When an artist holds the record for the most #1 songs in the history of the U.S. record charts there is never a shortage of commentary related to their work, nor is there a shortage of cover songs. This combination also acts as a catalyst to a song being turned into a Ted Tocks Covers feature.
For Paul McCartney, the fact that according to Billboard, he holds the record for the most number one songs on the Billboard Hot 100 explains why approximately one in thirty Ted Tocks Covers features offers either a Beatles song or a Paul McCartney song. The chart dominance shared above speaks to twenty #1 Beatles songs and 9 #1 songs by any combination of Paul McCartney and Wings.
How lucky we all are to be a part of the ‘music-verse’ during the reign of Sir Paul.
Today’s feature is ‘Silly Love Songs’ which was Paul McCartney’s fifth #1 as a solo artist, which at the time set the standard. ‘Silly Love Songs began its five-week run at #1 on this day in 1976.
It became his biggest hit with Wings and the #1 song of 1976.
What’s wrong with that? I’d like to know.”
So here I go…
…Again.
‘Silly Love Songs’ is an out and out response to an open criticism of his work. When the critique comes from former song writing partner, John Lennon, the retort had to be emphatic. Famously, Lennon had taken a swipe at McCartney during their post Beatles war of words, by suggesting that McCartney’s contribution to The Beatles was simply writing a series of “silly love songs”. Here is a quote from Paul that addresses this misplaced notion.
There were accusations in the mid-1970s – including one from John, that I was just writing ‘silly love songs’. I suppose the idea was that I should be a bit tougher, a bit more worldly. But then I suddenly realised, that’s exactly what love is – it’s worldly. ‘Some people want to fill the world/With silly love songs’. I’d been given that reputation, and I had to stand up for it. Instead of abandoning songs about love, just get on with it, get into it and don’t be embarrassed, because even thought you might say this is a soppy subject, it’s actually the opposite: this thing people can feel for each other that makes life better. I think that’s the crux of it, and if you want to be cynical, it’s easy, you can. ‘Love doesn’t come in a minute/Sometimes it doesn’t come at all’. I think a lot of people who are cynical about love haven’t been lucky enough to feel it.”
For fans of the Beatles this may seem familiar because in the post Sgt. Pepper’s era, critics of The Beatles opined that McCartney was the author of too many soppy songs, and challenged him to write something with a little bit more meaning, substance and bite. Barely missing a beat Paul McCartney recalled a statement by Pete Townshend of The Who, who claimed that when he wrote ‘I Can See for Miles’ he was simply trying to make as much noise as possible. Setting the course for a similar project McCartney produced the raging track we all know as ‘Helter Skelter’ which some musicologists point to as a launching pad for heavy metal.
Thing that make you go, hmm!
But the thing is, there is good, then there is great, then you get legendary and somewhere at the top of the mountain you will find Paul McCartney. Early in his career he found comfort in writing about the dynamics of love, while employing clever wordplay and repetitive phrases. This Beatles formula was derived from a range of influences, but within a matter of two years the Lennon/McCartney song writing duo became restless and took things to a different level. When you are this good, the hits can come in any form. When talking about ‘Silly Love Songs’ it is easy to point to the love theme, but truth be told it really is all about the bass.
That is the bass in your face. And that was really just because we were making a dance record on purpose. I had been accused around that time of singing too much about love. I said, ‘Hey, wait a minute! It’s the best thing!’ Love definitely beats hate, and it’s definitely kind of cool, at least in my book. But it can be perceived as sort of soppy. So, I wrote this song, and asked, ‘What’s wrong with silly love songs?’ I wrote it out on holiday in Hawaii; I just had piano and chords, and I then wanted to have a melody on bass. We really pushed the bass and drums right out front. But it drove the song along quite nicely. Pushed it hard. We wanted to make something you could dance to, so you had to.”
As one listens to the bass line it becomes apparent that ‘Silly Love Songs’ is a cleverly disguised disco song. Well into his second decade of hit-making Paul McCartney illustrates his adaptability, which extends to his continued influence on some of his most recognized peers. Soon after Paul McCartney wrote ‘Silly Love Songs’, Mick Jagger followed with ‘Miss You’ and Rod Stewart captured audiences with ‘Do Ya Think I’m Sexy’. From the forerunners of the ‘British Invasion’, the brief migration into disco was deemed acceptable by Sir Paul, and it sold because he managed to do it with a blend of styles and a dash of determination. He knew he had the makings of a hit song, but it had to be something people could identify with.
