My Evolution Revolution of the Solo Fabs (Or Imagine Living in the Material World, say London Town, with Beaucoups of Blues) Part 6: Wild Life Live

After leaving the Beatles, it’s amazing that Paul McCartney was even remotely interested in forming a new band.  That he did, indeed, form a new band—and not just a backing band (although there’s some of that, too)—but a band, whose members would contribute (a few) songs and sing lead (occasionally), and that that band would become HUGE, staggers the mind.  It was a gamble on McCartney’s part, but Wings proved to be a band in its own right.  A good, and often great band.  And, above all, Wings wasn’t, nor tried to be, the Beatles Part II.

One could argue that Ram is a Wings album.  But officially, and in my own estimation, Ram is a Paul and Linda album.  Which means that Wild Life is, what many would considerer, the inauspicious debut of Wings.

But I like the album.  

Like his famous enthusiastic four-count opening for I Saw Her Standing There, which ushered in The Beatles, McCartney ushered in Wings with an equally enthusiastic “Take it Tony!”, a cue for engineer Tony Clarke to make sure the tapes were a-rollin’.  Mumbo, the song Tony was a-takin’, is a rocking tune with nonsense lyrics delivered by McCartney with an intensity that powers the tune along.  Yea, it may be a throwaway jam fest, but it’s a really fun throwaway jam fest, and does show off some of the musicianship found within the new band.

There’s no rescuing Bip Bop.  It sounds like a song that one would noodle around with while sitting on the back porch, perhaps between sips of an alcoholic beverage.  Lyrically insipid (for what lyrics there are), it’s a real head-scratcher that McCartney would not only include the song on an album meant to introduce his new band, but to include it as the second track, following the lyric-less Mumbo, means that there are two lyric-impaired songs ushering in the new band.

Next up is Love is Strange, which for me, was the first time I’d ever heard the song.  (It would be a year os so before I discovered Micky and Sylvia).  The reggae-infused tune works great for Paul and especially Linda, who sings like she’s really enjoying herself.  After hearing the classic Micky and Silvia version, the Wings version impressed me even more with it’s inspired use of reggae, making the song, in that version of course, a Wings song.  The classic still belonging to Micky and Sylvia.

Sometime it’s easy to forget how much the Fabs’ liked the blues.  All four of ‘em include blues tunes on their solo outings, and Wild Life is one of McCartney’s best.  I’m not in the school that thinks the song is another well-veiled snipe at the Lennons’ and their radical politics.  (“We’re breathing a lot, a lot of political nonsense in the air”).  It’s hard to think that McCartney would swipe at Lennon on side one, and on the other, offer a delicate and emotional peace treaty.  To me, Wild Life is about the obvious: protecting animals and saving the planet.  Paul and Linda were on the green wagon long before it became fashionable, and I think Wild Life attests to that.  And McCartney’s vocal attack (does he sometimes say “am-inals”?) seems to hammer home the sentiment.

Side two offers decent songs written to, for and about Paul and Linda’s relationship.  I particularly like I Am Your Singer, which once again features Linda, and pretty much sums up their partnership.

There’s nothing to say, really, about the two, brief instrumental “links”, Bip Bop and Mumbo, except that they weren’t named on the original album and I thought they were bonus cuts when picking up the CD.

And Dear Friend, as mentioned, is a call for a truce with Lennon.  One can only imagine what kind of song McCartney would have written, after having heard How Do You Sleep?, if Paul was still in a fighting mood.  But fortunately for us, and especially for them, Paul instead decided to lay down his arms and to give peace a chance.

The Concert For Bangla Desh remains one of the best live concert recordings ever.  It was the first time George Harrison appeared on stage as a solo artist and it was also the first-ever benefit rock concert, which, like the single Bangla Desh, was to bring awareness and much needed aid and relief to the refugees of the war-torn country.  George Harrison brought in a bunch of his friends, creating a supergroup that delivered.  And some.

The concert itself was put together quickly, which meant that there wasn’t much time for preparations for recording the event.  This meant, that try as he might, co-producer Phil Spector wasn’t able to completely construct his wall of sound.  This means that the songs Harrison performs from his All Things Must Pass album, Wah-Wah in particular, explode with an energy and vibrancy that were never able to break through on the studio recordings.  The Bangla Desh version of Awaiting on You All, even with the forgotten lyrics, could have been released as a single; it just rocks.

And speaking of rocking, the live version of Bangla Desh achieves the intensity of the original single.  But live, Harrison’s vocal, while still filled with urgency, is confident and powerful.  It’s a great note on which to end the concert.

The spotlight on Ringo for It Don’t Come Easy is also great fun.  What’s a missed lyric here and there, right?

As I am more-or-less charting the Fabs’ solo efforts, I won’t go into how stellar Dylan’s set is, that Clapton’s solo on While My Guitar Gently Weeps is (understandably, given his condition) pretty uninspired.  I also won’t note that Leon Russell seemed to be trying to upstage everybody.