Make mine Macca?

As Alfred is quick to point out, I'm a bit of a McCartney fan/apologist. While this might cast a cloud over anything else I like musically, I think guilty pleasures (which I don't think McCartney really is, if you consider that band he was in before Wings) help define your musical personality as much as the cult favorites and big bands we all know and love.

Anyway. McCartney's latest, Chaos and Creation in the Backyard, isn't the world-beater publications like The Miami Herald and Rolling Stone claim it to be. It's a fun album. Which I guess means a lot to an audience that either bailed or was forced to trudge through albums (despite AllMusic head honcho Stephen Thomas Erlewine's half-baked claim of a mini-Macca rebirth) like Driving Rain and Off The Ground in the last decade.

The new song collection is a bit on the slow side, but listeners are given a more human sounding Paul. Not the Nutrasweet-addled voice behind "Magneto and Titanium Man" or "Big Barn Bed." This is Driving Rain refined. Producer Nigel Godrich ditched McCartney's competent touring band from the studio and put Paul on the spot: forcing the Beatle to play every instrument possible in the style of previous one-man albums like McCartney and its sequel McCartney II. The only difference this time around is that Godrich is in the mix, as opposed to leaving Paul alone in the basement with his excesses. The end result is a pleasant if slightly forced song cycle that reminds you why you bother picking up McCartney solo albums in the first place. For every "Monkberry Moon Delight" or "Bip Bop," you get an unexpected treat, like "Helen Wheels" or Chaos and Creation's opening track, "Fine Line."

In short, don't buy into the cyclical hype. But for McCartney diehards and those looking for an excuse to hop back on the Macca wagon, Chaos and Creation in the Backyard comes at the perfect time.

And for those who care, I'll be seeing him tonight (Saturday) in Tampa.