Red Rose Speedway [Extra tracks, Import, Original recording remastered]

Paul McCartney, Wings | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (June 8, 1993)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Extra tracks, Import, Original recording remastered
• Label: MSI:EMI/PARLOPHONE
• ASIN: B00000721M
• Also Available in: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (53 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #65,278 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

You could trawl the rock & roll archives all the way back to the start and never find an album quite like Red Rose Speedway. Which is not to say that it's great. Just that it's... weird. Though it's a Wings album, it's entirely irradiated with Paul McCartney's personality--to the extent that virtually the entire band left him while attempting to rehearse for the supporting tour, claiming they couldn't operate in his huge, overbearing shadow. You can see where they were coming from. Red Rose Speedway, right down to the cover shot of Macca with a rose in his mouth, is about Paul McCartney, specifically his unique ability in the '70s to pump up slight, pretty songs to the scale of "Hey Jude," seemingly unaware or unworried that that didn't necessarily make them as good as "Hey Jude." The high spot is the saccharine sauciness of "My Love," a lurching soft-focus ballad about his wife's sexual excellence. The rest of it--lazy, lushly produced rock, sometimes sweet, sometimes just cloying, but always unmistakably Macca--is worth hearing if just to ponder: "What the hell did he think he was doing?" --Taylor Parkes

Product Description

Out of print in the U.S.! Digitally remastered reissue of Macca & Wings' Top Ten album from 1973 featuring four bonus tracks: 'C Moon', 'Hi Hi Hi', 'The Mess' and 'I Lie Around'. Recorded just three years after the Beatles' split, this was his second album using the Wings name (and fourth solo release overall). Red Rose Speedway finds McCartney upping the Rock ante a bit. His three previous solo releases had been low-key, earthy and predominantly acoustic affairs, but Macca and mates started rocking out a little on tracks like 'Big Barn Bed', 'Get On The Right Thing' and especially the non-album bonus track 'Hi Hi Hi'. Featuring the beautiful #1 smash 'My Love', this remains a hidden gem in the McCartney canon. Parlophone.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Get on the Right Thing, March 18, 2005

By 

Tom Emanuel (Deadwood, SD USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Red Rose Speedway (Audio CD)

On 1973's Red Rose Speedway, Paul McCartney & Wings achieve the logical midpoint between the domesticity of RRS's predecessor Wild Life and its intense follow-up Band on the Run. Balancing the homespun looseness of the former with elements of bombast and production from the latter he creates a sort of domestic art-rock. This is most obvious in the medley, which is more ambitious than it seems at first glance - four simple, mid-tempo pop songs woven together into an eleven-minute suite, building so all are interrelated jigsaw pieces but entities in and of themselves. Twisted in its way, but strangely succesful, as on the infectious Get on the Right Thing, for instance, or the melodic When the Night.

However, where the album triumphs on a melodic level, except for a few very notable exceptions it stumbles lyrically. The opener Big Barn Bed, for example, has a great tune and is incredibly catchy, but there's not much substance to it beyond that. I suppose you could construe "Keep on sleeping in a big barn bed" to mean "Get out to the country, away from the bustle of city life", but I think that may cross the line to overanalyzing. This carries throughout - When the Night, One More Kiss, much of the medley, and (despite its overall quality) Get on the Right Thing are married to essentially lightweight words.

However, as mentioned before, there are some very conspicuous exemptions from this "rule". My Love (for all its "syrup"), Single Pigeon, and parts of the medley come to mind with heartwarming, uplifting messages and fine imagery. But the best and brightest of the lot is Little Lamb Dragonfly. With quite literally brilliant words set to an achingly beautiful melody, this song is like immense sorrow and regret blended with a kind of hope; it truly is extraordinary and worth every penny of whatever you have to pay for this disc. Production- and performance-wise it's all good - gone is the sloppiness of Wild Life, replaced by a quirky warmth more reminiscent of Ram.

Red Rose Speedway gives credence to the argument both for and against Paul McCartney, and is probably not the best place to dig into his repertoire - it's kind of hard to fathom that Band on the Run would be released at the end of the very same year. But for what it's worth Red Rose Speedway is a warm, imaginative, and, if you open your mind past (most of) the lyrics, thoroughly enjoyable listening experience.

NOTES FOR REMASTERED PAUL MCCARTNEY COLLECTION:

The bonus tracks are all excellent. Culled from Wings' contemporary and preceding singles, they share in RRS's vibe - the best I'd argue is either the raunchy Hi, Hi, Hi or laid-back I Lie Around.

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars one of the most underappreciated albums ever made, March 23, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Red Rose Speedway (Audio CD)

I'm glad to see there are some other reviewers on this site who really enjoy this album. Personally I really like every track, but especially "One More Kiss," "Get on the Right Thing," "Single Pigeon," and the medley. Two brief observations: (1) I noticed someone else here commented that "Little Lamb Dragonfly" was about a sheep (or lamb) on Paul's farm that died. I don't dispute that was the inspiration, but I have always found the song to have a very poignant subtext, related to the death of Paul's mother when he was 12 or 13. A number of Paul's Beatles songs have this theme as well, including "Things We Said Today," "Yesterday," "Let It Be," and "The Long and Winding Road." In "Little Lamb Dragonfly," I always imagined the "Little Lamb" part was Paul's mother singing to Paul about her death ("I have no answers for you little lamb/I can help you out/But we may never meet again"). The "Dragonfly" part continues the theme even more strongly ("Don't know why you hang around my door/I don't live here anymore/Since you've gone, I never know/I go on, but I miss you so"). It's really heartbreaking, if you ask me. A beautiful song, and the above is just one man's interpretation of it.

Point (2): I listened to the ending medley many times before it hit me that the guitar solos that end the album are actually playing the melodies of "Hold Me Tight," "Lazy Dynamite," and "Hands of Love," first individually, then at the same time. That realization just blew my mind. What a creative way to tie the medley together!

A great, unfairly unappreciated effort -- probably Macca's best.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If only for the one song, January 23, 2009

By 

John Galt 1957 "Clyde Conkey" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Red Rose Speedway (Audio CD)

Don't know why I waited 30 years to buy this CD. The song Little Lamb Dragonfly strikes a cord so deep in my soul that I cry every time I hear it. The melody, the words, the whole thing transcend my ability to describe it. The album is wonderful. Don't listen to those who say this is just a throwaway album by Paul. It is a delight start to finish.