Lifestyle
Creative outlets
While at school during the 1950s, McCartney thrived at art assignments, often earning top accolades for his visual work. However, his lack of discipline negatively affected his academic grades, preventing him from earning admission to art college.[249] During the 1960s, he delved into the visual arts, explored experimental cinema, and regularly attended film, theatrical and classical music performances. His first contact with the London avant-garde scene was through artist John Dunbar, who introduced McCartney to art dealer Robert Fraser.[250] At Fraser's flat he first learned about art appreciation and met Andy Warhol, Claes Oldenburg, Peter Blake, and Richard Hamilton.[251] McCartney later purchased works by Magritte, using his painting of an apple for the Apple Records logo.[252] McCartney became involved in the renovation and publicising of the Indica Gallery in Mason's Yard, London, which Barry Miles had co-founded and where Lennon first met Yoko Ono. Miles also co-founded International Times, an underground paper that McCartney helped to start with direct financial support and by providing interviews to attract advertiser income. Miles later wrote McCartney's official biography, Many Years From Now (1997).[253]
McCartney became interested in painting after watching artist Willem de Kooning work in de Kooning's Long Island studio.[254] McCartney took up painting in 1983, and he first exhibited his work in Siegen, Germany, in 1999. The 70-painting show featured portraits of Lennon, Andy Warhol and David Bowie.[255] Though initially reluctant to display his paintings publicly, McCartney chose the gallery because events organiser Wolfgang Suttner showed genuine interest in McCartney's art.[256] In September 2000, the first UK exhibition of McCartney's paintings opened, featuring 500 canvases at the Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol, England.[257] In October 2000, McCartney's art debuted in his hometown of Liverpool. McCartney said, "I've been offered an exhibition of my paintings at the Walker Art Gallery ... where John and I used to spend many a pleasant afternoon. So I'm really excited about it. I didn't tell anybody I painted for 15 years but now I'm out of the closet".[258] McCartney is lead patron of the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, a school in the building formerly occupied by the Liverpool Institute for Boys.[259]
When McCartney was a child, his mother read him poems and encouraged him to read books. His father invited Paul and his brother Michael to solve crosswords with him, to increase their "word power", as McCartney said.[260] In 2001, McCartney published Blackbird Singing, a volume of poems and lyrics to his songs for which he gave readings in Liverpool and New York City.[261] In the foreword of the book, he explains: "When I was a teenager ... I had an overwhelming desire to have a poem published in the school magazine. I wrote something deep and meaningful—which was promptly rejected—and I suppose I have been trying to get my own back ever since".[262] His first children's book was published by Faber & Faber in 2005, High in the Clouds: An Urban Furry Tail, a collaboration with writer Philip Ardagh and animator Geoff Dunbar. Featuring a squirrel whose woodland home is razed by developers, it had been scripted and sketched by McCartney and Dunbar over several years, as an animated film. The Observer labelled it an "anti-capitalist children's book".[263]
"I think there's an urge in us to stop the terrible fleetingness of time. Music. Paintings ... Try and capture one bloody moment please."[264]
—McCartney
In 1981, McCartney asked Geoff Dunbar to direct a short animated film called Rupert and the Frog Song; McCartney was the writer and producer, and he also added some of the character voices.[265] In 1992, he worked with Dunbar on an animated film about the work of French artist Honoré Daumier, which won them aBAFTA award.[266] In 2004, they worked together on the animated short film Tropic Island Hum.[267] The accompanying single, "Tropic Island Hum"/"We All Stand Together", reached number 21 in the UK.[268]
McCartney also produced and hosted The Real Buddy Holly Story, a 1985 documentary featuring interviews with Keith Richards, Phil and Don Everly, the Holly family, and others.[269] In 1995, he made a guest appearance on the Simpsons episode "Lisa the Vegetarian" and directed a short documentary about the Grateful Dead.[270]
Business
Since the Rich List began in 1989, McCartney has been the UK's wealthiest musician, with an estimated fortune of £680 million in 2013.[271] In addition to an interest in Apple Corps and MPL Communications, an umbrella company for his business interests, he owns a significant music publishing catalogue, with access to over 25,000 copyrights, including the publishing rights to the musicals Guys and Dolls, A Chorus Line, Annie and Grease.[272] He earned £40 million in 2003, the highest income that year within media professions in the UK.[273] This rose to £48.5 million by 2005.[274] McCartney's 18-date On the Run Tour grossed £37 million in 2012.[271]
