Behind-The-Scenes Of The New Skype "Love Mojis"

As announced today, Paul has partnered with communications giant Skype to compose music to accompany ten "Love Mojis". Check out the full details of Paul's compositions for the "Love Mojis" by clicking HERE!

Shortly after Paul had been in the studio working on the audio, we were able to catch up with him to ask him about the project

Question:
What attracted you to the project?

Paul McCartney:
My team is always on the look out for interesting ideas. They had been talking to Skype and suggested that I would write music for some new “Mojis” to be used around Valentine’s Day.

I was intrigued and thought it would be a bit of fun to see if I could do it! And it turned out to be a great laugh at the same time as challenging because you suddenly realise you’ve got to compress a musical interpretation of an emotion into less than five seconds. So with some of them, which were five and a half or six seconds, we had to work out a way to take the front off or just squeeze this or just take that bit out.

It was great! It was like doing a huge crossword puzzle and coming up with all these solutions. And at the same time it was musical so it was great practice for me in the studio.

Question:
As you were expressing universal emotions using music rather than language was composing for this project different from how you usually write, and did you learn anything from the process?

Paul McCartney:
Yeah, that was the thing. The decision I had to make was if I was going to use my voice; which I thought might be a good thing because it then identifies it with me. But it would have to be without using words.

And you know, I’ve seen kids’ cartoons that use sounds rather than words, but you still kind of know what they’re saying! [Impersonates cartoon character.] So I thought I’ll do that and just use “Doo-Dee-Do-Deee” and kind of sing it so it’s me and my voice, but at the same time no words. So yes, that was a conscious decision.

Question:
What instruments did you use during the recording sessions?

Paul McCartney:
I wanted to try and make the whole set have a signature sound, something that pulled it all together rather than just use a different instrument for every single sound so that it was like a portfolio of musical “Mojis”.

I decided to start roughing them all out with the Moog synthesizer. So I did a musical phrase on the Moog for each of the 20 emotions. Then I decided sometimes we don’t need a Moog, sometimes another instrument would be better.

The Moog was the first part and then I added my voice. Then I added xylophone to some of them, which is like a call sign. It’s kind of like an airport tannoy, but I wanted that. I wanted it to sound like something you might find on your computer. So it was, “Do-Do-Doo” [mimics airport call sign].

So that mix of the Moog and the xylophone is something you’ll hear, and then sometimes I added a guitar, voice, piano, harpsichord, and electric guitar. And then drums on the more sort of funky ones, like ‘I’m solo and loving it’. I thought, “OK! I’m gonna get a funky drum track on that!” So it was great fun! Really, I thought it might take a day – it took a week!

Question:
Was there any reason why you fleshed out the ideas on the Moog?

Paul McCartney:
I wanted it to be modern. I wanted it to sound sort of electronic so I wanted the signature to be an electronic signature rather than acoustic guitar, for instance. So I got the whole overall signature on the Moog in order to give it a modern flavour.

Question:
Which was the easiest expression to compose for?

Paul McCartney:
I must say I didn’t have too much trouble with many of them because it was instant. It was like, “I’m not going to spend a week composing this!” I’m just going to go [sings], “I love you, Do-Whee-Doo’. And then I gave another variation like, “Do-Whee-Oo-Oo”. So really it was like, “First thought, best thought”.

‘Lust’ [laughs], that was a good one to do. It’s a great exercise. How do you do that? It’s similar to composing a song; you’re trying to get an emotion like, “I love you,” or an “I miss you” emotion, or a “Don’t leave me” emotion.

‘Solo and loving it’ was the other one that was good fun to do. ‘Be My Valentine?’ was nice too, and I think those three I just mentioned have a little more instrumentation than some of the others. I kept some of them very spare, because they sounded like they worked - just like a call sign.

But it was really first thought, best thought. I thought, “I can’t deliberate over this - I’ve got to race them all out”. Then I thought, “Well, I’ll give a couple of alternatives,” which were mainly for me to choose from. But I ended up liking the alternatives so I thought, “I’ll let Skype choose”.

Question:
Which was the hardest expression to compose for?

Paul McCartney:
There were a couple that were more challenging; ‘Flirting’ and ‘Blushing’. But I just kind of had a go at it and thought, “There you go!” And then if I didn’t think it was enough, I might just add another instrument to try and get the feeling.

Question:
Is it exciting to think that potentially millions of people around the world will be using your music to express their feelings?

Paul McCartney:
Yes very, it really is! It’s already very exciting being a composer and a recording artist because you know in America, UK, Japan, Europe, etc. people are going to be listening to your records, to your music and that’s a very exciting thing. With modern technology now you get the idea that millions of people at one point could actually be ‘using’ your music.

I like that, it’s very exciting and it’s very human. It brings us all together. We all go, “I love you,” together. I’m interested to see how it goes. Anyone I tell about this I say, “If it comes off”, because I’m always terrified with these kinds of projects that you might spend a week doing it all, and then somebody goes, “No, we tried it on the bosses and they don’t like it!” If it comes off, I do love the idea of it - someone in America, signaling someone in Japan. It’s just great communication. It’s all about communication, baby!

Question:
Do you use Skype to communicate with family and friends?

Paul McCartney:
I do when I’m on tour to keep in touch with friends and family. The big Skype user in the group is Wix! He’s ‘Mr Skype,’ he’s always at rehearsals moving his iPad round the room with his wife and child. I will say hi to his family!

Question:
Are you a fan of “Emojis” and do you use them with your family and friends?

Paul McCartney:
Yeah I do! When I text I put a little thing. The one I happen to like a lot – I’m really lo-fi – is a little smiley face with shades, so it’s cool and it’s smiley!

Question:
As these audio “Mojis” will be published around Valentine’s Day, how would you define ‘Love’?

Paul McCartney:
I think it’s one of the most important emotions in life!

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The Mojis are available on Skype now.