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February 2006

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February 28, 2006 -- MSNBC.com

McCartneys head to Canada to protest seal hunt

Singer, activist wife to go to frigid ice floes in Gulf of St. Lawrence

Paul McCartney and his wife will travel to the ice floes off the Canadian Maritimes this week to observe seal pups before the country's annual hunt opens, the Humane Society of the United States said.

The former Beatle and his wife, Heather Mills McCartney, both longtime animal-rights activists, will head out to the frigid ice floes in the Gulf of St. Lawrence on Thursday and Friday in their bid to prompt Ottawa to end the annual hunt of seals.

"Heather and Paul's visit to the seal pups will shine a global media spotlight on this cruel and needless slaughter," Rebecca Aldworth, the society's director of Canadian wildlife issues, said Tuesday.

The timing of this year's hunt is uncertain. Generally the hunt runs from mid-March through mid-April, but the unseasonably mild winter has put the hunt date on hold.

Twenty years ago, the centuries-old industry appeared doomed. Celebrities such as Brigitte Bardot and Martin Sheen pushed to ban the hunt amid a worldwide campaign that featured graphic photos of doe-eyed whitecoats, or baby harp seals, being bludgeoned on the ice floes.

The protests worked. The United States moved to ban the import of seal products in 1972, and the European Union instituted a partial ban in 1983. Prices plummeted to as low as $5 per seal pelt, and in 1987 Canada banned the killing of whitecoats.

But by the mid-1990s, new markets opened up in China and Russia, the price for pelts started to rise, and the sealing industry's efforts to encourage humane harvesting practices limited the impact of renewed protests.

As a result, both the industry and the seal population bounced back.

The full 325,000 seals allowed under the country's quota were killed last year, giving some 15,000 fishermen and their families $16.5 million in revenue.

The former Scaffold star, 61, claims his family has been rocked by the accusations, which stemmed from an alleged incident in September 2004.

And he refuses to forgive his young accuser - whose identity is protected - insisting: "I'm not JESUS."

He adds, "I had to clear my name for my children's sake. Can you imagine what it would have been like for them to have a father on the Sex Offenders Register?

"Now we just want to get on with our lives. I'm no superstar. I've accepted my role in life. I'm very happy with my wife and children. I have a lovely family around me and nice neighbours. I am a lucky man.

"But this has been terrible."

Stella's art sale legal battle

MORE DETAILS

Fashion designer Stella McCartney is embroiled in a legal battle over the fate of her late grandfather's multi-million pound art collection.

The daughter of Sir Paul McCartney is being sued together with six relatives by the stepsons of entertainment lawyer Lee Eastman, who want a share of the £27.5 million ($48 million) the works raised at auction after his death.

The collection, which included pieces by Matisse, Picasso, Mark Rothko and Willem de Kooning, went under the hammer at Christie's in New York in November.

The plaintiffs, Peter, Paul and Philip Sprayregen, claim McCartney and the six other beneficiaries wrongfully sold the art when it should have been shared with the estate of their late mother, Monique Eastman, and are seeking $1 million (£570,000) compensation.

Linda McCartney, Stella McCartney's mother, was Mr Eastman's daughter from his first marriage.

Monique was his second wife and the Sprayregens were her children from her previous marriage.

The suit, filed last month in New York Supreme Court, says Monique owned some of the works outright and co-owned others with Mr Eastman.

It only identifies one disputed painting by name, Robert Motherwell's Elegy to the Spanish Republic #122, which sold for $2.1 million (£1.2 million) to a private collector.

The plaintiffs also lay claim to "additional paintings" they say their mother received from her husband or from artists.

McCartney said in a statement: "I had no legal say over the decision made by the estate's executors, and I have only very recently become aware of this."

In this unique concert, the legendary Paul McCartney returns to Studio 2 at London's Abbey Road Studios, where most of the Beatles' recordings were made, for a fascinating journey through his songwriting career, from his very first Beatles song to the work for his new album, CHAOS AND CREATION IN THE BACKYARD.

Using a selection of vintage instruments from his own collection -- including the bass played by Bill Black on Elvis Presley's original recording of "Heartbreak Hotel" and the Mellotron and mixing console used by the Beatles -- McCartney revisits his back catalogue in new and revealing ways before an intimate studio audience.

McCartney reinterprets old songs and new songs, performs some terrific cover versions, and enlists the audience's help in a demonstration of "in the moment" songwriting and arranging. Among the songs performed are "Blackbird," "Band on the Run," "Lady Madonna," and many others.

The program premieres on Monday, February 27, 2006 (check local listings).

Great Performances: Paul McCartney: Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road
Monday, February 27, 9:00 pm ET
"Paul McCartney: Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road."

repeat (check local listings):

Great Performances: Paul McCartney: Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road
Wednesday, March 1, 3:30 am ET (early Wednesday morning!)
"Paul McCartney: Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road."

At some point you have to ask yourself: What is cute?

Some things seem obvious. Puppies. Babies. Pandas. And then there's Paul McCartney, which is where things get complicated.

Like for instance he's a 63-year-old grandfather. And all that winking and thumbs-upping began to get tiresome in, like, 1968. And can anyone be cute and really rich at the same time?

And yet here he is again, the once and future Cute One. He whipped off a sizzling "Helter Skelter" at the Grammys the other week. And now he's headed to PBS for a concert recorded at the famous Abbey Road studios in London.

"Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road" is what they're calling it, in deference to McC's latest solo album. Actually, I predict less chaos and more cuteness. He'll shake his head adorably and chew on bamboo.

Monday, 9 pm ET, "Paul McCartney: Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road" (on PBS): Actually, Paul does some of his best work when he isn't feeling the least bit cute. Consider "Helter Skelter," "Long Tall Sally," "Hi, Hi, Hi," the seething parts of "Run Devil Run." Don't wink. Don't nod. Just rip it up, Paul.

Growing up on Abbey Road

"We weren't allowed up there where the grownups lived."

That's Paul McCartney in "Paul McCartney: Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road," a "Great Performances" installment premiering Monday at 9pm on PBS stations (check local listings)

At the beginning of the special, McCartney speaks those words while pointing to an elevated sound-engineering room in Studio 2 at Abbey Road Studios in London. Though the Beatles would make Abbey Road famous, they deferred to their elders in the early days of their recording career. Even now, "it terrifies me, this studio," says McCartney.

You wouldn't know it the way he takes over on the special, soloing on a dozen songs, in part or in whole, playing a variety of instruments and telling anecdotes with a man-of-the-world ease and charm in front of a small crowd of intimates and invitees, including his wife, Heather Mills McCartney.

At 63, McCartney is decidedly a grownup. He's also, well, Sir Paul, and he can go where he likes and do what he pleases with authority. He decided to do "Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road" as an outgrowth of his most recent album, the Grammy-nominated "Chaos and Creation in the Backyard."

He chose Abbey Road, even though the songs on "Backyard" weren't recorded there. But the special allows him to deliver a magical mystery tour and history lesson on both the Beatles and his subsequent solo career.

With the passing of John Lennon and George Harrison and with Ringo less visible, McCartney has become the group's tribal storyteller, always free with a bit of Beatles lore. Two of the songs he performs -- "In Spite of All the Danger" and "Twenty Flight Rock" -- actually predate the Beatles proper. The former is a song written by McCartney and Harrison when the group was still known as the Quarry Men. This is not only pre-Ringo, but pre-Pete Best, the famously jettisoned drummer.

According to McCartney, he, John, George, drummer Colin Hanton and pianist Duff Lewis made a recording of "In Spite of All the Danger" on the cheap at a small Liverpool studio in the late '50s. The resultant record resurfaced in the early '80s and was eventually heard on the soundtrack of "The Beatles Anthology" in 1996.

"Twenty Flight Rock," an old Eddie Cochran rocker, was the first song that McCartney ever played for John Lennon, on the day in 1957 when the two met. "Apparently," says McCartney, "that got me in the Beatles."

The balance of the special is a show of virtuosity. Among the five songs he performs from "Chaos and Creation in the Backyard" is "Jenny Wren," reminiscent of "Blackbird" from the White Album.

There's a reason for this. As teens, McCartney and Harrison would duet a piece by Bach on their guitars. As McCartney explains, the Bach piece influenced "Blackbird," which in turn influenced "Jenny Wren." To show the connective thread, he plays all three songs.

At one point, he brings out a standup acoustic bass that the late Bill Black, Elvis' original bass player, had used on "Heartbreak Hotel." McCartney then performs an impressive version of the song, thumping the familiar bass line and singing with Elvis-like authority.

On a version of "Band on the Run," McCartney shows his audience how to use an ancient four-track recorder, like in the old days, and invites them to be a part of the recording. He also creates sounds by manipulating wine goblets half-filled with water.

He tweedles the opening to "Strawberry Fields Forever" on a Mellotron, as on the original recording, and sings a snatch of the opening verse, a la Lennon. On piano, he performs what he calls "an old lady in new clothes" -- a slowed-down version of "Lady Madonna."

All in all, a hardy, and hearty, day's night.

The McCartney's trip March 2 and 3 will highlight the work of two animal protection groups to stop the Canadian seal hunt, during which hundreds of thousands of seal pups are killed each year: The HSUS and its international arm, Humane Society International, and the UK campaign group Respect for Animals. Both organizations are working to close global markets for seal products and to pressure the Canadian government to end the seal hunt for good.

During the last three years alone, the Canadian government has allowed nearly 1 million seals to be slaughtered. Fully 97 percent of them were less than 3 months of age, and the majority was less than 1 month old.

A 2001 independent veterinarian report concluded that close to half of the seals examined were likely still conscious when skinned, causing "considerable and unacceptable suffering."

"Heather and Paul's visit to the seal pups will shine a global media spotlight on this cruel and needless slaughter," said Rebecca Aldworth, director of Canadian wildlife issues for The HSUS. "The Canadian government must act now to save Canada's international reputation and put a final end to the commercial seal hunt."

Today's kill levels meet and even exceed those of the 1950s and 1960s, when the harp seal population was reduced by as much as two-thirds. In the 1980s, an EU ban on the import of the skins from "whitecoat" (newborn) seals dramatically reduced the number of seals killed in the hunt. But today, sealers kill pups as soon as they have begun to moult -- as young as 12 days old -- and the skins of these slightly older seals are legally traded in Europe.

