I just started getting into this band. Why would I do that? It’s because I remember hearing my dad listen to those songs when I was a little kid, and liking them, so now that I have a well-developed and critical musical taste, I wanted to download some Wings and listen to it.
And what I’ve found is that, compared to the later Beatles, Wings might be sappy and trite, but musically, it blows away anything on the radio now. It’s pop music, but it’s interesting, clever pop music. I like the nonsensical and sometimes admittedly crappy lyrics, just because they sound funny and don’t take themselves too seriously. And I really like Paul’s voice, so naturally I like Wings.
Does anyone else here enjoy this, or is it just considered crap? I know a lot of people tend to consider it crap.
Band on the Run is a great album, one of my all time favorites.
If you didn’t know any better, you’d swear you were listening to the Beatles.
The other 70’s albums were hit and miss, but the hit singles were pretty good, like “Listen to What the Man Said”, “Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey”, “Getting Closer”, etc.
I have everything Paul McCartney has ever released, and there isn’t anything that I’m aware of that’s unreleased that I also don’t have. So you could say I like the guy.
When he started over with Wings, he really had to prove something. After getting off to a rough start, and being made fun of by lots of people, including John Lennon, he got his act together and made some really good records. And Wings records were, as with any artist’s catalogue, hit-and-miss, but in this case, mostly hit. I think you will enjoy most of their material.
I’m a fan. Not a major, have-every-album fan, but a fan, nonetheless. I can remember being something like four years old and just dancing away (in that little “stomp your feet around in a circle” way that four-year-olds dance) to “Silly Love Songs”. I like “Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey” (I ALWAYS try to sing the “HAAAAAAAAANDS ACROSS THE WATER…(water)…HAAAAAAANDS ACROSS THE SKYYYYY…” part).
Then again, I’m a fan of 80s McCartney, too. I still have Pipes of Peace around somewhere…
“Hope of Deliverance” is one of the great songs, a gem in anyone’s career.
“We live in hope of deliverance from the darkness that surrounds us.” A truly mature and wise line that resonates today of all days with the news coming out of London.
But even so, I’m not a Wings fan. A few good songs from a band that would be mostly forgotten today if Paul weren’t its lead.
I’m gonna hafta go ahead and disagree with you on that. Lots of great songs that would’ve got the band up and running whoever was in it, though it might be fair to say they wouldn’t have been as huge if not for Macca.
Put me down as one who likes Wings… but don’t tell anybody I said that. I’m trying to keep it a secret.
Turned it into a trite piece of crap song that proved Lennon right?
Anyone who wrote as many great songs as McCartney did during his time in the Beatles obviously has a gift and is gonna do some great stuff just based on the law of averages, but if his solo work proves anything, it’s how desperately he needed Lennon as a reality check (to be fair, Lennon needed McCartney almost as much). It’s the classic example of why musicians that pursue a solo career almost always invariably suck when compared with their work in a band: when you’re working within a (mostly) democratic set-up, there are all kinds of checks and balances to prevent your moonier stuff from taking over, but when you’re the one calling the shots and everybody else is just a backing musician (and if you think this wasn’t the case with Wings, you’re delusional) there’s nothing to keep your ego from blinding you to the actual quality of your work. That’s my take on McCartney, especially after seeing his dictator/control-freak side come to the fore in the Beatles Anthology series. Sometimes horrible, occasionally quite good, mostly mediocre. I honestly believe that if it wasn’t for his stint in the Beatles, his solo output would be considered the work of a relatively minor artist by damn near everyone (though his first album, McCartney, recorded while still in the Fab Four, and Band on the Run, to a lesser extent, had enough decent material to ensure him a recording contract for at least another six years or so).
I had four or five Wings albums. I loved the hits.
But the typical Wings album had two great songs, and about eight bad ones. Anytime Linda sang was embarassing. Wasn’t there one called Cook of the House she sang? yeeesh.
