Wings "Wild Life" POLL DAMMIT! You know, Paul and Linda McCartney, and not calling it "Wild Poll" and certainly not "Poll Life" cause that's more Prince, innit?

Poll McCartney, innit?

GRMPH!

(yeah..)

"Dear Friend". But horrible album.

Mumbo, but I still think it would have been better w/real lyrics. Kinda Krautrocky in a way.

"Mumbo" is awesome - the whole rest of the record is always a letdown, though I do like their Lindarific "Love Is Strange."

This record wouldn't be so bad if they'd bothered to actually rehearse the songs a few times instead of seemingly just releasing the first runthroughs.

Gotta go with Some People Never Know- lovely melody with a pretty, rustic feel to it. I don't think it would work as well had Paul given it a big production.

See, here's the thing: Everyone says it's "Dreadful, except for ...." and then everyone has a different track that's the exception.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

so vote vote vote,because...

anImeanthatmostSincerely...

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Wild LIfe is a great album. I'm a bit baffled that people don't seem to like it much. Y'all need to try smoking up before you listen next time. It's very laid back and has some great little musical bits here and there. Lots of space in these songs. Linda's bits are cool too - eg. "I Am Your Singer" is wonderful (didn't vote though because I missed this poll).

That wasn't so bad, was it?

So what's next???

I dunno, I create a poll cause GHong's too shabby to do it, and I get less votes in than the No1 track on "Ram" !

Poll this then.
http://www.jpgr.co.uk/emc3175_a.jpg

Would be "Monkberry Moon Delight" I think.

tomorrow and dear friend are both really good, surprised they didn't win. the rest of the album is the worst shit.

WELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL ma ma mumbo breaky
dung dobbledy breaky

kind of wish this was just like, four songs and then the other side was twenty minutes of "mumbo"

How the fuck did the worst two songs on the album top this poll?

Would have probably voted 'Tomorrow', tbh.

Strong possibility: a lot of people give up on this album and turn it off after two songs.

Yeah, that is a possibility. And a bit of a shame, because side two of this album is far, far stronger IMO.

"Tomorrow"

I just clicked: Twinned with "Yesterday"!

Eight votes!

quite.

Maybe re-run it when it gets the 'new' version...

There's a 2010 remaster of it available as a download already. I would guess that's the only 'new' version there will be?

You can tell no one actually listened to this or else "Wild Life" would've won. Song's a killer.

Remaster of this is on Spotify.

Oh, never mind, 1993 version...

I got a nice "Ram" box deluxe recently.

I'd like a Wild Life one

Eight votes!

― broom air, Monday, June 11, 2012 4:42 AM (9 months ago)

Some people never POLL.

WELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL ma ma mumbo breaky
dung dobbledy breaky

― Doctor Casino, Saturday, June 9, 2012 4:43 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

me otm

THE AMINALS IN THE ZOO!

"Whatever Happened, 2"

TAKE IT, TONY!

AH YEAH YEAH love is strange

This entire album feels like a bootleg of off-the-cuff stoned studio jamming and demos that was accidentally released as a proper album. In a way, it kinda holds a similar place in McCartney's discography to McCartney and McCartney II except with a band instead of being all on his lonesome.

In a way it'd have been kind of cool if he'd just steadily alternated "proper" albums like Ram with "McCartney Series" records showing the WIngs at home goofing around being a garage band, playing with the kids, playing with the new synthesizer when it first shows up... get that impulse sorted in one place. Can't imagine the record company supporting that for long but maybe it could have been a parallel/independent thing.

I think if a new artist had delivered albums like McCartney, Ram, Wild Life and Red Rose Speedway as their first four albums to a major label, they would have been dropped. That's if the record company hadn't ordered him to re-do them or work on them further. As much as I like a lot of songs on those albums, it's very fair to say that McCartney had it easier than most coming off the back of The Beatles. He was free to piss around as much as he pleased in a way that a lot of artists weren't able to.

I dig this, but maybe wouldn't cosign 100%... I mean, there were a lot of not very good, or just kind of weird, records in the 70s, by all kinds of artists who didn't necessarily get dropped after one dud.

There definitely would have had to be some retooling, for sure! If McCartney had been some unknown singer-songwriter who got a big break, then the McCartney material would have definitely been pushed towards being wayyyy more commercial, with fewer instrumentals, maybe some standards or covers of then-popular tracks, but a decent promotional push behind "Every Night" or "Maybe I'm Amazed" as singles. If they did okay, then a version of Ram with "Another Day" on the record is a plausibly successful album. Of course, an unknown singer-songwriter probably wouldn't have been inclined to fuck around this much, or been able to get the kind of really attentive production that Ram enjoys. Who knows. Wild Life is pretty much a non-sell, with or without "Hi Hi Hi" jammed in the middle.

