How Kind Of You

‘How Kind Of You’ is the second song on Paul McCartney’s 13th solo album Chaos And Creation In The Backyard.

It’s something I’ve done for a long time but recently I’ve started to notice more perhaps, like how some people talk, what phrases they use and I’ve got a couple of sort of older posh English friends who instead of saying, ‘That’s very nice of you,’ or ‘Thanks a lot,’ where I come from – they might say, ‘How kind of you,’ and, you know, so I just started with that phrase and this whole idea, ‘How kind of you to think of me when I was out of sorts,’ instead of, ‘Thanks very much for thinking of me when I wasn’t feeling too good,’ which is just an ordinary way of saying it. I just liked this slight sort of elegant language; so I was just imagining it from the point of view of somebody like that, writing a thank you letter, ‘How kind of you to think of me. It was very nice…’ and so and so, and so and so. It wasn’t particularly about anything, just playing with that language thing and then trying to put the tune a bit more rock and roll, pop, to set it against it, so it kind of wrote itself that one, coming off the phrase, ‘How kind of you.’

The song was recorded at AIR Studios in London in April 2005.

It did develop in the studio. That was one that I brought in as a kind of, I can’t remember what key it’s in, (sings) ‘How kind of you to think of me, when I was out of sorts,’ but then what we did it was just like a drone and a sort of harmonium thing (sings) ‘how kind of you to think of me.’ Just put it in a kind of limbo land, like an Indian piece, (sings) ‘When I was out of sorts,’ so that changed its nature putting like a harmonium thing in there with it so it became like an Indian continent and then this pop song sitting on the top of it and then brought in some drums about halfway and bass on a kind of Sixties kind of vibe, almost reminds me of The Doors or somebody this funny little, kind of two-beat funny little thing on the drums, but, yeah, that changed quite a bit in the studio.

On 28 July 2005 McCartney opened the Chaos And Creation At Abbey Road television special with ‘How Kind Of You’.