In a recent interview, Ringo Starr put it well: "If Paul hadn't been in the band, we'd probably have made two albums, because we were lazy boogers. But Paul's a workaholic. John and I would be sitting in the garden taking in the color green from the tree, and the phone would ring, and we would know, ‘Hey lads, you want to come in? Let's go in the studio!'"
"Get Back" presents a reality-TV show version of this process in action. Almost everything that gets done goes through Paul. He is energetically testing and trying to improve musical ideas, whether his own or those of the group. He always seems focused. In one scene, while experimenting on the bass guitar for a few minutes, he seems to conjure up the song "Get Back" from virtually nothing.
He has what Silicon Valley venture capitalists call "founder energy." Chris Dixon, a partner at the VC firm Andreessen Horowitz and a professional judge of (non-musical) talent, tweeted how much respect he gained for McCartney by watching the documentary. The Beatles were one of the greatest startups of their generation: In addition to making music, they revolutionized social mores on a wide range of issues, including sex, drugs, fashion and politics.
As for work ethic, Paul has been writing and performing songs since 1956 with no real breaks. The sessions for the "Let It Be" concert and album, as portrayed in "Get Back," started only a few weeks after the work on the so-called White Album was concluded. And after "Let It Be" was to come "Abbey Road," the Beatles album where Paul most clearly takes the lead.
After the Beatles broke up, McCartney kept going. Many fans and critics prefer his work with the Beatles, but the totality of his achievements is jaw-dropping. He has three solo albums on which he plays every instrument, and he has composed in virtually every musical genre, including heavy metal, blues, music hall, country and western, gospel, Latin, pastiche, psychedelia, electronica, new wave, drone, lounge, reggae and more. Working with producer George Martin, he was one of the first popular musicians to master the use of the recording studio, in spite of having no technical background. He also learned how to compose for classical orchestra and wrote several major choral works, including the well-received "Ecce Cor Meum."
His vocal range once spanned four octaves and he is considered one of the greatest bass players of all time. The list of those he has collaborated with includes not only John Lennon and George Harrison, but also Ravi Shankar, Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Elvis Costello, Carl Perkins, the Everly Brothers, Kiri Te Kanawa, David Gilmour, Kanye West and Rihanna. He studied the avant-garde and helped incorporate the ideas of John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen into popular music.
He grew up in a very poor area of Liverpool (you still can visit the house) and became music's first billionaire, through royalties from songwriting, revenue from concerts and shrewd investments in royalty rights to others' songs (he also inherited money from his late wife). Well into his 70s, he was still putting on 2 1/2-hour live shows, a practice stopped only by the pandemic.
He has been an active painter, published two children's books, and this year oversaw the production of the gorgeous two-volume set "The Lyrics," a memoir of sorts told through his songs. He was also, by all accounts, a very active father, helping to raise five children.
McCartney was not a perfect manager. At times he pushed Harrison too hard, and that led to Harrison threatening to leave the Beatles, as shown in "Get Back," which resulted in a more general group dissatisfaction. In his solo career he has sometimes released sub-par material and been too tolerant of less talented subordinates.
Still, the point stands: The ranks of great founders and managers rightly includes people such as Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates. But that list is longer and more diverse than is commonly believed — and Paul McCartney stands pretty close to the top of it.
(COMMENT, BELOW)
Cowen is a Bloomberg View columnist. He is a professor of economics at George Mason University and writes for the blog Marginal Revolution. His books include "The Complacent Class: The Self-Defeating Quest for the American Dream."
Previously:
• 12/08/21 The only two pieces of advice you'll ever need
• 11/29/21 Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
• 10/27/21 America's national mood disorder
• 06/10/21 Lifting of mask mandates poses a challenge for Libertarians
• 05/28/21 Why economics is failing us
• 04/19/21We need green energy. We don't need green jobs
• 04/14/21 Libertarianism isn't dead. It's just reinventing itself
• 04/05/21 What does the world need? More humans
• 02/10/21 If Biden goes big now, he may have to go small later
• 01/12/21 Covid improved how the world does science
• 12/07/20 How to make sure your complaint is heard
• 10/27/20 It's getting better and worse at the same time
• 09/14/20 How to be happy during a pandemic
• 09/04/20 Trump is winning the vaccine debate with public health experts
• 07/01/20 Why Americans are having an emotional reaction to masks
• 05/20/20 Covid-19 will expose the ghosts in the U.S. economy
• 05/07/20 Are aliens visiting us? US military seems to think so
• 05/06/20 America's reopening will depend on one thing --- trust
• 04/22/20 How the covid-19 recession is like World War II
• 04/15/20 America is returning to 1781
• 04/08/20 Covid-19 is is upending everything for status seekers
• 03/17/20 The coronavirus will usher in a new era of entertainment
• 01/28/20 Social Security isn't doomed for younger generations
• 01/08/20 Why 2020 is harder to predict than 2019 was
• 12/02/19 Equality is a mediocre goal so aim for progress
• 11/25/19 Inflation inequality creates winners and losers
• 11/09/19 OK kids. This boomer has had enough
• 10/20/19 Would you bet against Trump in 2020?
• 09/25/19 The right industrial policy for America
• 09/24/19 Harvard's legacies are nothing to be proud of
• 09/02/19 Yes, the Fed could still stop a recession
• 08/20/19 A trade deal with China wouldn't change much
• 07/29/19 How your personality traits affect your paycheck
• 07/16/19 Internet 101 should be a required class
• 05/28/19 How Dems actually are the ANTI-immigrant party
• 04/23/19 Want to help fight climate change? Have more children
• 03/22/19 America isn't as divided as it looks
• 03/12/19 The Twitter takeover of politics: You ain't seen nothing yet
• 03/04/19 How to tell which Dem dreams won't come true
• 02/07/19: Now the Dems want to end America's nuclear first strike option. How clueless is that?
• 01/29/19: The shutdown hit a lot of government workers --- hard. But, ultimately, who is responsible for their unfortunate circumstances?
• 12/12/18: The West is abusing its legal power to punish people or institutions that do things it doesn't like. It better stop
• 10/23/18: The US needs Saudi Arabia, and vice versa
• 10/19/18: The right finds the perfect weapon against the left
• 07/24/18: The drive for the perfect child gets a little scary
• 06/04/18: Side effects of the decline of men in labor market
• 05/14/18: Proving Marx's theories right
• 05/08/18: Holding up a mirror to intellectuals of the left
• 05/01/18: Virtual reality will make lives better ... mostly
• 04/16/18: It's hard to burst your political filter bubbleIt's hard to burst your political filter bubble
• 04/09/18: The missing key to grasping why American politics seems to have become more polarized, with no apparent end in sight
• 04/05/18: Two American power centers are about to clash
• 03/22/18: We fear what we can't control about Uber and Facebook
• 03/08/18: How to stop the licen$ing insanity
• 01/10/18: Polarized Congress needs to bring back earmarks
• 12/27/17: The year when the Internet collides with reality
• 11/07/17: Would you blame the phone for Russian interference?
• 10/23/17: North Korea is playing a longer game than the US
• 10/12/17: Why conservatives should celebrate Thaler's Nobel
• 08/02/17: Too many of today's innovations are focused on solving problems rather than creating something new