Racing to the comments to mention Leslie’s magnificent book and saw the footnote was there. It’s brilliant and turned to the music afresh. A revelation (like your essays).
The John/Paul dichotomy is so fascinating. It's obviously sort of true that John is the cynical protopunk, and Paul the open-hearted eclecticist, but it's at most like, 60% true?
And the reason they work as a duo so well is both because neither of them properly fits in the box they're assigned to, and--for one brief incredible period--if you put them in a room together, they'd create this insane synthesis of their contrasting tendencies that would just be so much better than could have been possible by either of them alone.
And yeah, this song isn't the best _song_ that illustrates that, qua song; but it is one of the best illustrations of that phenomenon. And it is a hell of a song too!
I think Paul also talks about this in an interview with Paul Muldoon - saying it wouldn't have worked if John had e.g. responded 'It is indeed getting better'.
Racing to the comments to mention Leslie’s magnificent book and saw the footnote was there. It’s brilliant and turned to the music afresh. A revelation (like your essays).
Such a great tribute to their yin and yang -- a whole that was always more than the sum of their parts
The John/Paul dichotomy is so fascinating. It's obviously sort of true that John is the cynical protopunk, and Paul the open-hearted eclecticist, but it's at most like, 60% true?
And the reason they work as a duo so well is both because neither of them properly fits in the box they're assigned to, and--for one brief incredible period--if you put them in a room together, they'd create this insane synthesis of their contrasting tendencies that would just be so much better than could have been possible by either of them alone.
And yeah, this song isn't the best _song_ that illustrates that, qua song; but it is one of the best illustrations of that phenomenon. And it is a hell of a song too!
I think Paul also talks about this in an interview with Paul Muldoon - saying it wouldn't have worked if John had e.g. responded 'It is indeed getting better'.