A little earlier this year we found a New Zealand pressing of Paul McCartney and Wings controversial ‘Give Ireland Back to the Irish’ dating from 1972. As was the case in most of the rest of the world this was on a custom Apple label.
The other day at one of our local second-hand vinyl favourites (Audiomania) we found an original UK pressing, complete with its bright yellow custom Wings paper sleeve: 
The single itself, also on custom Apple labels, is in near mint condition:
We’ve just returned from the annual Glebe Record Fair – one of the biggest of the year – held in the Sydney suburb of Glebe:
The two photos below were taken just after opening time at 9.00 am. This was before the venue really became absolutely packed with patrons hungrily seeking out vinyl, books and CDs. As you can see it’s already very crowded:
And the crowds just got bigger and bigger. In the melee that ensued we were lucky to discover four interesting little 45 singles. First up, a US white-label pressing of George Harrison’s ‘This Song’ from 1976 on his Dark Horse label, complete in its original outer sleeve. First pressings of this came with these white labels, while later issues have the traditional colour label:
At the same vendor’s stall we also discovered this unusual New Zealand pressing of Paul McCartney and Wings controversial ‘Give Ireland Back to the Irish’, dating from 1972. As was the case in most of the rest of the world this is on a custom Apple label:
A little later in another pile of 45s we spied this nice US pressing (and original picture sleeve) of Mary Hopkin singing ‘Goodbye’:
By this time we were feeling pretty weary, and the crowds had built considerably. We were just about to leave and doing one final trawl through some singles at another table when out popped this rare little gem:
It’s a 1986 UK pressing with re-mixes of the Suzy and the Red Stripes song ‘Seaside Woman‘ (a.k.a Linda McCartney and husband Paul). This was originally released on the A&M label back in 1980 with this cover:
In our last post we featured the two Best Buy editions of the recent Venus and Mars and Wings at the Speed of Sound Paul McCartney Archive Collection reissues.
Darienzo has pointed out that the photo montages of the band on the back of the 2014 reissued Speed Of Sound are not the same as those used for the original sleeve in 1976.
Here’s the original rear cover for the Wings at the Speed of Sound LP:
And here’s the 2014 Speed of Sound Archive Edition LP:
Not really sure why they felt the need to re-do all those photos…..
By the way, Mojo magazine last year had a very interesting article about the photo shoot for that rear cover, including these original images (by photographer Clive Arrowsmith) which were used to create the striking over-layed look of the five band members: 
P.S. It was Clive Arrowsmith who took the famous Band on the Run front cover image:
It’s taken a while to feature these latest Paul McCartney and Wings items because of the convoluted process involved in securing copies for the collection.
These are the Best Buy limited editions of the latest Paul McCartney Archive series of CDs. The CD’s themselves are the standard US triple gatefold two-disc sets consisting of the remastered album on one CD, plus a Bonus Audio CD of rare tracks. Here’s Venus and Mars:
And here’s Wings at the Speed of Sound:
But as you can see by the stickers on the front of each – these were sold with a voucher inside to receive a bonus, limited edition 7″ 45 single – one from each album. The difficult (and time consuming part) for collectors living outside the USA was that these singles (reportedly limited to 5,000 copies each) were only available to customers of the Best Buy chain who were US residents. The process is that you mail back the voucher with a small postage and handling fee included, and Best Buy then mails you a picture cover replica of an original vinyl single from either album. Residents outside the States had to find an accomodating Ebay seller who would do this – and then post the whole lot to you…..hence the delay in being able to show these items on this blog…..ours have finally arrived.
For Venus and Mars the vinyl single is ‘Letting Go’/’You Gave Me the Answer’ (not ‘Venus and Mars/’Rock Show’ as original advertised by Best Buy back in October last year):
And from Wings at the Speed of Sound its ‘Let ‘Em In’/’Beware My Love’: 
Both these vinyl singles have front covers which are replicas of the originals, but the rear covers are dedicated to promoting the 2014 reissues of the Archive Collection CDs. And as you can see in the photos (if you look closely) there’s a sticker on the rear of each saying “Made in Germany”. It appears that subsequent to the Best Buy deal these singles were also made available in limited numbers to some independent record stores in Europe and the UK.
As with previous releases in this series, inside both CDs is a small paper insert advertising what could be the next two releases in the Archive Series Tug of War and Pipes of Peace:
The other thing to note is that both the Venus and Mars and the Wings at the Speed of Sound Best Buy CDs have stickers pasted over the originals with different barcode/UPC numbers to the usual releases. These are 88072 36382 3 and 88072 36383 0 respectively. The non-Best Buy discs are 88072 35650 4 and 888072 35671 9.
