Written by: McCartney
Recorded: August-November 1973
Producer: Paul McCartney
Released: 30 November 1973 (UK), 3 December 1973 (US)
Available on:
Band On The Run
Wings Over America
One Hand Clapping
Personnel
Paul McCartney: vocals, guitar
Linda McCartney: backing vocals
Denny Laine: backing vocals, guitar
Howie Casey: saxophone
Remi Kebaka: percussion
Written during a holiday in Jamaica, ‘Bluebird’ continued the themes of personal emancipation explored by Paul McCartney on his 1968 song ‘Blackbird’.
When you write something satisfying, it’s a feeling that makes you want to do it again. It’s an ‘at home’ songs, when I would have some free time, sitting around with a guitar. It’s a bird flying in, from the point of view of the bird. It’s actually the bird singing it, so it’s mystical, I suppose. It could work in a mystical Chinese movie like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragen; it’d fit in something like that.
Billboard, 17 March 2001
McCartney used the flight of a bluebird as a metaphor for the power of love to set a person free from mental and physical constraints. Whereas ‘Blackbird’ had been written about the civil rights struggle in the United States, ‘Bluebird’ was more personal, and reflected his contentment with Linda McCartney and the stability after the dissolution of The Beatles’ business partnership.
Recording for ‘Bluebird’ began in Lagos, Nigeria, and the song was completed at George Martin’s AIR Studios in London. Coincidentally, the percussionist on the song was a Nigerian working in the English capital.
The only other musician on the album, other than the orchestra, is, funnily enough, African! We were gonna use African musicians, but when we were told we were about to pinch the music we thought ‘Well, up you, we’ll do it ourselves then, so there’s no question about it.’ Then we were back in London working at AIR Studios and this old friend from the past named Remi Kabaka turns up. And he’s from Lagos! He played on one of the tracks, he plays a bit of percussion on ‘Bluebird’, so he’s the only one who ended up doing anything on the album.
Paul McCartney In His Own Words, Paul Gambaccini
The other session musician on ‘Bluebird’ was saxophonist Howie Casey, who also performed on ‘Jet’ and ‘Mrs Vandebilt’. Casey was a former member of Liverpudlian band Derry And The Seniors, who The Beatles had known in their Cavern Club days.
The sax solo was Howie Casey, and it was one of those first takes. Howie thought he was just busking it through, very roughly, and wasn’t thinking about it. We said, ‘OK! That’s it!’ He said, ‘Oh, no, can I do another one?’ I said, ‘Look, do another one by all means, but believe me, Howie, that was it.’
Billboard, 17 March 2001
‘Bluebird’ was the b-side of ‘Mrs Vandebilt’, a January 1974 single released in Australia and mainland Europe and Australia. The song was also performed by Wings throughout their 1975-76 tours.
In the Wingspan TV thing, there’s a nice little moment where we do an a cappella version with just one guitar accompanying it. Again, that version will get in the box set. It’s from when I was busted in Japan, for marijuana possession and was not allowed to go back in by the minister of state.The promoter said that it would be good to not disappoint the fans – and it would help my case if I ever wanted to get back in – to do a little message for the Japanese fans. So I’m there saying, ‘Hello, people of Japan. Sorry I can’t come on my tour. But we hope to see you in the future. Meanwhile…’ And we do our a cappella version of ‘Bluebird’.
Billboard, 17 March 2001
What does the bit about “when we were told we were about to pinch the music” mean? I know the quote is at least 25 years old, but does anyone have any background on what he was talking about?
In a pretty recent interview (I think it was BBC Mastertapes or something like that?), Paul said that a local Nigerian big man accused Paul of coming to Nigeria to appropriate their music (as so many white musicians have appropriated black sounds in the past). Paul visited the man at his house and made peace with him, explained to him that they had just come to record his own stuff, not to listen to Nigerian music and copy it. But Paul must have been sensitive to the fact that Bluebird played with Nigerian musicians might have been regarded as exactly the kind of cultural appropriation that he’d just been accused of, so he decided to record that one in the UK. But ended up having a Nigerian playing on it anyway!
@ Dee Kay: the Nigerian musician that complained about McCartney coming to Africa to steal the music was Fela Kuti.
Here’ a quote from an interview Paul gave to Marc Maron in 2018:
” [Fela] came over with his 30 wives and a studio full of ganja. He was one wild cat, he used to have a bottle of whiskey in which was marinating a pound of pot… in the whiskey. We turned out to be real good friends, he got it, he said ‘no you’re not doing that’ [stealing African music].
Ginger Baker was there, he was his big friend. So, Fela invites us to his club which was outside Lagos, the Afrika Shrine. This was a few of us, little white people, me and a couple of friends. So we go out there and I say, ‘”let’s not smoke any pot.” Cause it’s pretty crazy, we’re out in the jungle and it’s pitch black.
So we’re sitting there with Fela [at The Shrine] and one of Fela’s guys comes up, he’s crouching and he’s got a packet of Rothmans cigarettes. They’re all joints. He goes, ‘”You want one of these?” I say, “no thanks,” so he carries around and gets to Ginger Baker who says “Yeah man! Sure!’”
Then Fela shouts, “Ginger Baker! The only man I know never refuse a smoke!”
So I go, “A-ha! Ok, I’ll have one of those.”
Man. I tripped out. It was so strong. It was stronger than anything I’ve ever had, I don’t know if there was something in it.
But in the end it was a good night.”
Strange there is no one credited for playing drums and bass?
Like most of the material on Band on the run an uninteresting song both lyrically and musically.