McCartney's music has appeared on several record labels. In January 1962, Polydor Records issued the first commercially released recording of the Beatles, a single called "My Bonnie". Credited to Tony Sheridan and the Beat Brothers, Decca Records issued the track in the UK in April 1962. The following year, Parlophone released the band's singles "Please Please Me"/"Ask Me Why" and "From Me to You"/"Thank You Girl" in the UK. Vee-Jay Records released them in the US. Also that year, Swan Records released the group's UK Parlophone single "She Loves You"/"I'll Get You" in the US. From then until July 1968, EMI's Capitol (US) and Parlophone (UK) labels released the band's music. Starting with the August 1968 release "Hey Jude"/"Revolution", their new material would be issued with Apple labels, logos and sleeves, but with Parlophone or Capitol serial numbers.[29]
Following the break-up of the Beatles, McCartney's music continued to be released by Apple Records under the Beatles' 1967 recording contract with EMI which ran until 1976. Following the formal dissolution of the Beatles' partnership in 1975, McCartney re-signed with EMI worldwide and Capitol in the US and Canada. In 1979, McCartney signed with Columbia Records in the US and Canada—reportedly receiving the industry's most lucrative recording contract to date, while remaining with EMI for distribution throughout the rest of the world.[275] McCartney returned to Capitol in 1985 and from 1985 until 2006, Parlophone released McCartney's music in the UK and Capitol in the US.[276] In 2007, McCartney signed with Hear Music, becoming the label's first artist. He remains there as of 2012's Kisses on the Bottom.[277]
In 1963, Dick James established Northern Songs to publish the songs of Lennon–McCartney.[278] McCartney initially owned 20% of Northern Songs, which became 15% after a public stock offering in 1965. In 1969, James sold a controlling interest in Northern Songs to Lew Grade's Associated Television (ATV) after which McCartney and John Lennon sold their remaining shares although they remained under contract to ATV until 1973. In 1972, McCartney re-signed with ATV for seven years in a joint publishing agreement between ATV and McCartney Music. Since 1979, MPL Communications has published McCartney's songs. McCartney and Yoko Ono attempted to purchase the Northern Songs catalogue in 1981, but Grade declined their offer and decided to sell ATV in its entirety to businessman Robert Holmes à Court. Michael Jackson subsequently purchased ATV in 1985. In 1995, Jackson merged his catalogue with Sony for a reported £59,052,000 ($95 million), establishing Sony/ATV Music Publishing, in which he retained half-ownership.[279] McCartney has criticised Jackson's purchase and handling of Northern Songs over the years. Now formally dissolved, in 1995 it became absorbed in the Sony/ATV catalogue.[280] McCartney receives writers' royalties which together are 33⅓ percent of total commercial proceeds in the US, and which vary elsewhere between 50 and 55 percent.[281] Two of the Beatles' earliest songs—"Love Me Do" and "P.S. I Love You"—were published by an EMI subsidiary, Ardmore & Beechwood, before signing with James. McCartney acquired their publishing rights from Ardmore in the mid-1980s, and they are the only two Beatles songs owned by MPL Communications.[282]
Drugs
McCartney first used drugs in the Beatles' Hamburg days, when they often used Preludin to maintain their energy while performing for long periods.[283] Bob Dylan introduced them to marijuana in a New York hotel room in 1964; McCartney recalls getting "very high" and "giggling uncontrollably".[284] His use of the drug soon became habitual, and according to Miles, McCartney wrote the lyrics "another kind of mind" in "Got to Get You into My Life" specifically as a reference to cannabis.[285] During the filming of Help!, McCartney occasionally smoked a joint in the car on the way to the studio during filming, and often forgot his lines.[286] Director Richard Lester overheard two physically attractive women trying to persuade McCartney to use heroin, but he refused.[286] Introduced to cocaine by Robert Fraser, McCartney used the drug regularly during the recording of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, and for about a year total but stopped because of his dislike of the unpleasant melancholy he felt afterwards.[287]
Initially reluctant to try LSD, McCartney eventually did so in late 1966, and took his second "acid trip" in March 1967, with Lennon, after a Sgt. Pepper studio session.[288] He later became the first Beatle to discuss the drug publicly, declaring, "It opened my eyes ... [and] made me a better, more honest, more tolerant member of society."[289] He made his attitude about cannabis public in 1967, when he, along with the other Beatles and Epstein, added his name to a July advertisement in The Times, which called for its legalisation, the release of those imprisoned for possession, and research into marijuana's medical uses.[290]