I fucking love this album. It’s so off-kilter, plus the sonics on it are ace, just a super stoned intense jammy vibe to it that I get right into. Erik the Norwegian mastered the HELL out of this thing.

i saw something today about some big reissue coming out....would not be anywhere near the top of my list of albums needing that attention, but i should throw it on this weekend. i've never spent enough time with it to really remember all the tracks that are on it. i know i like Mumbo a ton. it's basically the equivalent of the Get Back footage, right? just a band trying out a couple riffs with Macca improvising temp lyrics, and playing it for a while? and yet oddly compelling. i really appreciate how raw the sound is, it's different in his catalog. can't remember if the songs really measure up.

As much as I dislike the album (and I think almost all of it's the pits), I know one fan who made a credible argument that there's a decent concept here - that is, you're hearing a band slowly come together, or rather learning to be band, which is why so much of it is half-assed. It's also why it gets better towards the end, with the closer "Dear Friend" being the only fully-realized recording and "Tomorrow" kind of there if it wasn't so cloying and grating.

Xp the songs absolutely don’t measure up, and that’s the whole POINT. It’s like some cassette-and-bandcamp-only indie release.

yeah, but some indie bands show up with better songs to play... idk. throwing it on now while i start the day, will see if any new thoughts burble up!

this album is underrated af

such a vibe

if you all loved weed as much as paul you’d get it

this morning's listen: i LOVE the songs that have this kinda dubby, echo-y thing creating more of a rhythmic flutter and wooze - "Bip Bop" and the "Love is Strange" cover are almost psychedelically enveloping. of the more 'produced' things, "Tomorrow" is the deep cut that sneaks up on me - the backing track still has that nice basic "band warming up with a light exercise" quality, but those washes of Paul/Linda vox are so lovely. "Some People Never Know" also has some real thrills and energy, but... 6:35!?!?! my fantasy version of this (which probably would lose much of what other people love about it!) would chop five minutes out of "Wild Life," a couple out of "Dear Friend," and swap in three short stoned renditions of 50s b-sides or mid-60s garage-rock obscurities. that would be up there with the debut for me as a loose shaggy McCartney exercise. also: crazy not to include some version of "A Love For You"!

until i checked the chronology i was halfway to convincing myself this was an underappreciated answer record to Sometime in New York City, which I finally checked out last night for the first time. back to basics, just a scrappy rock band playing straightforward tunes loudly. but if anything it's the other way around! perhaps john was like "i'll show YOU 'political nonsense in the air!'"

Some People Never Know is my favorite. Overall I agree it’s underrated.

"Tomorrow" is my favourite, if it were on Carl and the Passions it would not only be the best song but might have more critical acclaim.

As much as I dislike the album (and I think almost all of it's the pits), I know one fan who made a credible argument that there's a decent concept here - that is, you're hearing a band slowly come together, or rather _learning_ to be band, which is why so much of it is half-assed. It's also why it gets better towards the end, with the closer "Dear Friend" being the only fully-realized recording and "Tomorrow" kind of there if it wasn't so cloying and grating.

"Some People Never Know" and "Dear Friend" are better realized -- musically and conceptually -- than just about every RRS album track.

I gave RRS another listen on my morning walk and -- well, I can't. The wtf song titles just sit there, looking for something other than a hook (this is when I realized what shitty musicians the early Wings guys were, apart from maybe Denny Laine).

LMAO, otm on all accounts. Besides "Some People Never Know" and "Dear Friend," I might throw in "Tomorrow" - they're not exactly great songs, but all three feel better realized than anything on the released version of RRS and I'd much rather listen to them.

All these Paul McCartney threads...Bought Speed of Sound when it came out (one of my first albums when I started collecting), and an aunt gave me Over America a Christmas or two later; it had a tiny piece of cloth or something lodged in one of the records, so I eventually threw it away. Never a big fan.

All these threads, though, reminded me of how much I've come to love "Junior's Farm" the past few years. Especially this live clip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pEil2e_bUvg

I have a tendency to read way too much into certain things (and nothing at all in other things people analyze to death), and I probably do that here. The single was released Oct. 25, '74 (my 13th birthday), just after Nixon resigned. I hear the line "Everybody's talking 'bout the President/We all chipped in for a bag of cement," and it feels like a page is being turned. McCartney's having fun, there's a kind of lightness, almost melancholy to the melody of "Junior's Farm," and to me it's like, "Everything will be okay." (It never is, of course--bad stuff never stops.) It's just a silly song I find improbably moving. I'd probably take it over "Maybe I'm Amazed" as my favourite post-Beatles moment of his (and would be fine with not much else).

that's lovely

Thanks. I was going to add something about him having definitively moved on from the Beatles, a moment just before the Red and Blue albums brought them back as a story, but I checked and they both came out in '73--didn't realize it was so early.

Great that he got David Bowie to handle keyboards in that clip.

the b-side "Sally G" is Bowie-esque country

It's just a silly song I find improbably moving.

One of the nice things about Paul is that, regardless of how contrived his material may be, he never acts or talks like he's better than it. Unlike John, you don't feel that he would look down on you for admiring the most offhand throwaway -- but I agree with you that this song is one of his best.