Opinion polls consistently show the overwhelming majority of Canadians, Americans and Europeans oppose the commercial seal hunt. Mexico, Italy and Greenland are just the latest countries to take action to ban the trade in Canadian seal products.

Stella sued over £27 million sale of family art

Fashion designer Stella McCartney is embroiled in a family court battle over the proceeds from her late grandfather's £27.5 million ($48 million) art collection.

McCartney and six of her relations are being sued for a share of the money raised from the collection of Lee Eastman, who was a successful American lawyer.

The seven were beneficiaries of the sale at Christies in New York last year of Eastman's collection, which held works by some of the greatest artists of the 20th century, including Picasso, Matisse, de Kooning, Rothko and Giacometti.

Although details of the division of the proceeds are not known, an equal share for McCartney would have amounted to about £4 million ($7 million).

This would have been welcome to the designer: Her fashion label, which she co-owns with Gucci, has accumulated losses of millions of pounds in the five years since it started business.

She famously called her father Sir Paul McCartney, the former Beatle, a "tight bastard" for educating her at the local comprehensive in East Sussex rather than paying to put her through independent school.

After a stunning debut at Central St. Martins College of Art and Design - Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell modelled her creations - McCartney went on to build up her fashion label, apparently without financial support from her father's £800 million ($1.4 billion) fortune.

Likewise McCartney will not benefit from her mother's £138 million ($241 million) fortune until after her father's death. Linda, who was Eastman's daughter, died of cancer in 1998, leaving her money to her husband.

The battle over the Eastman fortune has been launched by Paul, Peter and Philip Sprayregen, the sons of Lee's second wife Monique from a previous marriage.

They claim their mother built the collection jointly with Eastman and that, as her heirs, they are entitled to part of the money raised from it. Eastman died in 1991, while Monique lived until last year.

The legal action, reported in the March issue of The Art Newspaper, was filed in the New York state supreme court at the end of last month.

It claims that "during Lee's lifetime, and after his marriage to Monique, the two of them accumulated a large collection of paintings from well known artists, many of which today have great value. That collection was always referred to as the collection of Lee and Monique Eastman, and was recently referred to by Christies as the Collection of Lee V Eastman."

In addition to Stella McCartney and Linda's three other children, the defendants include John Eastman, Lee's son and executor, and two other relations.

Stella McCartney is the most high-profile of the defendants. She set up a design company in 2001 after resigning from Chloe, the Paris fashion house, to enter into a 50:50 venture with Gucci using her own name as the brand. In 2003 she launched a perfume.

Despite her growing reputation, McCartney, 34, has seen her company run up losses of £15 million ($26.2 million) in the past five years. This is despite deals for her clothes to be sold by the chains H&M and Adidas.

Last week her label posted losses of nearly £1million ($1.7 million) for the last trading year, although turnover had doubled to £7.3 million ($12.7 million). This, however, was better than the £3 million ($5.2 million) loss posted in the previous year. McCartney drew a salary of £515,514 ($903,386) last year.

Commenting on the lawsuit, McCartney said in a statement yesterday, "Unfortunately, as one of the seven beneficiaries of my grandfather Lee Eastman's estate, I had no legal say over the decision made by the estate's executors."

John Eastman, also a well-known American lawyer, declined to comment on the lawsuit, as did Paul Bschorr, lawyer for the Sprayregens.

The single most expensive item in the November sale at Christies was an abstract work called Untitled 1977, by Willem de Kooning, the Dutch artist whose business affairs were managed by Lee Eastman. It fetched nearly £6 million ($10.5 million). Another de Kooning abstract from 1975 was sold for more than £2 million ($3.5 million).

Picasso's Buste de Femme, dated December 1939, went for more than £4 million ($7 million), while a Matisse bronze, conceived in 1910 although not cast until 1952, fetched £850,000 ($1.5 million).

Judge Elgan Edwards told the jury that Mike McCartney, 62, had been the victim of an "unfortunate misunderstanding".

And he blasted the Crown Prosecution Service for "wasting public money" with the trial.

McCartney wiped a tear from his eye as the judge made his ruling and he later paid tribute to his brother Sir Paul for sticking by him.

Flanked by his wife Rowena and son Sonny, he described the three-day trial and the 18 months leading up to it as a "living hell".

He said: "It's a monstrosity that an innocent man has been named and linked to a charge of sexual assault, which to the ordinary person means rape.

"I want to thank my family, including my big brother who has been a rock of support during this attempt to soil our name."

He had been accused of touching the girl's bottom as he asked for some more prawns in batter from a buffet.

The 16-year-old, who cannot be named, claimed the father-of-six had put his hand on the top of her leg, slid it upwards and left it there. She reported him to police after the alleged incident during a family party at a pub in the Wirral, Merseyside, in September 2004. Her claims were backed by another 16-year-old.

McCartney, a photographer and former member of 60s band The Scaffold, denied sexual assault.

Appearing at Chester crown court under his real name Peter, he said he only placed his hand on her back in a "fatherly gesture".

Judge Edwards ruled that the prosecution had failed to prove the incident was sexual in nature.

He said: "This defendant has not been acquitted on a technicality, he leaves the court without a stain on his character.

"This case was a misunderstanding from the word go."

The judge also heaped heavy criticism on the prosecution for taking more than 17 months to bring the case to trial.

He said: "A great deal of public money has been wasted and a great deal of court time wasted.

"Two young girls have had the agony of waiting for 17 months to give evidence and a man of exemplary character has had the matter hanging over him. It is quite inexcusable and makes a mockery of legal proceedings."

The judge took the unusual step of ordering the CPS to pay the costs in full, which could work out at more than £100,000 ($175,000).

McCartney plans to launch a campaign to change the law so both the accused and the alleged victims of sex crimes would be granted the same anonymity.

His solicitor Stephen Taylor revealed Sir Paul had been in touch. He said: "I have spoken to him and he said it's great news."

Legend: I met Paul McCartney. I was up there playing during rehearsal, and he walked up to the piano and said, "Sorry, but I just wanted to tell you that I think your song is beautiful."

Meeting him was cool, but getting a compliment from one of the best songwriters in the world was very, very cool. I listen to Abbey Road a lot.

Webmaster's Note: Rolling Stone has an article on the Grammys in the latest issue with a photo of Paul and Mariah Carey.

He has been a major promoter of the animal rights scam perpetrated by PETA. And he has operated a sheep farm with a "commitment to natural methods, and the farm and produce have gained recognition and designation as organic status," according to a McCartney spokesman. In other words, Paul McCartney has spent years accepting and promoting the environmental agenda that is based more on political propaganda than scientific fact. Sir Paul has done his best to toe an impossible, anti-human line. Worse, he has used his celebrity status to push that misguided agenda on the rest of us.

But Paul is only human. He has needs and wants. And he has the money to get them. Or so he thought. It seems Sir Paul is the victim of Sustainable Development and its strict land use policies that allow a power elite to dictate what we do with our own private property.

Paul's farm is an extensive estate with lots of land just 70 miles outside London. But when he built a simple one and a half story log cabin on the property to serve as a quiet retreat, away from the hustle and bustle of the farm, he was foiled. It seems the local community planning committee doesn't like the cabin. They say it "harms the intrinsic landscape quality and character of the area." Says Councilman Grey Metcalf, "Planning laws are there for a reason. If there was a free-for-all, people would build where they liked, whenever they liked." The council says Paul ruined an area of outstanding natural beauty.

The fact is, Paul's cabin doesn't harm anything. It's just that his neighbors want to control what he does on his property because they consider the view over his fields to be their own "view shed" and they don't want him building something in the way to spoil their vistas and sunsets. Protecting the environment is just a euphemism for stealing property.

Paul's problem is that he never argued before the Council that the land was his and that he should have a perfect right to build a little cabin if he wants to. Instead he argues his need, saying he has a need to privacy, seclusion and security due to the proximity of a public foot path running next to his farm house. Of course the foot path was already enforced over private land as part of the open space rules. Paul then goes on to plead what a great environmentalist he is. In essence, Paul pleaded that "I'm one of you, how can you do this to me?" The Council countered saying the cabin isn't essential to the running of the farm, so he doesn't really need it. Paul then learned that the pigs he had helped put in charge, through his support of the dictatorship called Sustainable Development, are now more equal than he is. It's the new order of things that Sir Paul thought he wanted.

Of course, it can be argued that Paul has received what he deserves because he's so eager to inflict the same idiocy on the rest of us. But gloating over Paul doesn't restore our property rights. Will he ever understand that his actions and political gibberish have consequences? Perhaps Paul could now be encouraged to rewrite George Harrison's song, "Tax man" and replace those words with "Land Man."

Webmaster's Comment - Isn't this the pot calling the kettle black? Lay off the caffeine dude! There's a fine line between chaos...

Fashion show has designs on top names

Top fashion designers including Stella McCartney and Nicole Farhi are being lined up to support this year's Edinburgh Charity Fashion Show.

Organisers say they are planning the biggest student fashion show ever held in the UK.

And they hope it will raise a mammoth £60,000 ($105,000) to be split between cancer care centres in Scotland and a new African orphanage.

Some of the biggest names in fashion - including Godiva and Ozwald Boateng - are helping out by loaning eye-catching garments which will be modelled by students on the catwalk at shows on consecutive nights from March 2 to 4 in the Royal Museum of Scotland.

And it is hoped Stella McCartney will also provide items for the shows, with tickets now on sale for the first two nights when 650 people will be able to attend each evening.

Burlesque dancers, flame throwers and African drummers will emblazon each of the evening's proceedings with excitement and glamour, while musical entertainment will be provided by up-and-coming bands and DJs.

The event will culminate in a VIP night extravaganza - attended by professionals including investment bankers - with a champagne reception, followed by a two-course dinner and a highly exclusive auction.

The 350 guests at the finale will have the chance to bid for prizes such as a week-long stay at The Sandy Lane, Barbados, for ten people and a dress made by Sue Bonham, dressmaker to the Queen.

Exciting sporting holidays and tickets to the Glyndbourne opera are also being auctioned.

Up for grabs in a raffle, for which tickets can be purchased at all three shows, are a limited edition box set of Harry Potter books signed by JK Rowling, signed brass cymbals belonging to the drummer in Kaiser Chiefs and a guitar from Snow Patrol.