For a video of how Venus and Mars and Wings At the Speed of Sound are packaged, the booklets, etc. have look at these YouTube clips prepared by Jose Miguel Grey:
As part of the continuing publicity push for the Archive Series re-issues this week of Venus and Mars and Wings At The Speed of Sound, Paul McCartney has made available another exclusive bonus track.
It’s a Wings track called ‘Love My Baby’ and is taken from the One Hand Clapping film:
Like the extended and remastered version of the song ‘Letting Go’ (released last week), ‘Love My Baby’ is not on the forthcoming re-issues of Venus and Mars or At the Speed of Sound, but is only being made available as a free download from paulmccartney.com
It’s short and cute. Sounds like Paul is playing a toy piano – long before that became fashionable!
One Hand Clapping was filmed in Studio 2 at Abbey Road in late summer of 1974. The documentary captures Paul playing numbers from Band on the Run with Wings.
He’s said of the film: “It’s nice to see that one re-surfacing. It was made by a friend of mine, David Litchfield; he produced a little magazine that was funky (Ritz, co-edited with David Bailey). We decided that he would shoot a very simple piece, on video. We would just go into Abbey Road and play basically what we had rehearsed. So we went in there and it was very simply filmed, absolute basic stuff, and I think its charm now is that there’s no pretence. It is what it is. We just called it One Hand Clapping, for absolutely no reason.”
Read more about the song on Buzzfeed.
Paul McCartney has today made available an exclusive, extended and remastered version of the song ‘Letting Go’. The song won’t be on the forthcoming re-issue of Venus and Mars (out next week), but is only available as a free download from paulmccartney.com
Venus and Mars and Wings at the Speed of Sound are the latest additions to the Paul McCartney Archive Collection. Both albums will be reissued on CD, vinyl and digital, including previously unreleased material, on November 3 (UK), and November 4 (US).
For collectors and completists there are not one, but three new Beatle and Beatle-related 7″ vinyl singles on the way.
The first two are from Paul McCartney and Wings.
In association with the Best Buy electronics supermarket chain in the USA, two 7″ vinyl singles – one taken from Venus and Mars, and one from Wings at the Speed of Sound – will be released on November 4 as limited bonus items with the purchase of the forthcoming re-issues of these two titles: 
From the description on the stickers (i.e. “DETAILS INSIDE”), it looks like there will be a coupon included to redeem these special vinyl singles after initial purchase, though we’re not sure about this.
Also, based on a tiny image on the Best Buy site, it looks like the singles will come in picture sleeves which re-create the original artwork:
The third 7″ vinyl item will be released on November 28 as part of the Record Store Day “Black Friday” celebrations at independent record stores. It’s a limited pressing of the Beatles EP Long Tall Sally (originally released in the UK in 1964):
Songs on the EP are: “Long Tall Sally”; “I Call Your Name”; “Matchbox” and “Slow Down”.
Like the recent reissues of the Beatles original albums, this EP is being released in glorious mono. The Long Tall Sally 7” vinyl EP is being specially reissued for Record Store Day’s Black Friday in very limited quantities. Click here for the full list of special Record Store Day releases.
In celebration of the forthcoming Wings reissues, Venus and Mars and At The Speed Of Sound, PaulMcCartney.com has created a new interactive microsite telling the story of Wings; its members, their influences and of course – the music. It’s pretty good! Click here to go there, or just click the the photo: 
The site also contains a new lyric video by artist Thomas Hicks for the Venus and Mars track ‘Call Me Back Again’. To see it, and to read the press release, click on the image below:
:
The long-expected official announcement of the next two instalments in the Paul McCartney Archive Collection has just been made.
Paul McCartney and Wings’ Venus and Mars (1975) and At The Speed of Sound (1976) will both be issued on 22 September in the UK and 23 September in the US, slotting into an already crowded Beatles and related release schedule for September:
Both albums will be available in a variety of physical and digital formats:
The Standard Editions will be a 2 CD set featuring the original albums remastered, plus a second CD of bonus material including demos and previously un-released tracks.
The Deluxe Editions will each contain 2 CDs plus a DVD, housed in a numbered hardback book featuring new articles, interviews, photographs, facsimile archive inserts and expanded track-by-track information. The DVD will feature material filmed at the time of each album’s release, some of which is previously unseen.
Both albums will be issued on vinyl in special gatefold covers. Digital downloads will be available for both Standard and Deluxe, and in a variety of formats including hi-res versions.
The detailed contents of each (including full track-lists) can be found at the Paul McCartney official page, and there’s more info in these two new YouTube clips which have just gone public:
This is fun:
Beatles Blog 