Paul McCartney | Egypt Station | Album Review

Capitol
Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

Paul McCartney is back with his 17th solo studio album, Egypt Station. The album does nothing groundbreaking for McCartney’s career. Instead, Egypt Station is one that could fit seamlessly into any point in his 62-year-long musical career. He expresses the same sentiments in the same styles as his time spent solo as well as his era spent in The Beatles. Egypt Station feels more like a retirement hobby project rather than a completely new album for McCartney.

The 16-track record begins with an instrumental entitled “Opening Station.” Listeners feel surrounded by a bustling train station, horns honking, cogs turning when suddenly an angelic chorus begins chanting. The 41-second introduction sets up the album with a characteristically Beatles-style opening.

Echoing his classic style, “People Want Peace” is McCartney’s lifelong anthem. It’s a tired track that would fit itself into any of McCartney’s albums over the course of his career. The lyrics center around his passion for worldwide justice and equality, echoing cries of opposing war, singing, “People want peace, a simple release from their suffering.”

The only characteristic of the album that marks it as most recent is the obvious strain on his voice. Each track reveals the fact that Sir Paul McCartney is 76 years old. One of the most popular songs on the album, “I Don’t Know,” captures this vocal stress. Each word feels as though he is pulling at his voice, trying to take it where he wants it to go, rather than simply singing with his previous ease.

There’s nothing wrong with Egypt Station. There’s just nothing original. It is the amalgamation of everything Paul McCartney. The album does not attempt new styles but rather focuses on what McCartney has always done best: building instrumentals and crying for peace with classic rock inspirations.