George Harrison Talks about the Indian Sound (1966)

 

George Harrison Talks about the Indian Sound (1966)

By Sean O'Mahony

Beat Instrumental

March 1966

    Just before George Harrison took off for Barbados with Pattie for their delayed honeymoon, he talked to me about the Beatles. Thinking of future trends in the pop music sphere, his use of a sitar on the backing track of "Norwegian Wood" and his newfound interest in Indian music have received a lot of comment recently.

     The Beatles, of course, are not the only ones to mention the music of the subcontinent in pop terms; many devotees like Decca's Tony Hall and Donovan are reputedly knocked out by the playing of gentlemen like Ravi Shankar. 

    When I talked to George, he was sitting on the wooden block floor of his music room in his home in Esher, nursing his sitar. All the room contains is a wall hung with guitars and a small jukebox. There aren't many Beatles titles on the list of records either. As George explained, he had to sit cross-legged on the floor because it was impossible to play the sitar any other way. Its long neck and heavy bowl make it almost impossible to play standing up, unless you rest the bowl on a table or something to support it. The equivalent of frets on this instrument are brass ring-like pieces which are fixed onto the neck, but compared with an ordinary guitar as we know it, they seem to be much scarcer, with the result that you have to play the instrument rather like a cross between a violin and a guitar to find the intermediate notes between the frets. 

    I couldn't resist asking George whether he thought this type of music would catch on. "I wouldn't be at all surprised if one day, when we are a lot older, our kids walk into the room and put some records on, which will be based on this type of music," he replied. "Maybe we will turn around and say, 'What the hell is that noise?'"

     "Isn't the Indian music scale different from ours? "I asked him. "Yes, it is different," George agreed. "In actual fact, it is far more complicated than the one we use. We think that Indian music has a lot of weird sounds in it. It doesn't sound right to our ears because we aren't used to it. In fact, to my mind, it's much more advanced than our scale. 

    "It does sound a bit distorted, but you have got to remember that a lot of the most interesting noises on top discs today are based on distortion. Jeff Beck, for example, gets some fabulous sounds by moving his guitar in front of his amp to create feedback." George returned to his sitar, but somehow I don't think we will see the Beatles sitting cross-legged on stage playing Indian instruments. 

Multi-Media McGear (1974)

 Multi-Media McGear (O.K. Mike?)

No writer listed

Ray Hammond (editor)

Beat Instrumental

October 1974

    The first time I saw Mike McGear was around 1963 in the basement of a Liverpool furniture store that had permitted a number of Liverpool poets and musicians to take it over for poetry and jazz night. There just on the crest of fame were Adrian Henri, Roger McGough, John Gorman, Brian Patton, and a tall blonde lad. "That's Paul McCartney's brother," said someone, pointing.

    "Did you see me getting up on stage?"  asked Mike, looking back over an 11-year-old gulf. "That was my very first time on stage. Did you laugh? There I was, standing with my piece of paper in my hand, shaking, but I found that the people liked the comedy thing I was doing. It was then I realized, 'oh, so they're just people, there's nothing to be frightened of."

     That was the beginning of Mike's collaboration with Gorman and Co. in the music/poetry/comedy band Scaffold, which, riding on the crest of the Beatles' fame, brought Liverpool humor to every corner of Britain and to some unsuspecting audiences abroad. It's difficult to think what an American audience could possibly have made of their first enormous hit, penned by Mike,  "Thank U Very Much". It even baffled a lot of Britons, including our kid, brother Paul, who didn't believe it set a chance on the charts.

     "Paul and I have always been brutally honest with each other. He said, 'Don't put that out as a single, the public won't get it. They won't understand.' And I said, 'Well, you've got your opinion, and I've got mine. It's going ahead.' He replied, 'Well, I think you're stupid. It's going to be to your detriment', as I was determined to carry on with it. 

    "He helped in the production, which is why that record got a bit more in the production than there is normally on our records. He's got a very good head for music. When the record was a hit, all he said was, 'All right, mate, I was wrong.'"

     Of course, there was always a bit of friendly rivalry between brothers, but it must have been terrible having one as famous as Paul. After the initial glow of basking in the shadow of McCartney's fame had died down, it must have been very difficult for McGear to shake off all the tags and be accepted on his own merit, instead of being accused of letting Paul help him along. "I suppose in the first days of Paul's success, I did feel a bit under his shadow," Mike confessed. "It's quite a cross to bear having a famous brother. You get a bit bored with the tags, but then the same sort of thing often happens in families. Lots of people feel under the shadow of an older brother or sister.

