1989’s “Flowers in the Dirt” was supported by Paul McCartney’s first tour since Wings and had a lot of press around it. It features four songs co-written with Elvis Costello. It was all there on the album cover’s sticker — “a return to form”. All signs pointed towards creative rebirth. What could go wrong?

“You will know me by my second track.” That aptly titled titled song is “Rough Ride.”  I am not a musicologist, but I believe this has flavors of synth-funk in it. Anyway, this song sounds like Stevie Wonder farted.  In case that doesn’t count as music journalism, it also sucks. I dare you to listen to it.

To be fair, there are some good songs here: the opening track “My Brave Face”  is bright shiny pop, if a bit incessant,  “Figure of 8” is a good romp. “We Got Married” is light and bouncy enough. But this was the album I realized that “return to form” was used by record companies to get you to open your wallet to mediocrity.  It was going to be a Rough Ride.

Michael Jackson might have liked “Distractions,” a real violin-soaked elevator-bound crooner that explains why people don’t like solo McCartney.  This does not describe me, to be clear.  I’m a massive fan, but I get it.  You’re not on a Venetian gondola, and you don’t need to be serenaded by this soft dreck.  Paul shares this much maligned syrupy quality with the King of Pop, his one-time collaborator.  We can all agree they both should be more afraid to sing about butterflies. As Michael and Paul hit middle age, they also both suffered from “put another producer on it” syndrome.  This album has nine -- apparently a past prime trick to sound current and fresh, and it works for about thirty seconds until 1989 ½ rolls around and it sounds dated.  The penultimate track, “Motor of Love” may actually be made up from scraps from the Beach Boys “Kokomo.”

There were a couple of videos made for the album. “This One” was a good choice for a single, a catchy piece of pop that almost got away untouched, until they decided to visualize it.  As a kind of goof on the Beatles Eastern spiritual period, the video has Paul and his wife Linda sitting in formal Indian dress, cross-legged for meditation. While singing, Paul and Linda unfortunately come up with a kind of dreamy hand-jive to do along to the song.  For a too long portion of the video, Paul has painted large McCartney-esque eyes on top of his closed eyelids to terrifying effect. There are an embarrassment of superimpositions in the video to simulate something metaphysical happening.  Everyone in the current band gets trotted out in Nehru jackets (perhaps by gunpoint?).  Towards the end, a swan rides by carrying a tiny Krishna-ish girl playing a flute.  

The main reason I wanted to write about this album and not “Press to Play,” Paul’s runner-up nadir, was that I scored a bootleg of the Costello/McCartney demos for this one and adored it.  Finally, McCartney had found a sour Brit like Lennon to balance his sweet tooth!  Fans were giggly with anticipation. When I heard the finished songs on “Flowers in the Dirt,” I was mad for about a decade.  The two best songs of the demo sessions never show up on an album. “Tommy’s Coming Home Again” and “The Lovers that Never Were”[1] are Beatles-level beautiful songs, full of tragedy and loss, and of course, Paul’s unparalleled ear for melody.  The Costello/McCartney songs that do make it on the album have been criminally molested.  “Don’t be Careless Love,” a plea to be cautious with precious things, ditches Costello’s harmonies for a choir of “oooooo’s,” shoots up two octaves, and turns into a strained spiritual. The destruction continues on the chorus as they bring in a bunch of quirky bleep-bloop banging, like calypso in a garbage disposal. It’s modern!

Lest I be accused of snarking, I do insist there’s value in the misfires.  Life is a long road, or a highway, or perhaps a roundabout?  Anyway, the whole trip should be aesthetically chronicled, not just the beginning. We can’t fully understand the mystery of the past prime slump unless we spend time examining it, which is why I have quit my job and left my family to do this important work.  Maybe there’s something beautiful in the slump that we’re missing?  Maybe trying matters?

Most of the original Costello/McCartney demos are on the reissue.  With absolutely no recording experience to draw from, I still insist that every music producer should listen to the difference between these demos and the album tracks and “never forget”.  Costello and McCartney never collaborated again.

by Steve Collins

[1] The Lovers That Never Were” does show up, cleaned up to worse effect on Paul’s next solo album “Off the Ground”