Ringo Starr opens up about his first duet with Paul McCartney
It features on Sir Paul's upcoming album
Following the release of Ringo Starr's latest album he joined Simon Mayo on Greatest Hits Radio, via Zoom from Los Angeles. With a backdrop of sunshine and palm trees, he jokingly compared it to his childhood home in Liverpool, telling Simon: "If you've ever been to Admiral Grove, there was no palm trees".
During the chat the pair spoke about the new album 'Long Long Road', working with Sir Paul McCartney on a duet for Paul's upcoming album, and his attempt to move to the USA when he was 18-years-old, before he became Ringo Starr.
Working with Sir Paul McCartney
Earlier this year, Sir Paul McCartney announced his first album in five years called 'The Boys of Dungeon Lane', inspired by the area of Liverpool where he grew up. On the album, which features 14 songs, there is one track called 'Home to Us'.
Although Ringo wouldn't confirm it to Simon, it's widely believed that it is the first duet Ringo and Paul have done together. Ringo went on to speak about the track and working with his former Beatles bandmate. Ringo explained: "Paul hasn't called me up now (and said), don't you talk about my record, Ringo."
He went on to reveal how the project came about, telling Simon: "The project that it ended up on, which is Paul's record, I did it with the guy who produced the record for Paul.
"And I went down to just jammed with him in his studio down the road and he played guitar and someone had left their kit there, so I played… (it) wasn't even my kit.
"We were just jamming and then three days later, because I was doing one of my EPs, I asked the producer guy to send me that track, maybe we can turn it into a song or something. Anyway, he never sent it to me.
"And then Paul comes into town, he's working with him, and they've taken the drum track from that jam and put everything on top of it, including the song, so it's far out and it's about us."
Ringo's album 'Long Long Road'
'Long Long Road' is the second album Ringo has released with producer T Bone Burnett, and he explained to Simon how the record came about. Although it wasn't created "by accident", Ringo admitted: "We just sort of did it. We just sort of wondered, you know, we'd finished ‘Look Up’ and we had time on our hands, and we started with a few tracks and it turned into another album, 'Long Long Road’.
"My point is that it was not like, we're going to do another one, we were just like, we're doing another one. It was so like, crazy. You know, it was great!"
The latest album features several collaborations including Molly Tuttle and Sarah Jarosz on their single 'It’s Been Too Long', which was released in March. It also features a collaboration with Sheryl Crow, which Ringo explained was because they "sort of know each other".
He went on to say: "I asked them to call Sheryl for me and say will she sing? I asked T Bone and she said: ‘Yeah’, because I bumped into her. I sort of… we sort of know each other, you know, we just bumped into each other.
"And I've been to see her several times and she comes to the All Starr gigs. And so she came out for that. So, yeah, Nashville is a very giving (place), you know, it's what music is about. It's a giving and I loved it there."
Becoming Ringo Starr
Ringo has now lived in Los Angeles for 10 years, but chatting to Simon, he revealed how in the early days he'd hoped to move to Texas. Still working at a factory in Liverpool, the young Richard Starkey (Ringo's real name) went to the American embassy in Liverpool and started to fill in some of the forms, but as Ringo explained, they decide not to go ahead in the end, and a short time later he became Ringo Starr.
"I did try and emigrate to Texas because of Lightnin' Hopkins, the Blues player," Ringo explained.
"(I) went down to the embassy in Liverpool and got these things we had to sign and write, we don't have a dog, another's name, these forms, (and) these forms. And there was a friend, another friend of mine, John, we were going to go together, and we signed and we filled these forms.
"And they even gave us a whole page of factories we could apply to because I was in Butlins and Son Factory as an apprentice engineer."
He continued: "And we went down there, we filled these forms, we took these forms back, and we thought, we've done the forms, now we can go to America. And they said: 'oh no, but now you've got to fill in this set of forms'.
"And if you ever remember when you were a teenager. At 18, don't give me no more forms, and we just ripped them up and said: 'Ah sod it' and got on to whatever, life continued. I was with Rory at the time and we got a three-month gig at Butlins, I left the factory. And that was... I became Ringo Starr and there I am."
Listen to the full interview below
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