The event is raising funds for two worthy causes. The Swaziland Charitable Trust, which is dedicated to helping orphaned children, or those whose lives have been made difficult by Aids in Africa, will benefit from the show. Cash will also be given to the Maggie's Cancer Caring Centres, as in previous years.

Stella McCartney is the daughter of ex-Beatle Paul and Linda McCartney who became chief designer of French couture house Chloe in 1997, while Ozwald Boateng is the first tailor to have staged a catwalk show in Paris. Nicole Farhi is an Algerian designer and sculptor based in London.

Organisers have approached Stella McCartney and are confident she will loan clothes for the event.

One of the organisers, Leonora Lonsdale, 19, a history and Spanish student at Edinburgh University, said: "We are so pleased that so many great designers are lending garments and we are hopeful that Stella McCartney will also be able to help out. It is now in its third consecutive year and every year it has escalated and escalated and this year we have really stepped up our game.

"What we are trying to do is make it the biggest student fashion show to date in the UK. The third night will hopefully draw all the movers and shakers in Edinburgh."

And she revealed: "JK Rowling just happened to be in a department store at the same time as our chairman, Joshua Scales, who asked her if she could help out - and we were delighted to get a signed Harry Potter box set."

A spokeswoman for Maggie's, which has a centre at Edinburgh's Western General Hospital, said: "We are delighted that once again the Edinburgh Charity Fashion Show is sponsoring Maggie's. I know it's going to be another fantastic show because of all the hard work that has been put into it."

Tickets for the event can be bought online from its website, at www.ec-fs.org.

Grammy Insider

A Grammy attendee sitting very near Paul McCartney had these observations of the evening:

I was sitting very close to Paul at the Grammys and his head of security Mark Hamilton was sitting near him and was with him every step of the way. He shooed away a couple of autograph seekers.

There was a seat filler who got a photo with Paul and then sat a few seats away in the front row. Hamilton came over and grabbed the guy by the arm and said "Get out of my f*kin' seat!" Then Hamilton sat there. It was pretty funny actually. After that, every time there was a commercial break, Hamilton would stand guard in front of Paul.

Backstage after the show Paul spent a good amount of time in Bruce Springsteen's dressing room along with Tom Hanks, Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman. The dressing room was guarded by two of Springsteen's guards. Paul's photographer was rebuffed when he tried to enter. They were there for at least 20 minutes. Paul left on his own.

Stevie Wonder was in the same hallway when Paul came out of Springsteen's dressing room and they spoke for a few minutes, actually whispering into each others ears. At one point Paul lifted Stevie off the ground with a bear hug. Stevie then picked Paul up in the air with a hug.

Paul actually spent a good amount of time in his seat. Many artists came out only when they were due for an award.

Dave Grohl was totally rocking out during "Helter Skelter" as was most of the audience.

After the last award was given Paul did get up and leave as the last performance was starting but so did every other celebrity.

Roger Friedman attended the Sony "after party" where he berated a girl who did not immediately let him into the VIP room. He said, (and I'm not making this up) "Don't you know who I am?"

Mike McCartney, 62, was charged with sexually assaulting the 16-year-old girl at a family party in a pub in Wirral, Merseyside, in September 2004.

But on Friday a judge at Chester Crown Court ruled that there should not have been a prosecution.

McCartney, of Park West, Heswall, Merseyside, was the singer with The Scaffold and is now a photographer.

McCartney, who had appeared under his real name Peter, had been accused of briefly touching the girl's bottom as he asked for more prawns from the buffet.

He vigorously denied the allegations saying he only placed his hand on her back in a "fatherly gesture" of thanks.

Judge Elgan Edwards, the Recorder of Chester, threw the case out ruling that the prosecution had failed to prove the incident was sexual in nature.

He directed the jury to find McCartney not guilty.

Judge Edwards said: "This defendant has not been acquitted on a technicality, he leaves the court without a stain on his character.

"This case was a misunderstanding from the word go and should never have been prosecuted."

The judge heavily criticised the prosecution for taking more than 17 months to bring the case to trial, saying a "great deal of public money and court time" had been wasted.

Brother thanked

He ordered the Crown Prosecution Service to pay the costs of the case, estimated at more than £100,000 by McCartney's solicitor Stephen Taylor.

Speaking outside court, McCartney described the experience as "a living hell" and vowed to campaign for a change in the law to give anonymity to people accused of sexual offences.

He said: "It's a monstrosity that a wholly innocent man has been publicly named and linked to a charge of sexual assault, which to the ordinary person means rape.

"I want to thank my family, including my big brother who has been a rock of support during this attempt to soil our family name," he added.

Taylor, his solicitor, said Sir Paul McCartney was delighted his brother had cleared his name.

He said: "I have spoken to him and he said it was great news."

"We're going to try and do a couple sort of experimental things tonight ... going to pretend to make records and do all sorts of funny things really," says Paul McCartney as he enters EMI's Abbey Road Studio 2 for "Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road."

The McCartney production for PBS airs at 9 p.m. Monday (February 27) as part the "Great Performance" series.

The documentary was filmed before an intimate group of the former Beatle's friends and fans. Most of them are young and watch in almost awestruck silence except for brief polite applause.

McCartney shows uncharacteristic humility as he demonstrates the chaos of creation. And the venue is the Beatles' musical Santa's workshop, which gave gifts that more than 40 years later keep on giving.

"Coming back to Abbey Road is always a very special thing because as kids this was really the first studio we came in, and we had to come in that door as I came in tonight. We weren't allowed up there (pointing to the control booth) because that's where the grown-ups lived. We came in as early 20-year-old kids."

That first session was the 1962 recording of "Love Me Do," and McCartney explains that producer George Martin wasted no time putting his imprint on the song ... moving John Lennon's harmonica line and bringing McCartney's voice to the front.

McCartney says he was unprepared and the nervous warble of the chorus can still be heard on the recording: "It terrifies me this studio ... just remembering."

A lot was at stake that day. The group had been turned away by every major recording studio, and Martin's career also was in jeopardy. Until then, his only "hits" had been recording symphony orchestras and comedy albums.

This show's shining moments are when McCartney walks the audience through how the complex, layered sounds were recorded on primitive four-track machines. Highlights:

McCartney demonstrates how an old dance-hall harmonium, combined with a track made by layering the chromatic sounds made by water-filled glasses stroked with a wet finger can come together with a rhythm track to make an opening for a song (in this case, his post-Beatles "Band on the Run."

He uses the unsophisticated Melatron, a Cro-Magnon ancestor of the synthesizer, to make the eerie molasses sound now instantly recognizable as Lennon's "Strawberry Fields Forever."

The money mogul McCartney pulls out one of his purchases - the bass used by Elvis Presley's band and, combining it with other instruments, does a bit of "Heartbreak Hotel."

McCartney completes a song track playing his Beatles bass guitar, drums, lead guitar, rhythm guitar and then makes up lyrics on the fly, involving his audience in the process to actually illustrate the chaos of creation.

In the short eight-year span of the Beatles' recording career, nearly all of the group's 13 albums were recorded at Abbey Road and most contained only original compositions. After 1965's "Help!" album, each release was a radical departure from the prior one.

Now he's got older, dyeing his hair. Sir Paul McCartney will turn 64 this year, prompting the question: do we still need him? He thinks so - 'I'm about uniting people,' he said after 9/11 - and judging from his Live 8 performance last summer, he's right. (Only a cynic could have stood there, unmoved by his closing Hey Jude.) On the other hand, we don't need him as much as his latest biographer contends.

Christopher Sandford, you see, is a fan - not just of Fab Paul, but of the solo artist and composer; of his soppy post-Beatles band, Wings; of his wives, even of his paintings. The upside to such enthusiasm, when the author purveys unflattering gossip, one tends to believe it. The downside, too much space is given to what has been, since 1969, a distinctly patchy career. McCartney's own concern for his reputation is legendary, but no recital of ticket receipts or platinum discs can outweigh how he squanders it every time he descends into fatuity or feuding.

Had Sandford talked to his subject, he might have felt constrained to pass over Paul's vanity and tantrums. Just as well, then, that he relies for new information on the outer circles of Macca's acquaintance. Thus we see the recording industry's Queen Mum cutting a friend who dares criticise an unmemorable album, screaming at a minion for forgetting a doily, and telling his widowed and supplicant stepmother to 'bottle fruit, it's character-building'.

Such vignettes are rare, though. More likely, Saint Paul is engaged in some entirely commendable act: holding George Harrison's hand in the cancer ward; caring for the Aids-stricken Robert Fraser, when everyone else had deserted him; and likewise for the school friend who in 1957 introduced him to Lennon. In 1995, he paid for a life-saving operation on the baby daughter of a bouncer he'd known back in Hamburg. Over the years, he has given millions to charities - not always publicised, or fashionable.

Much of the material in McCartney can already be found in other publications and web postings - and more comes out all the time - but in its favour, only a true Beatlemaniac could have marshalled it as efficiently. Sandford's familiarity with well-trodden ground allows him to keep up a brisk pace. His style is straightforward by the standards of the genre and, despite the odd clunker, he can turn a neat phrase. After the Beatles split, for example, its ex-members would always be 'poor relations of their own fame'.

As Sandford allows, the work they put out widened the gap, and on that count he shows no mercy to George or John. But the unavoidable 'bilge' or 'gush' apart, he gives a thumbs-up as irksome as his subject's to nearly all Paul's productions. And because McCartney spends most of his time working - at incredible speed - Sandford has a job just to cover all the albums.

That's a pity. It means Rupert Bear has a longer index entry than Eleanor Rigby (said by P. D. James to possess 'the minimalist perfection of a Beckett story'). And there's no room to wallow in the embarrassment of, say, the 'Linda tapes' - when Mrs McCartney's off-key warblings were stripped out of a Wings recording and leaked to the radio. (Webmaster's note: It was a live recording of "Hey Jude" from the Knebworth concert June 30, 1990. Not a Wings recording.) - or to bask in such occasional glories as Macca's 1999 rock 'n' roll revival at the reconstituted Cavern club.

Instead we plough through the making of Off the Ground, Press to Play and Tug of War. Never heard of them? Sandford says, 'Critical consensus names Band on the Run as McCartney's finest post-Beatles hour, but Tug of War would make a strong bid for runner-up.' And perhaps that says it all.

