Just my opinion – John Lennon had a way better quality solo career than McCartney

I don’t want people pummeling me about this but I was thinking that there really is no contest, in my opinion, that Lennon had the better solo career.
First I want to say. I love McCartney. I love his songs with the Beatles just as much as I love Lennon’s. I don’t have a favorite Beatle not do I have a favoritism b/w McCartney or Lennon. Blackbird may be my favorite Beatles songs ever along w/ Strawberry Fields. I love the McCartney’s Beatles ballads too- Let It Be, Yesterday, etc. Solo-wise, Flaming Pie is one of my favorite albums of all time just as Double Fantasy is.
Even if we just compare both their outputs from the time the Beatles broke up thru 1984- which was when Lennon’s last solo album of all-new material was released, Milk & Honey. Hell I don’t care, compare Lennon’s entire solo output with McCartney’s all the way up to now and I still think Lennon’s was way better. Plus Lennon retired for like 5 years whereas McCartney was pumping out albums left and right. Lennon still had a better group of albums and singles than McCartney did with less of an output during the 1970-80 recording period. Maybe because Lennon released less material, that there was better quality? I don’t know.
Put Lennon’s “greatest hits” against McCartney’s and I think Lennon’s are way better: Imagine, Watching the Wheels, Instant Karma, Working Class Hero, Jealous Guy, Mind Games, (Just Like) Starting Over, Nobody Told Me, Mother, Woman vs. Band On the Run, Jet, No More Lonely Nights, Coming Up, Junior’s Farm, Uncle Albert, Let Em In, Live And Let Die, Goodnight Tonight.
McCartney has written some brilliant solo songs and I’m not just tossing off everything he did all these years as bad. Flaming Pie as a whole is brilliant and so is Live And Let Die and few others.
I’ve tried to get into McCartney’s 70’s/80’s solo stuff and it’s just kitschy and fluffy to me whereas Lennon released songs and albums that just slay me every time I hear them.
Only since the 90’s, I think McCartney finally found his groove and has been releasing solo material that has gotten on par with what Lennon accomplished. Especially since his last 3 solo albums of original material.
Again, IMHO, of course.

I just hope no one freaks out on me but there's gotta be other people that feel that way, or not. I'm welcome to hear to everyone's opinions and have a discussion. I just don't want anyone getting pissed.

PS- I know about Lennon's avant-garde albums with Yoko. I'm not counting those.

 

I won't pummel you, but I have about 15 Macca cd's, 5 LP's.... and 2 Lennon cd's and 2LP's, so you know where I stand.

 

I love them both equally. During and after The Beatles.

 

If you're looking for opinions, here's mine:

The great stuff of Lennon's I really love. For me though, McCartney's albums - even with some of the filler that is in abundance there - hold up a lot better than Lennon's. I tried Lennon's catalog and it just did nothing for me, aside from most of the tracks you mentioned. Even in the most trite McCartney song, I can usually appreciate it for the arrangement or melody.

 

Let me just say first off, that I am neither pissed off, nor freaking out at you.

But, IMO, Lennon's solo career was a disappointment to me.

One classic album (POB), one near classic album (Imagine), and the rest was pretty average.

Now, some might say, what's wrong with that? (I'd like to know......)

Nothing, except this is John Lennon. I expect more from him than from George or Ringo.

While JL's solo career started out extremely strong, it nose-dived pretty quickly after that. Even the infamous lost weekend, when he should have regained his muse, only inspired the decent at best Walls & Bridges.

Maybe JL would have gotten his stuff together had he lived post-Double Fantasy, but who knows? It looked like Yoko was going to be his partner and take up half the albums, whether we liked her or not.

 

I'm not wild about either of their solo careers. I think they needed each other as a balance.

Having said that, if you sift through all the songs and make a compilation of the best ones, I think you would find more Paul songs than John. It's very subjective of course, and Paul had the advantage of time, but even if you only go up to the year John died and stop there, Paul has (in my count) more great tunes.

 

You expressed a perfectly valid opinion and supported your reasoning well. No problem on my end. I am not sure I agree, I don't think there is a huge difference in the quality of their output as of the time of John's murder.

 

This from an outsider looking in perspective (as I am a limited Beatles / McCartney / Lennon fan).

Lennon's solo career lasted what, 10 years? Sure, in those 10 years he released what are widely recognized as a few groundbreaking albums (I would assume many feel Imagine is just such an album).

Meanwhile, McCartney's solo career is still going strong 35+ years later. The dude sells out almost every venue he books and remains in high demand.

Now, that's not necessarily a fair comparison for Lennon as I'm confident his career would still be flourishing (if he decided to keep making music). I guess we'll never know for sure.

So, the only thing we can accurately (objectively) judge between the two are their solo efforts from 1970 - 1980. I still give the nod to McCartney, although I readily I admit I am by no means more than a casual fan.

On the other hand, I like Lennon's Beatles tunes better (for the most part). Go figure.

 

Better greatest hits (while I'm not sure I agree with you) does not mean better career.

Lennon made two great solo albums (POB & Imagine) and a bunch of mediocre ones. I would even argue that Lennon's successes are tied directly to his Beatles career - that's to say that POB and Imagine (along with McCartney, Ram, and ATMP) are, effectively Beatles records, albeit ones dominated by each individual Beatle. In interviews give in the 1971-72 period, Lennon implied as much, saying that "if you want a new Beatles record, just pull bits and pieces from all of our albums".

In contrast, with Band on the Run, McCartney created a great record that had nothing to do with the Beatles, something none of the others ever did. He has tried, over and over again, to re-invent himself, to challenge himself and keep things interesting. In the process, he has made some incredible music - not always entire albums, but that's rare for anyone - and has kept me checking in the whole time.