     "You have to say, 'I'm not just Paul's brother, I'm me.'" Was it Paul who inspired Mike to write in the early days? "No, I never wrote at all when I was a kid; our kid had all that wrapped up, going round everywhere with his guitar and things."

      Was Mike ever actually jealous of his brother? "No, why should I have been? When the Beatles started getting really successful, Brian Epstein said to me, 'Do you want to be a pop star?' And I said, 'Brian, my dear, you must be joking.'"

     When you talk to Mike, it's as if you're on stage with him and he's including you in his comedy act. He talks, not so much in a string of words, but in a series of scenes. In fact, it's very hard to put down on paper exactly what the man says, just because he is so expressive. Everything is accompanied by gestures, movements, changes of accent, and intonation. 

    Yet initially, the words"show business" were anathema to him. Instead, he wanted to go to art college, and ended up at the point where he joined Scaffold --as an apprentice hairdresser! "I certainly didn't intend to be a pop singer, in a way, but I got interested in the theater side of it, sketches and things, and it was very satisfying. And I went off on that tangent while Paul did his music."

     The two brothers seem extremely different in personality. Perhaps that's why McGear's determination to follow his own ideas, and not join with Paul or follow in his footsteps, has brought him to the point where he is completely accepted in his own right. Changing his name from the family one to McGear was a first step in this direction. 

    Yet he and Paul are still very close with the friendly rivalry and intuitive sensitivity about each other that is only found within families. He has worked closely with Paul on his new solo album (the title hasn't been decided upon at the time of our interview), and he found that working together was entirely easygoing. "I think it was because we are brothers, and being brothers, we are a darn sight more honest with each other than people are in normal working relationships, but it was very rewarding as well."

    As well as Mike asking Paul's opinion on his music, it turns out that the rules are frequently reversed, with Paul asking Mike's opinion, which, as they are so honest with each other, sometimes leads to awkward situations.

    "When I know my opinion is not going to be a good one, I just keep quiet, and he knows, I mean, it can hit a bit hard when someone's putting their whole thing into something and really believes in it, and the other person doesn't like it. 

    "Like that 'Helen Wheels' single, I went down to the studio, and there they were, Paul and Wings all dancing around. Paul was saying, 'Isn't it great?' And bopping up and down. And I just had to sit down and say nothing, because it did absolutely nothing to me. It was a nice little pop tune, but not where the man's head is at all. He's a very clever boy, so to waste it on that seemed a shame."

     Has Paul been a lot of help to Mike as far as writing and constructing songs is concerned? "No," replied McGear. "He's always done his songwriting and left me to mine. You know it's often quite tough."  For instance, on that Antitree iron business I told you about, one thing I wanted to know for years was to what this expression actually referred. But Mike was giving no secrets away. "If I was to tell you, I'd have to tell Harold Wilson. I learned from a very authentic source that he was literally ringing round everyone saying, (he adopts a flat Wilson accent) 'for God's sakes, what's the Antitree iron?'"

     Although Mike has become well known as a humorist, his new album shows very little of the comic side of his nature. "That's where Paul and I are different. He's always done his thing, and I've always been basically comedy. But this record is basically serious, serious pop, if pop could be serious."

     He has also been working on the new Scaffold album, which will probably be released later this month or early next. So he certainly hasn't stopped writing humorous material. He is very optimistic about its success. "We've been working on it in AIR London, producing it with a friend of mine, John Meganson. It's the best album Scaffold have ever done. Already, the B side of the new single, which will be out a few weeks before the album, is so good that it should be an A side. It's called 'Pack of Cards', based on that old song, 'Deck of Cards' that Wink Martindale one, and it has Zoot Money doing impressions of WC Fields!"

     In spite of his current enthusiasm over Scaffold, it was only their sudden hit with "Liverpool Lou" that brought him back to work with them again after a rest period, and filled him with the determination to see them doing the kind of things he thinks they ought to do, such As a  Monty, Python, type of TV show.

