Tag Archive for "paul mccartney" tag

Ten years ago to the day, almost to the hour, in fact, David was performing with Paul McCartney at Liverpool’s legendary Cavern Club before a crowd of 300 incredibly lucky so-and-sos.

Available on DVD as of 2001 (Paul McCartney, Live at The Cavern Club!), the show went out as a live webcast and is estimated to have been watched by some three million people worldwide – then a record for an online audience. A giant screen broadcast the performance to the many thousands gathered in a nearby park.

Did you see it at the time, have you seen it since, and what did you make of it?

Paul’s band also consisted of Deep Purple drummer, Ian Paice, Pete Wingfield on keyboards and the legendary Mick Green (of Johnny Kidd & The Pirates) on guitar.

For fun, if David could put together a similar band of talents to perform covers of anyone’s songs in any style, who would you want to see in the line-up, where would you want to see them and what would they play? As the Cavern gig’s set was an oh-so short one, I’ll have to limit you to choosing not much more than 45-minutes of material, please, so choose wisely… and not ‘Pink Floyd’.

How about recreating Jokers Wild somewhere in or around Cambridge, possibly involving a few early Beatles and Stones numbers, perhaps a smidgen of Sam & Dave, but almost certainly Manfred Mann’s brilliant ‘Don’t Ask Me What I Say’?

The chatroom will be opening for its final session of 2009 on Wednesday. Please note that there is a change to the time as has been advertised for the last week or so, thus the chatroom will now be open from 1pm (UK). Hope to see you there.

Another surprise appearance from David last night, then (see the Latest News page for the whats and wherfores) – this time with Jeff Beck at London’s Royal Albert Hall, scene of the shows that made up the ‘Remember That Night’ DVD.

If you were there, I’m sure we’d all love to hear from you.

If you weren’t there, please take a moment to stop kicking yourself and tell us which of David’s many guest appearances has pleased you most, however surprising they may have been.

In terms of one-off shows, that 1999 gig at Liverpool’s Cavern – with Paul McCartney, Mick Green, Ian Paice and Pete Wingfield – has to be my favourite.

Have you heard about this? See Paul McCartney’s video message, here, which explains why it’s a good idea for everyone to reduce their unhealthy dependence upon meat and commit to a weekly meat-free day. (If you’ve got the time and desire to find out more, you can do worse than read Compassion in World Farming Trust’s 2004 report, ‘The Global Benefits of Eating Less Meat’).

Meat production has undeniably become a serious environmental hazard. A huge strain on the Earth’s resources, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation, the world’s livestock population is responsible for some 18% of greenhouse gas emissions. The transport industry is responsible for 13%.

Livestock production uses 8% of the world’s (increasingly scarce) fresh water supplies. Indeed, you use more water producing meat than you do grain.

Animal waste pollutes. In North Carolina, USA, for example, there are roughly as many pigs as there are people… and the pigs produce four times as much waste.

With increased prosperity, we are consuming more meat. The World Cancer Research Fund recommends that we eat no more than 500g of red meat each week – roughly the equivalent of three 6oz steaks.

In the West, where meat consumption is at its highest, one billion people are overweight. Developing nations have adopted a similarly unhealthy, meat-based diet. Even though the West eats three times as much meat as the rest of the world, meat consumption in ‘poorer’ countries has doubled in just over a decade.

The demand for meat is a major cause of deforestation. Estimates suggest that 70% of the Amazonian rainforest has been flattened to make way for livestock.

Worldwide, about 200 million hectares of forest has been lost since the ’60s, much of it cleared to rear cattle for the hamburger trade – vulgarly referred to as “hamburgerisation” – or to grow subsidised crops for, you guessed it, animal feed.

Consequently, one way or another, livestock now claims more than 30% of our planet’s land surface.

Lastly, and perhaps the fundamental reason for vegetarianism: factory farming is irrefutably inhumane. Millions of living creatures, bred only to be slaughtered after often brief, miserable lives of deprivation and suffering in intensive farms, do not exercise, enjoy fresh air, graze casually or interact with other animals. Selective breeding to ensure unnatural growth has created myriad health problems and deformities, which further add to the animals’ unnecessary suffering.

So, with all this in mind, if you don’t already, will you forgo meat on a Monday from now on? As Paul says, “it not only addresses pollution, but better health, the ethical treatment of animals, global hunger and community and political activism.”

Today just so happens to be Paul’s birthday, so a very Happy Birthday to him.

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On this day in 1964, The Beatles made their American television debut on The Ed Sullivan Show. More than 70 million viewers tuned in for what was the first of three legendary appearances throughout February.

Unless you’ve got a very good reason not to, perhaps you’d care to take ten minutes out of your day to enjoy this classic footage. It is, undeniably, an important piece of both music, and TV, history.

So, as well as your feelings towards those four lovable mop-tops, it’s Beatles songs that David could cover today, please.

You probably know that David and Syd spent some time busking together in 1965, performing songs from ‘Help!’, in France. You ought to know that David performed with Paul McCartney at Liverpool’s famed Cavern Club in 1999. That’s been captured for posterity on DVD, as has another gig, in aid of PETA, billed ‘The PETA Concert for Party Animals’. I’d like to know what you thought of those two.

Any other Beatles connections, do send them in. There are many.

Finally, following on from our Rock and Roll ruminations last week, how about The Beatles’ ‘Live at the BBC’ for some great classic covers? I’m thinking specifically of the raw vocals of Paul and John respectively on Little Richard’s ‘Lucille’ and Chuck Berry’s ‘Rock and Roll Music’, classic Ringo on the Carl Perkins number, ‘Matchbox’, and George’s fine guitar-playing on the unmistakeable ‘Johnny B. Goode’.