What is it about Band On The Run by McCartney-that makes it his best 70s work ? Or album

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by johnny moondog 909, Oct 21, 2017.

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  1. Royce

    Royce Senior Member

    Besides all the reasons Johnny mentioned above, one of the many things "I" love about the album is it sounds for all the world like John, George and Ringo each guest on a song

    Let Me Roll It (John)
    No Words (George)
    Picasso's Last Words (Ringo)

    Finishing it off with a reprise of the title tune helped tie it all together. Perfect.

    Great Record. (I'm listening to it now) :)

    P.S. John and George's backing vocals on "Helen Wheels" are very Get Back/Let It Be era. (Get my right foot down) :winkgrin:
     
    Last edited: Oct 21, 2017
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  2. Somerset Scholar

    Somerset Scholar Ace of Spades

    Location:
    Bath
    It's an interesting variation including Helen Wheels, but it does not sit well and spoils the flow of side 2. I find Mamunia really comes alive on a 1st press UK LP. Better than the DCC. I agree with you about 1985 but "No Words" is a little bit of Beatlesy classic. PLW is essential in bringing the loose concept together.
     
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  3. DK Pete

    DK Pete Forum Resident

    Location:
    Levittown. NY
    Concept? You lost me.
     
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  4. ccbarr

    ccbarr Forum Resident

    Location:
    Iowa, USA
    I can't say if it is his best album, Ram may be, but Band On The Run is my favorite album by Paul, and my favorite album of all time. I have so many thoughts and feelings about the album, it is hard to put them all in words. It is an album full of melodies, and though it isn't a concept album it has a song cycle and vibe of a band with their backs against the wall, making a majestic statement. I know that sounds sappy, but that is the best way I can sum it up.

    EDIT: I hear a concept or cycle of escape coming from the album, with tracks like Band On The Run, Jet, Helen Wheels, Bluebird and others.
     
    Last edited: Oct 21, 2017
  5. ...but he's tawdry at Least according to his biography.

    For me BOTR stands out because of its ambition and the fact that Paul, Denny and Linda achieved it under the most adverse circumstances.
     
  6. the pope ondine

    the pope ondine Forum Resident

    Location:
    Virginia
    the songs. paul always had one or two good song on an album but sometimes the quality fell off into his granny songs/half polished ditties ....etc..... here he stayed with it and came thru
     
  7. egebamyasi

    egebamyasi Forum Resident

    Location:
    Worcester, MA
    Band On The Run and Jet.
     
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  8. Sixpence

    Sixpence Zeppelin Fan

    Location:
    Connecticut
    Strictly looking at the songs alone, Band on the Run (IMO) is McCartney best post Beatles work. Add on-top of that, two band members quitting, traveling to Jamaica to a studio that was unfinished and getting mugged with studio tapes in you hands; I am very impressed he could produce such excellent work under those conditions.
     
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  9. Nipper

    Nipper His Master's Voice

    Location:
    Wisconsin
    Five star album, great songs plus the totality of the circumstances listed above create a masterpiece.

    FWIW, I love "Mamunia". :wave:
     
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  10. Channel Z

    Channel Z Forum Resident

    Location:
    Illinois
    It's the only McCartney Super Deluxe Edition I have ever bought and glad I got it. (I purchased it heavily discounted at a Borders Book Store going out of Business Sale).
     
  11. maccafan

    maccafan Senior Member

    I'm not in the camp that thinks BOTR is his best, but I do think it's one of them.
     
  12. duggan

    duggan Senior Member

    Location:
    sydney
    I don't care about how difficult it may or may not have been to make the album, couldn't care less about whether it was recorded in Lagos or London and am frankly disinterested in who played bass, guitar or tambourine.

    What I do care about is the fantastic final product. A truly superb album, best post Beatles album by a country mile.

    It is one of those classic albums where even the lesser tracks can just jump out from the speakers and impress 40 years later.
     
  13. formu_la

    formu_la I'm not a robot

    Location:
    Toronto, Canada
    Pure and utter awesomeness.
     
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  14. Dude111

    Dude111 An Awesome Dude

    Location:
    US
    Indeed so!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
     
  15. johnny moondog 909

    johnny moondog 909 Beatles-Lennon & Classic rock fan Thread Starter

    I agree with you by the way. I'm familiar with people who prefer Ram or whichever other album.. But generally even fans that like Ram, Chaos, Venus or whatever album better, still place BOTR in the top 2-3 or 4 albums. Of his 25 post Beatle rock albums.

    I was interested in the poster who said he preferred RR Speedway, because he liked the sound of that band lineup.

    I prefer that line up also. Another poster said unlike many McCartney albums, where he records 20 songs, but only uses a few of the best ones, choosing weaker tracks because of myopic thinking or poor judgement.

    I think if you keep the 5-6 best Red Rose tracks, & replace the others with Live & Let Die, I Lie Around, Hi Hi Hi, & 72-73 studio versions of 1882 & or The Mess & or Cmoon, it might've been better than BOTR. When you can open a new album with Live & Let Die, & Close it with My Love. That's hard to beat...

    But McCartney as that poster said, recorded 25-30 songs in 72 early 73, but didn't put most of the good ones on the RRS album. Using Live & Let Die, Hi Hi Hi, I Lie Around instead of Lazy Dynamite, Indian on the moon & one other Drech song would've made it Rock, & made every song at least a good song.

    But it still wouldn't have had the homogenous feel of BOTR, where all the songs sound like they belong together.

    The reprises & codas on side 2 of BOTR, especially that breakdown Ho Hey Ho bit, I think is the albums only failure. The excecution of the codas & reprises could've used George Martin or someone with similar skills, to make that a bit smoother & natural sounding.