     Although he may be about to embark on a dazzling solo career, he wants to combine this with Scaffold. "Although doing it will require careful planning. I believe in Scaffold. I always have, and hopefully I always will. They are a unique thing, a unique thing, but the only way I'm going out on the road is when they're solid, secure, and things are definite. There's an agent coming to see me tonight about dates and things.

    "Scaffold have been through some bad times, and that's why things in the future have got to be a progression, because before we were regressing and playing to smaller and smaller places. That is what led to the situation that night in Manchester last year, where I jacked it all in. I said to myself, 'Forget it. I've had 10 years of all this', and I gave it up for eight months."

     So what brought him back after this momentous decision, doing the album with our kid ?  "The Scaffold single 'Liverpool Lou'. I became involved in all this madness again, but it's easier this time. I can see it for its madness and be more objective."

     McGear has also written a book for children about yet another bear to share the nursery bookshelf with Paddington, Rupert, and Winnie the Pooh. "It's sad, really. When the book first came out, it was during all that business over Oz and Rupert, so my poor little Roger Bear got lost in all the troubles. All together now... 'ahhhhhh!'

     The book is now being reissued to coincide with the release of the album. Mike also did the illustrations. "Oh, there's no end to this man's talent!,"He joked.  "Multimedia Mcgear, there's your title!"

     If the album takes off as well as it might, with the heart, with the hand of McCartney resting heavy upon it, in the form of co-written songs, arrangements, vocals, and instrumental backings by Wings, plus session people like drummer Gerry Conway, it will still be quite a time before we see the solo McGear take to the road. 

    "The only time I'll perform in this country, apart from with Scaffold, that is, is when I've got the people I want with me. Gerry Conway, who's just got back from a worldwide tour with Cat Stevens, has already phoned me to ask me what I'm doing.

     "You see, there's certain killer people, amazing musicians, who are friends as well, and when I've got them, I'll go on the road. I can't tell you their names at the moment, but only when they are available, only when I can play them the full screw on top artist can pay to his so-called backing group. Will I go on the road. But they won't be a backing group -- they'll be like traveling with my friends.

Venice Preserved! (1976)

 Venice Preserved!

By Rosie Horide

Beat Instrumental

December 1976

    What's the worst job you've ever had? That's the current catchphrase culled from the Derek and Clive live album. But if you asked any of the Showco team that worked for Paul McCartney at his recent gig in Venice, I'm sure they'd cite that gig as their worst job ever. 

    There's no reflection on McCartney or Wings, but the problems were considerable and somewhat unusual. But let's start at the beginning. Paul McCartney and Wings were invited by UNESCO to perform a live concert in the beautiful St. Mark's Square as part of their Save Venice campaign. 

    As everyone should know by now, the city is slowly sinking, and a great deal of money is needed to rescue this beautiful and historic place. So they had a week of artistic functions to raise money and wanted a pop group as the piece de resistance. 

    Mr. Leon Davisco, director of publicity for UNESCO said, "We believe that Paul McCartney's group would be just right for the occasion. Not only are they one of the top groups in the world, but they appeal to people of all ages and tastes. We thought their concert would be a fitting finale for our week."

     Paul himself said, "We were very honored to be asked, and after checking out that we could do it, we said we would be delighted."

     And so it all began. For a start, it was going to be an expensive business. There would obviously be no fee, and although UNESCO paid some of the cost, like setting up the special stage and the band's hotel bills, it would cost the McCartneys a lot too. So they did a few other European gigs on the way to defray some of the costs, which would have been incurred if it had all been done just for one gig. 

    The biggest problem to be surmounted was the fact that no merchandise transport had ever been allowed on the main island of Venice, where the square is. It's never felt so much as the weight of a car, and the band had three truckloads of gear! What's more, with all that water around, how do you get the equipment to the island in the first place? The answer was huge barges which were loaded up with trucks and then sailed to the nearest point to the square. Then the trucks were slowly unloaded, and there came an ominous cracking sound. Five of the square's 1000-year-old paving stones had cracked under the weight!  Of course, the various local dignitaries were horrified. But eventually, and very gradually, the trucks got to the side of the square. 

    The crew had arrived a week before the concert to get things ready, and they needed every minute of that time. First, they had to get a stage erected. It was specially built with a high canopy in case of rain and other safeguards against the elements and risk of electrocution. Then all the equipment for the 4000 watt custom built PA had to be assembled. And as if all the usual problems weren't enough, there was a language problem too. Someone from the Italian record company was on permanent call as an interpreter. 

