Paul McCartney has said that Johnny Cash inspired him to form Wings.
McCartney credited the late singer with inspiring him to form the band, having found himself at a crossroads after the Beatles split up.
With several other bandmembers drifting in and out of the band, Wings’ main three players were Paul McCartney, his wife Linda who was on keyboards, and Moody Blues guitarist Denny Laine.
Following two unsuccessful albums, Wings eventually released ‘Band On The Run’ in 1973, reaching number one in the UK charts by early 1974, thanks to the album’s title track and Jet. It also hit top spot in the US Billboard Chart.
McCartney previously announced that a special 50th anniversary edition of that album, would be out next month. More on that here.
McCartney Was Facing “certain alternatives”
Before this success was to happen, Paul McCartney admitted that he was in the midst of a musical crossroads, following the Beatles split.
“After the end of The Beatles I was faced with certain alternatives,” he explained. “One was to give up music entirely and do God knows what. Another was to start a super-band with very famous people, Eric Clapton and so on. I didn’t like either so I thought: How did The Beatles start?”.
He added, “It was a bunch of mates who didn’t know what they were doing,” he continued. “That’s when I realised maybe there is a third alternative: to get a band that isn’t massively famous, to not worry if we don’t know what we’re doing because we would form our character by learning along the way. It was a real act of faith. It was crazy, actually”.
But one night, the music legend was watching another legend Johnny Cash on television with his wife Linda, and suddenly Paul found his inspiration.
“We were in bed one night,” he said, “newly married, when Johnny Cash came on the telly with a new band he’d formed with Carl Perkins, a big hero of mine. There they were, playing with some country musicians I had never heard of, looking like they were having fun.”
“I thought: here’s Johnny, he’s back, he’s doing it. So I turned to Linda and said: Do you want to form a band? And she went: ‘Sure.’ That’s how our relationship was. Do you want to go and live on a farm in Scotland? ‘Why not?’”.
Speaking of Wings, Paul McCartney paid tribute to his former bandmate Denny Laine, who passed away aged 71 last month. More on that story here.
