During a playback event today at London’s Abbey Road Studios for his forthcoming LP The Boys of Dungeon Lane, Paul McCartney shared the news that the new album will include his first-ever duet with his former Beatles bandmate Ringo Starr. The single “Home to Us” will arrive this Friday and will additionally feature backing vocals from Chrissie Hynde and Sharleen Spiteri. “Ringo went round to the studio and drummed a bit,” McCartney explained. “I said to Andrew [Watt, the album’s producer], we should make a track and send it to him. So this song is done totally with Ringo in mind.
“In writing the song,” he continued, “I’m talking about where we came from. In common with a lot of people, you come from nothing and you build yourself up. Ringo was from the Dingle, and that was well hard. He said he used to get mugged coming home, because he worked. Even though it was crazy, it was home to us. I made the song around that idea and sent it to Ringo. He sent me back a version where he just added some lines to the chorus, so I thought, maybe he doesn’t like it. I rang him and he said he thought I only wanted him to sing one or two lines, and I said I’d love to hear him sing the whole thing. So we took my first line, Ringo’s second line, and then we had a duet. We’d never done that before. Then we wanted some backing vocals and I had the idea it would be nice to hear girls. Chrissie Hynde said she’d do it, and Sharleen Spiteri, they’re mates. So they did it.”
The Boys of Dungeon Lane will be released on May 29—pre-order that here, and expect Paul and Ringo’s duet to drop this Friday.
