McCartney, Simon and the reality of one's last act
Paul McCartney and Paul Simon. Credit: Universal Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images, Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images
Some folks nearly lost their minds this week when news broke that Paul McCartney had used artificial intelligence to "create" a new song with John Lennon.
In a way, you couldn't blame them, what with the recent tidal wave of apocalyptic warnings about AI and the more-than-passably-good renderings of Drake and The Weeknd in an AI-generated April rap. Had Sir Paul brought John back with a silicon chip-generated voice that was all heartless mimicry and none of John's soul?
No, as we quickly learned. Paul and film director Peter Jackson used the same AI technology that helped produce the fascinating 2021 Beatles documentary series to isolate Lennon's voice on what McCartney called "a ropey little bit of cassette," and then mixed it more conventionally to produce what McCartney says is "the last Beatles record." It will be released later this year.
While another Beatles tune is occasion for at least cautious joy, you can't escape the wistfulness of "the last." McCartney is 80 years old. And while it might be unclear whether he will be a rock star who burns out or fades away, you imagine he must be thinking about it. And you imagine that reaching way back into the past to produce something new is another way of cheating Father Time.
That's not where another Paul in the musical pantheon seems to be, another genius songster who recently gave us what might be his valedictory.
Paul Simon, now 81, released an album last month called "Seven Psalms," as dreamlike and religiously referential as you might expect a thoughtful farewell to be. Always introspective, he opens with the lyric, "I've been thinking about the great migration," fills the tracks with haunting reflections, and ends with a drawn-out church-like "Amen" sung with his wife, Edie Brickell. It's an alpha-to-omega progression that feels like an acceptance of something inevitable. And yet, at one point Simon sings, "Wait, I'm not ready … my mind is still clear."
And there it is, the doubt that each of us faces at some point. The poignant questions that must be answered.
When is your last act? Will you know when the time comes? And if you do know, and if you have the chance, what would you choose your last act to be?
Would it be more fruit of your labors — your art, your music, your writing, whatever your work product is, like David Bowie and Leonard Cohen, two more songwriting gods who released albums only days before they died? Would it be good deeds — adding something of yourself to the goodness all around us in the hope that it gets passed on after you go? Or would it be time — time spent with family, time spent thinking, time spent soaking in this beautiful bewildering world of ours?
These are melancholy ruminations, for sure, brought on by the aging and passings of people with whom we once were young. It happens more often these days, which is what happens to us all in the end.
In "Seven Psalms," Brickell sings that life is a meteor, and it's unclear whether the reference is to the speed with which it travels, its awesome beauty, or the fact that no matter how brightly it glows for however long it always comes to an end.
When you reach the point in life where Simon and McCartney are, it seems to me that either you hold on or you give in. You rage against the dying of that meteoric light, or you go with it. Each singer may have made his choice. Both roads require courage.
At one point, Simon offers a wistful hope, singing:
“Two billion heartbeats and out
Or does it all begin again?”
At some point, we'll know. Until then, we can sing.
Columnist Michael Dobie's opinions are his own.
Michael Dobie is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