So...I disagree.

 

I think if Lennon had been allowed to continue on, he'd have released his share of duff albums, as well as classics, just like McCartney has. I think at this point, they'd be pretty much evenly matched. McCartney's just had a lot more time to make bad albums, along with the good.

 

I like Lennon's output better than Macca's but that's me.
Anyway, I completely agree with davenav.

 

I much prefer Lennon's Beatles songs over Paul's. But, as a solo artist, it's not even close: Macca by a landslide. Lennon left behind three top-rate solo records (POB, Imagine, Walls and Bridges). Macca also had three by the time of John's "retirement" (Ram, Band on the Run, Venus and Mars). But the difference, for me, is in the quality of the "second-tier" material: McCartney and Red Rose Speedway are so incredibly superior to Sometime in NYC and Mind Games (I'm still not in love with Wild Life, but nobody's perfect).

And then, of course, there's the matter of what Paul has produced after 1980: am amazing body of songs (if not consistently great albums). So maybe John would have regained the fire that Double Fantasy promised, but who knows. In the end, however, if we're talking about the consistency of the entire body of work, it's Paul for me, hands down.

 

I agree 100%.

I think people like Paul's solo career because of the cheese factor.

 

agree with this, and I think that's why Hendrix, Cobain, the Doors, etc., are remembered more fondly than they probably would have been, had they not died early (Morrison, of course, not ALL the Doors...though that could be debated )...they would have certainly put out weak material, like Paul and John, had they continued...

 

I think that had he lived, Lennon probably wouldn't have made anywhere near the number of records McCartney has. He didn't have the strong compulsion to make music Paul does, nor the strong desire to promote himself -- after all, he had already taken a five year break before he died, and he was only in his late 30s (and it was a period where artists released a lot more music). At the time of his death he seemed to recapture his interest, but I suspect that as he got older he would have been more like George, releasing the odd album when the spirit moved him but otherwise mostly retired.

 

First of all, you made your statement and came up with good reasons. So it's good to have an open discussion. But I disagree. I must say that I haven't listened to all of their solo works, but in my collection Lennon is only represented by his Imagine album and the Legend compilation. I own far more McCartney albums, so guess whose side I'm on.

You have a point here. Some of Lennon's 45's are brilliant in a way that McCartney could never match. Nevertheless, McCartney proved himself a very good songwriter, especially during his Wings days. He had his dips too, during his solo career, but as far as I can judge, he's had more albums that hold well for the whole playing time.

Funny that you bing this up. My greatest appreciation of McCartney's work goes to his 70's output - Band on the run, Venus and Mars and even London Town and Back to the egg). He's had a few good albums afterwards (Tug of war, Flowers in the dirt, Off the ground), but overall things got a lot worse in the 80's and 90's. I even think Flaming pie is one of his worst albums. Can't tell you exactly why. I had it once, but disliked it so much that I sold it. I'm curious what other forum members think of this.

I do agree that many of McCartney's songs are just lightweight pop that suffer from the kitsch factor (My love, with a little luck). Of course this is where Lennon and McCartney found the right balance during their Beatle days. That's probably why both their solo material is pretty uneven - they lost their counterparts. But it's not that easy to write good pop tunes that stick in your head. I like most of them anyway.

Like I said, I kind of lost interest after Off the ground and my expercience with Flaming Pie kept me for listening to his other recent stuff, so I can't really discuss these. But actually this is the first time that someone is telling me that Macca's recent output contains some of his best albums.

 

Wow, I must be missing the brilliance. I don't like it.

Now Chaos.....I love that!

 

Pauls was mostly safe music more popie johns was more complex on average, he could of done mostly love songs to like paul but wanted to go a different direction for the most part.

 

I don't agree. Band On The Run is far more complex than Imagine, musically speaking. Sure, lyrically Imagine is on a pedestal, but Paul has written his share of complex songs. Try singing John songs versus Paul songs. John would, in his words, "take a note and ram it home". Paul's melodies are all over the place.

 

Where is all the daring, avant garde music in John's solo career? He made the ultra-safe "Double Fantasy" when Paul put out the experimental "McCartney II". Look at Lennon's overall solo work and you'll find almost nothing envelope-pushing in there. "Plastic Ono Band" was a great album and an artistic breakthrough, but everything else in his catalog lacks any real edge. There's some good stuff there - "Imagine" is a solid album, and I really like "Walls and Bridges" - but there's very little that I would call "complex" or daring.

This is the Lennon myth: that somehow he's the artistic, daring solo Beatle while Paul did nothing other than silly love songs.

 

The only appropriate response to this statement:

 

When it comes to killer melodies, I'm afraid Paul will ALWAYS have the edge. The man has a gift.

 

I once did a survey that directly compared Paul vs. John on a contemporary basis: Look at the albums they had out at basically the same time and pick a winner. My thoughts:

-POB over McCartney
-Ram over Imagine
-Wild Life over Some Time in NYC (both suck, but WL sucks a little less)
-Red Rose Speedway over Mind Games
-Band on the Run over Walls & Bridges
-McCartney II over Double Fantasy

Obviously others will disagree - especially with my last pick - but I think this is an apples-to-apples comparison that works best for this topic. It's not fair to factor in all of Paul's catalog since he's had 26 more years to make music. Look at what they did as contemporaries and I think Paul is the victor - not by a landslide, but his work is stronger.

Oh, and if we compare their albums of cover songs, Paul wins there. I'd take either the Russian album or "Run Devil Run" over "Rock and Roll" any day...

 

They had essentially opposite songwriting approaches. John wrote a song because he had something to say, while I would say Paul wrote songs to explore musical ideas. Music was secondary for John and lyrics secondary for Paul.