Paul McCartney and Wings: Band on the Run, Underdubbed (digital outlets)

Band on the Run is widely accepted as McCartney best post-Beatles album, but it was born our of adversity.

The ground had been prepared by the excellent if underrated Ram (a longtime Essential Elsewhere album which has grown in stature over time) and the lesser Red Rose Speedway, but on the eve of recording his next album two band members quit just before they were due to leave for sessions in Nigeria, the studio in Lagos required renovation, McCartney was mugged and the tapes lost and . . .

But he salvaged the songs and with extensive overdubbing, and work by Tony Visconti, turned the pop songs into the polished and orchestrated songs we know while not losing their core craftsmanship.

Band on the Run has previously undergone the whole remaster and re-presentation in a box set but on its 50^th anniversary McCartney was not one to let the opportunity to go by.

So here it is again as a double album, the first of which is the original album so our attention turns to the other disc, the “underdubbed” version in which we hear the songs without the Visconti treatments and overdubs.

And what we hear are familiar songs now presented as engaging folk (Mamunia, Bluebird), edgy and enthusiastic rehearsal room rock (Let Me Roll It, Jet) and something which seems a work in progress made of separate pieces which somehow come together into a whole (the meandering working drawing of Picasso's Last Words with odd drum bits, a slice of Jet making an unexpected appearance and a lovely and sad McCartney vocal).

Picasso's Last Words (underdubbed)

Paul McCartney hardly needs any more flattery for his songcraft but here is why he gets it. He makes it sound effortless.

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You can purchase the Underdubbed version of Band on the Run at Amazon and iTunes.