5 Nearly Perfect Paul McCartney Songs That Should Be Required Listening For Younger Generations

Paul McCartney will always be known for his time with the Beatles, but after their break-up in 1970, he followed his own epochal musical path that has continued into the present. And while his post-Beatles career may be somewhat overshadowed by the immensity of his former band, he's crafted some nearly perfect songs that should be required listening for younger generations who might not be as familiar with his solo work as well as with his band Wings.

The '70s were an especially fruitful time for McCartney, beginning with his first solo album, 1970's "McCartney," which contains "Maybe I'm Amazed. This song is simply majestic, by turns heart-wrenching and tender. With his band Wings, which included his wife Linda McCartney, he soared with epic songs like "Band On The Run" and "Live and Let Die" that could hold their own against such Beatles classics as "A Day in the Life." And there are so many more, even beyond the five we're highlighting by this ex-Beatle who continues to deliver.

In the midst of the emotional turmoil wrought by the implosion of the Beatles, for which Paul McCartney blamed John Lennon, McCartney, newly married and a father, moved with his family to a far-flung sheep farm in Scotland. There, he began to record new material on a four-track that included "Maybe I'm Amazed." McCartney played all the instruments and Linda McCartney sang harmony and did hand claps. The piano-driven track begins slowly and builds to a dramatic crescendo with McCartney's voice straining to the hilt in a falsetto before returning to his normal range. The music and his voice perfectly capture the essence of the lyrics of this timeless love song.

"Maybe I'm Amazed" is a love letter to Linda and what seems like an admittance of McCartney's depression over the end of the Beatles (Baby, I'm a man, maybe I'm a lonely man / Who's in the middle of something / That he doesn't really understand). But this is no facile sappy serenade. It instead encompasses the fear that can come with giving yourself wholly to someone else, with lyrics such as "Maybe I'm amazed at the way you love me all the time / Or maybe I'm afraid of the way I love you." McCartney has said he was trying to capture this push and pull. "The whole thing is scary when you fall in love with someone," he recalled (via The Guardian). "There's two sides ... Yeah, it's blissful. But then there's also this scary side."

In 1971, Paul and Linda McCartney formed the band Wings with guitarist Denny Laine and drummer Denny Seiwell (guitarist Henry McCullough would join the band the next year). In 1973, McCartney wrote "Live and Let Die," which the band recorded for the James Bond film of the same name. The song was a return to a more epic and lavish sound for McCartney and featured former Beatles' producer George Martin, who added magnificent orchestral flourishes and a reggae-infused interlude.

The single was a hit for the band in both the U.S., where it went to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, and the U.K., where it was a Top 10 hit. "Live and Let Die" rocks hard for a McCartney-penned song with seemingly dark lyrics — "You used to say live and let live ... But if this ever-changing world in which we're livin' / Makes you give in and cry / Say, 'Live and let die'". This was something Guns N' Roses likely picked up on when they decided to cover the song in 1991. But where Guns N' Roses went for bombast, the Wings' version is cinematic and, as it turns out, isn't as dark as it seems. McCartney has said that the lyrics are about letting go of your problems (via Paul McCartney's Instagram).

On the heels of "Live and Let Die," Paul McCartney and Wings, following some personnel changes, released their seminal album "Band On The Run" with the single of the same name that went further than "Live and Let Die" into mini-suite territory. The song is epic in scope and audacious in execution. It starts with a laid-back guitar riff and atmospheric synthesizer and Paul McCartney's laconic vocals that leads into a funk rock section that then collides with a booming horn part before transitioning into its final country-rock movement. 

Lyrically, the song tells the story of a jailbreak of a band who then go on the lam. McCartney has said that "Band On The Run" is a statement about the establishment treating musicians as criminals for smoking marijuana. "We were being outlawed for pot," he said in "Classic Rock Stories: The Stories Behind the Greatest Songs of All Time." "It put us on the wrong side of the law. And our argument on the title song was, 'Don't put us on the wrong side, you'll make us into criminals. We're not criminals, we don't want to be." With the song's complex structure and lyrics, it's a McCartney tune that requires multiple listens.

On "Waterfalls," Paul McCartney takes the opposite tack from "Live and Let Die" and "Band On The Run," stripping the song down to its barest essentials. Even so, what's left is a pure musical distillation; an ethereal song about a father's fear for the safety of his children, summed up in the first verse: "Don't go jumping waterfalls / Please keep to the lake / People who jump waterfalls / Sometimes can make mistakes." With just an eclectic piano, McCartney's plaintive vocals, and an atmospheric synthesized orchestral part, it's a beautiful and haunting song, and so unlike much of McCartney's other music.

Like "Maybe I'm Amazed," the delicate "Waterfalls" from his 1980 solo album "McCartney II" was born out of turmoil; It came on the heels of his arrest for marijuana possession in Japan, just part of McCartney's untold truth. The song, especially in the U.S., isn't as well known as many of McCartney's other solo work. This is probably mainly due to the fact that it wasn't a hit there like it was in the U.K. The song didn't chart when released as a single in 1980. This makes it even more of a relevant song for younger generations to listen to since it's a bit of a hidden gem, especially if they're familiar with TLC's "Waterfalls," which "borrowed" most of the first verse for its 1995 hit.

"Jet," also on Wings' "Band On the Run" album, is a barn-burner of a glam rock tune that's weird and wild and just plain fun. It starts with a buzzing saxophone part and chugging rhythm guitar before overdriven synths and punchy lead guitar come in. Between the boogie-woogie piano parts, a Moog solo, the shouted chorus of a single word, "jet," and its mysterious lyrics that rhyme "suffragette" with "jet" and may be either about McCartney's black lab, a pony, or his father-in-law, this is an unusual song by any measure. But it all manages to hang together while introducing dynamic changes in pacing and melody to boot. It's so full of exuberance that it will have you shouting along with the band.

McCartney has admitted even he doesn't actually know what it's about. "I can't really explain what it is," he told Rolling Stone. "It sounded silly, so I liked it." So did many others. It was a Top 10 Billboard hit and has remained one of McCartney's go-to concert tunes. Like the rest of the songs on this list, it's a McCartney song that should be required listening for younger folks, especially if they're looking to go beyond the Beatles.