EP of the Day, 3/26/12: Richard Cummins-5 Things I Learned from Paul McCartney in Song

British Columbia's Richard Cummins is an unabashed Beatlemaniac, and his latest EP is an enjoyable homage/tribute to Sir Paul McCartney. The EP features two original tracks, "Paul McCartney Taught Me Right"- a jangly Rickenbacker-laden number that cites McCartney as a role model and features an always-welcome timpani in the chorus - and "Paul, He Used to Sing With Me", a trippy mellow number that quotes McCartney lyrics. The rest of the EP is a couple of note-perfect covers of McCartney standards "Mull of Kintyre" and "Back Seat of My Car", along with an Abbey Road Studios mix of "Paul McCartney Taught Me Right". Cummins does sound a lot like McCartney, so if you don't pay close attention, you might think Paul was honoring himself. Still in all, it's a fun little EP and you don't have to be as big a McCartney maniac as Cummins to enjoy it.

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New McCartney on eMusic!

Perhaps the biggest criticism aimed at eMusic is that they don't have many "big name" artists available on their site. Of course, that's not something I concern myself much with as I tend to concentrate on independent power pop artists. Nevertheless, it's still a big deal when a big name shows up on eMu, and there can no bigger name than Sir Paul McCartney. His new release, Memory Almost Full, makes it bow on eMusic today, so here's your chance to legally download it for a fraction of what it would cost on iTunes or elsewhere.

How is it? I've listened a couple of times myself, and like most McCartney solo releases, it tends to be a bit inconsistent. Nevertheless there are a few gems in there, and if you'd rather cherry pick, grab "See Your Sunshine", "Only Mama Knows" and "Vintage Clothes".