A half-century after McCartney first picked up a guitar, Sandford's conclusion is 'We want more'. But remembering those rumours of Paul's death - started by the number plate 28 IF on the cover of Abbey Road - one is half-tempted to wish 'if only'.

Stella is in the red

Stella McCartney's design company is still losing money, four years after it was started at massive cost to Gucci, it has emerged. The label has posted losses of nearly £1 million in its latest trading year.

But this did not stop Miss McCartney from drawing a salary of £515,514 ($903,386), the company's report revealed.

Concessions with high street labels H&M and Adidas have failed to stem the losses at Stella McCartney, which now total more than £15 million ($26.3 million).

The designer, 34, is in the red despite the company doubling turnover from £3.7 million ($6.5 million) to nearly £7.3 million ($12.8 million). The gains were outweighed by costs including 30 staff.

She has significantly reduced the losses, however, as they now total £948,899 ($1,662,850) compared to the £3,170,174 ($5,555,412) reported for the previous year.

And in the report, posted at Companies House, directors predict the label might make a profit next year.

The report said directors were ' satisfied' with the business's growth. It said: 'Operating losses have been cut three-fold during the year. The directors

believe that the overall business will reach its target of profitability by 2007.' However, it may be some time before parent company Gucci reaps the benefits of its £ 20million ($35 million) investment.

Miss McCartney's label is one of the best known in Britain because of its popularity with celebrities. But some critics claim its success is due to her father's fame.

The report also revealed that she will focus more on accessories and will extend her contract with Adidas.

Now it can be told: The world's most famous meter maid -- Lovely Rita -- was really a traffic warden.

Paul McCartney explains: " 'Lovely Rita' was occasioned by me reading that in America they call traffic wardens 'meter maids', and I thought, God, that's 'so American! Also to me 'maid' had sexual connotations, like a French maid or a milkmaid, there's something good about 'maid', and 'meter' made it a bit more official, like the meter in a cab; the meter is running, meter maid. Hearing that amused me. In England you hear those American phrases and they enter our vocabulary. We let them in because we're amused, it's not because we love them or want to use them, it's just because it's funny. 'Rita' was the only name I could think of that would rhyme with it so I started on that, Rita, meter maid, lovely Rita. And I just fantasized on the idea."

-- From "Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now," by Barry Miles

While the Apple Computer versus Apple Records case wends its way through the courts, former Beatle Paul McCartney isn't shy of new technology.

As a thank you gesture at the end of his last US tour (which took place between September and November last year), McCartney gave everyone who toured with him a video iPod.

A source also told Macworld that McCartney also uses Macs in his UK recording studio on the South Coast.

McCartney also raised eyebrows when he performed at the Grammy Awards earlier this month. He sang a version of "Yesterday" with Jay-Z and Linkin Park.

The reason is simple, the source said. When mash-up artist DJ Danger Mouse created the infamous 'Grey Album', he chose to mix the vocals from Jay-Z's 'The Black Album' and the Beatles' 'The White Album'.

Though the remix was subjected to a cease and desist order by EMI, the move did win Danger Mouse one interested potential fan - Paul McCartney, who listened to the album in his car.

"McCartney remains really interested in what's going on in the creative world," the source explained, "He likes to know what's going on."

This interest in modern music culture also led McCartney to take UK DJ, remixer and musician The Freelance Hellraiser (Roy Kerr) along with him on his tour.

Kerr won fame with a mash-up called "A Stroke of Genius", which combined an instrumental edit of The Strokes' track "Hard To Explain" with Christina Aguilera's pop hit "Genie in A Bottle".

The DJ was given unique access to McCartney's own tracks in order to create remixes to play to the audience before each show.

Mike McCartney, 61, is accused of sexually assaulting the 16-year-old girl at a family party in Merseyside in September 2004.

The schoolgirl alleges he grabbed her bottom as he asked for more prawns.

Mr McCartney, who is appearing at Chester Crown Court under his real name Peter, denies the charge.

Deborah Gould, prosecuting, said that as the complainant was clearing plates, Mr McCartney, of Park West, Heswall, approached her from behind and moved his hand to her bottom.

Don't you know who I am? All these young girls are only after one thing - some money from me
Mike McCartney's alleged comments

"He kept his hand on her bottom while he asked her if there was any [food] left, said Miss Gould. "...She was upset and embarrassed by the defendant's behaviour in putting his hand on her bottom."

The girl - who cannot be named for legal reasons - reported the incident to her manager Gavin Batchelor who confronted Mr McCartney, a photographer and former member of the 1960s band The Scaffold.

Miss Gould said: "The defendant flew into a rage. Although he denied the allegation, he was abusive and extremely angry.

'No idea'

"He kept asking Mr Batchelor if he knew who he, the defendant, was.

"Mr Batchelor had no idea what that meant, he did not know the defendant's identity at that stage.

"Mr Batchelor described that the defendant was 'full of himself and arrogant in his manner; he seemed to expect that we must know him'."

The court heard that pub licensee David McCarten asked Mr McCartney to leave but he refused, saying: "I'm famous, I've been well known for over 60 years.

'Absolutely abhorrent'

"Don't you know who I am? All these young girls are only after one thing - some money from me."

When he was interviewed by the police in October 2004 he denied the allegation, saying: "I'm sorry... there is no way that I would touch a girl's or a lady's bottom in my life.

"The idea of doing that to a girl is absolutely abhorrent to me... I think that is wrong."

The case continues.

Songwriter George Martin is demanding recognition for co-writing The Beatles' hit "Yesterday," insisting he penned the track alongside Sir Paul McCartney.

The song's composers are officially listed as McCartney and late Beatle John Lennon, but Martin claims McCartney added Lennon's name to the songwriters list, despite the "Imagine" singer having no involvement in the melody.

He says, "We didn't know what to do with it. It was such a soppy tune, so I went away and wrote a score for a string quartet to go with it.

"Two days later I was rehearsing it and Paul McCartney walked in. He'd never seen a score before, and he said, 'It hasn't got my name on it.'

"So I handed him a pencil and he signed it.

"He wrote John Lennon's name too - although he had nothing to do with it - and added Esquire to mine."

George Michael, Sting and Mary J Blige will also appear on the record, along with Barbra Streisand and John Legend.

The world's biggest recording artists are queuing up to duet with the US singer, best known for his hit I Left My Heart In San Francisco.

Bennett turns 80 in August and the album will be released the following month.

Hollywood star Clint Eastwood has directed a forthcoming documentary about the star's career.

The crooner has been a chart fixture since the 1950s.

Bennett has signed a lucrative deal with record giant Sony BMG, which described the singer as "one of the most legendary performers of all time".

His most recent recording, The Art Of Romance, won a Grammy last month for best traditional pop vocal album.

These days Sir Paul McCartney is well known not only for his impressive music career, he also has the reputation of a model family man who lived a long and happy life with his first wife Linda. However, those who knew him in the time of his youth paint a different picture. They say McCartney was a junkie and a womanizer. John Lennon suspected McCartney of sleeping with both his wives. Lennon called his band mate a sex gladiator.

In the spring of 1989 a young woman confronted the 46-year-old pop icon as he was leaving his London office in Soho. The woman started yelling in McCartney's face: "Why don't you recognize me? Why don't you recognize me?" The Beatle looked pale and embarrassed. He was just a step away from a big scandal while the fans and onlookers were watching. Eventually, McCartney's bodyguards pushed the woman aside and carried the musician into a car that sped away before the exhaust fumes vanished in thin air.

It is unknown who that woman was and what kind of recognition she was after. According to Christopher Sanford, author of a new biography of the famous musician, the unfortunate incident is a reminder of a time when the Beatles bass player was one of the sex symbols of his generation.

In his book, "Paul McCartney" Sanford says that McCartney developed a penchant for sex when he was 16. He would always spend some time with his first girlfriend July Arthur after running away from school to write songs with Lennon.

The number of his female fans went up sharply after the Beatles took shape in the late '50s. McCartney took advantage of the situation. He was especially popular with girls in Hamburg where the group went to play in clubs. According to Sanford's calculations, during the next ten years Paul had sex with 500-600 women. Several flings might have ended up in a very bad way as his former sweethearts were keen to get money for children born out of wedlock. In April 1962, McCartney had an affair with Erica Hubers, a waitress at a night club in Hamburg. In December the same year, Erica gave birth to a daughter called Bettina. Erica claimed McCartney got her pregnant. She filed a suit in court seeking alimony. McCartney categorically denied his parenthood but eventually paid Erica about $5,000 in child support. He never acknowledged his parenthood, though.

McCartney continued his amorous exploits after coming back to Liverpool. His father would drop by The Cavern, a club where the Beatles played frequently, and he would say: "The birds are beginning to flock", a reference to numerous young girls hanging around the stage. Then one day Paul fell in love with a young actress. Her name was Jane Asher, she was upper middle class, lived with her parents in a big house in central London. McCartney lived with Jane in that house for three years. He penned "I Want to Hold Your Hand," one of his best songs in a basement of the house.

Despite his lengthy relationship with Asher, McCartney never stopped having fun with female fans while on tour. The Beatles's tour manager Mal Evans said that scores of young women were trying to get inside Paul's hotel room on the U.S. tour. Some of them eventually succeeded.

McCartney bought himself a home, a three-storey building in St. John's Wood near the Abbey Road Studios. According to Sanford, a countless number of women of different ages and trades spent nights at McCartney's place. He would normally forget the name of his one-night-stand girl on the morning after.

McCartney once said that Lennon had warned him after having fallen in love with Yoko Ono:

"Don't you ever think about it!' Sure thing, he knew I was a bit of a ladies' man. That's true, I always loved girls."

In May 1967 Paul's life changed forever after he spotted an attractive blonde with a camera in a Soho night club. The blonde's name was Linda Eastman. She turned up at Brian Epstein's apartment at a release party for Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Legend has it that Paul asked Linda to "come to my place and have a look at my paintings" at the end of the party. Paul and Linda spent the next few days together. A few months later, Jane Asher announced that her engagement with Paul McCartney had been cancelled at the request of the latter. Linda told Paul that she was pregnant in late December 1968. They got married on March 12, 1969. Linda gave birth to three children: Mary, Stella, and James. Their marriage lasted for 29 years. Linda succumbed to breast cancer and died in December 1998 (Linda died in April 1998). Paul McCartney is now married to Heather Mills, they have a daughter called Beatrice.

