Paul McCartney: Man on the Run, a documentary about Paul McCartney’s departure from The Beatles, his beginnings as a solo artist, and his founding of Wings, and ending in the early ’80s with his McCartney II album, is currently playing on Amazon. Directed by Gordon Neville, it’s an entertaining and surprisingly candid portrayal of McCartney’s early solo career, ’70s success, family life, and much more.
A companion soundtrack album has been released. The album is yet another recently released project that looks at the period. The Wings Anthology audio releases and Paul McCartney and Wings: The Story of A Band on the Run book are also part of chronicling this era. In many ways, the soundtrack album, best enjoyed on the 180-gram vinyl edition, is a pared-down version of the Wings Anthology. This album, though, includes some rarities.
There’s a demo of “Silly Love Songs,” a rough mix of “Arrow Through Me,” a track from the James Paul McCartney television special from 1973, and the Rockshow version of “Live and Let Die” from 1980. Although not in chronological order, the album actually has a nice flow. As a single album, it might be a good introduction for younger fans just discovering McCartney’s early solo music and Wings. Collectors will appreciate the rarities and the enclosed two-sided color poster. The sound quality is also quite good, particularly McCartney’s bass, considering how many different sources were accessed for this project.
While this soundtrack and even the Wings Anthology are welcome releases, an audio companion that matched the robustness of the book and film might have been more fitting. Gathering together several discs of rarities would have been thrilling. Also, many live concert discs could have been released, chronicling the different bands McCartney assembled during the Wings period. And of course, fans are still waiting for the obvious reissues of London Town and Back to the Egg from this period, as part of the McCartney Archive.
The amount of unreleased music from this time frame is staggering, even taking into account the superb and much-loved Archive releases that have already come out. Reissuing any of the Archive releases from the Wings and early solo music period that are out of print would be great for those who missed out on various releases and for the ever-growing legion of new fans who discover McCartney’s music every year.
It’s wonderful how not only McCartney, but also his wife Linda and the various members of Wings are being given their much-deserved recognition as key contributors to one of the best periods of Paul McCartney’s music through these recent projects. McCartney’s collective output at the time is an embarrassment of riches, particularly his music in the 1970s when he and Wings dominated FM radio and were a top concert draw.
Paul McCartney’s new solo album, to be released later this spring, is going to be called The Boys Of Dungeon Lane.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
B
