RUPERT AND THE FROGS FULL

Paul McCartney typically feels his way through a melody improvisingВ dummy lyrics and sometimes those lyrics get worked and reworked into something truly elegant and powerful ('Eleanor Rigby', 'For No One') and sometimes they remain the dummy lyrics and they work just fine ('Get Back' or 'the movement you need is on your shoulder' in 'Hey Jude').

Well, McCartney's not Dylan and never tries to be.

The middle eight soars romantically, and, second time round, the grouchy bass frogs bubbleВ up to counterpoint the tune and cut through any sweetness (reminiscent of McCartney's fluent bass playing high on the fretboard for songs likeВ 'Come Together' or 'With a Little Help From My Friends' so inexhaustible was his thirst for melody in the late 1960s he kept finding new tunes inВ the bass lines).ДЄnd the lyrics. Bom Bom') is witty and rhythmically robust (Paul McCartney being one of the most inventive and melodic bass players in pop creates a typically memorable bass line) and then in the second verse the bass voices are answered by a nicely crunchy alto harmony ('ah-ee-ah') which brings a welcome sourness to the arrangement. George Martin - of course it is - has delivered aВ characteristically restrained orchestration listen to the elegant little flute flourish that takes us from the first to the second verse, repeated on the violins between the two iterations of the middle eight. Despite its reputation, it's not schmaltzy В it's very spare.

RUPERT AND THE FROGS FULL

And then we're dipping down on 'side' and 'hand' before the title line lands us the lower C of 'all' bounces and then finally back there on the last syllable of 'together', the whole tune therefore climbing and descending a full octave. In the first lines listen to the way we soar from an E up a 4th on 'lose' and 'swim' then we reach even further to the C for 'one THING.' before we waltz so gracefully down the other side of the melody on '.is certain we'll never give in'. And listen to the twisting vertical quality of the melody. Because where the asshats are right is that The Frog Chorus epitomises Paul McCartney - except it shows us everything amazing about Paul McCartney as a composer and nothing bad.ДЇirst there's the melody: it does that thing that McCartney has so often managed, writing a song that isВ so catchy, feels so natural, flows so easily, that you can't quite believe no one ever thought of that tune before (other great examples: 'Yesterday', 'Penny Lane', 'Hey Jude' and, yes, 'Mull of Kintyre'). If you hate The Frog Chorus you must basically hate (a) kids, (b) yourselfВ (because you were once, all too briefly,В a kid), and (c) music. Of courseВ it's childish:В it's written for kids.В And what's more it's a gorgeousВ children's song. How is it necessary to say this? It's a children's song. Let me tell you something: The Frog Chorus is a fucking magnificent song. When Paul McCartney dies, as sadly one day he must, these asshats should be rounded up placedВ in a prison ship and forced to listen to 'Eleanor Rigby' and 'Maybe I'm Amazed'В until they admit that they are asshats. These asshats will survey Paul McCartney's contributions to The Beatles and these tin-eared halfwits will bring forward 'Ob-la-di Ob-la-da' and 'When I'm Sixty-Four' and 'All Together Now' and 'Maxwell's Silver Hammer' and claim that (a) these are all dreadful songs (which they're not) and (b) they are what all Paul McCartney was ever capable of. The Frog Chorus, these asshats will declare, is everything that's wrong with Paul McCartney: it's sickly sweet and it's sentimental and it's childish and it doesn't ROCK.В The second view, even more fucking moronic, is that Paul McCartney wasn't even all that good in The Beatles and that John Lennon was the real genius and if you want proof of how shit Paul McCartney was when he wasn't able to ride on John Lennon's coat-tails, Exhibit A is The Frog Chorus. This will take one of two forms (there will be asshats queuing up to give both of these opinions): one view is that Paul McCartney was good in The Beatles, but after The Beatles he was rubbish and Exhibit A will be The Frog Chorus. This asshat is going to point to The Frog Chorus as the centrepiece of their irrelevant and ignorant opinion that Paul McCartney is overrated or even just plain rubbish.

That is, the single 'We All Stand Together', credited to Paul McCartney and the Frog Chorus, a song written for a cartoon film of Rupert the Bear, and released as a single in 1984, getting to number 3 in the UK charts, universally referred to as The Frog Chorus. When Paul McCartney dies, as some day sadly he must, some asshatВ on Twitter is going to bring up The Frog Chorus.

Rupert and the frogs