"Rock Bottom"

A novel of complete and utter fiction by Geoff Baker.

Geoff Baker served fifteen years as public relations spokesman for Sir Paul McCartney. "Rock Bottom," Geoff's first novel, is a scabrously funny fiction about the corrosive effects of mega-celebrity.

Out May 2006.

Paul McCartney enjoyed a nice sales spike as a result of his performance at the Grammy Awards last week. "Chaos and Creation in the Backyard" re-entered the Billboard Top 200 at #143, with SoundScan showing sales of 8,807 units, a 99.3 percent increase over the previous week.

Designer Stella McCartney is making sure best pal Gwyneth Paltrow smells good as she gets set to become a mother again - by throwing her an aromatic baby shower.

The British style guru teamed up with the owners of top London spa Aroma Me to stage the party for the six-month-pregnant actress.

Spa owner Kirstie Garrett brought her spa treatments to McCartney's home so Paltrow and a few choice pals could pamper themselves, according to American magazine In Touch.

The firm said losses in the fiscal year running from Feb. 1, 2005, to Dec. 31 declined 70 percent to 948,899 pounds, or $1.7 million, from 3.2 million pounds, or $5.9 million. Revenues nearly doubled to 7.3 million pounds, or $13.2 million, from 3.7 million pounds, or $6.8 million, the company said in a statement Tuesday.

Due to the large amount of mixes submitted there has been a delay in the announcing of the winner. We are still listening to mixes at the moment, but will hopefully soon be in a position to present Paul with a shortlist of ten to choose from.

The winner's track will be made available for download on PM.com.

1000 Dinners 2006 - moves to the spring

1000 Dinners ­ a great way to have fun with friends and raise funds to clear landmines and help landmine survivors.

Hold a dinner this spring and you will be automatically entered into a prize draw to win a meal cooked for you and your friends by chef and food writer for the Telegraph Tom Norrington-Davies in your home!

Starting in 2006, our 1000 Dinners campaign will move to the spring with a focus on hosting dinners between March 1st, in commemoration of the signing of the Mine Ban Treaty, and April 4th, in support of International Mine Awareness Day.

To find out more about 1000 Dinners and get lots of resources to help you arrange you dinner please visit www.landmines.org.uk/436.

If we had our druthers, we'd druther have been in Sir Paul McCartney's dressing room backstage on Grammy night.

Paul, Tony Bennett and James Taylor proceeded to serenade such friends as Nicole Kidman, Keith Urban, Faith Hill and Tim McGraw with an impromptu trio of "The Very Thought of You."

It seems Tony and Paul will be together in London at this month's end, recording that very track for release on Tony's 80th birthday. Taylor had already done a recording with Tony for the project, along with Bono, Elton John, the Dixie Chicks, etc. Tony also won his 13th grammy in the Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album category.

They could make a new Grammy category - Best Performance From a Dressing Room.

Boston's own classic rocker Chachi Loprete will be in Abbey Road Studios at the end of the month when his best bud Tony Bennett records a tune with Sir Paul McCartney for the crooner's upcoming duets album.

"Tony knows that I am a big Beatles fan, so he invited me and my girlfriend over to London to watch them record in the same studios that the Beatles recorded," said Loprete, who hosts WZLX-FM's four-hour Fab Four fest on Saturday mornings. "I'm totally psyched."

Bennett, in anticipation of his 80th birthday in August, is putting together the duets album of his fave tunes with a Little Help From his Friends such as McCartney, Elton John, Bono, Billy Joel, James Taylor, the Dixie Chicks and Diana Krall. Recording sessions are also planned in New York and Los Angeles.

Chachi, who is tight with Bennett's son, Danny, said Tony will croon "The Very Thought of You" with McCartney during the week of Feb. 21.

"Danny's become pretty close with Paul and they hang out all the time," said Loprete, who has interviewed the Beatles frontman a few times in his career. "I just can't wait to be there."

"That is so gross," said the 12-year-old boy. "Who are those guys?"

"Those guys" were the Rolling Stones, performing during half-time at the Super Bowl last Sunday. My grandson Patrick, who is learning to play guitar, was not impressed.

Old rock stars should take their cue from football players, who find something else to do when they're no longer able to perform on the field.

Though there were plenty of aging, bald men on stage, Jagger didn't want any of the billions of Super Bowl viewers to see any in his audience. The Sun reported on Tuesday that Jagger, 62, had all the wrinkled folks removed from the central area so they wouldn't appear on the TV screen.

"Staff were told to take tickets off older fans and hand them to better-looking ones," The Sun reported.

As I watched Jagger's jumping gyrations, I wondered what doses of amphetamines he was taking these days to achieve that effect.

Yes, it can be a drag getting old, if, like Jagger, you never grow up and remain in denial about your aging. That doesn't mean you act old and crotchety, you just accept each season of life as it comes and enjoy it for what it is.

Look at Paul McCartney. He's a year older than Jagger.

Of course, McCartney is a singer/songwriter/guitarist - an artist - whereas Jagger is an entertainer. But Jagger is not even a well-rounded entertainer. He can only do one thing: jump around a stage while singing.

As an artist, McCartney is still writing songs, still singing, still performing. He looks great for a guy his age, assuming he hasn't succumbed to the vanity of plastic surgery.

As a little kid in the 1960s, I had Paul McCartney's picture - clipped from a Parade magazine - hanging on my bedroom wall. I kissed it every morning. When I got a stereo, I bought Beatles' single hits and albums.

This is when rock 'n' roll as a musical genre was just being born. It started in the 1950s, but rock bands really got going in the 1960s with the coming of the Beatles, then later the Rolling Stones and others.

Rock 'n' roll was not only unique musically, but it was the first genre that appealed directly to youth, thus causing a divide between generations. When I was in fifth grade, my mother sat me down for a serious talk. She said rock 'n' roll was from the devil and that I should stop listening to it. Her talk was too late. By then I was hooked.

But I could never get into Jagger's act. As a teen with a big collection of rock albums, I never bought, asked for or possessed a Rolling Stones record. And though living in New York I attended many rock concerts - Black Sabbath, Ten Years After, Johnny Winter, Lynnyrd Skynnyrd, Fleetwood Mac, Deep Purple, the Grateful Dead, Bob Dylan, the Allman Brothers, Alice Cooper, Frank Zappa, Edgar Winter, The Band and so many others - I never cared to see the Rolling Stones. Their music never appealed to me, never spoke to me, never got me up and dancing.

As for Mick Jagger, I always thought he was ugly, in an ugly sort of way, and not just his looks, but who he was. The Stones never sang anything worth thinking about or even anything fun. They were all about drugs, sex and rock 'n' roll. Shallow, hollow, worthless.

Jagger is supposed to have seven kids by four women; Paul McCartney was married to his wife, Linda, for almost 30 years before she died of cancer in 1998. They had four children.

Seeing Jagger onstage Sunday reminded me of a visit back to Long Island years ago, when I decided to look up some old high school friends. In their 30s and 40s, these friends were still buying and selling drugs, still committing crimes, still in and out of court and jail. They were divorced or still single. For all their experiences they were no wiser than the last time I'd seen them in their early 20s.

Like Mick Jagger, they have nothing to offer.

Jagger, writes Nick Gillespie in a 2002 Reason Online column, "never promised any sort of political or moral uplift; rather, he promised only to debauch himself and whoever he was with, to push the limits of human excess and degradation."

Yeah, Patrick, that is gross.

Paul McCartney is getting into the act at the Chicago Auto Show this weekend. Lexus has partnered with Sir Paul to create a one-of-kind special signature edition car.

It's part of a benefit project for McCartney's Adopt-A-Minefield - an organization that's mission is to resolve the global landmine crisis.

It is not too late to participate in the online fundraising raffle at www.landmines.org/wincar. The winner will get the "rock and roll" Lexus, a collection of Paul's music and a guitar. The raffle ends on March 31 and the vehicle will be awarded shortly thereafter.

Even if you don't win, you can check out the McCartney car at the Chicago Auto Show.

"I was trying to figure out what it felt like,and it was like in seventh grade asking a girl to a dance. You know, when you're excited and you're super-nervous about it and you feel uncomfortable in your own skin," Phoenix recalled backstage of Linkin Park's onstage collaboration with former Beatle Paul McCartney.

"You have a seventh-grade crush on Paul McCartney?" singer Chester Bennington interrupted, ruining the moment.

"I actually just turned 13," Phoenix jokingly replied. "I'm waiting for them to play 'Lady in Red.' "

Now that would be a mash-up. Until then, though, Linkin Park are thrilled with how their "Numb/Encore" with Jay-Z meshed with McCartney's "Yesterday" during the big show (see "Jay-Z And Linkin Park Set To Mash Up Grammy Stage").

"The Grammys asked us to perform with Jay-Z since we were nominated for the mash-up, but since we already played together on some really high-profile stages with our MTV special and with Live 8, we wanted to do something really special that showcased the power of the mash-up," explained guitarist Brad Delson, who orchestrated the performance. "So we had this idea to do something with Paul, and when I went to Mike [Shinoda]'s house and we were listening to some of the older Beatles songs to see what would work best, 'Yesterday' really popped its head up."

"This is getting into technicalities, but Jay's verse is like a weird measure, like 18 bars, and the fact that 'Yesterday' works with that weird number, we just looked at each other like, 'How did that happen?' " Shinoda added.

"The Da Vinci Code was cracked," Bennington joked.

Once Delson and Shinoda had the mash-up on tape, they took it to the rest of Linkin Park and eventually McCartney and Jay.

"I thought it sounded great, but at the same time I said, 'I think I am going to puke,' because you can't mess it up," Bennington said. "Either you go out and you nail it or you quit the business, pack up and move to some strange country where no one knows who you are. It was really that much pressure, but what was really interesting was that once I met Sir Paul McCartney, all of that went away and ... he brought everything down to a level that made it more real rather than surreal. And that was very helpful because in my mind he is one of the greatest legends of rock and roll."

February 10, 2006 -- Fox News

http://www.xsorbit6.com/users/jorie/index.cgi?McCartney Snubs Sting, The Boss

By Roger Friedman

Paul McCartney did not like losing Best Album to U2 on Grammy night.

