McCartney III is the sequel that nobody expected, coming as the successor to his ’70s McCartney album and his ’80s McCartney II album. 

But Paul McCartney’s new album is nothing close to its predecessors. The sounds are abstract compared to the usual McCartney tunes that were hits on radio stations throughout his career. 

In almost every song on the album, the music overpowers his voice, and the words he sings do not carry nearly as much weight as his past songs, even his songs outside of the McCartney and McCartney II albums. 

Specifically, in “Lavatory Lil.” McCartney tells the story of one of his former coworkers and how the relationship he had with her went south. It is a good story, but it has no meaning to his listeners. He refuses to allow his followers to know who this woman was, or where he had worked with her. 

“Winter Bird” is the one true McCartney song on McCartney III. In it, he tells the story of his retreat to his farm in Scotland in the early 1970s when the Beatles were falling apart. 

McCartney has said that he traveled there to fix up the farm, to escape his stress and focus on something else, and that is where he wrote “Winter Bird.”

However, regardless of the sound of McCartney III, it will excite his fans because it offers new music from a beloved, aging superstar.