Originally published by L.S. Media. February 7th 2012. 
L.S. Media Rating ****
There’s nothing quite like a forgotten old gem to make you sit and take notice. When you tag that onto the Liverpool legend giving a new life to the tune, your perspective suddenly changes. You can end up digging through other timeless and wonderful songs that have sadly been neglected by a society that has moved on and away from its own soul. This is the result of Paul McCartney and the new take of old songs in Kisses on the Bottom.
Trust in Paul McCartney though to resurrect these American easy listening songs and give them an edge, the Scouse wit and love of clear, concise and beautiful music that has followed him throughout his life clearly shows.
These great jazz tracks from a by-gone age that has slipped us by in much the same way as the clubs that dotted the landscape of 1930’s New York’s 57th Street area and the thoughts of poetry of Auden are wonderfully resurrected. No, it’s more than that, they haven’t just become a being, an entity with artificial sparks of life thrown casually into them by a performer who has been paid to play them and then tick them off his C.V. to do list. This is done from the heart, this is true belief in a music that kicked off a musical genre that took music away from the highly placed and took them into the realms of the deserving.
Perhaps it’s only right that Paul McCartney recorded this album, for whatever motives he is accused of doing it for. He is one of the men that kick started the music renaissance in Britain after the austere and repressive post-war years.
It doesn’t matter what musical belief you adhere yourself to, whether pop, 60’s revolution and beat music, good old fashioned dyed in the wool punk or classic rock, unless you have the stoniest of hearts and a brain that just will not except the joy of listening to well-made music from another genre then you will enjoy the 14 tracks on this album. For the record, I love my Punk, I love Rock and I adore Prog and Metal, however listening to songs so wonderfully heart-warming as We Three (My Echo, My Shadow and Me), Bye Bye Blackbird and It’s Only a Paper Moon, I’m reminded of my time in New York and visiting some of the new, more sterile clubs and I weep. These are good tunes. More than that, they are just stunning!
I have no doubt that there will be detractors of Kisses on the Bottom, give it a chance though and you really might surprise yourself.
Ian D. Hall