Paul McCartney claims Johnny Cash was his inspiration for starting Wings

To coincide with the re-release of Wings’ seminal album Band On The Run on February 2nd, Paul McCartney has revealed how Johnny Cash inspired him to form the band.

Following the end of The Beatles in 1970, McCartney was unsure where to take his career next. After much deliberation, he decided to form a start a new group with a set of relatively unknown musicians and his wife, Linda, which became Wings.

In a new interview with Mojo, McCartney recalled: “After the end of The Beatles I was faced with certain alternatives. One was to give up music entirely and do God knows what. Another was to start a super-band with very famous people, Eric Clapton and so on. I didn’t like either so I thought: How did The Beatles start?”

He continued: “It was a bunch of mates who didn’t know what they were doing. That’s when I realised maybe there is a third alternative: to get a band that isn’t massively famous, to not worry if we don’t know what we’re doing because we would form our character by learning along the way. It was a real act of faith. It was crazy, actually.”

McCartney then revealed how seeing Johnny Cash on television prompted him to start Wings, remembering: “We were in bed one night, newly married, when Johnny Cash came on the telly with a new band he’d formed with Carl Perkins, a big hero of mine. There they were, playing with some country musicians I had never heard of, looking like they were having fun.”

“I thought: here’s Johnny, he’s back, he’s doing it. So I turned to Linda and said: Do you want to form a band? And she went: ‘Sure.’ That’s how our relationship was. Do you want to go and live on a farm in Scotland? ‘Why not?’,” he added.

Last month, Wings founding member Denny Laine died, aged 79, following a battle with lung disease. Following news of Laine’s passing, McCartney said: “Denny was a great talent with a fine sense of humour and was always ready to help other people. He will be missed by all his fans and remembered with great fondness by his friends. I send my condolences and best wishes to his wife, Elizabeth and family.”

The new expanded edition of Band on the Run is set to be available in a series of new formats such as vinyl, CD, digital and Dolby ATMOS formats on February 2nd.

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