McCartney’s Seventies Singles Top Ten

After first having released two solo albums, McCartney becomes with his band Wings one of the most successful recording artists of the seventies. Internationally, he scores dozens of number 1 hits and he proves that there is life after the Beatles. My personal top 10 of McCartney's seventies singles:

10. Let ‘Em In
In the summer of 1976,  the second single taken from the album Wings At The Speed Of Sound was a big hit in the UK, US and the UK. The song starts with the first eight notes from the Westminster Chimes and  has a special ending, a fade-out of which the last two notes are at full volume again.

9. My Love
If it was up to McCartney, My Love wasn’t meant to be the lead single from the 1973 album Red Rose Speedway. But the record company thought the song might have some hit potential, and it turned out they were right. The wonderful, sensitive guitar solo was played by Henry McCullough, who changed McCartney’s original solo while recording the song. 

8. Hi Hi Hi
Hi, Hi Hi is a classic rocker and a typical McCartney song: It sounds simple, easy to listen to, but it is much more complicated you’d expect it to be. It consists of many layers with different guitar riffs and it took the band two days recording it. Banned by the BBC because of sex and drugs references in the lyrics. 

7. Another Day
McCartney’s first solo single, although most of the song was already written during the Beatles’ Let It Be sessions in 1969. Another Day is one of McCartney's songs about fictional people. The lyrics tell the story of a woman living on her own, locked in a boring daily routine of going to work, coming home to an empty flat and dreaming of ‘the man of her dreams’. Drummer Denny Seiwell described the song as ‘Eleanor Rigby in New York City’ (where the song was recorded).

6. Silly Love Songs
Because of the cheerful, funky tune you won’t expect it, but in Silly Love Songs McCartney viciously gets rid of the critics, claiming he’s only writing silly love songs since the breakup of the Beatles. Silly Love songs is funk, with the lightweight yet energetic drums by Joe English, Wings' swinging brass section and above all the fabulous, pumping bass line by McCartney, all in perfect balance. The three-part canon at the end is just absolutely brilliant.

5. Letting Go
I prefer this second single from the Venus and Mars album over the first one, Listen To What The Man Said, although it was much less successful in the charts. The bluesy love song for Linda McCartney with multiple melody lines sounds very ‘southern American’, but, remarkably, it’s one of the few tracks from the album that wasn’t recorded in New Orleans, like the rest of the album was.

4. Mull Of Kintyre
For the one, Mull of Kintyre is the epitome of Paul McCartney's genius, for the other, it's just a compelling example of how McCartney can be completely wide of the mark sometimes. I’m with the first group. The Scottish walls with bagpipes is an ode to the area where McCartney and his family spent a lot of time during the seventies. 

3. Live and Let Die
The James Bond theme is with all its hooks and twists a typical McCartney track: starting as a ballad, switching to reggae and then rocking to a powerful climax. Since it’s release in 1973 Live And Let Die is a highlight of every live show McCartney has played, with or without Wings. 

2. Band On The Run
The song about a gang escaping from prison, is a three-part medley of which the separate parts flow seamlessly into each other while supporting the lyrics. The key changes on the moment that the prisoners are escaping, are just brilliant: You hear the freedom when they’re out.  The song is McCartney’s call for an escape: from business meetings with his former Beatles mates or from being criminalized because of pot procession. 

1. Maybe I’m Amazed (live, 1976)
I’m still amazed by the fact that this song wasn’t released as a single in 1970, when it appeared on McCartney’s first solo album McCartney. The song got a second chance when the live version from Wings Over America was released in 1976. That was six years too late, so the single wasn’t a great success. Nevertheless, Maybe I’m Amazed has become one of McCartney’s most iconic solo songs.

Related Posts:

Quiz: McCartney In The Seventies
Ten Great McCartney Gems From The Seventies
Ten Great Rock Songs By Paul McCartney & Wings

André Homan

André Homan is a Dutch writer and journalist.

Nieuwere post Oudere post