    At the same time, 2000 seats had to be erected on the square. They were for the people who'd paid 15,000 lire for their tickets (roughly £10), the other members of the audience, 13,000 of them had paid 3000 lire for their tickets (£2).  But eventually, that was all done. The seven laser machines worth half a million dollars had been assembled and placed strategically in buildings around the square. In fact, people arriving on the night before the gig were treated to a run-through of the laser, which had been placed on top of the column in the center of the square, and a bright green shaft of light shone out across Venice. 

    Finally, after a week of hard work and aggravation, the concert took place. Musically, it was splendid. From the audience's point of view, it was chaos. Security, supposedly done by the Italian navy, didn't exist. No one was checking tickets, and the police estimated later that there were about 30,000 people there, not the 15,000 that was supposed to be the limit. In fact, most people would have said there were even more there than that. The audience was strangely subdued, too. Even the sensational laser show with the second encore, where the seven lasers were focused together to form the Wings butterfly logo, which twisted and turned like the real thing, didn't rouse them to much enthusiasm. 

    After the show, McCartney himself was a little subdued. "We really enjoyed doing the concert. Not only was it an honor, but what more beautiful place could there be to stage a rock concert? The audience were a bit quiet, though, weren't they?" He was also a little mystified to find that the garrulous European press, who fought to get into the press conference, were suddenly struck dumb when they saw him, and a lady from a TV show refused to do an interview because she couldn't be in the shot with him, too.

     But he did discuss with us plans to play behind the Iron Curtain. "Band on the Run's just been released in Russia, and we'd love to play there, if we were asked. And if possible. You know, you hear such strange things about the people, but I suspect they're just like us under the skin. It would be great to see them-- rocking commies."

     He admitted that the Venice show had cost him a lot, but said it was worth it. And we were told that the week had raised $50,000 for the fund, most of which had come from his gig. 

    As for future plans, Paul said, "We're currently working on the live album, which we hope to have released before Christmas. We're listening to the 90 hours of tape we've done on the World Tour and selecting the right tracks for a three-album set. Then we have Christmas off and start working on our next album. I write all the time, whether I'm on the road or at home, and there are already a few things ready for the next studio album."

     And what about concerts? "We love performing. So I guess we'll be back on the road again soon, but there'll never be another gig like Venice." A sentiment echoed by the crew who were at that moment racing to get all the equipment packed away before low tide left them stranded. 

Arranging What the Man Says (1975)

 

Arranging What the Man Says

By Lorna Read

Beat Instrumental 

November 1975

    "Paul McCartney doesn't really need an arranger, because he's a brilliant one himself. It's just that he can't put down on paper what he hears in his head. So he needs someone to do it for him."

     Actually, Tony Dorsey McCartney's co-arranger on the Venus and Mars album is being unnecessarily modest. It comes out in conversation that he really had quite an integral part in the overall sound, as well as leading the horn section on the recent Wings tour. 

    Tony is a keyboard player and trombonist from Macon, Georgia. He studied music at university and was aiming at being a music teacher, until he found out that he could make more money "selling pencils in New York." Then he joined the US Air Force as a trombonist in their band, and ended up spending four years as their arranger because they had nobody who could write out parts for pop music pieces to provide a bit of light relief from the interminable military marches and songs from the shows. 

    His next job was in Joe Tex's band. "I was 25 and wanted to travel around, and I've been traveling ever since," explained Tony, but at that time, thoughts of touring Australia and Japan with Paul McCartney were as far away as ---Venus and Mars!

    " At the time, I was put in touch with Paul. I had my own group called Magic, featuring my wife as lead singer. I was working in Nashville for Dial Records, doing some horn and string arrangements for them. When Paul came through to do some recording, he had "Sally G" and "Junior's Farm" and a few more tracks and wanted to add horns to them, but the Memphis Horns, who he had planned to use, were unavailable. The next thing I knew, I got a phone call asking how I'd like to do some arrangements for Paul McCartney. At that time, I'd heard a few of his songs, but not his albums, because for some reason, I never got into albums, not even Beatles ones. Yet some of Paul's songs, like "Yesterday " and "My Love," really came across to me. 