In 1972, a Swedish court fined McCartney £1,000 for cannabis possession. Soon after, Scottish police found marijuana plants growing on his farm, leading to his 1973 conviction for illegal cultivation and a £100 fine. As a result of his drug convictions, the US government repeatedly denied him a visa until December 1973.[291] Arrested again for marijuana possession in 1975, in Los Angeles, Linda took the blame, and the court soon dismissed the charges. In January 1980, when Wings flew to Tokyo for a tour of Japan, customs officials found approximately 8 ounces (200 g) of cannabis in his luggage. They arrested McCartney and brought him to a local jail while the Japanese government decided what to do. After ten days, they released and deported him without charge.[292] In 1984, while on holiday in Barbados, authorities arrested McCartney for possession of marijuana and fined him $200.[293] Upon his return to England, he stated: "cannabis is ... less harmful than rum punch, whiskey, nicotine and glue, all of which are perfectly legal ... I don't think ... I was doing anyone any harm whatsoever."[294] In 1997, he spoke out in support of decriminalisation of the drug: "People are smoking pot anyway and to make them criminals is wrong."[250]
Vegetarianism and activism
Paul and Linda were vegetarians for most of their 30-year marriage. They decided to stop consuming meat after Paul saw lambs in a field as they were eating a meal of lamb. Soon after, the couple became outspoken animal rights activists.[295] In his first interview after Linda's death, he promised to continue working for animal rights, and in 1999 he spent £3,000,000 to ensureLinda McCartney Foods remained free of genetically engineered ingredients.[296] In 1995, he narrated the documentary Devour the Earth, written by Tony Wardle.[297] McCartney is a supporter of the animal-rights organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.[298] He has appeared in the group's campaigns and, in 2009, he narrated a short factory farm exposé titled "Glass Walls."[299][300][301] McCartney has also supported campaigns headed by the Humane Society of the United States, Humane Society International, the World Society for the Protection of Animals, and the David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation.[302][303][304]
Following McCartney's marriage to Mills, he joined her in a campaign against landmines, becoming a patron of Adopt-A-Minefield. He wore an anti-landmines T-shirt during some of the Back in the World tour shows.[305] In 2006, the McCartneys travelled to Prince Edward Island to raise international awareness of seal hunting. The couple debated with Danny Williams, Newfoundland's then Premier, on Larry King Live, stating that fishermen should stop hunting seals and start seal-watching businesses instead.[306] McCartney also supports the Make Poverty Historycampaign.[307]
McCartney has participated in several charity recordings and performances, including the Concerts for the People of Kampuchea, Ferry Aid, Band Aid, Live Aid and the recording of "Ferry Cross the Mersey".[308] In 2004, he donated a song to an album to aid the "US Campaign for Burma", in support of Burmese Nobel Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi. In 2008, he donated a song toAid Still Required's CD, organised as an effort to raise funds to assist with the recovery from the devastation caused in Southeast Asia by the 2004 tsunami.[309]
In 2009, McCartney wrote to Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, asking him why he was not a vegetarian. As McCartney explained, "He wrote back very kindly, saying, 'my doctors tell me that I must eat meat'. And I wrote back again, saying, you know, I don't think that's right ... I think he's now being told ... that he can get his protein somewhere else ... It just doesn't seem right – the Dalai Lama, on the one hand, saying, 'Hey guys, don't harm sentient beings ... Oh, and by the way, I'm having a steak.'"[310]
Meditation
In August 1967, McCartney met the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi at the London Hilton and later went to Bangor in North Wales to attend a weekend initiation conference, where he and the other Beatles learned the basics ofTranscendental Meditation.[311] He said, "The whole meditation experience was very good and I still use the mantra ... I find it soothing."[312] In 2009, McCartney and Starr headlined a benefit concert at Radio City Music Hall, raising three million dollars for the David Lynch Foundation to fund instruction in Transcendental Meditation for at-risk youth.[313]
Football
McCartney has publicly professed support for Everton, and also shown favour for Liverpool.[314] In 2008, he ended speculation about his allegiance when he said, "Here's the deal: my father was born in Everton, my family are officially Evertonians, so if it comes down to a derby match or an FA Cup final between the two, I would have to support Everton. But after a concert at Wembley Arena I got a bit of a friendship with Kenny Dalglish, who had been to the gig and I thought 'You know what? I am just going to support them both because it's all Liverpool.'"[315]
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