Just a few notes on the listings…  Any songs that are struck through are actually sung by someone other than the specified ex-Beatles, whether it is Yoko Ono or Denny Laine.  Meanwhile songs in italics are instrumentals.  These two types of songs are far less likely to make the cut for the album, as there are not a lot of previous examples of these two types of song on the officially released Beatles albums.

After two rounds containing two of John and Paul’s best albums, it is inevitable that things can’t maintain this level consistency.  Two of the least loved solo Beatles albums came out in late ’71 and ’72.  While trading timeless for timely, both John and Paul have missed their mark, although neither album is nearly as dire as their popular reputation suggests.  There are some surprising connections between the two.  While John had recorded three albums with Yoko prior to this, Some Time In New York City was the couple’s first joint foray into straight forward pop/rock music and not experimental noise and sound collage.  While some of John’s output had been technically credited to the Plastic Ono Band, there’s not a lot of chance of collaboration in a group with no actual members on any sort of permanent basis.  So this album really represents the first time since the Beatles that John had worked in his usual milieu with someone else.

By the same token, Ram was credited to Paul & Linda, but Linda’s contributions seemed to just be helping with the backing vocals and taking credit for some of the songwriting for legal reasons.  With Wings, Paul had finally achieved his dream of getting a band together that he could take on the road again.  Of course, how much Wings is a “band” how much it is a “Paul McCartney backing group” depends on Paul’s mood on the album.  But at least at first, with Wild Life, Paul was trying to convince us that Wings were a fully-functioning, collaborative musical unit.

At the time of this record, John was (as the title suggests) living in New York City.  His battles with the American government over his immigration status, led him down a rabbit-hole of radicalism, hanging out with activists like Jerry Rubin and yippie-founder, Abbie Hoffman.  This only intensified Nixon’s personal paranoia, and probably delayed his green card more than anything else.  While Lennon had always been outspoken in his political beliefs, with songs like Revolution or Imagine or even Give Peace A Chance, he always dealt in generalities and philosophies rather than anything terribly specific.  On Some Time In New York City however, John and Yoko are finally naming names, protesting actual events, and citing specific examples.  As a result, a lot of the lyrics on this album dated fairly quickly, and will be of no meaning to your average listener today, without looking up all the references on Wikipedia.

Paul’s album with his new group is also pretty rushed, but not because of the political nature of the lyrics.  Instead, Paul wanted to get this new group off the ground long before they were ready to leave the nest.  The line-up hadn’t fully formed, and this is the only iteration of Wings as a four-piece.  There are only eight tracks on Wild Life, of which one is a cover, one is an improvised jam session, and one is an outtake from the Ram sessions.  Apparently inspired by tales of Bob Dylan’s frenetic recording sessions, Paul decided to take his band into the studio to knock out an album in a week, before they had the songs really ready.  Both the one-man-band ethos of McCartney and the elaborate production of Ram required some time and forethought and effort.  Paul thought he would try to do something quick and slap-dash.  While it was a noble effort, it is not a style that a control freak like McCartney thrives in, and as a result, Wild Life is a one-off experiment that was never attempted again.

While the ephemeral nature of the political lyrics are the most commonly cited reason for the dislike of Some Time In New York City, I think a lot of it has to do with the prominence of Yoko (and her idiosyncratic vocals) on most of the tracks.  Of the ten songs on the studio album, Yoko sings 30% on her own and duets with John on another 40%.  If you don’t want any Ono on your Lennon songs, that leaves only New York City, John Sinclair, and the first song on the record, which is not a lot.

Speaking of the first song (and the first single) from the record, I’m not typing out that title.  We all know what it is.  While I believe in freedom of speech, and John’s right to sing that word if he wants to; I don’t want to listen to it.  Especially not from a white guy.  While I agree with the general sentiment of the lyric (women are treated poorly), there’s got to be a better way to say it that doesn’t include that word.  It’s not even slipped in there like on Dylan’s Hurricane or sung from a different point-of-view, like on Randy Newman’s Rednecks.  It’s part of the title and the chorus and he sings it over and over again.  Some people trying to find the one god thing to say about Some Time In New York City, will champion this song (which was included on his greatest hits, Shaved Fish) saying that if you can get past the word itself, the music is pretty good, but I can’t even get into that.  It just sounds like a fairly standard Lennon track, not nearly as good as Power To The People, with a cheezy sax solo.

