“Whenever I hear someone condemn Paul McCartney,” a voice says early in “Man on the Run,” “I usually agree with them.” The person saying that? Paul McCartney. It’s the perfect introduction to the Wings story. Man on the Run is director Morgan Neville’s delightful new documentary about one of the strangest chapters in the Macca story: Wings, the strange ’70s band he formed after the breakup of the Beatles. For years it was a taboo subject that he essentially tried to eliminate from his own narrative. The most derided, least respected corner of his career, the case of the Beatles who took a wrong turn.
A new beginning after the Beatles
But now McCartney is finally ready to reclaim Wings’ legacy. “Man on the Run,” available Friday with an accompanying soundtrack, is an intimate portrait of a rock superstar who knew what the world wanted from him — but decided to throw it all out the window and start from scratch just for the joy of it. “We don’t ‘work’ on music,” he explains in the documentary. “We play them. I’m addicted to gaming!”
Throughout “Man on the Run,” the question keeps coming up (like a flower, on the hour): Why is Paul doing this the hard way? Why is he starting a new band with a bunch of hippie malcontents who constantly complain about his controlling tendencies? (Didn’t they ask around?) Why doesn’t he just play the Beatles hits? There’s a great anecdote when Paul visits Nashville in the summer of 1974 and tells guitarist Jerry Reed that Wings are going on tour again. Reed says: “If I were Paul McCartney, I would buy the street.”
Looking for your own voice
When the Fabs broke up, the whole world wanted Paul to continue being a Beatle. He was the only one who wanted something different. But he had to find his own voice. So he retreated to his Scottish farm with his new wife, Linda Eastman. He founded Wings with her and a few strangers and played harmless amateur gigs. He loaded the band into the van, showed up at some university and asked the puzzled students if he could play that night. For years he refused to sing Beatles classics. None of it seemed to make sense.
But he took to heart some sage advice from Linda, who told him: “Let’s just get lost.” That’s exactly what they did. For two. Plus the backing musicians who were just as confused as everyone else as to why they were there. He constantly made decisions that were guaranteed to cause trouble – like his 1972 single in which he sang the nursery rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” That didn’t go down well with anyone, least of all with the other wings. “Mary had a little fucking lamb?” snorts one of the band members in the documentary. “Are you crazy?”
Linda in the band
The biggest Wings controversy at the time: that Paul brought his wife into the band. “I’m not here because I’m the best keyboard player,” Linda says in one scene. “I’m here because we love each other.” The fact that John and Paul broke up the Beatles and formed new bands with their wives, whose musical expertise ranged from “a matter of taste” to “you can’t be serious,” was one of their revolutionary innovations – but one that no one respected at the time. Fans mocked Linda and Yoko throughout the ’70s, in ugly ways that bordered on and often went far beyond misogyny. Both women were years ahead of their time – Mother Superiors who were too early.
John took Paul for this in his attack “How Do You Sleep?” straight to the point (“Jump when your mom tells you anything” – that’s what needs to be told to you). Mick Jagger remarked pointedly that he would never let his old lady join the band, a remark that hit Paul deeply. But he saw Linda as an artist – one of the most successful and respected photographers in the music world.
Paul was proud to have such an accomplished partner – think of the great moment in “Get Back” when he introduces her to a cameraman and boasts, “Linda’s a cameraman.” John and Paul drew confidence from their wives’ independent artistic careers – something these men shared with no other male rock star of their generation, to put it bluntly.
Democracy at Wings
It’s hilarious to see the Wings boys in this documentary still complaining that they didn’t have enough creative influence. But this was the ’70s – casual hangers-on hired to accompany Paul McCartney could be outraged that they weren’t on equal footing with the man who wrote “Hey Jude,” not to mention the Beatle who was constantly telling George Harrison how to play the guitar.
“He wants you all to be normal and equal,” complains one of the band’s many drummers. “But you are not normal and equal because he is the superstar of the world and you are a dog-faced nobody.” Frankly, it’s a complaint that requires a “yes, what?” deserved, louder than the final chord of “A Day in the Life.”
But he stuck to democracy, even if it meant letting the others sing and write rough tunes like “Medicine Jar.” Imagine going to the Wings Over America tour in 1976 and then hearing Denny Laine sing a Simon & Garfunkel cover. (On the live album you can practically hear the rush to the bar.)
There’s a great Wings photo that fans love – a day in the Scottish Highlands, on the family farm, Paul and the band happily playing football while his sheepdog and muse Martha chases the ball. The look on a bandmate’s face says it all: I signed to play with a Beatle, tour the world, party with women – why is playing with the boss’s dog now part of my job description?
From scorn to masterpiece
When he and Linda released Ram in 1971, it was unanimously hailed as one of the worst albums of all time. Hell, even Ringo made fun of it. “I don’t think there’s a single song on the last one, Ram,” Ringo explained. “I just think he’s wasted his time. He seems to be getting weird.” Even Mr. Octopus’ Garden drew the line at “Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey.”
During Wings’ lifetime, “Band on the Run” was widely considered her masterpiece, while “Ram” was aesthetically on par with a hairball regurgitated by Martha. It took 40 years for the music world to collectively decide that “Ram” was an art-rock masterpiece, so much so that it is now twice as famous as “Band on the Run.” (Personally, I’m a “Venus and Mars” man. “Love in Song,” baby.)
A few years ago I was at a McCartney concert in Brooklyn where he introduced the ’70s deep cut “Letting Go” with the words, “Are there any Wings fans in the house?” The couple next to me, both in their early twenties, cheered; They explained that his first band was okay, but they were actually into Wings. (I later mentioned it to McCartney in an interview, a story he tells in his 2025 book Wings.) Like any Beatles story, this one is constantly changing, always taking new turns.
A love story
Paul made so many amazing decisions in his twenties that no one else in his situation would have made. The biggest, of course: Linda. He was only 26, a rich and charming young rock star with countless groupies and a whole life ahead of him, when he fell madly in love with Linda and decided she was the one.
He switched to monogamy overnight, without hesitation, even though he had never been faithful to anyone before but John. The ’70s were the heyday of excessive rock star debauchery – an era Paul helped create – but he spent the decade on the farm raising their children. They remained inseparable until her death from cancer in 1998. The first night they ever spent apart was in 1980, when he went to prison in Japan after being caught with cannabis at Tokyo airport.
Paul’s choices in the ’70s – playing in the band, caring for his wife, “Mary Had a Little Lamb” – were a joke around the world. He knew everyone was laughing at him. John scoffed. Mick scoffed. George – well, you can imagine. He didn’t care. Paul and Linda are the only ’70s rock stars whose tour photos show them with strollers at the airport instead of bottles of Jack Daniel’s – toddlers and babies in tow – both parents with big smiles that even their superhuman marijuana use can’t explain.
That is the power of “Man on the Run” – in many ways it is a love story, and yet a deeply enigmatic one. In the end, it’s one of those silly love songs that keeps going until it’s no longer silly, no longer silly, love isn’t silly at all.
