Paul McCartney & Wings* – Band On The Run

wow what an incredible album without a doubt paul’s “finest hour”

Probably McCartney’s finest and most interesting hour, where all he needed to do to achieve this was to wrap a formal band around himself instead of going it alone.

For the most part, I had begun to feel that McCartney’s lyrics meant nothing, that he was all about the sound and texture, and while the lyrics behind Band On The Run may have meant nothing as well, like the Eagles and their desperado image, I began to think that finally Paul was beginning to developed a life beyond the Beatles, and now had his own interpretive stories to lay out, where for the most part, I’d suggest that at the central core of this record is the essence of freedom. (laughing) Yes, by this stage even Paul, the cute Beatle had become a desperado of sorts himself. In reality the song “Band on the Run” revolved around the theft at knifepoint on the streets of Nigeria of the band’s demo tapes for the album Band On The Run. Those tracks recreated from memory, though not before they were altered to reflect on the band’s status of being stuck inside the four walls of the small cell-like recording studio, faced with the reality of redoing all they’d created. There were many other hidden gems laced within the record, making many fans feel that McCartney had finally returned. Consider the line “If we ever get out of here,” being inspired by something George Harrison had once said regarding the notion that he was feeling like a prisoner locked within the Apple Company. McCartney also goes on to note that all of his former bandmates had by this time split with Allen Klein, and were now on much better terms with each other, belaying yet another sense of freedom. Of course there was also his relationship with marijuana, where other musicians like himself were being arrested for using this illegal substance, all while it was perfectly fine to drink one’s self to death.

Now, who in the world talked Paul and his band to record in Nigeria, who were now trimmed down to three members, he, Linda and Denny Laine, where I have to ask what in the world Paul was thinking? Nigeria is a terrible place today, yet alone in the 1970’s (I know, I was an Army nurse, I’ve been there), with bodies lining the streets. I’m actually surprised that once Paul was taken sick there that he hadn’t died.

That being said, people often walk out of tragic situations far better fo the experience, as the album is intricate, filled with subtle shifting arrangements that seemingly re-arrange themselves in the air right in front of you. The album is far from mediocre, it’s filled with direction and personal statements, the most thrilling being that there appears to be two distinct atmospheric searches going on simultaneously, those being for the listeners of McCartney’s music and for McCartney himself. You’ll find that title song begins soberly with its narrator in jail, his music depressed. Then both he and the album explode at the moment of his escape (an escape which involves seeing the listeners as co-conspirators), with this newfound exhilaration suggesting that there could have been no such pleasure without the preceding pain and that while McCartney prefers the former to the latter, he has learned how to cope with both.

Again, no, this is not a Beatle-esque album by any means, though Paul does use elements of the creative process from those years to create these songs, where from the realization or concept of Paul’s great escape, everything on the record eventually revolves around the idea or evokes the notion of flight. All this leads directly to “Jet,” a dynamic bit of music infused with an obscure lyric about Paul’s dog, implying an overwhelming desire to not only get away, but to get away to someone in particular, or even to become a new person. The number ends up triumphantly, turning into a love song, a tribute to both a state of mind and and a person, a person where the persona is left behind, with all this moving excitingly forward, encapsulated by a grandiose performance.

Of course, I could endlessly go on about each track, though the most important aspect of this album was that initially things were referred to as Paul McCartney & Wings, where after this, things would fly under the banner of Wings, finding Paul again right where he belongs, happily immersed within the construct of a band.

*** The Fun Facts: Returning to the nature of the album Sgt. Pepper, the cover photo for Band On The Run was taken at Osterley Park in West London, and is filled with rather famous people dressed as convicts caught in the spotlight. Linda McCartney came up with the concept for the cover shoot, which featured the members of Wings alongside talk show host Michael Parkinson, singer Kenny Lynch, actors James Coburn and Christopher Lee, boxer John Conteh, and Member of Parliament Clement Freud, the song of Sigmund Freud.

Review by Jenell Kesler

...seriously, $500 dollars for this...I assumed it had to have been a signed copy or something special, but it was only listed as being sealed. Am I missing something, or did somebody just waste a ton of cash?