    "I went and met him, and we got along pretty good. I arranged the horns on two tracks for him, and thought that was the end of the whole thing, because he said, 'Nice meeting you. Best of luck'. And we shook hands, and that was it. Then last December, his manager called me and said, 'How would you like to do an album with Paul?'"

     The offer came at a difficult time for Tony. "When I started work on the album, I was working with Magic at weekends, and during the week, I'd fly off to Nashville to work on the arrangements," he explained. "I went up there in January and heard the material for Venus and Mars. Then Paul and I sat down and talked about it, and he started playing ideas to me on the piano."

     Paul's method of working now isn't substantially different from the way he was working during the making of Sgt. Pepper, when he stabbed out brass parts in the air with the first finger of his left hand, telling producer George Martin that that was what he wanted a certain instrument to play. According to Tony, doing the arrangements with Paul was really a collaboration. "He could come in with a tune and sit down at the piano, he'd play some bits and say, 'here's a bit, and here's that bit. And right now, I want to get from here to there. Do you have any ideas how I can do it?' So I'd think of something, and sometimes he'd say, 'okay,' and other times my suggestions would spark off an idea for him, and he'd leap to the keyboard and say, 'I've got it.'

     "This is what we'll do. So, although I was supposed to be the arranger, I ended up assisting him in all sorts of ways. For instance, when we were in the studio recording the album, I'd be in the control booth saying, 'No, that's not right yet. Do it again.' I completely got into the music and the people he had with him after we'd finished the mixing in. 

    "Paul's manager talked to me about the idea of going on tour with Wings. He said, 'Hang loose for a while. Don't make any commitments.' So I relaxed for a few weeks, and then he said they were putting a horn section together for the tour. At first, it was going to be a big thing, 20 strings plus a 12-piece horn section, but we got it down to six horns and four electric strings, which we had to drop as we couldn't get any string players. So it was just four horns."

     In the end, all four members of the horn section had worked with Wings in various capacities before, and they all got on together really well, "not like some jobs I had!" Tony commented. There were a few problems with the sound on the tour, like one night when the monitors failed, and Tony had to carry on playing when he couldn't hear anyone else and just prayed that his trombone was in tune. The audience, according to Tony, was split down the middle, half of them, 25 plus, and the other half, the kids, who were all down the front hollering. 

    I asked him whether, in his opinion, the audience had now accepted Linda McCartney as a musician. "She goes down well with the audience," he replies. "I just think she has a little problem with the press. They won't accept her and try to down her for being average. But there are average musicians in every group. The thing is that they don't know is she didn't start out as musician, but came into it much later. What they don't see is that one average musician in a band doesn't affect the whole. You need some outstanding people and some average in a group, because if they were all geniuses, they wouldn't work together. And every group needs one thing to hold them all together. 

    It's Paul who brings and holds Wings together, because everyone respects his singing and writing and the kind of person he is, if a guy gets angry or out of line, Paul will smooth it all over and ease what could have been a bad situation."

     At first, Tony decided that Jimmy McCullough was the best musician in the band. "Just when I thought I had it all figured out, there'd be another night on which Denny Laine would really shine. That's the sort of band it is. Everyone is equally good and has their moments. I think Denny has a lot of talent. He doesn't generally get a resignation because he's the easiest-going guy. You can say to him, 'We need someone to play bass on this because Paul is playing piano, and he'll always offer, even if he doesn't love playing bass. He never grumbles. He's a great singer and writer as well, and helps Paul with some of the songs."

     Apparently, there is nothing that annoys Paul more than having people put down the other members of Wings. "Wings is much more of a group effort than it's publicized to be," explains Tony. "The nucleus of the group is Paul, and the nucleus of the material is his. Then people pick this up and say that the rest of the guys would be nowhere without Paul, that they're just guys. He picked up. They don't see that Paul is in a position to do whatever he wants, and if he hadn't wanted them in particular, he wouldn't have them.

     "Paul could have kept on just selling records and never made another personal appearance if he didn't want to. But the whole object of entertaining is to know you're being appreciated, and you only know that if you're performing."

     Does this mean that Paul still feels the need to prove himself, to be reassured that his music is still appreciated? "I think so," Tony replied, "although I don't think he ever doubted himself.