After James Taylor and Bonnie Raitt announced that U2's "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb" had beaten McCartney's "Chaos and Creation in the Back Yard," the ex-Beatle got up and left with his very arrogant bodyguard. They weren't exactly subtle about it, either.

If he'd stayed, like everyone else, McCartney would have seen Bruce Springsteen and Sam Moore's knockout tribute to the late Wilson Pickett on "In the Midnight Hour."

The pair was joined by The Edge and Elvis Costello, with Bonnie Raitt on background vocals. Unfortunately, McCartney was long gone by then.

Backstage, McCartney was pretty much at loose ends. Occasionally he'd leave his dressing room and walk up the corridor looking for a little love and attention.

On one such trip, he walked right past Sting without saying hello, at the same time giving his royal wave to excited fans in the VIP area.

As usual, McCartney continues to be the worst judge of his own material. When I told him I thought that the experimental and genius song "At the Mercy" was one of the best tracks on the album, he replied, "That's Nigel's favorite one too," referring to producer Nigel Godrich.

"I like 'Jenny Wren,'" McCartney said of one of the two least interesting tracks on the CD (the other being something about the time).

Oh well. Backstage there were several grimaces when Paul insisted on performing "Helter Skelter."

One rock star said, "Why? What an awful choice."

Indeed, only crazed killer Charles Manson could have been overjoyed to hear his favorite song. But for McCartney, the most successful living pop songwriter, the choice remains bizarre.

Maybe he thinks it's hip. Note to Paul: It's not.

Email the editor of Fox News about this story: foxlife@foxnews.com

WEBMASTER'S COMMENT: Paul was with bandmate Wix not a bodyguard at the Grammys. There are photos of Paul backstage with Springsteen. "Helter Skelter" was listed as one of the 'highlights' of the Grammys with one paper noting Paul "outrocked rockers young enough to be his grandchildren." Numerous other newspaper articles referred to Paul's "rocking" performance at the Grammys.

Roger Friedman has consistantly been negative in his articles about Paul McCartney as well as inaccurate in his observations. It's obvious he has a grudge against McCartney that he needs to get over.

The members of Linkin Park were on Cloud 9 afterwards.

"It was the most surreal, awesome, experience of my life," Chester Bennington said backstage.

"Just the fact that he was into the idea was the best day of my life."

The performance started with a duet of Jay-Z and Linkin Park's Numb/Encore, which won a Grammy for best rap-song collaboration. They later started singing "Yesterday" when McCartney walked on stage.

The band really wanted McCartney so they could tip their hats to DJ Danger Mouse who started the mash-up concept with his Grey album. It seamlessly blended together the Beatle's famous White album with Jay-Z's Black album.

"We wanted to nod to that and do something that incorporated a Beatles sound," said Rob Bourdon.

The band pitched the idea and, to their surprise, all players agreed.

"We could not believe it when he said he would actually do it," said Bourdon.

So you're a songwriter and you write this cute little song about your lawyer's cute little 5-year-old daughter, and it shoots to the top of the Hit Parade.

Good story.

Then this 5-year-old grows up to be even more famous than your song.

Better story.

Except that for Jack Lawrence, who wrote "Linda" for young Linda Eastman, who would grow up to become Mrs. Paul McCartney, the story ended up tasting just a little sour.

Jack Lawrence was born in Brooklyn in April 1912, a week before the Titanic went down. He attended Thomas Jefferson High and, at his parents' urging, went on to earn a degree in podiatry, a nice respectful profession where a young man could earn a nice decent living.

But come 1932, just as Lawrence was stepping into the foot biz, the muse intervened. He wrote a song called "Play Fiddle Play," which became a hit and got him accepted into the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) - at 20, the organization's youngest member.

And thus did the world lose a foot doctor and gain a songwriter whose compositions would include "All Or Nothing At All," "Tenderly," "Beyond the Sea" and "If I Didn't Care," which ignited the career of the Ink Spots.

Come World War II, Lawrence entered the Marines and was put in charge of welfare and morale at Manhattan Beach Training Center in Brooklyn. As musicians entered the military, he funneled them into marching bands or dance bands. Their temperaments and egos, he would later say, sometimes made this assignment feel like combat.

Still, he kept writing songs throughout the war, which meant he kept in touch with his team of personal advisers, including attorney Lee Eastman.

Eastment's youngest daughter, Linda, was born in 1941, so Lawrence knew her as she was growing up, which meant he was delighted to write a bouncy little song about her.

The specific circumstances that triggered the song, however, have been recounted in two different versions.

The first version is that Lawrence owed Eastman money and the song became a mutually agreed-upon payback. Lawrence would write it and assign the publishing rights to Eastman, who in return would cancel Lawrence's debt. That story has circulated for years.

Lawrence, however, tells it somewhat differently. By his account, Eastman approached him one day and said, "Jack, do me a big favor. You know my wife Louise has a name song - the one popularized by Chevalier. My daughter Laura is proud of that Mercer-Raskin song and my son Johnny has lots of name songs he can claim. But my daughter Linda feels left out. How about writing a song for her?"

Whatever the motive, Lawrence's song was classic pop, catchy and almost nursery-rhyme simple:

When I go to sleep
I never count sheep
I count all the charms about Linda

After he wrote it, Lawrence made the rounds of song publishers, only to be told the name "Linda" just wasn't musical or exotic enough to catch the public ear. He heard suggestions he change it to "Mandy" or "Ida."

Finally, as Lawrence tells it, Eastman called and said one of his other clients wanted to start a record label and would record "Linda" if he could get its publishing rights.

Lawrence says he agreed - only to find out that Eastman was funding the label and wanted the copyright himself. That bit of chicanery, says Lawrence, "was the end of our relationship."

But the song's life was only beginning. Versions by Charlie Spivack and Paul Weston reached the top 10, while a third version by Ray Noble's venerable British band, with Buddy Clark on vocals, went to No.1. It stayed on the Hit Parade for months.

Linda admitted years later that, being 5, she was only dimly aware she was "sort of famous," and even that fame receded as she moved through adolescence in the privileged worlds of Westchester, the Hamptons and Park Avenue.

But then in 1963, when she was 21, the song returned, this time by Jan and Dean in a latter-day doo-wop arrangement that began with a deep voice chanting "Li-li-li-li-li-li-li-li-li-li-nda."

Most of the pop world had no idea who this Linda might be, but Linda herself was working to change that.

Like Jack Lawrence before her, she was slipping into the world of pop music. After landing a job with Town & Country magazine, she became both photographer and friend of rock stars, who affectionately dubbed her "The Park Avenue Groupie." Long a fan of rhythm and blues, she gravitated to artists who shared that passion, including the Rolling Stones, the Animals, the Rascals, Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper.

Eventually, she met the Beatles.

And when she saw Paul McCartney standing there at a party in London, she was hooked.

Eventually she hooked him, too, and in 1969 they were married, a happy union that lasted until her death from cancer in 1998.

Paul also wrote songs about her, and in the early summer of 1973 "My Love" reached No.1 on the charts - the second time in 26 years Linda Eastman had provided that level of inspiration.

By then, the success of "Linda" had also eased some of Jack Lawrence's irritation at his attorney. He always remained fond, he would later say, of the cute little girl for whom he wrote the song.

For more about songwriter Jack Lawrence and his book go to: www.jacklawrencesongwriter.com

February 9, 2006 -- USA TODAY

The Grammys

Paul McCartney performs "Fine Line" and "Helter Skelter"

The verdict: One of pop's most beloved elder statesmen perched on a piano bench during a catchy track from his CD. But Sir Paul then announced he was ready to rock, and that's exactly what he did -- with a little help from his friends in the band.

Paul McCartney with Jay-Z, Linkin Park performing a mash-up of "Yesterday"

The verdict: "Sounds so beautiful, don't you agree?" the ever-charismatic Jay-Z asked the crowd after this unlikely fusion of rap, classic rock and fratboy pop. But it looked so weird. Still everyone seemed to be having fun.

NOTE: USA TODAY features a full-page ad congratulating McCartney at the Grammys.

Sir Paul McCartney brought the house down at the Grammy Awards last night when he bridged the generation gap by performing Beatles anthem "Yesterday" with Linkin Park's Chester Bennington and and Jay-Z.

Wearing a T-shirt featuring John Lennon, Jay-Z rapped over the tune as Bennington and McCartney sang.

The rap mogul ended the surprise collaboration by stating, "Sounds so beautiful, don't you agree?"

It wasn't the first time Jay-Z and McCartney had collaborated. DJ Dangermouse 'mashed' the rapper's Black Album and the Beatles White Album together on The Grey Album.

February 9, 2006 -- AP (See Video)

Jay-Z, McCartney, Linkin Park Team Up

When Jay-Z walked onto the stage wearing a John Lennon T-shirt underneath his gleaming white suit, it was a hint of the Grammy Awards' oddest mashup of the night.

The rap superstar performed a duet of "Numb/Encore" with Linkin Park. Earlier, when it won a Grammy for best rap-song collaboration, Linkin Park singer Mike Shinoda (sic- should be Chester Bennington) thanked "everyone in our management and legal teams that made this record possible, because it was a nightmare."

It certainly looked like a business transaction, because Jay-Z and Linkin Park had zero chemistry, barely acknowledging each other onstage.

Toward the end, Shinoda (sic- Chester) oddly sang a verse of the Beatles' "Yesterday," and that was the second hint. Soon after, Paul McCartney himself walked out to finish the song.

There they stood - the rock legend, hard rockers from a few generations after and a rap mogul. McCartney and Shinoda (sic-Chester) sang together, with Jay-Z adding "that's right" a few times afterward.

They ended the song arm-in-arm, standing under a portrait of the late Coretta Scott King.

Who would have figured Paul McCartney, at age 63, would make the most noise at the Grammys?

"It's the first time I've ever played the Grammys," he said, "and I've finally passed the audition. So I want to rock a bit."

McCartney and his backup band swung into the throat-shredding "Helter Skelter," one of the Beatles' hardest-rocking songs. And he pulled it off: At one point the crowd seemed to applaud in simple appreciation that McCartney could hit the high notes on the line, "and I see you again."

