The Paul McCartney Drumming Mistake Wings Left on ‘Band on the Run’
Paul McCartney responded to The Beatles’ break-up by releasing a pair of solo albums under his own name. Then he formed the band Wings. It was still something of a solo gig. Macca wrote the music (including songs he wrote on the spot) and played many of the instruments, but the group dynamic got him touring again. His bandmate said one Paul mistake stayed on a Wings song from the signature album Band on the Run.
Paul McCartney was the first Beatle to form a new group with Wings
Paul was the first member of The Beatles to form a new band after the Fab Four splintered. When he assembled Wings, his bandmates still recorded their solo songs under their names with help from guests and other contributors.
Two of Paul’s Wings bandmates played with him for nearly as long as John Lennon and George Harrison. Linda McCartney, his wife, and guitarist Denny Laine joined Wings at the start in 1971 and remained in the group until it disintegrated in 1981.
John never minced words when he criticized Paul (or any of his other bandmates). Laine called out Paul’s mistake on the Band on the Run song “No Words,” but he did so in a complimentary way.
Denny Laine said a Paul mistake on drums made it onto ‘Band on the Run’
Wings’ 1973 album Band on the Run includes some of Paul’s best solo songs of the 1970s. The opening couplet of “Band on the Run” and “Jet” gave us two all-time classics. The rollicking “Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five” is a love song from the future (Paul’s words, not ours).
Paul and Linda shared songwriting credits on most Band on the Run songs. Macca handled “Let Me Roll It” on his own, and Laine and Paul shared credit for “No Words.” Still, Wings functioned as a trio at the time they made the record. That left their founder to handle much of the instrumentation, including drums. Laine told Guitar World that a Paul drumming mistake on “No Words” made the final cut. His criticism landed a lot softer than John’s biting commentary:
“I remember on ‘No Words,’ Paul forgot one of his drum entrances and came in a measure too late. But we left it in and kind of built the arrangement around that.”
Denny Laine describes Paul McCartney’s drumming mistake
Laine didn’t specify when Paul’s mistake happened. The guitar player said his bandmate missed his entrance, which indicates he should have been playing from the start. Still, it sounds like Macca is right on time with his first drum strokes when they meet the first guitar notes. Paul’s drumming falls on the right beats during the bridge.
Paul’s drumming error on “No Words” might have come right after the first chorus. Bright horns and more emotive singing enter around the 1:20 mark, but the beat doesn’t match the intensity of the music around it. The focus of Paul’s unspectacular but serviceable playing remains on the high hat. His drumming lagging behind the guitar solo in the outro seems like a calculated move.
Either way, Laine handled Paul’s mistake with gentle diplomacy (albeit years later) rather than John’s scathing criticism.
How did ‘Band on the Run’ perform on the charts?
Despite Paul’s error while drumming on “No Words,” Band on the Run gave Wings their biggest hit in the United States. The album spent four weeks atop the Billboard 200 albums chart in 1974. The band’s At the Speed of Sound record lasted longer at the top, but no other Wings album came close to Band on the Run’s 120 weeks on the Billboard charts.
Band on the Run also produced a No. 1 single –“Band on the Run” — and two other top-10 hits — “Jet” and “Helen Wheels.” Those three songs cracked the top 10 in England (per the Official Charts Company), and the album spent seven weeks on top.
The RIAA certified Band on the Run gold within a month and eventually went triple-platinum.
Paul McCartney’s drumming mistake on “No Words” proved there were limits to his musical skills. Yet the nearly imperceptible error, which songwriter Denny Laine handled with dignity, didn’t mar the song or Band on the Run’s chart performance.
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