In what fantasy rock-band league do the bass players of Killing Joke and The Beatles form a band? Yet The Fireman is unquestionably the sound of Youth and Paul McCartney working together. McCartney has been known to play with pop’s more experimental side since he helped invent the genre in the ’60s, and on 2005’s Chaos and Creation in the Backyard, he brought in Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich to provide a more contemporary edge.
But The Fireman is a much clearer collaboration, and from Beatles to Wings, McCartney has functioned well in band formats. For those who wondered where his rage toward his ex-wife went, opener “Nothing Too Much Just Out of Sight” recalls a bitter version of “Why Don’t We Do It in the Road?” There are other dark moments here, like “Highway,” in which a harassed McCartney sings of escaping a smothering love. Still, even in “Highway” McCartney concludes, “The sun is rising again.”
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In the end, divorced or in a group, McCartney is basically an artist of uplift, and from Youth’s soundscape dubs to the more traditional elements on Electric Arguments, this optimism comes through. Even the song titles are pure McCartney treacle: “Light From Your Lighthouse,” “Sun Is Shining,” “Dance ’til We’re High” and so on.
As those titles suggest, much of the disc consists of standard pop with Youth filling out the edges. But on Arguments’ best track, “Sing the Changes,” the group comes together with a U2-style sing-along better than anything The Killers ever mocked up. After all, underneath this relentless anthem is a signature melody by Paul McCartney.
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