He preceded it with "Fine Line," one of the highlights of his Grammy-nominated album "Chaos and Creation in the Backyard." It's a pleasant song, and McCartney performed with more gusto than on the album. One demerit to the Grammy producers, who surrounded McCartney and his piano with distracting, head-spinning graphics.

Hey, it's a Beatle up there - why give us a headache?

Paul performed "Fine Line" and "Helter Skelter" with his band. The audience gave him a standing ovation.

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February 8, 2006 -- Paul McCartney.com

PAUL AND BONO AT GRAMMY REHEARSALS

Paul took time out from his rehearsals for tonight's 48th Grammy Awards Show to have a quick photo taken with his Live 8 collaborator, U2's Bono (pictured right).

Paul has nominations for Album Of The Year, Best Male Pop Vocal Performance, for the album's first single "Fine Line," and Best Pop Vocal Album, (as well as a Producer Of The Year nod for Nigel Godrich).

"Too Much Rain"

Unfussy, lean and heartbreaking, this immaculate tune reveals the Cute Beatle's skills without the cuteness.

Madonna and Sir Paul McCartney arrived in Los Angeles for the Grammy Awards on the same plane from London.

1) Album Of The Year
(Award to the Artist(s) and to the Album Producer(s), Recording Engineer(s)/Mixer(s) & Mastering Engineer(s), if other than the artist.)

* Chaos And Creation In The Backyard
Paul McCartney
Nigel Godrich, producer; Darrell Thorp, engineer/mixer; Alan Yoshida, mastering
engineer
[Capitol Records]

2) Best Male Pop Vocal Performance
(For a solo vocal performance. Singles or Tracks only.)

* Fine Line
Paul McCartney
Track from: Chaos And Creation In The Backyard
[Capitol Records]

3) Best Pop Vocal Album
(For albums containing 51% or more playing time of VOCAL tracks.)

* Chaos And Creation In The Backyard
Paul McCartney
[Capitol Records]

4) Producer Of The Year, Non-Classical
A Producer's Award.

* Nigel Godrich

The celebrity pair have criticised the Grand Union pub, in Westbourne Park, west London, for serving diners with pies filled with camel and chick peas, or zebra and root vegetables in tomato sauce, both priced at £9.50 ($17.00).

Llamas with figs and sultanas in tomato sauce is no longer available because the meat is now out of season.

The Brit, who also refuses to work with leather, lent her New York boutique to the charity PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) for its fashion week party.

Guests including musician Moby and Scottish actor Alan Cumming were toasted by host Pamela Anderson for speaking out against fur.

McCartney, whose parents Paul and Linda brought her up as a vegetarian, could not be there because she was in Paris putting the finishing touches to her new collection.

But she sent a special message to the "veggie sex gods."

"You all rock for keeping the dream alive, we all need to keep pissing people off with our 'uncool' love of animals," McCartney said.

"So a huge congratulations for standing your ground from both myself and the animals."

"Are you serious?" he asks when told the Grammy total during an interview in his office complex in fashionable Soho Square. Everyone keeps track of Grammy wins (13 in his case), but no one keeps track of nominations - certainly not once they enter double figures.

"It was really an arbitrary number when I wrote the song. I probably should have called it 'When I'm 65,' which is the retirement age in England. And the rhyme would have been easy, 'something, something alive when I'm 65.' But it felt too predictable. It sounded better to say 64."

Despite the Beatles' constant invention, "When I'm Sixty-four" caught listeners by surprise when the jaunty singalong appeared on the "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" album in 1967. In the youth-conscious world of '60s rock, it stretched the imagination to think about being even 30. And here was McCartney singing about a lifetime beyond that.

John Lennon once scoffed that he would never have written something as quaint as "When I'm Sixty-four," but it was the differences between the biting Lennon and the more comforting McCartney that made the Beatles' songbook the most thrilling in rock history.

McCartney has aged well - on many levels. Wearing a stylish pinstriped suit and munching bagels on a recent morning, he still has the charm and smile to remind you why all the girls thought he was so cute way back then. He's slim, and he shows no signs of losing his hair - though it is now dyed, as he freely admits.

In fact, despite being one of the most revolutionary forces in modern pop culture, McCartney has always been driven by old-fashioned values, and he now credits them for helping him avoid becoming another of the many victims of pop fame.

Professionally, he's on a roll. His "Chaos and Creation in the Backyard" is up for album of the year in the Grammys - the awards ceremony will be held Wednesday at Staples Center - and every date on his 2005 U.S. tour was a sellout. Final gross: $77.3 million.

No other single figure from his generation can draw fans like that. The Rolling Stones can as a band, but neither Mick Jagger nor Keith Richards alone could sell out multiple-night arena shows. And Bob Dylan plays mostly theaters unless he's got a strong support act.

More important, McCartney continues to represent, in his music and in his personal life, many of the ideals of the Beatles. His solo albums certainly don't match the consistency or heights of the early days, but there is a similar sense of warmth, optimism and even social activism.

He shows little interest in the glitter of show business and tends to keep his personal life private. There's no autobiography or memoirs, and he normally limits interviews to backstage at rehearsal halls or the studio and tries to avoid personal questions. As the interview moves from Grammys and songwriting to focus on aging and more personal questions, he sits forward and objects: "I think it's time for me to begin pulling off this subject."

But McCartney is basically too polite not to answer some of the personal questions, uncomfortable as they may make him feel. He even ends up volunteering a "When I'm Sixty-four" story.

"I met someone who plays piano in an old persons' home, and he said, 'I hope you don't mind, but I play some of your songs, and the most popular one is "When I'm Sixty-four," but I have to change the title to "When I'm 84" because 64 seems young to those people. They don't get it.' "

McCartney understands fully. "If I were to write it now," he says with a sigh, "I'd probably call it 'When I'm 94.'"

Wearing his knighthood lightly

The tourists checking out the historical marker in the park-like grounds that front Soho Square learn that the square dates to the 1680s and a few other obscure facts, but there is no reference to its most famous presence.

One hundred years from now, the marker will surely note McCartney's years here, and tourists' heads will turn to the five-story red brick building that has been his business home for 30 years.

The strangest thing about stepping inside McCartney's office is getting used to the fact that he has an office at all. The lure of a rock 'n' roll life in the '60s was the freedom of not having to report every day to an office or factory. Recording studios, stages and parties sounded like much more fun.

The first reassuring sign in McCartney's case is that the receptionist refers to him simply as "Paul." After all, he was knighted in 1997.

"At first, the whole thing was a bit embarrassing, to be honest," he says of the honor. "Even the people on my farm went, 'Do we have to call you Sir Paul?' The great thing for me was that in sniffing around once it was announced, people seemed to like it. That incredible warmth was the best thing about the honor for me."

McCartney's suit with white sport shirt, open at the collar, is not his regular office attire. It's for an appointment outside the building. As he relaxes in the top-floor lounge, an aide serves him tea.

When he opened the office, he started off modestly - just one room. As needs expanded, he bought the building. You don't get the sense that McCartney spends a lot of time around Soho Square; he goes there mostly to handle meetings dealing with recordings, tours and related projects.

The Times of London estimated McCartney's fortune last year at more than $1 billion - most of it generated though his own music. One of his great regrets is that he let Michael Jackson, whom he had tipped off to the value of copyrights, buy the Beatles catalog out from under him in 1985. Jackson and his business partners now receive 50% of the publishing revenue from Lennon-McCartney songs, while McCartney and the Lennon estate receive only 25% each. McCartney gets 100%of the publishing royalties from his post-Beatles work.

The singer also owns MPL (McCartney Productions Ltd.), one of the world's biggest privately owned music publishing companies. Originally set up to handle McCartney's solo compositions, MPL now holds the rights to the work of writers ranging from Buddy Holly to Harold Arlen. Among the titles: "Hello, Dolly!," "Unchained Melody" and "The Christmas Song." The company actively places movies in films, including Buddy Holly's "It's So Easy" in "Brokeback Mountain" and David Mann and Bob Hilliard's "In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning" in "The Matador."

"The business thing was out of necessity," he says, referring to the death in 1967 of Beatles manager Brian Epstein. "We suddenly felt naked when it came to the business stuff. The last thing I wanted to be is a boss. The boss is a hated figure. But I suddenly felt I had to. So I just told myself, 'Just try and be a reasonable boss and not the stereotype.' And I've tried to do that.

"Some of the people in the office have been with me 30 years. I'm actually very proud of the fact that I've somehow managed to combine this enjoyment of rock 'n' roll music with this idea of having an office."

Good role models, solid grounding

To begin understanding how McCartney has come through the years of fame with so few visible scars, you have to go back much further than his Beatles days.

He's not even sure his story is all that unusual. But a list of all the other rock stars who have been destroyed or warped by fame, from Elvis Presley and Jimi Hendrix to Kurt Cobain and Michael Jackson, finally opens him up.

"I don't know what shaped my outlook," he begins. "I'm grasping at straws when I try to talk about it. But a lot of it probably has to do with my family. I think I got a good grounding. I can't even remember my parents having an argument. The biggest tragedy for me is that my mom died when I was 14."

McCartney's father, Jim, was an especially strong role model. "My dad was a very cool guy," he says. "He was a musician, taught by ear, and very good with words. People admired him. You could count on his word, and he instilled good values in us, and I really feel blessed because of that.

"When my brother and I would go to the bus stop with him, he'd raise his hat to the ladies and he'd encourage us to raise our caps and to stand up for people on the bus. To this day, if I'm on the train and there is a pregnant woman or an old lady and there's no seat, I'll get up for her, and it's not me trying to be noble. It's just what you do."

That grounding, he says, helped him to see all the craziness when he got into show business. "In the '60s we were all doing too much drugs, pushing it to the limit," he says. "At first it was kind of fun. Then it became not fun, and you had to go, 'Wait a minute.' This little sensible gene kicked in.

"I think my background made me a little more cautious. I'm not impetuous. Rather than rush into a thing, I'll go, 'Let me think about this.' I never just pick up the phone and say, 'I've just thought of something, and we've got to do it now.' For me, if it's a great idea, it'll still be a great idea tomorrow."

But nothing prepared him to deal with the breakup of the Beatles in 1970. It was such a devastating time, before he started Wings, that he wondered whether he even wanted to compete with the legacy of the Beatles.

