Cover photoshoot: Wings Greatest by Wings

The cover photoshoot for Wings’ first compilation, Wings Greatest, took place on 14 October 1978.

As with all Wings albums since Band On The Run, the design was handled by Hipgnosis.

Paul and Linda McCartney had recently bought ‘Semiramis’, a sculpture by Romanian artist Demétre Chiparus, which they wanted to feature on the cover. However, their stipulation to Hipgnosis’s Aubrey Powell was that they wanted Mount Everest to be the backdrop.

Powell unsurprisingly pushed back on the idea, suggesting instead that they photograph the ornament on the Matterhorn in the Swiss Alps. That was also unfeasible, due to the difficulty in landing a helicopter on the slopes. A compromise was to use a neighbouring mountain, the Unterrothorn.

Powell accompanied photographer Angus Forbes and a small crew on this day to shoot the image.

It just so happened that a helicopter couldn’t fly to the top of the Matterhorn, but there was a mountain next to it called the Rothorn, which a helicopter couldn’t land on, but it could go at a 45 degree [angle], which would allow us to open the door and put the statue on top of the mountain. And Paul said, ‘Yeah, okay, great. You know what I want – I want the mountains behind, and snow, and stuff like that.’

It was a lot of fun, and very dangerous, and absolutely terrifying. I think it’s one of the most frightening shoots I’ve ever done, because the top of the Rothorn is about the size of four sitting rooms, with a 10,000-foot drop below you, on all sides. And the funniest thing was, if you look at the cover, you can’t see the Matterhorn behind, although the Matterhorn was there. I did shoot pictures that showed it, but Paul didn’t want them. He wanted it very much to be about the statue.

When we finished the cover he was really happy. And I’ll always remember, it was just before I walked out of the door of his house, he said to me, ‘You know, we could’ve shot this in a studio with an effect drop.’ And I said, ‘Yeah, I know, but we didn’t – we did it for real, and it’s all in Club Sandwich, and there are photographs everywhere, and it’s great PR.’ And he said, ‘I know, man, it’s terrific.’

Also shot on this day was the rear album cover, which showed the mountain range as a backdrop to superimposed images of single and album covers, and a central portrait of Wings by Clive Arrowsmith.

Wings Greatest was released on 1 December 1978.