Complete Promo Clips Vol. 1 1970 – 1979 (Misterclaudel mcdvd-05/06)
DVD 1: Maybe I’m Amazed #1 (1970), Three Legs (1971), Heart Of The Country (1971), Give Ireland Back To The Irish (1972), Mary Had A Little Lamb #1 (1972), Mary Had A Little Lamb #2 (1972), Mary Had A Little Lamb #3 (1972), Hi Hi Hi (1972), C Moon (1972), My Love (1973), Helen Wheels (1973), Jet (1973), Band On The Run medley (1973), Band On The Run (1973), Junior’s Farm (1974), Venus And Mars Album Promo (1975), Venus And Mars – Rock Show (1975), Letting Go (1975), Live And Let Die (1976), Listen To What The Man Said (1976), Maybe I’m Amazed #2 (1976)
DVD 2: Silly Love Songs (1976), Mull Of Kintyre #1 (1977), Mull Of Kintyre #2 (1977), Mull Of Kintyre (Mike Yarwood Christmas Show 1977), London Town (1978), With A Little Luck (1978), I’ve Had Enough #1 (1978), I’ve Had Enough #2 (1978), Goodnight Tonight #1 (1979), Goodnight Tonight #2 (1979), Goodnight Tonight #3 (1979), Getting Closer (1979), Baby’s Request (1979), Old Siam Sir (1979), Winter Rose – Love Awake (1979), Spin It On (1979), Arrow Through Me (1979), Wonderful Christmas Time (1979), Again And Again And Again (1979)
Since all fans of Paul McCartney are anxiously waiting for the release of the three DVD retrospective The McCartney Years, the Beatle specialists at Misterclaudel release their most ambitious DVD project with the Complete Promo Clips series. Spread out over three volumes and six DVDs, they collect every promo video McCartney released including variations. This doesn’t included full-length television shows like “One Hand Clapping” or “James Paul McCartney” (both of which were released by Misterclaudel several years ago), but all of the videos associated with current hits.
The first disc begins with the hastily assembled videos for his first solo album McCartney in 1970 and runs through to 2007’s Memory Almost Full. The source for these videos are video tapes directly from television feeds and like any collection the quality in picture and sound varies, but on the whole they are all very good and watchable. Complete Promo Clipsisn’t as complete since it won’t have the never before released video for “Mamunia,” but it more than compensates for all of the videos that aren’t included on the official DVD set, which places all the videos on two discs and runs only until 2005. The first volume of the Promo Clips collection gathers together all of the releases videos from the initial ventures into his solo career in 1970 to the final days of Wings in 1979.
The first disc begins with McCartney’s first solo promo “Maybe I’m Amazed.” This video consists of Linda’s photos of the McCartney family on their Scottish farm. The clip premiered on the Ed Sullivan show on April 19, 1970 the day before McCartney was released. The video was taped off of television and is in excellent quality. The next two videos come from the 1971 release Ram. “3 Legs” is a simple video of Paul and Linda riding horses across their farm in Scotland and “Heart Of The Country” has silent footage of the couple walking along the seashore. This video was aired in Europe but not in the U.S.
There is an alternate version of “Heart Of The Country” which is similar to “Maybe I’m Amazed” with still photos of Paul, Linda and daughter Heather sunning themselves by a pool, but Misterclaudel didn’t include it in this collection. “Give Ireland Back To The Irish” dates to 1972 and is the first Wings clip in this collection. It shows Paul playing a snippet of the song with Henry McCullough, Denny Laine and Denny Seiwell on drums with a short interview in the middle of Paul saying how shocked he is at how oppressive the British government is in northern Ireland. Sadly the entire song isn’t present on the video.
What follows are three different versions of “Mary Had A Little Lamb” from Wild Life. The first is the so-called “bib” version which premiered on the “Flip Wilson Show” and is sourced from a recent rebroadcast on TV Land. It is called such because of the gaudy orange bibs the band wear as they are suspended over a sea of snowflake shapes. The second version is actually the first official video promo for Wings and features the band lip-syncing to the song in a barn while farm animals wander around them.
The third version is a short ten second clip and is the rarest of the three. It was aired only once on the BBC’s “The Basil Brush Show” and is notable for Denny Laine laying down on his back and a cute, fluffy white bunny sitting on Paul’s piano. “Hi Hi Hi” and “C Moon” were both filmed on the same sound stage after Wings’ first tour of Europe. Both consist of the band lip-syncing to the song on a stage and both were taped off of VH1 in excellent quality. “Hi Hi Hi” has nice close ups of McCullough playing slide but “C Moon” is rather lazily mimed by the band and McCullough plays drums while Seiwell alternates between xylophone and trumpet.
“My Love” features the band playing in a smoked filled room. It was during this filming session that McCullough supposedly vomited, infuriating the boss and spelling the end of his time with the band. No such evidence is apparent in this promo, but it is the last we see of him in this collection. “Helen Wheels” is the first video from Wings’ landmark Band On The Run LP and features only Paul, Linda and Denny Laine miming the song intercut with them driving around having fun. This version is in excellent quality taped off of the Japanese cable channel WOWOW.
