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Microscope: Wild Life

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Bobber:
Mumbo
What the f*** is this? Nothing more than a random tho energetic jam that any band could pull off on their first rehearsal together. We drop in in the middle of that jam and Paul is nothing more than screaming himself through a song. In hindsight, maybe this really wás the first rehearsal night of Paul’s new band Wings. Denny Seiwell had been playing the drums on Paul’s previous album Ram and had joined Wings after that. Linda also contributed on Paul’s albums, but was now asked to really join a band that would be on the road and play live shows. That is a huge difference compared to Linda’s role before. Mumbo, and in fact this complete album, sounds like a band trying to get things together and looking for its own sound. It usually doesn’t work to put stuff like that on a record and even in Paul’s case that is a fact. Listening to this complete album, I feel like this should’ve been kept in Paul’s private cellars and seen the daylight as an interesting bootleg. This song is going nowhere, like any jam. A terrible first song to be heard from a new band.

Bip Bop
Things doesn’t get better with Bip Bop. The guitar sounds awful in the start, and so does the very simply played bass. I would have fitted well on Paul’s first solo album, McCartney. And maybe that is the point with Wild Life: it’s what McCartney was for Paul solo. Nothing more than some random things that had been lying around for a day or so. Another song that is going nowhere and is therefore far too long. It goes on and on and on, without any change or progression.

Love Is Strange
I could not remember I had ever heard this song done by Wings before. I haven’t been missing much. Wings is trying some reggae rhytms here. I has a nice lick, played by guitar and bass simultaneously, plus some funny little solo (by Denny Laine?). The song has reached a point of becoming annoying even before Paul and Linda start singing at 1.36. It doesn’t improve things. Denny Seiwell’s drumming is decent as ever. I read this was the first reggae recording by a white band. Yeah, well, who cares? It’s not really outstanding, is it. Paul start singing solo at 3.10, well after the annoying border, and here one can hear that a great singer is available in this band. A singer tho that just wanted to be a part of a band, instead of really going solo. The band is trying to have some fun towards the end, but it doesn’t really show off.

Wild Life
The song that give the album its name. If possible, an absolute low point to me. Linda’s keyboards starting at 0.09 sounds like the first lesson for beginners on the keyboard. After Denny Seiwell great opening, the song develops into a slow blues. After over six minutes, my mind was really bothering me. How could I ever manage to listen to another side of this album? Paul’s voice is not really great and tends towards screaming. Even his falsetto lets him down (2.00) and he forces it into a scream at 2.10. Are all the instruments really tuned well? The guitar solo sucks and makes it clear why a leadguitarist would be part of Wings in later years. Terrible.

Some People Never Know
A bit more like it. The acoustic guitar at the start sounds good, at least compared to all the songs on side 1. Linda’s harmonies don’t sound too convincing, but I’ll dig it. The guitar solo (at 1.55) isn’t that great and consists merely of the vocal line. Piano sounds good. Once again a song that is far too long to remain exciting till the end, but at least it shows but this band is able to.

I Am Your Singer
Linda as a lead singer for the first time, in the second verse. Not very convincing, but she’s in tune. I like this song enough to not skip it when I was listening to this album over and over. The recorder is a nice little touch. Denny’s drumming is good, he almost sounds like Ringo here. Didn’t I say that before?

Bip Bop Link
Yeah right. Some 45 seconds of the song from side 1, now instrumental. Played by Paul on a heavily phased guitar. Doesn’t make much sense.

Tomorrow
A little light at the end of this dark tunnel. The piano opening sounds exciting. Pauls sings with passion and energy but his voice has sounded better before. Effective drums once again by Denny Seiwell. And here’s the characteristic Wings background vocals! At 0.43, to go into a nice bridge. The harmonies continue into the second verse and Linda does do a good job here, together with Denny Laine I presume. Nice change of rhythm at the end, where Paul showcases the possibilities of his voice. Best song on the album, but that was not hard to achieve.

Dear Friend
A song for John. Well sung by Paul. Not a bad song, but far too long. Why is Paul repeating himself again and again? Every instrumental verse should have been deleted, for it adds nothing to Paul’s message. Had it been minimalised to about two minutes, it should’ve been a far better song in my humble opinion.

Mumbo Link
Another 45 seconds of rubbish jam.

All in all, a pretty bad album with just a few highlights. Certainly not an album I enjoyed listening to.

Toejam:
That's a harsh review and I don't mind Mumbo. It's obvious he wasn't trying to write a good song and was just messin' around but ideally you'd want a better song on an album. I don't like Bip bop but the rest are o.k but I esp. love the title track and Tomorrow.

tkitna:
I only read Toejams response since I like to review the record first to compare, but if it was given a harsh review its because this album sucks. I'm really not even looking forward to listening to this, but i'll wipe the six inches of dust off it for the threads sake of course.

Gary910:
The thing you have to remember about this album is Paul had heard the way Bob Dylan did his albums. How Bob had recorded his albums in two days. Denny Seiwell told me that story. That is why it starts out, "Take it Tony". The "jam" that is Mumbo was not really written. It was just recorded as it happened.

I have an deep affection for this album, but I will admit it really is not Paul's best.

Bobber:

--- Quote from: Gary910 on October 01, 2011, 04:39:32 AM ---The thing you have to remember about this album is Paul had heard the way Bob Dylan did his albums. How Bob had recorded his albums in two days. Denny Seiwell told me that story. That is why it starts out, "Take it Tony". The "jam" that is Mumbo was not really written. It was just recorded as it happened.

--- End quote ---

I don't really care why the song is there in this form and whether Paul wanted to follow Bob Dylans way of recording. The recording is just not good enough, certainly not to act as the opening song of an album by Paul McCartney.

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