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Wild Life by  Released7 December 1971Recorded25 July – 2 August 1971Studio, LondonLength37:43 chronology
(1971)Wild Life
(1971)
(1973)

Wild Life is the debut studio album by the British–American rock band  and the third studio album by  after the breakup of . The album was recorded in eight days, from 25 July to 2 August 1971, at  by McCartney, his wife , session drummer , whom they had worked with on the McCartney's previous album , and guitarist , formerly of the English rock band . It was released by  on 7 December in the UK and US, to lukewarm critical and commercial reaction.

Recording

In July 1971, with a fresh set of McCartney tunes, the newly formed Wings recorded the album in slightly more than a week with the mindset that it had to be instant and raw in order to capture the freshness and vitality of a live studio recording. Five of the eight songs were recorded in one take. Paul McCartney later cited the quick recording schedule of  as an inspiration for this. The first session was held at  on 25 July. Footage of McCartney playing "Bip Bop" and "Hey Diddle" from around this time was later included in the made-for-TV film .

The album was rehearsed at McCartney's recording studio in Scotland dubbed Rude Studio, which Paul and Linda had used to make demos of songs that would be used in the album, and recorded at Abbey Road with Tony Clark and  engineering. Paul had lead vocal parts on all tracks, sharing those duties with Linda on "I Am Your Singer" and "Some People Never Know". "Tomorrow" features background vocals from  and .

After the rehearsals at Rude, the recording moved to , where the album was completed in a few weeks. According to drummer , five of the eight recorded tracks were done in one take. One almost definite example of this is "Mumbo", the opener on the album. According to Clark, they were just jamming and Clark decided to start recording. McCartney, upon noticing, shouted "Take it, Tony" and started ad-libbing lyrics.

On the promotional album The Complete Audio Guide to the Alan Parsons Project, Parsons discusses how he did a rough mix of "I Am Your Singer" that Paul liked so much, he used it for the final mix on the album.

Music and lyrics

"Dear Friend", recorded during the  sessions, was apparently an attempt at reconciliation with . It followed Lennon's attack on McCartney in the song "", from the album , which had been in retaliation for McCartney's perceived digs at Lennon in "" on . Music critic  cited "Dear Friend" as a counter-argument to the caricature of McCartney as an emotional lightweight.

Wild Life also included a  remake of 's 1957 top 40 hit "". A promotional single was distributed in the UK by Apple in December 1971 with catalogue No. R5932, but the commercial release was cancelled due to poor album sales.

Release and reception Professional ratingsReview scoresSourceRatingC–4/102.5/5

After announcing to the media the band's formation on 2 August 1971, the group were named "Wings" on 9 October. On 8 November, the group held a press party in London to announce both the group and Wild Life, which was released on 7 December, in both the UK and US, to lukewarm critical and commercial reaction. The album reached number 11 in the UK and number 10 in the US, where it . At the same press party, in an interview with , McCartney said that the group should soon be performing live.  wrote in  that he wondered whether the album may have been "deliberately second-rate." In ,  and  called the album "rushed, defensive, badly timed, and over-publicized" and wrote that it showed McCartney's songwriting "at an absolute  just when he needed a little respect". The liner notes for Wild Life (and on the  album) were credited to Clint Harrigan, but in 1990 McCartney admitted to journalist Peter Palmiere that he was Harrigan. Lennon claimed to know the identity of Harrigan during their  feud in 1972.

Track listing

All tracks written by  and , except where noted.

Original release

Side one

"Mumbo" – 3:54 "Bip Bop" – 4:14 "" (, , ) – 4:50 "Wild Life" – 6:48

Side two

"Some People Never Know" – 6:35 "I Am Your Singer" – 2:15 "" – 3:28 "Dear Friend" – 5:53