• Home
  • About
    • blog riley
    • Tim Riley
    • Contact
  • AJBlogs
  • ArtsJournal

blog riley

rock culture approximately

RAM DELUXE OXYMORON

June 3, 2012 by Tim Riley

Another Day (Paul McCartney song)

And then there were four...

Amid all the tripe written about this Ram deluxe reissue, Jayson Green’s pitchfork review struck me as descriptively modest. Always had a curious soft spot for Ram, seeing as it was among my earliest headphone slabs. I keep dismissing and returning to it. The vocals: AMAZING. The tone: elaborately controlled ABSURDIST WHIMSY. “Halsey” earns itself that xgau “major annoyance” lament, and yet still a secret cousin to epics like “Hey Jude,” “You Know My Name,” and an early fluttering precursor 1975’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.” McCartney had cheek, stood next to Plastic Ono Band like a giant Jeff Koons marshmellow man. Ram twisted the knife, “Smile Away.” Horribly now. 

You have to give him credit: he couldn’t raise the bar any on Pepper or Abbey Road‘s finales, so he simply inverted his target: why polish the chrome when you can overstuff the couch? Even the closers reek of self-conscious disdain: let’s go spin codas off a cliff (“Long-Haired Lady”)! And again (“Back Seat of My Car”)!

Always been fond of his “Another Day” b-side (itself a marvel of misdirection), “Oh Woman Oh Why,” about a man bleeding out from his lover’s gunshot wounds. “Comic” screams. “What have you done?!?!” Here’s the real McCartney “break-up” track; it’s enough to make Plastic Ono Band sound literal. Almost worth investigating: Richard Hewson’s Percy Thrillington orchestral arrangement of the entire album, where bassist Herbie Flowers and drummer Clem Cattini play Impress the Man. Standout track: “Eat at Home” as a reggae two-step. The first muzak reduction of a muzak album? 

Thrillington

Thrillington (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

Related articles
  • Remastered McCartney Album Out Next Week, Listen Here NOW

  • Paul McCartney to Release ‘Ram’ Box Set

  • The newest release in the Paul McCartney archive collection

  • CD Review: RAM – Paul And Linda McCartney

Filed Under: main

Tim Riley

NPR critic, Author, Emerson College Journalist and Campus Speaker Tim Riley contributes to HERE AND NOW out of WBUR Boston. Read More…

rss thumbnailfacebook thumbnaildeliciousThumbnailyoutube thumbnail goodreads thumbnail
Lennon cover qrcode gplus page pinterest
Lectures: Jodi Solomon Speakers

FEVER playlist

Books

FEVER
IMG_0444hardrainknopf
Feverpbpcmadonna_lgRileyALLBOOKS2

Archives

This blog published under a Creative Commons license

an ArtsJournal blog

Copyright © 2025 · Magazine Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in