"I toyed around for a while with this idea of [leaving rock and] being a composer with patches on my elbows, gnawing at a pencil," he says. "It was a terrible period because I was also breaking up with old friends in an acrimonious way and having to sue them to get out. That was really more worry than 'How do I compete against the Beatles?' "

McCartney credits the support of his first wife, Linda, with helping to pull him through the period. Together, they raised three daughters and a son. Stella is an award-winning fashion designer, and James has played guitar on McCartney albums.

Linda's death in 1998 was another body blow. McCartney didn't know if he would ever have another relationship. In 2002, however, he married Heather Mills, a former model and anti-land mines campaigner, and they had a daughter, Beatrice Milly, the following year. They now have a house in the Los Angeles area as well as homes in England.

"I wondered if this was where I sort of become a monk," he says of the time after Linda's death. "When love did come, it was totally unexpected. I feel very grateful and very blessed for Heather. She's a very beautiful and kindhearted lady."

Sticking with a low-tech approach

On the way back to the ground floor after the formal interview, McCartney leads me on a tour of the building, stopping only to sign some correspondence and huddle with a secretary. The walls are lined with photographs from various points in his career, including one from the '60s of him and a grinning Lennon shaking hands.

Except for the odd computer on staff desks, there is little sense of high tech. McCartney has an iPod but tends to listen to it only on tour. At home and in the car, he prefers CDs. He doesn't have TiVo, and he has no theories about the future of the music business. He just knows people will continue to write songs and others will respond to them.

"I'm not big on technology," he says. "I don't like to stare all day at a computer screen. I like to look around in the room. Similarly, earplugs smack of work to me. When I am at home, I don't want earphones. When I jog, I prefer listening to the sounds around me."

When he gets to his formal office, he points to a photo from the 1988 tribute dinner ASCAP threw for him. It was attended by scores of the greatest songwriters from mainstream pop, and they signed the photo. "There's Stephen Sondheim," McCartney says proudly. He also names Cy Coleman, composer of the musical "Sweet Charity," as well as Mitchell Parish, who co-wrote "Stardust."

Much like Bob Dylan, McCartney greatly admires the songwriters from the first half of the 20th century, and the best of his songs, including "Hey Jude" and "Yesterday," have been built around melodies as graceful as those standards.

"A lot of people thought you had to throw out all the old values when you joined rock 'n' roll," he says. "But I never believed that. I thought you could embrace rock and still hold on to the old values, including songwriting craftsmanship. I learned a lot from those writers."

McCartney's next stop is in front of a flashy Wurlitzer jukebox, which plays vintage 78 rpm records. He presses one of the buttons, and the room is filled with the sound of Elvis singing "All Shook Up." He taps along on the top of the jukebox until near the end, when he can't resist singing along. He even does a couple of quick dance steps.

It may be as close as he comes to a public performance this year. Perhaps to avoid fueling the public fascination with his 64th birthday (he didn't even do the song on last year's tour), McCartney plans to maintain a low profile in 2006.

"I'll do the Grammys have a bit of fun there," he says. "Win or lose, it doesn't matter. Then I'm going to work on some projects. But no tour."

Those projects will tap McCartney's very active non-rock 'n' roll side. He's a dedicated painter who moves between impressionism and abstraction. He cites American painter Willem de Kooning as an influence. For years, he kept his art private. But he finally held an exhibition in 1999 and has since allowed several of his paintings to be featured in a book. He also co-wrote a children's book last year and wrote a classical work, "Liverpool Oratorio," that was released on record in 1993. This year he hopes to complete a classical choral work that he's been toying with for years and to put some guitar sketches into an extended work.

Next year, though, he'll surely think about another tour. He has done only five since the breakup of the Beatles but two in the last five years, and he's more enthusiastic onstage each time around. Last year, for instance, he performed some 40 songs a night, reaching all the way back to a number that he, Lennon and George Harrison recorded before the Beatles days.

"A lot of people mentioned that I looked comfortable on the last tour, and that is true," he says. "I love being onstage, working with a great band and feeling the affection. It never gets old."

Macca bandmates Brian Ray, Rusty Anderson and Paul "Wix" Wickens were on Fox11's "Good Day LA" morning show on Friday. Hosts Steve Edwards, Dorothy Lucey and Jillian Barberie chatted with the band who talked about the Grammys, the Super Bowl, the "US" tour and their boss, Paul McCartney.

Jillian asked Brian if the "hot girl" on the cover his new CD "Mondo Magneto" was his girlfriend. "No" was the answer. Edwards held up Brian and Rusty's album "Undressing Underwater" giving them a well deserved plug.

The Liverpool Institute For Performing Arts 10th Anniversary Press Conference, January 30, 2006

by Macca Reporter Steve Barnes

Maybe I'll Amaze

Sir Paul McCartney bounced in - stage right - accompanied by the Leader of Liverpool City Council Warren Bradley, Liverpool Culture Companies Artistic Director, Robyn Archer and LIPA's co founder Mark Featherstone-Witty.

He was really buzzing with enthusiasm and obvious affection - having just been entertained, in the company of his wife Heather and brother Mike, by LIPA students at nearby Liverpool's Philharmonic Hall.

Sir Paul of course the focus of attention - holding the stage for most of the 40 minute event. When asked about a performance during Liverpool's 2008 Capital of Culture celebrations, he stated that he had "Not yet decided, but had been approached by The Culture Company," a fact that Robyn Archer seemed to confirm, as the smile on her face got bigger.

He continued, "I have just finished a tour in America and I normally lie low for a while afterwards. I have not got any plans. We will see. It is obviously very early days."

When asked if LIPA would ever produce another Beatles he answered, "We decided to not to make that our aim. We have to give up on that. If it happens, great."

"When we started the school I was working with the Liverpool band The Christians on a charity record and they said to me that you couldn't teach what we did. I agree with that - a great band probably comes about naturally."

"Whenever I come up here to LIPA I get a feeling of great pride. I am very proud of this school and what it did for me; It gave me a free education."

And so after the fastest forty minutes I have experienced, the conference was brought to an end as Paul announced "We've got to go for a bevy," a drink as we say in Liverpool.

by Macca Reporter Elsa Buckingham

Heather Mills McCartney was the guest speaker at a Juvenile Diabetes Fund Raiser at the Hyatt Regency Downtown. The luncheon was called "Women of Strength" where three local prominent Houston women were honored. The placed was 90%filled with nearly 500 people attending - mostly women. The luncheon fee for the charity event was $100 per person.

Paul was a no-show. According to Heather's Houston hair dresser's mom: "Paul stayed in England with baby Bea."

The luncheon was very good and wasn't strictly vegetarian. The salad was a crispy, crunchy Southwestern combination of Pico de Gallo mixed with yellow corn kernels and thinly cut slices of red, green and yellow corn fried tortilla chips served over two leaves of butter lettuce. It was followed by a very tasty char-broiled, sliced chicken breast beside thin slices of roast beef with mushrooms and gravy. A triangular sliced potato layered with butter and cream was adjacent to a half sliced roma tomato baked with a toping of parmesan and Italian spices/bread/cheese and crumbs all on a bed of spinach. Hot French bread was served with butter. Drinks were, ice tea and coffee. For dessert there was a very succulent Key Lime Pie with sliced strawberries.

Heather wore a white pant suit and jacket with a stylish, black, sleeveless blouse that was embroidered. She was seated at the very front center table accompanied by her sister, Fiona. They ate a vegetarian lunch even though the rest of their table had the non-veggie lunch.

Heather's speech moved from topic to topic highlighting events in her life mentioned in her book "A Single Step." She talked about her womanizing dad and the car wreck that nearly severed her mother's leg. Her dad's only concern at the time was her mother bleeding all over the expensive fur coat he had just bought.

Heather talked about being homeless and a little bit about joining "The Fair." After that she jumped straight to the time she became an entrepreneur and imported self-adhesive braless breast supports to England which became very successful. She went on to say that there were women complaining because they had "hairy nipples" and the adhesive would rip the hairs off. That got a chuckle from the audience. She mentioned her breast reduction and a tiny bit about life in Yugoslavia.

Heather touched on her mother's death from a blood clot thrombosis due to heparin antibodies.

She told the story about her first ill fitting prosthetic limb and how the doctors wanted to keep amputating more of her leg because it wasn't healing. She changed her diet, becoming a vegetarian and the limb healed itself in about two months. After that she began collecting discarded prosthetic limbs and distributed them. People would come to her house and find limbs all over the place, tossed here and there. That got another laugh from the audience. As she talked about her leg she pulled her pant leg up so people could see the artificial limb.

Heather claimed that becoming a vegetarian has helped diabetics (Type I & II) manage their diabetes. Heather warned that regular cow's milk is "bad" and how "calves won't drink their mother's milk after they are a year old." She mentioned alternative types of milk like soy and others that were better for you. She said her daughter Bea "the light of her life" is a size three even though she is only two years old. Husband, Paul was not mentioned during her speech.

The event finished with a short movie about her work with amputees and land mines.

Paul McCartney has won 13 Grammy Awards and now the former Beatle is going to make his debut performing during the awards ceremony. (First reported here on the Macca Report last month!)

McCartney will take stage Wednesday during the 48th Annual Grammy Awards telecast from the Staples Center in Los Angeles, the Recording Industry Association of America announced Thursday. McCartney is up for three awards including album of the year for "Chaos And Creation In The Backyard."

Also making her Grammy debut will be "American Idol" first season winner, Kelly Clarkson. Clarkson was nominated in the best female pop vocal performance category for "Since U Been Gone" and best pop vocal album for "Breakaway."

R&B newcomer Ciara was added to the lineup for the previously announced tribute to Sly & the Family Stone. She's up for three Grammys including best new artist.

Several presenters were added to the lineup Thursday, including Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong, singer/guitarist Bonnie Raitt and actress Jennifer Love Hewitt.

Additional performers, presenters and special segments will be announced soon.

The Grammy Awards ceremony will be broadcast live on CBS.

It's hard to imagine that after more than four decades as one of music's most iconic artists, Paul McCartney has yet to play live at the Grammy Awards. With 13 Grammys to his credit, Sir Paul has certainly taken the stage as a winner, but he's never dripped performance sweat on it. But that's going to change on February 8, when the 48th annual awards go off inside Los Angeles' Staples Center.

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