In January of 1976, reporter Barbara Charone was hanging out with Paul McCartney and Wings in Hawaii, and to our good fortune she was there to witness the song come together. Here is her account.
Gathered round a small cassette recorder, Paul and Linda McCartney intently listen to their at-home voices build each other. Occasionally tapping a foot to the lazy beat, Linda sways while lending additional harmonic support. Paul mentally rewrites the song, changing bits as the cassette gathers speed, visions of the final vinyl product dancing in his head…
As the basic rhythm track is still being perfected, Linda joins the rest of Wings upstairs in the control room, peering down from the glass partition victoriously every time a particularly good take is reached. Guitarists Denny Laine and Jimmy McCulloch scan newspapers on control room couches, apprehensively awaiting recording time. Downstairs in the studio, McCartney sits at the piano, leans into the microphone and begins to sing a song that differs greatly from the scratchy tune that had come out of those small cassette speakers, minutes before. Coaching English on several takes, McCartney joyously shouts encouraging instructions to his drummer over a practice vocal. ‘Latin beat in four bars,’ McCartney energetically instructs. As the song begins to blossom, Denny and Linda add imaginary harmonies to the tune. In just over an hour, the song has changed considerably.”
Paul McCartney had an idea of what he wanted, but in many ways, it came out in a stream of spontaneity. It was based on the concept of ‘give the people what they want’ and Paul McCartney above all else always knew what the buying public wanted, sometimes before they were even aware of their own desires. In other words; “you want this, you just don’t know it yet.”
Here is a quote from Paul McCartney’s co-arranger, Tony Dorsey who marvelled at his ingenuity.
Paul has absolute control of all of his music. I think he basically likes to have someone to critique his work to reassure him. Occasionally he would come to me and say, ‘I need horns here, but I have no idea, so give me your best shot.’ Or, like on ‘Silly Love Songs’, he knew exactly what he wanted from the horns but had no idea what he wanted from the strings.”
One could look back to the earliest days of The Beatles and detect similar processes at work in some of the Fab Four’s run of hit songs and albums with George Martin at the helm.
With ‘Silly Love Songs’, those who understand Paul McCartney and how his style was influenced by those immediately surrounding him, will note the similar song structure to ‘God Only Knows’ by The Beach Boys. Brian Wilson and his masterpiece ‘Pet Sounds’ was a source of intrigue for Paul McCartney. Just listen to the intro of both songs side by side. You may detect some similarities.
In the end, the listener is greeted with a love song that celebrates the authentic love between Paul and Linda. Much of the song exists as the McCartney’s ode to the importance of family. Through it all, ‘Silly Love Songs’ becomes eternally relatable, and the buying public ate it up. Listening to it nearly fifty years later, I would challenge you to listen to it again for the first time, and I guarantee you will discover the song for its relevance in the lexicon of the Paul McCartney catalogue.
It is certainly no accident that ‘Silly Love Songs’ became his biggest hit with Wings.
As great as the studio version is, it is the live version that really sells it. Here is a performance from Rockshow in 1976, a short time after its release. The blend of the dominant bassline and the horns leaves the audience in a hypnotic trance. Paul has won them over. Watch as he leads the band. He is the central figure in this clip for a reason.
This live version lacks the video accompaniment but you get a sense ot Paul McCartney and Wings’ commitment to excellence in the live setting. This recording was captured on the triple live album ‘Wings Over America’.
Sharing two live versions from 1976 was by designs because remarkably neither Paul McCartney nor Wings ever performed the song live again.
Think about it. The best-selling song in his post Beatles catalogue and he hasn’t played it in 48 years and counting. There is only one artist alive who could justify such a setlist decision. It is simply because his legion of hits is so plentiful that it is only after the curtain falls that audiences could note its absence.
The legend reigns.
Although. Paul decided to retire ‘Silly Love Songs’ the message lived on through the voice of numerous other artists and one unique presentation by Paul himself.
