#Paul mccartney band on the run archive#

#Paul mccartney band on the run archive#

It was re-released in March 1999 to celebrate the 25th anniversary, and again in 2010, as the first release in the Paul McCartney Archive Collection, featuring the remastered album, with rare bonus audio and video content, all in new packaging. The album was also his most commercially successful, selling well and spawning two hit singles, the multi-part pop suite of the title track and the roaring rocker 'Jet. Its success has endured and in 2000 the album was included in Q magazine's list of Greatest British Albums Ever, as well as Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. Band on the Run is generally considered to be Paul McCartneys strongest solo effort. The album topped the US chart three separate times in the UK, it was the biggest selling studio album of 1974 and spent a miraculous 124 weeks on the chart. Despite the setbacks, Paul, Linda and Denny Laine persevered and Band on the Run – complete with its famous celebrity-packed cover art – proved a triumph. McCartney’s former Beatles’ bandmate, George Harrison, partly inspired the creation of this song. And he did so while beefing at the executives of Apple Records, the same label that put out “Band on the Run”.Paul’s fifth album since the break up of The Beatles, Band on the Run was made under difficult circumstances: band members Denny Seiwell and Henry McCullough left before recordings began in Lagos, Nigeria – which itself proved a challenging environment to work in. This track topped the Billboard Hot 100, Canada’s RPM 100 Top Singles and reached an impressive number 3 on the UK Singles Chart. It has also been certified gold by the RIAA, which in the early 1970s meant it sold at least 1,000,000 copies. The radio version of this song, as issued in the United States, was notably shorter than the original.Īn official music video to this classic didn’t really come out until 2014. And it was put together by a music-centered graphic designer named Ben Ib. More Interesting Facts about “Band on the Run” The part of this song that was recorded in London was with Tony Visconti conducting an orchestra consisting of 60 musicians. However, he was not credited with the arrangement until the 25 th anniversary edition of “Band on the Run”. 3. The lyrics of this song are a cohesive narrative throughout. However the instrumental is a medley consisting of a ballad, funk and then country-music style section. Song’s TitleĪccording to Danny Seiwell, the title of the song (and the album) may have come from an incident when the band had to literally flee from the police after Macca got into an altercation with a hotel owner.

decided to record in was a subpar facility. And one of the engineers of the track is Geoff Emerick, who also worked regularly alongside the Beatles. In fact Emerick helped save the project so to speak, after it was discovered that the Nigerian branch of EMI Studios which Macca and co. McCartney wrote this song with his first wife and bandmate at the time, Linda McCartney (1941-1998). There were further challenges to this song and the album in general. For instance, right before the band had set off to Africa to begin recording it, two members of Wings, Henry McCullough and Danny Seiwell, had quit the group. Macca even reportedly alludes to this incident in the song’s lyrics.Īs the story goes, said demos were actually jacked from the band at knife-point. So they had to re-do “Band on the Run”, as well as the other tunes from memory. This track was recorded partly in Nigeria and partly in London. And as an interesting side note, while the band was in Lagos the original demo to this song, as well as others on the album, was stolen. At first the group did not do too well (being compared to the Beatles after all), but this track and album overall is considered to be amongst their greatest successes. It is the title song and third single from the third album by Paul McCartney and Wings, a band Macca and his wife Linda put together shortly after the Beatles disbanded.

Release Date of “Band on the Run”ĭecemwas the date this song was released. The final verse which details how everyone was searching for them to no avail affirms how the writer believes The Beatles will never regroup despite how much their fans would love a reunion.