“Band on the Run” is a complex track by Paul McCartney that tells the story of a band escaping prison. McCartney has always been a great storyteller through his music, and he based this story on a memorable George Harrison quote from when they were with The Beatles.
‘Band on the Run’ is one of Paul McCartney’s biggest hits
“Band on the Run” is the title track of the album of the same name. The track was released as a single in 1974 and reached No. 1 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 and No. 2 in the U.K. It’s one of McCartney’s most significant hits from his time with Wings.
The song is a unique three-part medley that begins with a lonesome band stuck in prison, hoping to escape. The second half of the track sees their fortune turn as it turns into a more country and peaceful sound that portrays their escape. In a 2010 interview with Clash Magazine, McCartney said “Band on the Run” represented how The Beatles felt when the band became more about business than creativity. They began to feel trapped.
“It was symbolic: ‘If we ever get out of here … All I need is a pint a day’,” McCartney explained. “[In the Beatles], we’d started off as just kids really, who loved our music and wanted to earn a bob or two so we could get a guitar and get a nice car. It was very simple ambitions at first. But then, you know, as it went on it became business meetings and all of that … So there was a feeling of ‘if we ever get out of here’, yeah. And I did.”
Paul McCartney based the story for the song on a George Harrison quote
In the novel Paul McCartney in His Own Words by Paul Gambaccini, Paul McCartney discussed the origins of “Band on the Run.” He said the line “If we ever get out of here” came from George Harrison in an Apple meeting for The Beatles. Harrison was expressing his frustrations with the band’s business side and half-joked about escaping. McCartney recalled the line and turned it into a prison break story.
“It’s just a good flow of words. I really don’t analyze stuff, and, if I do, I kind of remember what it meant about three months later, just lying in bed one night,” McCartney said. “It started off with ‘If I ever get out of here.’ That came from a remark George made at one of the Apple meetings. He was saying that we were all prisoners in some way, some kind of remark like that. ‘If we ever get out of here,’ the prison bit, and I thought that would be a nice way to start an album. A million reasons, really. I can never lay them all down. It’s a million things; I don’t like to analyze them, all put together. Band on the run – escaping, freedom, criminals. You name it; it’s there.”
McCartney was dealing with legal troubles at the time
While the story in “Band on the Run” is fake, Paul McCartney had a few run-ins with the law at the time. Part of the lyrics might have been him expressing his grievances with the legal system and its strict policies on pot.
“We were being outlawed for pot,” McCartney shared. “And our argument on [‘Band on the Run’] was ‘Don’t put us on the wrong side. We’re not criminals, we don’t want to be.’ So I just made up a story about people breaking out of prison.”
