Paul McCartney Thinking Quotations

I think I always had a musicality, and I think I could tell a good song from a bad song. And I would appreciate hearing something that was new to me.

I'm often reading a magazine and hearing about someone's new record, and I think : "Oh, boy, that's gonna be better than me". It's a very common thing.

I think people who create and write, it actually does flow-just flows from into their head, into their hand, and they write it down. It's simple.

When you first get money, you buy all these things so no one thinks you're mean, and you spread it around. You get a chauffeur and you find yourself thrown around the back of this car and you think, I was happier when I had my own little car! I could drive myself!

Looking back, I think I was always musical. My dad was very musical, and I think my mom was musical.

I used to think that all my Wings stuff was second-rate stuff, but I began to meet younger kids, not kids from my Beatle generation, who would say, We really love this song.

I think the pop industry is still a young man's game.

Having a beard is natural. When you think about it, shaving it off is quite weird.

I think [Transcendental Meditation] is what people need. They don't need high minded talk, they need results.

The medical argument for animal testing doesn't stand up. Even if it did, I don't think we should kill other species. We think we're so much better; I'm not sure we are. I tell people, We've beaten into submission every animal on the face of the Earth, so we are the clear winners of whatever battle is going on between the species. Couldn't we be generous? I really do think it's time to get nice. No need to keep beating up on them. I think we've got to show that we're kind.

I think the minute you're full up and have had enough to eat, then that's time to retire.

I'm actually doing what I want with my life. I do sometime think I could just shut up and rest on my laurels and say: you know what guys, I'll operate out of the pocket you put me in.... but no way! No way I'm gonna do that! I'd just get bored stiff the first minute.

I did cocaine for about a year around the time of Sgt Pepper. Coke and maybe some grass to balance it out. I was never completely crazy with cocaine. I'd been introduced to it and at first it seemed OK, like anything that's new and stimulating. When you start working your way through it, you start thinking: 'Mmm, this is not so cool an idea,' especially when you start getting those terrible comedowns.

I think the French girls are fabulous.

People don't like land mines, especially the survivors and the people who are living in the countries with them, ... They think they are cowardly, like we do, so I think it's down to the governments to actually just listen to the people and sign the treaty and get rid of all these things and there would be an end to it.

I'm still looking to write a great song.... You always are. You know, you never think, 'Well, that's enough ... that's good enough.'

It was a period when they used to read into our lyrics a lot, used to think there was more in them than there was.

Personally, I think you can put any interpretation you want on anything, but when someone suggests that Can't Buy Me Love is about a prostitute, I draw the line. That's going too far.

To get a big hit single you've got to go a bit dance. You've got to go a bit Britney. I don't think I can do that - well, I could but it wouldn't look very seemly!.

Life is an energy field, a bunch of molecules. And these particular molecules formed to make these four guys, who then formed into this band called the Beatles and did all that work. I have to think that was something metaphysical. Something alchemic. Something that must be thought of as magic.

I think it's something to do with the structural quality of the songs. We weren't actually trying to make stuff that was cool, or of the moment, although a lot of it was. We were trying to make stuff that was good enough to stick around and lo and behold, it has.

When I write, there are times -- not always -- when I hear John (Lennon) in my head, ... I'll think, OK, what would we have done here?, and I can hear him gripe or approve.

Think globally, act locally.

I think the idea of getting out of a traffic jam and getting out of work each week and going and doing all this stuff would be really exhausting.

When you get the money, you still need to keep going; you don't stop. There has to be something else. I think it's the freedom to do what you want and to live your dreams.

I just start singing some words with a tune. I don't ever write a song thinking, Now I'll write a song about... .

I think a domestic situation can change you and your attitudes. I suppose if you did get a bit content, then you might not write savage lyrics.

There are two things John and I always do when we're going to sit down and write a song. First of all we sit down. Then we think about writing a song.

I'm mad, you know? I don't think of retiring at all.

With life and all I've been through, I do have a belief in goodness, a good spirit. I think what people have done with religion is personified good and evil, so good's become God with 'o' out, and evil's become Devil with a 'd' added. That's my theory of religion.

I think when you're making an album, as the songs are piling up, one of the good things about it is that you will often write the song that you need.

Sometimes when you write a thing you think, 'Oh, this is good', and it's not a modesty or an immodesty thing, you just... it's just the same with anything; when you write a piece you just figure, 'Oh yeah, I'm on a roll here. This is good; I'm getting the hang of this'. Some pieces are better than others.

I think globally and act locally.

So many times, I will have people tell me what I did when I was younger. There's so much being written [about] the early Beatles period, and even pre-Beatles period. And people will say, "Oh, he did that because that, and that happened because of that." And I'll be reading and think, "Well, that didn't happen" and, "That's not why I did that." Like anyone's history, you remember what went down better than people who weren't there.

No matter how accomplished or how many awards you get, you're always still thinking there's somebody out there who's better than you.

I think that selling rights is a bad move commercially, not just morally. It cheapens the songs. When people come to my concerts, they often hold up candles when we do "Let It Be." I don't think they'd do that anymore if the song suddenly became part of an Oldsmobile ad.

I don't think of myself as a legend. I just love what I do. I love playing with my band, I love going to beautiful places and give people good music. I love what I do, I`m very lucky man.