Tug of War Paul McCartney

“the masterpiece everyone has always known Paul McCartney could make. In style and format, the album isn’t all that different from his earlier work, but the songs are far more substantial than the eccentric doodlings of recent albums. Instead of another homemade effort, McCartney has teamed up with producer George Martin to create a record with a sumptuous aural scope. Together, McCartney and Martin have compiled a veritable encyclopedia of contemporary studio pop in the deluxe, high-tech tradition of Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Rumours’, Michael Jackson’s ‘Off the Wall’ and Stevie Wonder’s ‘Songs in the Key of Life’. Every cut offers a stylistic montage of one sort or another, creating an actual tug of war between different pop notions — between British pop parochialism and Afro-American progressiveness, escapist fantasy and sage observation, world-weariness and utopian sentiments.” - Stephen Holden, Rolling Stone