The landmark 1973 classic turns 50 this year.
“Can you see it?”
Those were probably the last words Paul McCartney expected to hear after stepping into the cockpit of a plane carrying him and Wings bandmates Linda McCartney and Denny Laine to Lagos, Nigeria, in August 1973. Hoping to watch the landing from the front of the aircraft, McCartney – one of the most famous and successful musicians in the world — instead found himself helplessly standing by as the pilots went back and forth trying to locate the landing strip under the mist-covered jungle canopy. “Oh my God, are we even going to land?” McCartney later recalled of the panicky incident that marked the start of the sessions for Band on the Run, his 1973 masterpiece that turns 50 this December.
To record his fifth post-Beatles album and third LP with new band Wings, McCartney decided to relocate to Lagos for a change of scenery and musical inspiration. It was exactly the sort of bold gambit that his three former Beatle bandmates, just before the split, probably would have shot down without blinking. So, goodbye London, Beatles litigation and paparazzi; hello Africa, the warm sun, open air and Lagos’ music culture.
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