Recently, Shirley Bassey has appeared in a run of Ted Tocks features. This is purely by coincidence, but the fact is whatever Dame Shirley does is high end and needs to be shared. This is from her 1977 album ‘You Take My Heart Away’. Shirley Bassey and Paul McCartney are long time friends and both are considered music royalty in the U.K. Bassey’s cover of ‘Silly Love Songs’ is widely considered one of the best covers of Paul McCartney’s post Beatles material.
Following the dissolution of Wings, Paul McCartney embarked on a project that would yield his fifth solo album, ‘Give My Regards to Broad Street’. Partially due to the strength of the single, ‘No More Lonely Nights’ the 1984 album went to #1 in the U.K. There is merit in thinking that much of the attraction to ‘Give My Regards to Broad Street’ stemmed from some interesting re-interpretations of several classic Beatles and Paul McCartney recordings.
In the film this is the second big studio number which we made as if for a video. Really, we just wanted to use the opportunity of being in a studio to dress up. The story for the film was that we were on a planet and we were a little music box that appears every day, plays a song and disappears.”
The ever-classy McCartney dedicated the six Lennon-McCartney tracks on this album to the memory of his long-time song writing partner. Here is the updated version of ‘Silly Love Songs’.
One year later one of the key figures in the Liverpool ‘Merseybeat’ style, Gerry Marsden who was the leader of The Beatles rival band Gerry and the Pacemakers, released this cover of ‘Silly Love Songs’ on his album ’18 Hits of Lennon and McCartney’. This was released on the K-Tel label. Wow!
In 1996, Denny Laine released ‘A Tribute to Paul McCartney and Wings’ which included this strong and definitely edgier version of ‘Silly Love Songs’. I love the rock and roll vibe from Laine whose friendship with Paul McCartney went back to his days in The Moody Blues. When Paul McCartney formed Wings, Denny Laine was top of mind and he and Denny Selwell formed a dynamic guitar tandem that saw Laine remain through the band’s decade long run as a global force. Sadly, Denny Laine died in December of 2023 on the anniversary of ‘Band on the Run’ hitting #1 in the United States. It was exactly 50 years to the day that the song hit the ‘toppermost of the poppermost’.
As the curtain was closing on the 20th century, a New Zealand act called Ardijah went to #1 in their native country with a what they referred to as a poly-funk version of ‘Silly Love Songs’. In all, this cover remained on the ‘kiwi’ charts for 17 weeks. This adds credence to the universal popularity of Paul McCartney and Wings.
As recently as 2021, the quality covers keep coming. Here is another important version to share. Enjoy Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis Jr. whose time together goes all the way back to 5th Dimension in 1966/67. This duo is best known for their Grammy Award winning song, ‘You Don’t Have to Be a Star (To Be In My Show)’. In 2021 the couple released a tribute to the Lennon and McCartney song writing tandem called ‘Blackbird Lennon-McCartney Icons’. They were inspired to record in response to their concerns with the rising tide of racism and intolerance in the United States.
It was a civil rights movement which became a human rights movement, with a goal to come together during trying times.”
Music has the potential to heal broken souls but way too often the artists are preaching to the converted.
There is something about the eternal quality of Paul McCartney’s music and his presence in the mainstream. In 2015, Sir Paul joined forces with Rihanna and Kanye West to record ‘FourFive Seconds’. McCartney shared the production credit with West, while the list of song writers, credits ten contributors, led by Kanye and Paul. The vocals are primarily handled by Rihanna who does a magnificent job. Backing vocal contributions are provided courtesy of Wilson-Phillips.
I think I’ve had enough
I might get a little drunk
I say what’s on my mind
I might do a little time
‘Cause all of my kindness
Is taken for weakness”
This combination of artists and genres struck a chord, as the song went to #1 in seven countries and hit the top 5 in another five national charts.
A little bit of folk and pop, mixed with a whole lotta soul.
Remember what I said about adaptability?
Paul McCartney just knows what will sell, and he always had a knack for delivering just the right blend of sounds.
Call it intuition, and perhaps you can call it silly, but a six-decade run of success will leave you eternally amazed…
…Maybe?
Ted Tocks Covers 