Song of the Day 9/26: Paul McCartney, “My Brave Face”

Paul McCartney scored a couple of big hits in the ’80s with other artists, but his duets with Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson weren’t musical collaborations. McCartney wrote “Ebony and Ivory” and asked Wonder to sing it with him. Jackson wrote “The Girl Is Mine.”

In 1987 McCartney’s manager suggested he get together with Elvis Costello. That many-month interlude didn’t result in any massive hits, though this one, which appeared on his 1989 LP “Flowers in the Dirt,” made No. 25 in the US. It remains the last Top 40 hit with any Beatle as the lead performer.

Each songwriter brought some near-completed compositions (Costello’s “Veronica” for example) to their early sessions before they started working on new material. This was the first song they wrote together from scratch. Lennon-McCartney comparisons were inevitable, and Paul acknowledged that Costello played much the same role John once had, tossing barbed rejoinders to his sunny lines.

In “My Brave Face” McCartney, happily married to Linda in those days, portrays a man who goes from celebrating to ruing newfound bachelorhood. Everything lyrically, from the title to the scenario to the phrasing, sounds like Costello, who was a few years post-divorce. Musically, though, it’s McCartney’s sunshine-pop Beatles.

“Given our vocal registers, it was inevitable that I would end up harmonizing below Paul, which made a couple of tunes sound like they were trying to be Lennon/McCartney songs,” Costello said. The major sixth chords also lend the production a fab vibe, as does Macca’s Höfner bass, brought out of storage at Costello’s request.

The official video features some rare film snippets, but they come amid a silly narrative about black-market memorabilia that detracts from the tune. This official alternate was shot in the recording studio. You might not recognize the blond bloke on guitar out of his kilt — that’s Hamish Stuart of the Average White Band.

If you wonder what the song would sound like as an Elvis Costello track, you can get a pretty good idea from this rehearsal video. It would be faster, for one thing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ua-44ZLcSMg

“My Brave Face” has been covered a couple of times for McCartney tribute albums. This one’s by a Vancouver band called Star Collector for a 2001 LP called “Coming Up!”