Saturday, May 27, 2006

Seaside Woman by Suzy and the Red Stripes


If you have never heard of this group from the late 70's it is not surprising. While the song was released between 1977 and 1978 it was not a hit and Epic pulled the record early on. At least in America. You see the group is really Paul McCartney and Wings. I had heard a that Linda had written the song and Paul wanted to record it with her singing lead. Capitol refused to record the song so Paul called the group Suzy (Linda) and the Red Stripes (Wings) and they signed with Epic under that name. The name Red Stripes is from one of Paul and Linda's favorite drinks. They must have thought the name change would be enough to avoid contract entanglements. Paul should have known better. They didn't really hide the fact it was really Paul and Linda very well. If you click on the picture of the 45 you can see that the songwriter is credited as McCartney and it is produced by Paul McCartney. Plus the MPL logo is on the record. Paul is very good at changing his voice as he has done so on many Beatles and Wings songs and even done some animation voice overs. For some reason he doesn't change it while singing background on this song and his familer voice sticks out like a sore thumb. Capitol di threaten to sue if what is really a Wings song was not pulled from the market. Since Wings was under contract to Capitol and Epic didn't think they could win a suit by saying they signed them as the Red Stripes they pulled the record from stores. While the song was not selling well at the time it was still early after the release and may have become a hit if not pulled. Now it is just a footnote in Paul McCartney's long career. The flip side to the song took a humorus tone with the title as it was called the B-Side to Seaside. Posted by Picasa

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