Of course, George’s third record was equally unimpressive.  Luckily for him, it was boxed up with previous two superior discs so critics weren’t as harsh.  Subtitled Apple Jam, the third record of All Things Must Pass contains nothing but instrumental noodling from George and what was beginning to coalesce into Derek & The Dominoes.  While the caliber of musicianship on display is quite impressive, there’s nothing particularly notable about any of these tracks besides the titles.  It all feels somewhere between filler and showboating.

George wasn’t the only ex-Beatle needlessly tacking on a whole extra disc onto their latest release.  Some Time In New York City came bundled with a second record subtitled Live Jam that did this record no favors in improving its reputation.  Side one featured two songs performed live from a UNICEF benefit concert from late 1969, featuring George Harrison, Keith Moon, and a bunch of people from Delany & Bonnie.  There’s an eight-and-a-half minute version of Cold Turkey that slowly devolves into a Yoko Ono-style noise experiment followed by a sixteen minute version of Don’t Worry Kyoko that starts out as a Yoko Ono-style noise experiment and only gets more unlistenable from there.

The second half features John & Yoko sitting in with Frank Zappa and the Mothers.  While there’s a pretty straight-forward cover of Well (Baby Please Don’t Go) most of it sounds like what you’d expect a Zappa/Ono mash-up to sound like.  Apparently John & Yoko assumed the band were all jamming and not playing the Zappa composition King Kong, so they took credit for the tracks, all while mixing out Mothers’ vocalists Flo & Eddie.  When Zappa finally released his version in 1992 on Playground Psychotics it featured a different mix, track breaks, songwriting credits and song titles (including the painfully accurate A Small Eternity With Yoko Ono).

In general, most people tend to just pretend this whole second disc doesn’t exist.  It’s kinda of like a much longer Revolution #9 to most fans, only it’s been quarantined to its own record making it that much easier to skip.  It’s funny that after defining the double-album with 1968’s self-titled album, none of the solo Beatles really released a 2 disc set during their career.  Certainly Paul threatened to a number of times (Red Rose Speedway and McCartney II) but each time he chickened out at the last minute.

For this playlist, there is a dearth of big hit singles to really open with, so instead I decided to start with the John & Yoko duet The Luck Of The Irish, one of two songs on this album inspired by the 1972 Bogside Massacre.  The other track, Sunday Bloody Sunday shares a title with U2’s composition on the same subject, but I chose this song as I enjoy its sarcastic bent (joking that this is an example of good luck for the Irish) while plying on every stereotype and trope about Ireland they could think of.  However, John and Bono weren’t the only one moved to put pen to paper in response to these killings.  In the rare instance of two ex-Beatles writing about the exact same thing, McCartney’s first single release was the rare political stab, Give Ireland Back To The Irish.

It may seem somewhat hypocritical after decrying “too many people preaching practices” on the last album; Paul’s song may be more convincing as an argument, if not as a song.  McCartney starts by buttering up his audience, reminding Britain how tremendous they are.  From there he tries to put the listener in the angry Irish patriot’s shoes, and reminds England of that IRA members also have families and believe in the Judeo-Christian god.  He also remarks their similarities in appearance to Paul McCartney himself.  Comparing and contrasting these two songs is a pretty quick way of seeing and dissecting the differences in approach between Lennon and McCartney.

While neither George nor Ringo have songs about “Bloody Sunday”, Harrison did release his big political single, Bangla Desh, around the same time, continuing the playlist’s political theme.  It’s a fine funky workout, with most of the heavy lifting done by Leon Russell.  The single didn’t sell that well though, prompting George to create the modern rock-star benefit with Concert For Bangla Desh.

Ringo also wrote a song inspired by the events of the day.  But for the B-side to his sequel to It Don’t Come Easy, Starr penned a tune for the spaghetti western he was in and recounted vaguely the plot of the film.  While the movie’s producers were more than happy to employ Ringo as an actor playing a Mexican bandito, they declined his offer to use this song in their film.  It’s a shame because this one of Ringo’s more adventurous and experimental productions, featuring timpani and vibra-slap and woodblocks and all sort of odd percussion.