     "To get back to the press, there are some people who will read an article and believe every word like gospel. So if the writer says Paul still 'hasn't lived up to what the Beatles did,' that real reader will believe him. That's what makes Paul so upset and angry, the fact that they won't let him get away from the Beatles things. He's not trying to forget the Beatles because he still likes all of them. They grew up from childhood to adulthood together, regardless of what goes down. They were very close, and they still are. Paul is not trying to say through Wings 'to Hell with the Beatles.' The Beatles are like a family.

     "When the child grows up and becomes an adult, he moves off from the family to his own thing, and Paul fails to see why people can't understand this. He finds the general attitude towards Wings very disturbing. He feels they are capable musicians and deserve better recognition, and he would like to see them getting that recognition. That's the only thing that gets to him, really."

     What is it that, in Tony's opinion, makes McCartney's song so special? To what technique and talent does he owe his fantastic success? "He breaks all the rules. He invents such unusual chord changes that the first time you hear them, you think, 'Did he really mean that?' His writing is so simple yet so meaningful. It's good, logical music.  There's good and bad in all music, and the trick is to be able to sort it out, to take the good and throw out the bad. This is what Paul does so well. When he plays the song, you can hear something there that's so old it goes way back, and then you hear something that's brand new, or leading the way towards things that are yet to come.

     "But for the most part, it will never be complicated. He never writes anything the average person couldn't play, but the end result is so simple, so effective, and so fitting that you wonder how on earth he came by it. He always ends up with something that was right there under your eyes all the time. And I wonder how he could have stopped at that. Because if he had, if it had been me writing it, I'd probably have kept right on trying to reach for something more dynamic and maybe ruin the whole thing."

     Paul writes all the time, backstage, on the road, in the hotel. He keeps all his ideas in his mind. He always carries an acoustic guitar with him when he's traveling, and there's usually a piano wherever he goes. Most times, he'll think of a melody first, fiddle around on the piano with it, then add the lyrics.

     Tony feels that this lucky break, the opportunity of working with Wings, should open a few doors for him. This also had a profound influence on his own music. "This is a great learning period for me. I think the reason why I never made it as a writer was that a few things were out of order, and being around Paul has shown me how to correct them. He's a great writer and a great person. I don't think success has changed him in any way. He seems well-balanced and very normal. As a matter of fact, he may be too normal under the circumstances. I would have thought that someone in his position would have been really different. But that's the thing that amazes me about Paul. I think, 'look at you, Paul. I'm talking to you, and it's just like talking to any other guy right now.'"

     Tony is fulfilling his ambition to travel by playing his way across Australia and Japan, with the hope of a tour of America and another Wings album ahead of him.

     Accompanying them on tour will be a well-known guest, one who is totally uninvited. "Paul has a fan from America who says she has dedicated her whole life to him for the last 10 years; she's only 21 now. She made every date of the '73 tour, and every single date on this tour, and she says she's going to be at all the gigs in Japan and Australia."

    "She isn't a groupie. She never has had any sex with anyone to do with the band. She's just dedicated. She's been pointed out to Paul many times, but he avoids her because he's embarrassed. He thinks she must be a bit weird. Just think, 10 years she's been following him, and they've never even spoken to one another."

Paul Spreads Those Wings (1973)

 

Paul Spreads Those Wings

No writer listed

Beat Instrumental

June 1973

     Has McCartney lost his magic touch? That's the question being asked time and again as Paul and his "new" band Wings undertake their first major British tour. It's a question that has been asked ever since the days of the Beatles' split. The one which only time and audiences can decide.

    The other Beatles have been accepted in their new roles: George as a solo artist and guitarist, John for his work with Yoko and Elephant's Memory, and Ringo as a filmmaker and actor. The public doesn't seem to have decided about Paul; however, few can understand how the man who wrote standards such as "Yesterday" and "Fool on the Hill" can turn his back on 10 years of success and start from scratch all over again. 

    Those who have heard the singles from Wings: "Mary Had a Little Lamb," "Give Ireland Back to the Irish,"and "Hi Hi Hi". Still don't know what to expect from the group, and have been disappointed with the band's publicity that has happened. 

    It probably started with Paul's lawsuit against the other Beatles, which wasn't helped by the appearance of wife, Linda, on the scene, and was capped by two drug cases, which could well mean that the band won't be allowed to perform in America. 

    Now that manager Alan Klein has parted company with the other three Beatles, the way is open for the fabulous foursome to work together again. And it was with all this in mind that Beat Instrumental spoke to Wings' American drummer, Denny Seiwell. 