    I think Tony Visconti did that ? Didint he ? The Bowie guy ?

    But after reading this thread I'll say this. Nearly every McCartney studio album has 10-12 good to great songs. If you look & include all the b sides, bonus tracks, non LP singles. But BOTR is a rare early McCartney album, where he used his best new songs on the album.

    Any McCartney album, the material is there, but he's a big shot & just does what he wants.. uses weak tracks for personal reasons, poor judgement whatever it is. Look at Driving Rain, I hate that album. But dump 4-5 of the weak tracks & add in Vanilla Sky, Whole Life & bam all of a sudden you've lifted the album by 50%... You don't need 15-16 long 4-5 minute songs that are mostly just average, & don't go well together. Dump & trim down to 9-10 songs then add Whole Life & Vanilla Sky all of a sudden it's a lot better...

    Most Mccartney albums have that issue. Or at least many of them. BOTR he only had 10 songs, just focused on those & used them all... Maybe that's why it's better, he spent 4-5 months just focusing on 10 tunes. Recorded them all with Henry & Denny & Denny, then did them all again from scratch.
     
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  16. idleracer

    idleracer Forum Resident

    Location:
    California
    :kilroy: Since no one has mentioned it yet, does anybody think this might have fit somewhere on the album?

     
  17. keyse1

    keyse1 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Australia
    What about this
    Great band
    Great songs
    Great singer
    And a producer who knew it
     
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  18. wildstar

    wildstar Senior Member

    Location:
    ontario, canada
    On the Red Rose Speedway album for which it was recorded and intended to appear on before he trimmed it from a double album to a single album? Sure.

    In fact its better than a few songs he chose to keep on the RRS single album.
     
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  19. wildstar

    wildstar Senior Member

    Location:
    ontario, canada
    The first song is reprised in the last song during the fade out, and the second song is reprised in the second last song where a bit of the Jet chorus is sung.

    Plus many of the songs deal lyrically with themes of flight/freedom/escape....

    Paul seems to like having a loose concept to frame his albums such as:

    Venus & Mars with a version of the title song leading off each album side
    Ram with a version of Ram On appearing on each side of the album
    Tug Of War/Pipes Of Peace which I think were originally meant to be songs that bookended a shared album, but even if that wasn't originally the intention, they did in the end tie two subsequent albums together thematically into a de facto double album.

    Plus going back to the Beatles the Sgt Pepper album with the Reprise near the end....and the repeated/reprised musical motifs in the Abbey Road medley.

    Back To The Egg seemed to follow a loose concept as well if I recall.
     
  20. tommy-thewho

    tommy-thewho Senior Member

    Location:
    detroit, mi
    Easily my fav. McCartney solo album.
     
  21. To paraphrase an old political slogan, it's the songs, stupid.
     
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  22. Lemon Curry

    Lemon Curry (A) Face In The Crowd

    Location:
    Mahwah, NJ
    The album works because:

    1. Band on the Run was an amazingly good song that sounded like the Beatles.

    2. In the mid 70's there was a non-stop drumbeat for a Beatles reunion, and the record played into that emotion

    3. The songs were pretty good across the board, making it the most listenable Macca solo record for the casual fan.

    McCartney used the formula again on the next one, Venus & Mars. It just wasnt as strong overall as BOTR, but it was close. I think of these two as Vol 1 and Vol 2 of a single concept.

    To me, that was the end of the Beatle-esque Paul albums. Speed of Sound had a completely different contemporary feel to it.
     
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  23. abzach

    abzach Forum Resident

    Location:
    Sweden
    Because of it's progressive rock tendencies.
     
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  24. wildstar

    wildstar Senior Member

    Location:
    ontario, canada
    Well those were non albums singles. They weren't "left off the album" they were recognised as superior to and promoted ABOVE mere album placement to that of a SINGLE (not to mention that L&LD was specifically commissioned for an outside project/album and thus wouldn't have existed otherwise and as it did exist it "belonged"on the movie soundtrack album. Paul still followed the sixties ethos of keeping singles and albums separate, probably because when he did pull a single off an existing album for the first time it flopped - Back Seat Of My Car made a dismal UK #39 when pulled from Ram several months after the album's release. My guess is he saw how huge My Sweet Lord was for George which was pulled from ATMP as a UK single after the album's release and after its massive success as a single in the US (not to mention Something" from Abbey Road making #4 - below the normal chart peak for a Beatles single, but still very respectable for an album extracted single at the time) and decided to take the chance. IIRC he never again pulled a single from an album until BOTR. My Love was released before the RRS album and also contained an exclusive B-Side to help boost sales.

    So if anything may have been included to make RRS stronger it would have been things like Country Dreamer which remained in the vault until its use as a BOTR era B-Side, or other later released tracks like "Mama's Little Girl" or never (as yet) released tracks like Tragedy, not to mention one of the best songs from the RRS sessions Denny's 'I Would Only Smile".

    RRS wasn't a compilation/hits album so it wouldn't have included a bunch of previously released singles, and it also wouldn't have included so many later extracted singles from the album.

    Airplay meant literally nothing when it came to UK single chart placement - it was a strictly sales based chart, so pulling singles from albums that your fanbase already has in their collections was not the most savvy business move as you made less money AND you also in public perception seemed less popular than you actually were - people hear "flop single" and they don't automatically think "oh well that's probably just because so many people already bought the album".
     
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  25. daveidmarx

    daveidmarx Forem Residunt

    Location:
    Astoria, NY USA
    Minor fact check - Paul + Linda were robbed at knifepoint - not gunpoint
     
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