New Book Looks at Paul McCartney's 'Flowers in the Dirt'

A new book from McCartney expert Luca Perasi:

Released on 22 October 2026, Flowers in the Dirt. The Road to Comeback (1987-89) by Luca Perasi (L.I.L.Y. Publishing, 198 pages, available in paperback and hardcover) tells the story of one of McCartney's most challenging but rewarding periods. “Over these two years, Paul recorded over 70 songs, and this album was the final piece in a well-executed strategy that saw Paul change his artistic direction with the help of his manager Richard Ogden,” says the author, who in 2022 was credited in the booklet of Paul McCartney’s compilation The 7” Singles Box for additional research with the MPL team. 

“If Press to Play has gone down in history as Paul McCartney’s prime example of “that unmistakable 80s sound,” the author adds, “Flowers in the Dirt reveals itself to be a heavily computerised album, but at the same time stands out as a fabulous collection of clean and scintillating pop songs.”  

There’s much more than only Flowers in the Dirt in the book. “We’re examining a period of great changes for Paul,” says the author. “The book starts from the Press to Play aftermath, then goes through the Phil Ramone sessions, the collaboration with Elvis Costello and finally details all the various recordings for Flowers in the Dirt, the first album where McCartney experimented with the multi-producer formula. It’s a fascinating story, which proves that the road to success was long and winding.”

In its detailed account of the album's creation and analysis of its songs, based on contemporary sources and 25 in-depth interviews by the author with people who were involved in various recordings during the period, including Phil Pickett, Tim Renwick, Charlie Morgan, Stuart Elliott, Kevin Armstrong, Hamish Stuart, Chris Whitten, David Rhodes, Steve Lyon, Neil Dorfsman, Chris Hughes and Steve Lipson, the book is rich in offering anecdotes from the studio sessions, never heard before details, as well as musical and human insights. “I’m grateful to all of these people for helping me create this volume, which offers an even more privileged insider’s view than I was expecting,” adds the author.

Enriched by some never seen before photos from the personal archive of Charlie Morgan, the volume covers the timeline of the sessions, the stories behind the songs of the album and of the period (including the entire Phil Ramone Return to Pepperland project, “Tropic Island Hum”, the Daumier’s Law soundtrack, the single “Once Upon a Long Ago”, plus B-sides and other tracks), their harmonic and rhythmic inventions, the instrumentation, the recording equipment, the lyrics’ analysis, the promotion, the chart success, the critical acclaim. Over two complete chapters, the book also explores in depth the McCartney-Costello partnership – how this collaboration started, developed and somehow “fell apart”, their communication and disagreements, their discussion about the re-discovering of The Beatles’ musical language – offering an analysis and perspective that go beyond the obvious Lennon/McCartney analogy. An unprecedented first-hand account of one of the most important Paul McCarney albums ever. 

This is the fifth volume dedicated to a McCartney album in the Milestones series, which has recently seen the release of a book on Al Stewart’s Year of the Cat. Next titles in the series will be dedicated to Joe Jackson’s album Night and Day (written by Alfredo Marziano), Yes’ Fragile and George Harrison’s Cloud Nine, another unmissable comeback by an ex-Beatle.