If Mull of Kintyre was a Xmas no 1, how come it never gets played at Xmas?

[ManWithARash]

or am I just listening to the wrong stations?
I've only just discovered that it was number one in Xmas 1977, I think.

Enjoyed the trip down memory lane but not a whisper of Grandma getting run over

Yeah the Frog Chorus was pure genius!

@SpineyCrevice

It was the soundtrack for a children’s animation film. I doubt whether it was supposed to define his career.

For those trashing the Frog Song - you do realise it is a children’s song written for a cartoon film?

Isn't the tune eidelweiss? Not sure about spelling

I don't know if it was meant to be a rearranging of Edelweiss or just happens to share a similar structure - but Julie Andrews never sang "Bum, bum, bum - AWIAAA!" in her 'version' - which certainly went strongly in her favour

@PuddleglumtheMarshWiggle

Oh, the one with Two-Tone Ted from Teddington?

I saw the video a couple of weeks ago. I wept like a baby. Paul was handsome. Linda was pretty. There was a pipe band. I'm Scottish and sometimes like a mournful dirge.

@ZaraCarmichaelshighheels I did consider those lines, but got sidetracked by talk of lovers entwined, and love being the only pleasure .

Any way, MOK is not a dirge - it's rousing!

[quote deepbluesea18]@MoodyMarshall

To some extent, I agree with that. Paul’s critical reputation was definitely trashed by the John and Yoko hate campaign of the 70s and beyond. I’m not sure that the average Mumsnet commentator would know much about that however. Most of them seem pretty clueless about the music industry pre 1990.[/quote]
No, I also hate Lennon, who was, at best, a cheating, wife-beating class traitor.

I also think McCartney is, albeit a writer of a few pretty tunes, a gurning dullard.

However, the Beatles were, without doubt, one of - if not the most - important bands in the formation of modern Western music.

I can hold more than one thought in my head at once, see?

@GellerYeller you're right about Always On My Mind. Christmas no 1 for 1987 yet the Pogues and Kirsty Mccoll won the war, as it were.

@BestIsWest and @MoodyMarshall I read that piece (it's the same one) last week and it's great! Did make me think that McCartney has been dealt with pretty patronisingly for many years now given his talents. I must listen to McCartney III.

@MargotLovedTom1 I also love No More Lonely Nights! And Only Love Remains.

Finally, Pipes of Peace is a true Christmas classic, and should be elevated to the seasonal playlists.

@LadyJaye

I’m sure you can. You obviously don’t know what you’re talking about though.

John Lennon had serious mental health problems. It was a bit more complex than ‘wife beating’ - he had manic episodes where he would black out and not remember what he’d done.

To be fair, it couldn’t have been easy being the most famous person on the planet. How many icons can you think of who haven’t gone off the rails? There’s only one as far as I know, but you think he’s a dullard.

I have no idea what you mean by ‘class traitor’. John was at least five rungs up from Paul and about twenty from Ringo on the social ladder - he was a privileged middle class boy.

I think you’re the dullard, LadyJaye, for hating someone that you obviously don’t know the first thing about. By all means hate who you want (if you can summon up the energy), but make sure that you have your facts straight first.

For the same reason we don't hear 'There's no one quite like grandma', '2 become 1' by the Spice Girls or 'Ernie the fastest milkman in the west'. All Xmas number 1's but not Xmas songs.

Although I'd bloody love to hear those over the usual Slade and sodding Maria Fucking Carey dirge.

Are there different amounts payable by radio stations for different records being played? Could be a factor if the case.

@Hailtomyteeth
Yes, two ton Ted was the baker
'when she saw the size of his hot meat pies it very near turned her head!'
Classy lyrics 😃

I love MoK - most of PM’s solo work, too! Am I a heathen?

It's not that I don't like Paul McCartney. It's that Mull of Kintyre is a horrible song.

@WanderingTrolley1

McCartney has sold more albums in the UK than any other artist in the world (with MoK his greatest hit ironically), so I would say that most people agree with you.

While it was fashionable to shit on Paul from a great height by the rock music press in the 1970s and after John was killed (Ono and Wenner really did a number on him), he is isn’t bullied in public nearly as much these days. Except on Mumsnet, where he is universally ‘hated’ and his every achievement demeaned and belittled.

I honestly think it’s part of a wider agenda to damage the national psyche by shitting on everything great to come out of the UK. I bet if he was Irish, everyone would love him. But Mumsnet hates white, working class Northern men and thinks everyone else should too.

Thank God the public aren’t so daft.

He's been a major/sole contributor to a lot of great songs, but that doesn't mean that all of them are automatically wonderful - or that everybody will like the same ones. Stevie Wonder is a hugely talented songwriter and musician, but even he released I Just Called To Say I Love You. Bowie's Laughing Gnome?

I just heard a (new, I think) song by PMcC on the radio in the car called The Kiss Of Venus, and I thought it was really awful. The song itself was alright, but Paul had chosen entirely the wrong key and was clearly straining to try to hit the high notes, and not really getting there. He still has a good voice, but he's never had the widest range (decent, but no Elvis), so why wouldn't he pitch it to suit his voice?

There are artists to whose work I find myself naturally drawn, but I don't really get the all-out fandom as an adult. If I like a song, I do; if I don't like another from the same artist, I'm not going to lie and say that I love it, just because of who released it - it's not like it's a proudly-proffered muddy paint splodge 'work of art' from your own 4yo that takes prime spot on the fridge door

FWIW (very little indeed, as it's just one person's opinion), I couldn't stand Lennon or any of his own solo compositions. McCartney has had moments of great talent and moments of.... less than amazing. George was always my favourite Beatle by a long way - very underrated talent IMHO. I wonder if he might have written more songs for the Beatles but was 'dissuaded' as John and Paul 'had it covered'.

Ringo we know about....

Beatles should have got Paul out and Ray Davies in. Imagine that as a songwriting partnership.

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll - George wrote four songs that anyone has ever heard of. One of them was plagiarised and cost him millions when he was sued for it, and he had a lot of help with the others.

It’s fashionable to like George more than the other three, but anyone who thinks he was the greater talent is deluded. He was at best an average guitarist (Paul played lead guitar on a lot of Beatles stuff because some of the guitar solos were too tricky for George, who was a slow learner) and his songs all sound the same - like a dirge.

@user1471565182 - LOL. John needed Paul a lot more than Paul needed John.

deepbluesea18

Very good points. I'd completely forgotten about the My Sweet Lord/He's So Fine debacle. Whether it was intentionally plagiarised or not, I'm not sure if that was ever known/admitted, was it?

I prefer his solo stuff to that of the others, though, even if there is less of it and it's not as well known; and he was the driving force behind the excellent Traveling Wilburys. I think he had the best voice of them all, though. The Beatles, that is; Roy Orbison was in the TW!

Maybe the family of the late 'original' Paul were upset about him taking all of their loved one's glory and so forced him, under threat of having his cover blown and livelihood ruined, to record and release The Frog Chorus and Silly Love Songs - just to make sure that people couldn't say "Well, of course, all of his later work is so much better!"

Its shit.