McCartney back catalog to Concord

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – (Business Wire) Paul McCartney’s MPL and Concord Music Group, one of the world’s leading independent music companies today announced an historic agreement to globally market and distribute McCartney’s venerated solo and Wings catalog, which encompass 40 years of cherished, classic material from the most successful songwriter and recording artist in music history. Indeed, the music legend has sold an astonishing 100 million solo singles and 700 million albums world-wide in his unparalleled career. The announcement coincides with the 40th anniversary of McCartney, his fabled first solo album released April, 1970.

This exclusive global arrangement, will cover both physical and digital distribution of McCartney’s treasured post Beatles catalog including landmark solo albums such as McCartney, Ram, McCartney II, Tug Of War, Pipes of Peace, Give My Regards To Broad Street, Press To Play, Flowers in the Dirt, Off the Ground, Flaming Pie, Driving Rain, Chaos and Creation in the Backyard, Memory Almost Full, and Good Evening New York City. The classic Wings albums include Wildlife, Red Rose Speedway, Band On The Run, Venus and Mars, Wings At The Speed of Sound, Wings Over America, London Town and Back To The Egg. The catalog also includes the inventive, highly regarded albums recorded under the McCartney pseudonyms Percy “Thrills” Thrillington, The Fireman and Twin Freaks.

McCartney fans can look forward to an ambitious and rewarding reissue program beginning in August of 2010 with Band On The Run; Paul McCartney & Wings’ classic #1 album from 1973 that spawned the immortal title song as well as the smash hit “Jet”. It will be available in a variety of configurations, including a special collector’s multi-disc edition with remastered audio, enhanced packaging and rare bonus content, according to the press release.

So let’s hope that Concord will remaster the rest of the catalog. Many of McCartney’s fans have been unhappy with Peter Mew‘s 1993 remasters that were released on CD as “The Paul McCartney Collection”, and are instead favouring the rare DCC gold edition CD’s remastered by Steve Hoffman from the same year (sample picture above), or even the eighties versions of the CD’s that weren’t remastered at all…

A rare boxed set of The Paul McCartney Collection from 1993, only released in Japan, and only used as a prize for competition winners.

Press release