From here we get another overtly political song from John Lennon, this one titled John Sinclair.  This song features some nice slide guitar work from Lennon on the resophonic guitar.  The lyrics paint a nice portrait of the jailed poet and activist, although the message is nearly undone by Lennon’s over-use of the repeated “got to, got to, got to…” hook.

Since there is a dearth of usable material from Apple Jam and George only had the one single, I have called an audible and included the Early Takes Vol. 1 version of Woman Don’t You Cry For Me in the mix.  While he isn’t playing a dobro, the use of the bottleneck guitar helps tie this song in with the previous one.  Plus this is one of the more produced demos of the time, with George’s audibly tapping foot and someone playing a jaw-harp in addition to the vocals and guitar.

We close Side One with Paul’s Dear Friend.  McCartney sounds genuinely pained as he responds to the wounds that Lennon inflicted with How Do You Sleep?  It is one of the most personal and stunning songs in Paul’s cannon.  Even his song for John after his murder, Here Today, doesn’t sound as vulnerable.  It’s a great way to close the side, although much like the title track, this song could’ve (and occasionally does) end a couple of times, before rising back to life and continuing on for a couple of minutes.  It’s a good song, but there’s not much to it.  It doesn’t need to be nearly six minutes when there is really only the two verses.  Paul could’ve used an editor here.

Side Two Opens with John & Yoko’s seasonal non-album single Happy Xmas (War Is Over).  It’s a simple sing-along, which is exactly what you need for an effective Christmas carol.  Since we have a number of John’s duets with his wife on this playlist, it’s only fair that we include one of the only duets between Paul and his betrothed, I Am Your Singer.  Linda only got a handful of lead vocals during the run of Wings (the pseudonymously released Seaside Woman, and the album cut Cook Of The House). Paul has written more tunes for Ringo to sing than he did for Linda.  While Linda is not a great singer, her voice isn’t quite the acquired taste that Yoko’s is, so this is nice pleasant little track and matches Happy Xmas well even if it doesn’t have the seasonal trappings.

With its gentle acoustic backing and toggling back-and-forth between major and minor chords, Deep Blue is a nice continuation of the good-natured feel of the first two track while hinting at darker things to come.  Ringo’s second rock’n’roll single feels much more like a solo composition than It Don’t Come Easy.  Since Ringo is a drummer, it is only fitting that Starr pen a tune with the drums as up-front and center as Back Off Boogaloo.  The song came to Ringo in his sleep and is either a tribute to Marc Bolan or a swipe at Paul McCartney.  This is the song that Ringo has returned to more than any other having re-recorded versions of it for both 1981’s Stop And Smell The Roses and 2017’s Give More Love.  It definitely warrants it.  It’s a great song.

We conclude the album with an instrumental jam medley.  Ideally these next few tracks will all be edited together and cross-faded into each other.  Not only did John and George release whole bonus discs of this type of material, but Paul even opened his first Wings album with something similar.  A lot of people knock Wild Life for opening with the tossed-off Mumbo followed by the trite throwaway Bip-Bop, but for my money, these are two of the best tracks on that record.  From Mumbo we use George’s fifty second birthday greeting to John to segue into Scumbag, one of the only tracks to have the same title on Some Time In New York City as Playground Psychotics.  It is also one of the more straightforward and tuneful tracks on the Live Jam disc.  Mumbo Link is then used as a link to the next song.  Much like the inclusion of The Lovely Linda and My Mummy’s Dead violated the “four songs apiece” rule; I don’t really think of these two interconnecting passages as songs really unto themselves.  The whole jam medley wraps up with Plug Me In.  I selected this Apple Jam track (credited to Eric Clapton, Jim Gordon, Dave Mason, Carl Radle, Bobby Whitlock, and George Harrison) not because it stick out from the rest of them, but because it was easily the shortest of the four. This is a tough period of the Beatles to enjoy or romanticize.  While The Beatles sixties career was pretty much flawless, this is the first time any of them ever really fell on their faces.  And to have all of them (except Ringo) to fail at the same time is kind of heart-breaking.  Still, it shows that by this period in their respective careers, none of them were that concerned with the effect on album could have on the reputations and at least felt secure enough to try really venturing out of their wheelhouses into uncharted territory here.  For those who don’t care for this kind of thing, don’t worry.  The next round will all be a retreat to their strengths on a lot of levels.