Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr are finally releasing a duet together.
The legendary pair have been making music together since the early ’60s, but they’ve never actually duetted on a track until McCartney began putting together his forthcoming album, The Boys of Dungeon Lane.
One of the album’s tracks, “Home to Us”, features Starr on vocals alongside McCartney himself.
“In writing the song I’m talking about where we came from,” McCartney said at a press event previewing the new album (as per Rolling Stone). “In common with a lot of people, you come from nothing, and you build yourself up. Ringo was from the Dingle, and that was well hard. He said he used to get mugged coming home because he worked. Even though it was crazy, it was home to us.”
“I made the song around that idea and sent it to Ringo,” McCartney continued. “He sent me back a version where he just added some lines to the chorus, so I thought, maybe he doesn’t like it. I rang him, and he said he thought I only wanted him to sing one or two lines, and I said I’d love to hear him sing the whole thing.
“So we took my first line, Ringo’s second line, and then we had a duet. We’d never done that before. Then we wanted some backing vocals and I had the idea it would be nice to hear girls. Chrissie Hynde said she’d do it, and Sharleen Spiteri, they’re mates. So they did it.”
The Boys of Dungeon Lane, which was produced by Andrew Watt, finds McCartney in a contemplative mood.
“This was a lot of memories of Liverpool for me,” McCartney said at the press event, “but also any days we’ve left behind. Everyone’s got them – school, old mates. [The song] has memories of John in the middle, that’s lovely to go back to.”
Befitting their longstanding connection, McCartney held his press event in London on the very same day the Rolling Stones were promoting their own new album, Foreign Tongues (also produced by Watt) at an event in New York City. McCartney even features on one of the Stones’ album tracks.
While the Stones and McCartney don’t have any tour dates coming up, Starr kicks off another leg of his ‘All Starr Band Tour’ at the end of the month in Temecula, California.