The video for “Jet” is a rarity, being produced for Dutch television. It basically shows the lyrics written on cue cards with various pictures of the band shown between them. Both the sound and video are fair to good at best and this is included as a curiosity. The Band On The Run medley is a medley of the tunes from the album played over film of the sessions which produced the album cover. The following “Band On The Run” is the studio cut of the last third of the song (“well the rain exploded with a mighty crash”) played over a collage of live and candid clips from the Wings Over America tour. This also was taped off of VH1 and is in excellent quality.
“Junior’s Farm” is in very good quality and was filmed at the same time as the “One Hand Clapping” television special. For a long time it was the only part available to the public and is the only footage of drummer Geoff Britton’s participation with Wings. The Venus And Mars promo is a television advertisement with a short medley of the songs from the LP over the band playing billiards, ending with the red and orange balls that are featured on the album cover.
“Venus And Mars / Rock Show” and “Letting Go” are both performance clips from the album and are the first to have the new drummer Joe English in the group. The former clip is synced to the single version instead of the longer album version of the songs. Both were taped off of VH1 and are in excellent quality. “Live And Let Die” is a strange editing between a raw, black and white performance cutting in near the beginning of the song and the Rock Show version. “Listen To What The Man Said” is taken from Japanese television and is simply the movie version of the song, and is followed by the second version of “Maybe I’m Amazed” on this disc. This is the full band, Wings version as found on the Wings Over America triple live LP with a collage of live photos over the music. This was produced to support the single in 1976 and it is in very good quality.
“Silly Love Songs” is a collage of live footage and candid shots from 1976 including Paul’s infamous “disappearing ping-pong ball” trick, something he did so often former Wings members still talk about it. This was taped off of VH1 and is in excellent quality. This is followed by three separate versions of Paul’s biggest solo hit “Mull Of Kintyre.” The first clip is a version that was aired on US television and was taped off of VH1. It begins with Paul alone on the farm singing the song and strumming along and is joined by Linda, Denny Laine, all their neighbours, and the Campbelltown Pipers on the beach.
The second “Mull Of Kintyre” was filmed for “Top Of The Pops” and consists of Paul, Linda, and Laine walking around the stage in fog while singing the song. The third version of the song is direct from the Mike Yarwood Christmas Special from 1977. Like the “Top Of The Pops” taping, the three are sitting in smoke while singing along and are joined by bagpipers during the course of the song. “London Town” dates from the following year and is a simple video, showing the three walking down a studio set up a street while lip syncing to the track. Victor Spinetti, who acted in A Hard Day’s Night, Help! and “Magical Mystery Tour,” appears in this video and it ends with Paul flashing and revealing lace over his pants.
“With A Little Luck” is a performance video featuring the first appearance of drummer Steve Holly with the band. There is a small crowd dancing in front of the band while they play, and they look very very white. Even the black people in the crowd dance like white people. Both “London Town” and “With A Little Luck” were taped off of VH1 and are in pristine sound quality. “I’ve Had Enough” marks the first appearance of guitarist Laurence Juber with Wings, and there are two versions contained on this disc. They are virtually identical except that the second version has some split screen theatrics at the very beginning. The first version has much better sound and picture quality than the second.
Three different editions of “Goodnight Tonight” follow this. They differ in the amount of cuts between the 1920’s and the contemporary stage set. There is supposed to be a version that concentrates on the 20’s set only, but it isn’t included. The first and third versions of the video in this collection look like they have identical cuts, but the third has the best picture quality with very strong colors and having greater clarity. “Getting Closer” is another Back To The Egg video and shows the band playing on stage with intermittent footage of them driving a bus trying to find the gig. “Baby’s Request” is a concept video of the band in a desert dressed in English military fatigues.
Taped off of VH1, this is in excellent quality. “Old Siam Sir” is a simple performance video of a vasty underrated track. The setting looks like some kind of chapel. “Winter Rose / Love Awake” was only aired as part of the Back To The Eggvideo album shown on local US television stations. The first half shows the McCartney’s around Lympne castle outside of London and the second half contains the band miming to the song around a fire.
“Spin It On” is a fun performance video filmed in an airplane hangar. There is sped up film of Linda and Juber spinning around and Paul and Denny are in good spirits. “Arrow Through Me” is a simple studio recreation of the track. “Wonderful Christmastime” is a Paul McCartney solo single but features Wings in the clip. The band are partying in a club and at one point emerge from a giant gift box. The final clip is “Arrow Through Me.” This video shows the band in an overgrown meadow miming to the song. Promo Clips Vol. 1 isan excellent compilation of the early solo and Wings years, packaged in a plastic DVD case with an insert showing the Misterclaudel / Piccadilly Circus catalogue.
