The title One Hand Clapping, taken from a Japanese kōan, tells you just about all the pieces it is advisable learn about Paul McCartney and Wings‘ 1974 Abbey Street classes: These performances are an occasion not often seen and heard even much less usually. For years, you’ve needed to think about what didn’t leak out from the studio as bootlegs for your self. Those that do know these session know them as greasy VHS transfers to YouTube and bonus tracks to Band on the Run and Venus and Mars reissues. Up to now, McCartney followers must seek for these recordings, if they knew what they have been. However now McCartney is marching out One Hand Clapping from footnote to centerstage for reconsideration as a standalone launch. With half a century of hindsight, he has lastly acknowledged he had captured one thing particular.
Up to now, McCartney shrugged off One Hand Clapping, initially a TV particular, as nothing particular. “We referred to as the movie One Hand Clapping, for completely no purpose, and never so much occurred with it,” he remarked in an interview a few decade in the past. Wings had enlisted guitarist Jimmy McCulloch and drummer Geoff Britton to their ranks that summer time after McCartney recorded Band on the Run with solely his spouse Linda and Wingman Denny Laine backing him up. The classes, primarily recorded over six days in August 1974, have been meant to get McCulloch and Britton able to run on tour and check their mettle for 1975’s Venus and Mars.
On the time, McCartney, age 32, was flying excessive. A fab 4 years had handed because the Beatles broke up, and by the One Hand Clapping classes, he’d launched 5 LPs — as a solo artist, with Linda, and with Wings — exhibiting he might get alongside with out the opposite Beatles very nicely. Most of the songs that Wings rehearsed have been an extension of the songwriting observe he’d gotten on with “Let It Be” and “The Lengthy and Winding Street” (two songs he doodled within the One Hand Clapping classes), in addition to “Get Again” (which he didn’t), constituting McCartney’s musical imaginative and prescient however with out all of the discord and brinksmanship of the Let It Be classes. It’s Orpheus shifting far alongside the lengthy and winding highway, refusing to get again. (And for historical past’s sake, the opposite Beatles have been declaring their very own independence and dependencies across the identical time, too.)
As an entire, listening to One Hand Clapping is a lark — simply because it was for McCartney and Wings to file. It isn’t overly critical, however the songs sound good, possible as a result of the musicians have been so relaxed on the time. McCartney didn’t embody each tune the group recorded in the course of the One Hand Clapping classes on this archival launch — notably absent right here is “Suicide,” a straightforward listening tune he as soon as pitched to Sinatra (who balked at it) — nevertheless it offers a protracted have a look at what the band was as much as on the time.
About half of 32 tracks that did make the minimize have by no means come out formally, which is a disgrace since they embody contemporary takes on well-known songs: the model of “Nineteen Hundred and Eighty 5” right here feels each pressing and funky with some nice, tension-building synths by Linda; “Wild Life” sounds extra soulful and doleful than the album model (plus McCartney doesn’t sing “aminals” as he did on the album); and the reggae guitar on “Jet” skanks more durable than beforehand. The band and orchestra hit completely different accent chords on an electrical “Dwell and Let Die,” which incorporates a grittier vocal efficiency from McCartney than on the James Bond single; he growls when it’s carried out, refusing to let it die.
The “yard” tape, which comes as a seven-inch with the vinyl model of One Hand Clapping, additionally sounds notably energetic. Mere months earlier than John Lennon put himself by hell with Phil Spector, rehashing his favourite songs from his youth with middling outcomes for 1975’s Rock ‘n’ Roll, McCartney was goofing round with an acoustic guitar in Abbey Street’s yard, taking part in the primary tune he and Lennon ever performed collectively, Eddie Cochran’s “Twenty Flight Rock.” And in contrast to Lennon, he seemed like he was truly having enjoyable. (McCartney hiccups “Peggy Sue” with extra gusto than Lennon did on Rock ‘n’ Roll, too.)
Among the different tracks on One Hand Clapping, although, really feel a bit of too free — which, as a doc of a rehearsal, is completely effective, however they don’t forged any new mild on McCartney’s hits. “Possibly I’m Amazed” bears all the ability inherent within the tune however doesn’t match the throat-shredding depth of the Wings Over America rendition. The Beatles trilogy of “Let It Be,” “The Lengthy and Winding Street,” and “Woman Madonna” sounds improbable however lasts lower than three-and-a-half minutes complete, since he strikes on from every tune about as rapidly as he moved on from the group. And “Band on the Run” begins shaky since among the guitar runs aren’t tight and Linda virtually misses the opening keyboard quiver. Within the extant One Hand Clapping video footage of the tune, you’ll be able to see her grimace with embarrassment on the digicam, however Paul appears unbothered.
On this format, although, he album largely advantages from the shortage of video, the standard of which wasn’t nice to start with. A lot of the unaired TV particular, which got here out as a DVD bonus disc to Band on the Run in 2010, featured lengthy photographs of the musicians’ faces, chopping out the devices, and its director, David Litchfield, has admitted he wasn’t minimize out to be a filmmaker since he was primarily {a magazine} editor. “Paul stated … the documentary wasn’t meant for anybody however him, Linda and the band,” Litchfield as soon as stated. “[My magazine] The Picture was nearly to go bust so it saved my life.” However as a result of longtime Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick recorded it and one other engineer, Steve Orchard, has given the tracks a contemporary combine, McCartney seems like he’s singing to you in the identical room.
It’s that intimacy that makes the very best of One Hand Clapping really feel particular and in the end extra like an “album,” or an official bootleg (which it’s), than the soundtrack to a live performance movie. This lineup of Wings didn’t final an excessive amount of longer, since McCulloch and Britton by no means jelled, and the drummer stop virtually as quickly as Venus and Mars got here out. However for a number of days in ’74 and the Venus and Mars classes that adopted, the friction labored in Wings’ favor. The sound of One Hand Clapping is the sound of a band simply getting on its ft.