all went well. […] Delivering the equipment and setting it up for recording was all that was required of me. In fact, I rarely saw Paul. He truly recorded everything on his own. When he was finished in Sussex I would dismantle it all and take it up to the barn on Paul’s farm in Ranachan, Scotland and set it up there. Once I’d tested everything I left to return home.
Eddie Klein, from McCartney II Archive Collection, 2011

By sessions’ end, roughly 20 songs were recorded. They would be mixed soon after (in September / October) at Abbey Road, and then shelved for the time being – with the exception of Wonderful Christmastime, released in November 1979.

From Twitter – Paul’s studio set up in Scotland during recording sessions for ‘McCartney II’. Photo by Linda McCartney #ThrowbackThursday #TBT

From puremccartney.com – PAUL RECORDING ‘MCCARTNEY II’, EAST SUSSEX, 1980

From Hog Hill Mill Blog (@hoghillmillblog) • Instagram photos and videos – @paulmccartney playing the @yamahasynths_official CS-80 at Spirit Of Ranachan in 1979 during the ‘McCartney II’ sessions. This photo is interesting to me because it shows a few things that can’t be seen in most other photos from these sessions. 1. The Arp 1601 Sequencer that was hired and used on “Temporary Secretary” can be seen on the floor. 2. The box for a brand-new @rolandglobal CR-78 drum machine 3. A mystery kick drum with a dark finish. 4. Most interestingly to me, a light colored right-handed @fender Telecaster in the bottom left corner. It’s hard to tell from this file, but I’ve seen this photo printed and you can tell that its strung lefty. We know his ’66 sunburst Tele was around at this point, but this Tele is a mystery!

From Hog Hill Mill Blog (@hoghillmillblog) • Instagram photos and videos – @jamesmccartneyofficial tugs on Dad’s shirt at Lower Gate Farm in Sussex, 1979. Before moving the ‘McCartney II’ sessions to Spirit Of Ranachan, @paulmccartney had the gear set up in this empty farm house on his property in Sussex where he stated the record. This photo was used on the record sleeve for the album. @neumann.berlin u47 and u67 in the foreground of this photo. Paul is working on the Studer A80 16-track tape machine.

From Hog Hill Mill Blog (@hoghillmillblog) • Instagram photos and videos – A different view of @paulmccartney’s control room for the ‘McCartney II’ sessions as Spirit Of Ranachan in 1979. In the foreground is a @neumann.berlin u67 large-diaphragm tube condenser microphone. In the back is a Studer A80 16-track 2″ multitrack tape recorder. On the table to the right is a Custom 16-channel mixer built by Eddie Klein with an @abbeyroadstudios speed control on top, next to a Teac A-480 cassette deck. The headphones on the chair are @beyerdynamic DT 100s. The kick drum is a “pure white” 70’s @pearl_drums Wood-Fiberglass bass drum, and the toms are @gretschdrums “stop sign badge” (manufactured ’72-’79) toms in silver sparkle.

From Hog Hill Mill Blog (@hoghillmillblog) • Instagram photos and videos – @paulmccartney’s bog/tom setup at Spirit Of Ranachan recording ‘McCartney II’ in 1979. “Secret Friend”, “Frozen Jap”, and “Bogey Music” all have tom overdubs listed on the track sheets. My guess is that if these bathroom tom overdubs ended up on the record, it was on “Secret Friend”. “Frozen Jap”, and “Bogey Music” especially sound very dry and muffled so I don’t believe they were done in the bathroom. The black rack tom is a @pearl_drums Wood-Fiberglass tom. He had three of the Wood-Fiberglass toms (12″, 13″, and 16″) in “Jet Black” finish. Hard to tell if this is the 12″ or 13″. The floor tom is a @gretschdrums “stop sign badge” (manufactured ’72-’79) floor tom in silver sparkle. The microphone is an @akgaudio D202E.

From Hog Hill Mill Blog (@hoghillmillblog) • Instagram photos and videos – Its been a few days since I’ve posted a picture of @paulmccartney recording in the bathroom, so here you go! Recording drum overdubs at Spirit Of Ranachan for ‘McCartney II’ in 1979. The drum is a @pearl_drums Wood-Fiberglass tom. He had three of the Wood-Fiberglass toms (12″, 13″, and 16″) in “Jet Black” finish, as well as a kick in “Pure White” finish. From the photos it seems that the toms were mostly used for overdubs and not with any kind of drum set in the traditional sense. The headphones are @beyerdynamic DT100s, and the microphone is an @akgaudio D202E..

Last updated on September 3, 2022