    We asked him about the effects of all the controversy and how much it prevented Wings from relaxing and making music. "Well, it affected us quite a bit," he said. "We are a new band, and we have our normal growing pains, but we can't be just another new band in the sense that we can't go playing in little nightclubs where we can gig five nights a week and get it together as a new band would.

     "In that respect, we've had a completely different scene, and we've had to learn how to deal with that simply because Paul McCartney is in the group, not to mention Denny Laine and Henry McCullough. Everything we do is under a microscope and compared by the audience to the last time that they saw the Beatles live."

     Such a comparison may be unfair, although Denny claims that none of the group resents it, but it will no longer be necessary to view Wings' new LP, Red Rose Speedway, and their current tour. "Yeah, I kind of feel that we've come through all that," said Denny. "And now people are just starting to accept us as a band. Anyway, this new album that we've just done really reflects that. If I was listening to it as someone who had nothing to do with it, I would say it was a group. It wasn't just some musicians who were thrown together in a session scene.

     "It's obvious that we all been together, and we've had as many problems as anybody that has been living together. It's like a marriage, you know, and over the years, we go through our hassles and our scenes, and that's how we got to know each other. That's how you really form a love between everybody in the band."

     Much of Wings' "getting to know you" time was spent on and around Paul's farm in Scotland. Denny recalls, "It was nice when we were up there in the spring of last year. We were rehearsing for the European tour, and it was great to be doing it out in the country, that relaxed. We got to know each other a lot better, and the music started to happen; we found out what every member of the band really had to offer. And that's the thing that really takes time, you put all the offerings together and make one little bit of magic."

     Can Wings' magic ever be as great as the Beatles' magic? Few would care to say, but at this stage, it's still obvious that the rest of the band are overshadowed by Paul's Beatle past. Is it something they want to be free of?  "No, not at all." said Denny. "I mean, who are we to say anything like that? That we don't want the shadow of the Beatles? They were the most fantastic group that ever hit the world, of course. And anyway, it's not really a problem. It's just that sometimes you go to a concert and people are expecting something, Beatle-ish, they don't necessarily get it, but they're not disappointed with Wings either. 

    "On the European and the college tour of this country that we did, the audiences went away really happy. They loved it. You don't get any people shouting up about the Beatles. We never get any of that. Every now and then, we get someone shout up for us to play one of the songs that Paul wrote in those days. But that's very rare. We haven't done any of those songs up until this TV show that we've just done, in which we've done a little medley of some songs, songs that Paul wrote and that he's proud of writing."

     Wings material Denny describes as "a mince" because the band have so many songs that they could do that they never know which ones to put together into a stage act. "But we're all rock and rollers at heart," said Denny. "We would like the next album to be a rock and roll one, you know, get everybody rocking. We love bands like Slade, for example. 

    With Red Rose Speedway, however, we had enough of Paul's material alone to do a double album. He has an amazing imagination and is still writing as many songs as he ever used to."

     Paul also uses his imagination when it comes to choosing the members of Wings, and has pulled together some fine musicians. Lead Guitarist Henry McCullough worked with the Grease Band of Joe Cocker fame.  Denny Laine, who handles vocals, piano, and guitar, comes from the Moody Blues, and drummer Denny Seiwell has worked with top jazz and session bands all over the world. 

    He told us the story of how he joined Wings. "I was living in New York when Paul came to town looking for musicians to make Ram. He found out who all the top session guys were and had them drop around to the studio, which was a rundown, old basement in a real heavy district. A friend called me up and asked me to do a demo. I had no idea it would be an audition, so I showed up at the studio, which I'd never heard of before. Anyway, I just went in, and there was Paul and his old lady just standing there, which kind of took me by surprise. So we just had a chat, and he told me what he was looking for and asked me if I mind playing a bit for him."

     It's taken some time for  Wings to settle in. Was Denny worried about the prospect of The Beatles getting together again? "No, I think it's amazing," he said. "I'd love to put another Beatles record on my turntable. I don't know if they'll get together again as a band, and I'm sure that what we've all got going together now with Wings is going to continue anyway. Just because Klein is out of the scene now, it doesn't mean that Wings is going to fold, because we've just devoted so much of ourselves to making the band work. We've gone through changes that no other band in the world has had to go through, and we really want to make it work."